Bhagavad Gita
The Bhagavad Gita has remained an influential text throughout the last two thousand years because of its diverse range of applicability. While the application of the text varies, the major theme remains unchanged: a spiritual transformation takes place through the knowledge and understanding of Krishna’s true being. The Gita presents this transformation through the strife of Arjuna as he completes his divine duty. How to achieve this transformation and what this transformation entails are truly matters of ultimate concern. The prize of this transformation is ultimate being in the eternal consciousness of Krishna. Certain examples in the text provide information into the cognitive and metaphysical elements needed to achieve such a higher state.
Understanding this spiritual change is difficult because the spirit is not a readily definable quality of a person. Modern day thinkers associate the qualities that define the essence of a person as deriving from the brain. But Krishna’s order to relinquish one’s body (and with it the brain) to achieve this higher state muddles the modern sense of where the brain ends and the spirit begins. A rhetorical rollercoaster is needed to identify the relationship between the two. In book 8, Krishna describes what constitutes the conditions of this post-mortem transformation. “Whatever he remembers / when he abandons the body at death, / he enters, Arjuna, / always existing in that being.” (Bhagavad Gita, translated by Barbara Stoler Miller, page 78, Book 8, Line 6) Krishna used this to show how men who follow transient gods at the point of death meet transient ends, but those who follow Krishna at the point of death always exist in Krishna’s eternal spirit. The way this transformation occurs is the most interesting part of the passage, and often the most overlooked. “Whatever he remembers,” is essential in defining the relationship between the brain and the spirit. Remembering is defined as ideas recalled to mind, kept in mind, or recurrence of memory in one’s mind. The mind is defined as the elements, parts, substance, or process that thinks, feels, wills, perceives, or judges. The minds processes all originate in the brain. This passage states that if a brain were to focus on Krishna at the point of bodily death, then Krishna would be the eternal destination of that spirit. This is a revelation in the relationship between the brain and the spirit. The processes of the brain ultimately determine the transformation of the spirit after death.
This revelation places a great importance on the brain as its ability to change the mindset and mental processes are necessary in preparing the soul for eternal unity in Krishna’s will. One must “see your form/ in all your majesty,” (Bhagavad Gita, page 97, book 11, line 3) to understand Krishna’s being as he describes it. Understanding Krishna is to acknowledge Krishna as the embodiment of everything. Everything is then acknowledged as a manifestation of a small fraction of Krishna’s spirit. To actualize this one must personify all things perceived as one of the many faces of Krishna’s true being. Sanjaya describes Arjuna’s insight as “… a multiform, wondrous vision, / with countless mouths and eyes/ and celestial ornaments,” (Bhagavad Gita, page 98, book 11, line 10) The face imagery is important because facial recognition is critical in the mind’s understanding of the persona behind the face, which is the pursuit of this spiritual transformation. If we are to truly understand the importance of the face and the dynamics of this perception change in literal terms we must look to the brain. Science allows us to identify which parts of the brain perform these processes. The recognition of faces is perceived in the area of the brain called the fusiform gyrus.
Information on the fusiform gyrus has been found through work with autistic patients. In people with autism the fusiform gyrus does not function properly. This malfunction causes the face to be perceived instead by the part of the brain which recognizes objects. But seeing the face as an object does not directly lead to perceiving the persona behind the face. As with autism, without the proper use of the fusiform gyrus a problem exists between differentiating an artificial face, such as a statue or cartoon, and a real face. The distinctive elements of the face are recognized as features and individual objects, but not understood for what is there: a personal human spirit. This explains the supreme importance of facial recognition in Arjuna’s immaculate vision of Krishna’s ultimate being.
By truly seeing Krishna’s faces in everything that exists, Arjuna can understand the persona that these faces represent. In book 11, Krishna says, “But you cannot see me/ with your own eye; / I will give you a divine eye to see/ the majesty of my discipline.” (Bhagavad Gita, page 98, book 11, line 8) This passage highlights the change in perception to achieve divine insight. Krishna lends Arjuna a divine eye by which to perceive the entirety of Krishna’s presence. With this eye Arjuna can discover the personal nature of each face in the unmanifest and manifest reality of Krishna.
Arjuna before the application of the divine eye was suffering spiritual autism. He could not perceive objects with his persona recognition part of his brain, but after receiving the eye he appreciated all objects as facets of Krishna’s persona with the facial recognition portion of his brain. Carrying on the autism allusion, Eric Hollander, the director of the compulsive, impulsive, and autism spectrum disorders program at the Montefiore Medical Center in New York, mentions autism’s equivalent to Krishna’s divine eye, “In patients with autism, the fusiform gyrus doesn't seem to light up in response to human faces... But we seem to get more recruitment of the fusiform gyrus when we administer oxytocin.”[1]
The introduction of oxytocin healed the defective perception of autistic patients to see meaning behind the otherwise meaningless expressions shown on the face. These two external initiations of perception change illicit intense consideration on the application of medicine in changing the brain chemistry to reach a more enlightened state. If a spiritual change is dependent upon the actions of the brain then the changes implemented on that brain are determining factors in spiritual transformation. Krishna’s divine intervention brought about a mental change in Arjuna that was essential in his understanding of Krishna. But what would Krishna say about medicinal intervention to cause this necessary mental change?
There are textual indications that such medical advancements would not be condoned in pursuit of ultimate knowledge of Krishna. The main tenet of Krishna’s teaching is to give up attachments. Taking medicine to reach enlightenment would create a necessary and prolonged attachment, whose fruits would be desired if lost. Krishna’s enlightened man “Does not dislike light, / or activity or delusion; / when they cease to exist, / he does not desire them.” (Bhagavad Gita, page 124, book 14, line 22) Devotion and sacrifice are two mainstays to Krishna’s teachings and are not easily disregarded. This is because sacrificing all desire leads to the changeless state which embodies the eternal spirit of Krishna. “Absolute joy beyond the senses/ can only be grasped by understanding; / when one knows it, he abides there/ and never wanders from this reality.” (Bhagavad Gita, page 65, book 6, line 21) This refutes continuous medicinal use to reach enlightenment because enlightenment is a place one can never leave.
However, Arjuna does not lack conviction in his duty after relinquishing the eye. His perception has been altered and his understanding remains devout to what he has seen after the removal of the eye. Krishna’s divine eye does not cause dependence and its fruits are not relinquished when removed. Krishna’s understanding of attachment pertains to worldly things. But, like Krishna’s divine intervention, our mental manipulation would provide spiritual fruits, not bodily fruits. In this sense medicine is a spiritual tool and not a worldly one. The administration of medicine would occur only to prepare our minds for death.
Krishna mentions spiritual tools as prescribed action in the final chapter, “Renunciation of prescribed action/ is inappropriate; / relinquished in delusion, / it becomes a way of dark inertia.” (Bhagavad Gita, page 144, book 18, line 7) If you can understand Krishna through spiritual tools, sacrificing those tools is wrong and leads to ignorance and failure. In book 15, Krishna describes himself as one who “Nurtures all healing herbs.” (Bhagavad Gita, page 130, book 15, line 13) The afflictions of the mind are nurtured into divine sight with the help of healing agents, which are agents of Krishna’s divine will. ”Memory, knowledge, / and reason come from me; / I am the object to be known.” (Bhagavad Gita, page 130, book 15, line 15) Processes of the brain come from Krishna and focusing the brain on Krishna is disciplined. Therefore, it would be irresponsible to relinquish such divine help. The unrelenting sacrificial values previously pronounced are now known for their dark inertia. Sacrificing the fruit of actions is right, unless “undertaken in delusion, / without concern for consequences,” (Bhagavad Gita, page 146, book 18, line 25) in which case it leads to dark inertia. That is why Krishna does not condone renouncing prescribed action.
The Bhagavad Gita is often maligned for its contradictions. How can one relinquish all the fruits of actions and not care for consequences? This is a misunderstanding in the dynamic between the physical attributes of the person and the ethereal qualities of the soul. Those who become attached to the physical and sensational world around them fall short of enlightenment. By relinquishing our attachments to our bodies we transcend spiritually into Krishna’s consciousness. But when all we know of the spirit is contingent upon the brain, relinquishing our true cognition of Krishna is foolish and darkly inert. Understanding Krishna is needed to attain enlightenment and sacrificing what is needed to see Krishna to please Krishna’s will is a distorted view of dharma. If all we perceive of Krishna originates in the brain, then manipulating our brains to decipher the true nature of Krishna is a disciplined act which may lead to an unchanging existence beyond death, for by
“Knowing nature and the spirit of man,
As well as the qualities of nature,
One is not born again—
No matter how one exists.”
(Bhagavad Gita, page 124, book 14, line 23)
[1] Mary Carmichael, Newsweek Magazine, The ‘Bonding Hormone’ That Might Cure Autism (2010), retrieved from http://www.newsweek.com/2010/02/25/the-bonding-hormone-that-might-cure-autism.html
