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Quotes On The Greatness And Importance Of Bhagavad Gita

A small collection of quotes by world renowned authors and thinkers on the greatness and importance of the Bhagavad Gita.

Henry David Thoreau on Bhagavad Gita

In the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous and cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagavad Gita, in comparison with which our modern world and its literature seem puny and trivial.

The reader is nowhere raised into and sustained in a bigger, purer, or rarer region of thought than in the Bhagavad Gita. The Gita's sanity and sublimity' have impressed the minds even of soldiers and merchants.




Sri Aurobindo on the Bhagavad Gita
The Gita is not a weapon for dialectical warfare; it is a gate opening on the whole world of spiritual truth and experience and the view it gives us embraces all the provinces of that supreme region. It maps out, but it does not cut up or build walls or hedges to confine our vision.

Bhagavad Gita – Solutions for the Problems of the Human Mind

It is in a mental civilization that we live today – and so the fundamental problem of our age is indeed the Problem of the Mind. How is the mind to be freed from tensions and conflicts which seem to have increased with the growth of mental capacities?

How is the human mind to come to terms with the two Wills – the Cosmic Will and the Individual Will? These are the most pressing problems of the day.

It is in the background of these problems that the modern man can evaluate truly the message of the Gita. For, the Gita deals with the Problems of the Human Mind – with the reconciliation between the Will of Man and the Will of the Cosmos.

The Bhagavad Gita is a dialogue between Sri Krishna and Arjuna. And does not Sri Krishna represent the Cosmic Will and Arjuna the Individual Will? It is with the conflict between these two Wills that the Gita is primarily concerned.

And at the end of the dialogue we see the perfect reconciliation, the absolute merging of the Two Wills.

(Source: From Mind to Super Mind, A commentary on the Bhagavad Gita by Rohit Mehta)

Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan Quotes on Bhagavad Gita

Though everything else is taken away from him, though he has to walk the streets, cold, hungry and alone, though he may know no human being into whose eyes he can look and find understanding, he shall yet be able to go his way with a smile on his lips, for he has gained inward freedom. (Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan on Verse 38 Chapter 2 of Bhagavad Gita )

(The verse is – Treating pleasure and pain, gain and loss, victory and defeat alike, engage yourself in your duty. By doing your duty this way you will not incur sin. (2.38)

Mahatma Gandhi on the Bhagavad Gita

When doubts haunt me, when disappointments stare me in the face, and I see not one ray of hope on the horizon, I turn to Bhagavad Gita and find a verse to comfort me; and I immediately begin to smile in the midst of overwhelming sorrow. Those who meditate on the Gita will derive fresh joy and new meanings from it every day.

Carl Jung on the Bhagavad Gita

The idea that man is like unto an inverted tree seems to have been current in by gone ages. The link with Vedic conceptions is provided by Plato in his Timaeus – “behold we are not an earthly but a heavenly plant." This correlation can be discerned by what Krishna expresses in chapter 15 of Bhagavad Gita.

Carl Gustav Jung - One of the founding fathers of modern depth psychology. Carl Jung's most famous concept, the collective unconscious, has had a deep influence on psychology and also on philosophy and the arts.

Sri Chinmoy Quotes – The Bhagavad Gita

The Gita teaches us the purest oneness. This oneness is the inner oneness. This inner oneness is at once spontaneous and unique. This oneness can never be truncated or dwarfed by the mind. The realm of oneness is far beyond the approach of the physical mind.

Self-knowledge is the knowledge of universal oneness. Divine perfection can be founded only on the fertile soil of universal oneness. Serve humanity precisely because Divinity looms large in humanity. Know Divinity and you will in no time realize God's Immortality in you and you're Immortality in God. God in man and man in God can only announce the truest embodiments of perfect Perfection.

Sri Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati on Bhagavad Gita

On perusal of the first chapter of Bhagavad Gita one may think that they are advised to engage in warfare.

When the second chapter has been read it can be clearly understood that knowledge and the soul is the ultimate goal to be attained.

On studying the third chapter it is apparent that acts of righteousness are also of high priority.
If we continue and patiently take the time to complete the Bhagavad Gita and try to ascertain the truth of its closing chapter we can see that the ultimate conclusion is to relinquish all the conceptualized ideas of religion which we possess and fully surrender directly unto the Supreme Lord.

Swami Mitrananda on the Bhagavad Gita

Lord Krishna's teaching accommodates diverse levels of learners – from the most elementary to the most philosophical or the most profound. While the Lord explains to Arjuna the sacred secret that is the greatest and ultimate knowledge (Raja Vidhya), He points out that despite it being inaccessible and difficult, it is still directly attainable (provided it is understood clearly) to those who are keen to gain access to it through meditation. The desire to understand has to be matched with the determination to be engaged in regular study and reflection.

The mysterious and impenetrable nature of Truth and the limitations of the human intellect together make its comprehension difficult. Human intellect at best is able to get only glimpses of Truth and, failing to grasp its entirety, remains prejudiced.

In this context, Arjuna exemplifies the ideal disciple, for he is willing to listen patiently, and remains unbiased. The Lord reinforces that only with tremendous faith in the teaching can one make the intuitive leap to comprehend the Truth. Accessing this knowledge is possible by personal experience when direct acquaintance with the truth validates it. For, knowledge that remained as mere information combines with immediate experience to penetrate reality to grasp the profound nature of things. This esoteric and hidden knowledge is the only means by which a soul can get liberated. It is totally aligned with the path of Dharma, promises harmonious existence and release from misery, and remains imperishable.

Mataji Vanamali on Philosophy and Psychology in Bhagavad Gita

Is it fair to say that Sri Krishna is the father of the fields of Transpersonal and Cognitive Psychology?

It would be a lot fairer to say that Sri Krishna is the master of all fields of psychology. His answer to Arjuna's question is one which is a solution to the universal problem of unhappiness and unfulfillment. All psychology tries to solve this type of problem whatever be the name they call it.
Transpersonal psychology tries to make the person go beyond the self and discover their greater potential. Jung was a pioneer in this field. Certainly this is the first method advocated by Lord Krishna. He told Arjuna to delve into the million dollar question,
’Who am I.’ He goes further to explain to him that the outer personality which we are all familiar with is not our real Self. This is only the small self which is totally conditioned by the environment and education etc. However there is a higher self in all of us which is the Person beyond the personality and this is our true Self and this is what we have to discover if we want abiding happiness.

Cognitive psychology helps people to discover what went wrong in their thinking and helps them to rectify these thinking patterns. In the very first chapter itself Arjuna starts his arguments based on very wrong thinking patterns. He is only seeing a partial view of the problem from his biased and individual view point. ‘I don't like to fight and perhaps kill by teacher and grand sire’. This is no doubt a very legitimate view, you might say but the fact is that Krishna is trying to take him to see a higher view point. It is like an old time general who stations himself on top of a hillock in order to have an overall view of the battle. He is thus able to gauge what should be done where and when and keeps sending messages to the soldiers and captains which might not be understandable to them from their limited stand point on the field. Thus one might say that Krishna is also the father of cognitive psychology.

All Hindu philosophy deals with transpersonal and cognitive psychology. All types of yoga encourage the individual to go beyond his personality and discover the Person underlying it which is the true core of his being. So long as we float on the surface of the ocean (our superficial personality) we are sure to be buffeted by the waves. It is only when we dive into the depths that we can come into contact with ‘the Person’ who ever abides in the peace and quiet of the ocean bed. Having understood the Person we can come up to the surface and play with the waves and we will not be harmed by them but until we find this for ourselves we are not capable of dealing with the waves!