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Bhagavad Gita Is Understood Differently By Every Reader

It is commonly believed that the Bhagavad Gita contains the essence of the Upanishads and it is true that in the Gita we get the best exposition of spiritual life.

The Gita is understood differently by every reader of the text, according to one’s own capacity and needs—adhikara. The spiritual benefit of the study of the Gita also depends upon everyone understanding it in one’s own light, for it is only then that she or he will be able to perform her or his svadharma, duty, properly.

All the available commentaries of acharyas help to understand the text from various angles of vision and they give us an opportunity to choose for ourselves what we think best according to our own adhikara.

The Gita deals with spiritual life in all its aspects and each person is invited to take up any of the prescriptions as would suit her or his particular disease. The Gita is called yoga shastra indicating it to be the science of spiritual life in all its aspects. The Gita represents a synthesis of all spiritual practices helpful in perfecting the human personality in its entirety as seen in a person of spiritual realization, wherein the intellect, emotion, and will are the various ways in which one’s mind works and jnana, bhakti, and karma—dharma—represent the perfect working of the mind in all its aspects. An aspirant is expected to aspire to attain this synthetic perfection through whatever sadhana one might predominantly follow according to adhikara.

Source – Excerpts from article titled ‘The Essence of the Bhagavad Gita and its Significance by Swami Tyagishananda.’ Prabuddha Bharata March 2017 – Page 15 - 16