September 1, 2026
THE MONTH OF SEPTEMBER
The great Indologist, Dr. Heinrich Zimmer, pays an eloquent tribute to The Bhagavad Gītā: “The Bhagavad Gītā has become the most popular, widely memorised, authoritative statement of the basic guiding principles of Indian religious life” and says, “It was in the great paradoxes of the epoch-making Bhagavad Gītā that the non- Brahmanical, pre-Aryan thought of aboriginal India became fruitfully combined and harmonised with the Vedic ideas of the Aryan invaders. In the eighteen brief chapters was displayed a kaleidoscopic inter-working of the two traditions that for some ten centuries had been contending for the control and mastery of the Indian mind”. Krishna’s genius was synthesis. The one continuous basic note in the whole scripture is the bold declaration of the truth that this synthesis is the inevitable consequence of the realisation that the reality (God) alone exists, and even the apparent diversity and distinctions have to be resolved in him.
Even in the practice of yoga, though each may choose that path to which his temperament qualifies him, Krishna asks us to synthesise the different approaches into one sādhana. Devotion, service, meditative communion and intuitive realisation are all necessary for each one of us. We should love God alone at all times but that does not mean we love God and hate all. We learn to love God in all. In order not to cheat ourselves, we should remember that all of us love one another because of his omnipresence – God-love – and ensure that there is no personal attachment.
Place God in yourself. Feel he is in every part of you. He fills you now. Place yourself in God; feel you are part of him. God is all around you now – in all, as all. Now he is all-in- all – omnipresent. You do not confine him to yourself. And, you do not push him out either! Wisdom and synthesis at every turn. By a series of paradoxes, Krishna leads us to his lotus feet.
arjuna uvāca
evaṁ satatayuktā ye bhaktās tvāṁ paryupāsate
ye cā ’py akṣaram avyaktaṁ teṣāṁ ke yogavittamāḥ
śrībhagavān uvāca (XII-1)
mayy āveśya mano ye māṁ nityayuktā upāsate
śraddhayā parayo ’petās te me yuktatamā matāḥ (XII-2)
XII/1. Arjuna said: Those devotees who, ever steadfast thus worship thee and those also who worship the imperishable and the unmanifested – which of them are better versed in yoga?
XII/2.The blessed Lord said: Those who, fixing their mind on me, worship me, ever steadfast and endowed with supreme faith, these are the best in yoga in my opinion.
Swamiji's Commentary
Indian and other schools of thought differ about the right attitude. Some say: God should be approached as nameless and formless – to give him form is false and heretical. Others hold that God can only be approached through his manifestations. Even J. Louis Orton in his book “Hypnotism Made Practical”, asks “What do we know except through manifestation?” The danger in this method is that the image of the manifestation may be contaminated by us transferring our own worldly defects, innate in our family, possessions and environment, to the image itself. Thus, instead of helping us to overcome our egoism, this method may subtly feed it. Much can be said for and against both points of view.
Krishna has his own method of dealing with a controversy! He asserts the truth, but has no dogma – our goal is to realise “I am God”, and we can reach it only if we turn away from ‘dogma’ (the word when reversed reads ‘am-god’!). Therefore, he repeats what he had said at the conclusion of the previous chapter: “Whatever be your approach to me,remember that one-pointedness, steadfastness, and faith are essential, and you must merge yourself in me”. (cf XII:5).