Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Troll_Bait]

Unless you're new to these boards, you've probably read Rteacher writing about his religion, which traces itself back to the Bhagavad Gita text.
There's a website called sacret-texts.com where you can read almost any kind of scripture.
The The Bhagavad Gita is part of Book 6 of the Mahabharata.
Here's Book 6 of the Mahabharata.

http://www.sacred-texts.com/hin/m06/index.htm

And here's the Bhagavad Gita.

http://www.sacred-texts.com/hin/gita/

Now we can check it out for ourselves, and Rteacher can stop telling us about it*.



* I'd also like a million bucks, but hey, we can all hope, can't we?



P.S. Rteacher, could you tell us where in the Gita God beats up the ass demon?



Edit:

This looks interesting.

[manlyboy]

Stop deidreaming and Gita life, Bodhi!

[hubba bubba]

uh, vampires??? ass demons??

Care to comment Rteacher?

[arjuna]

Is Rteacher on vacation?

Anyway, since I am Arjuna, I might as well throw in my 2 cents.

The Mahabharata is a kickass epic, much grander in scale and length than The Iliad or The Odyssey. I, Arjuna, am one of the main characters, and the Bhagavad Gita is a pep talk by Krishna to me before the Kurukshetra battle in which I had to kill my own cousins and some of my dearest teachers.

The only complete translation of the Mahabharata into English is by Kisari Mohan Ganguli. The four volume set is not readily available anywhere--you have to search for it.

Peter Brook dramatized the Mahabharata some years ago, and now it's on DVD. It's worth a look.

[merlot]

[/url]

[Rteacher]

There are well over 600 editions of Bhagavad-gita that have been translated to English, and none of them had the spiritual potency to make any western devotees of Krishna. When Bhagavad-gita As It Is by A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada appeared, however, many thousands of devotees of Krishna were made by its pure presentation of Krishna's original teachings.

It's essential to receive knowledge originally given by a perfect source (Krishna or God) from a realized soul with no material motivation to adulterate it in any way. Such a pure devotee of Krishna should also be linked to Krishna via one of the four authorized chains of disciplic successions (sampradayas...) that go back at least 5000 years to when Krishna was personally present on this planet...

Such a pure devotee's mission is perfected if he makes at least one pure devotee disciple to continue the disciplic succession...

Many academic scholars, poets, and politicians with their own careers, philosophies and agendas to push have used Bhagavad-gita as a convenient vehicle to advance their own interests, and their materialistic renditions have practically no spiritual value. Purity of purpose - which they lack - is the real force ...

There are several bona-fide online editions of the Gita available (including audio versions...)

The most comprehensive edition is from the Bhaktivedanta VedaBase. One can click on the chapters to get all the translations contained within, then click on each verse to get the transliteration and purport for each verse. One can further click on each word to reference how it's used and when it appears in other verses... http://www.krishna.com/gitaframeset/gita_frameset.html

Another version favored by some (who want the original version sans editing done by devotees the last thirty years since Bhaktivedanta Swami's passing away) is found here: http://www.asitis.com/

[Troll_Bait]

[arjuna]

Swami Nikhilananda's translation is good, too:


The Bhagavad Gita
Chapter 2

Krishna speaks to Arjuna

2
The Lord said: In this crisis, O Arjuna,
whence comes this lowness of spirit,
unbecoming of an Aryan, dishonourable,
and an obstacle to the attaining of heaven?

3
Do not yield to unmanliness, O son of Pritha.
It does not become you.
Shake off this base faint-heartedness and arise,
O scorcher of enemies!

31
Considering, also, your own dharma,
you should not waver;
for to a kshatriya nothing is better than a righteous war.

32
Happy indeed are the kshatriyas, O Partha,
to whom comes such a war,
offering itself unsought,
opening the gate to heaven.

33
But if you refuse to wage this righteous war,
then, renouncing your own dharma and honour,
you will certainly incur sin.

37
If you are killed in the battle, you will go to heaven;
if you win, you will enjoy the earth.
Therefore arise, O son of Kunti, resolved to fight.

38
Regarding alike pleasure and pain,
gain and loss, success and defeat,
prepare yourself for battle.
Thus you will incur no sin.

[arjuna]

K & A, two cool dudes:

[Rteacher]

That painting was done by a member of the Hare Krishna movement, of course (much of their artwork has be more-or-less stolen by Indian art-sellers...)

(And Protestants - more-or-less -basically threw the baby out with the bathwater...)

The reason that it's necessary to hear the book from the current authorized link in the disciplic succession is because the original message needs to be adjusted somewhat over a great span of time and different cultural circumstances in order to convey the intended meaning...

The translation and commentary should be rendered by a pure devotee who faithfully presents what he heard from his spiritual master in one of the disciplic chains that originates with Krishna.

Otherwise, material motivation (and contamination) inevitably enters into it...

Philosophers use it as a vehicle to put forth their own philosophies to make a name for themselves. Even a relatively saintly politician like Gandhi put out a version of the Gita which blatantly altered the original meaning to fit his own political philosophy. Academic scholars with no devotion can only produce dry (often speculative) work, naturally bereft of spiritual potency...

[josesiem]

I love the Gita, but I didn't get it from a "pure source." I think the reason the Hare Krishnas became so popular is their fundamentalist position/interpretation. Fundamentalism always gets more converts -- just look at protestant Christianity, Islam, etc. which are the fastest growing religions today.

You need a strong message --- "This is the truth and the only truth. If you don't believe it, then you will________" Essentially, the Krishna movement has this kind of reasoning. "We have the pure, right way -- others, well, they're simply deluded."

Before the Hare Krishna movement there was no charismatic figure who presented the Gita to westerners in this way. That's why there were no devotees.

[duns0014]

Rteacher: you're allowed one period per sentence, no more.

[Rteacher]

The ... sometimes indicate that my mind is wandering off ...

At other times, it indicates that there is more to be said (or was said) but I'm leaving it out (and the reader is left to ponder the void ... )

Most previous English translations of Bhagavad-gita were contaminated with impersonalist ideas (eg: When Krishna plainly says "surrender unto Me", impersonalist commentators like Dr. Radhakrishna don't accept the clear, direct meaning of surrendering to the Supreme Person Krishna. Rather, they interpret it as meaning that one should surrender to the "unborn" formless spirit within Krishna.

In the personalist conception, there is no difference between the body and the soul (and the transcendental names) of the Absolute Person.