Sunday, April 12, 2020

Bhagwad Gita - Post 198


Having declared about the great qualities of a human being, now, the Lord proceeds to list down qualities of those who are exactly opposite to the men having the great qualities, as explained in the 3 earlier verses.


Verse 4


  
Hypocrisy, arrogance, self-conceit, harshness and also anger and ignorance, belong to one who is born in a demoniacal state, O Arjuna!


Dambha is putting on a show—making a show of that which is really not there. 

Dambha is a show of something which is not there, that is, Hypocrisy.

Hypocrisy is, certainly, one of the cheapest poses assumed by the vicious. To them, all their superficial glow of goodness and purity, of religiosity and sincerity are but attractive hoods to cover their deadly motives and ugly intentions.

These are men who are not endowed with Trikarana Shuddhi.

They think something, speak something else and act in a totally different way.


Darpa is pride over something which is already there. So, either way there is some show. The only difference is that in one case there is nothing and in the other case there is something, but it is a big demonstration, adumbration and advertisement of one’s great importance. 

It is difficult to sometimes understand, which one of these qualities come first in such beings. 

They exhibit hypocrisy because they have pride or the inner pride makes them Hypocrites?

Abhimāna is being intensely self-conscious, always thinking of oneself, always looking in the mirror, being fond of oneself, and imagining that all people are thinking of us only, while nobody is thinking of us. 

This arises out of the basic ignorance, Avidya, ignorance about one’s true nature as SELF.

Man forgets he is divine, so, it must follow that he is a human being with a body, with a mind, with an intellect.

Whatever he thinks himself to be, it is but natural that he is conscious about that identity and goes out of way to nurture and cherish that identity. 

Krodha is anger. Lord has given the qualities in such a manner that one obviously leads to the other.

When  a self-conceited, arrogant, hypocrite, conscious and thinking always about one’s physical identity, one’s own preferences, likes, dislikes etc., when he  looks at the world around him and whenever he finds that the world's estimate of him is different from his own estimate of himself, he revolts within and hence his wrath (Krodha) at everything around him.

Pāruyam is cruelty, a cruel nature. We feel very happy at the suffering of other people. Even if we do not actually commit an act of cruelty, we would like it to be committed by somebody else. Or if we ourselves do it, it is still better. 

Needless to say, it is the combination of all earlier qualities that makes a man cruel by nature. 

Anger follows from conscious about one’s physical identity or ego, when the society or a part of society does not accept our nature.

And, to those who do not accept us the way we have understood ourselves to be, cruelty crops in. We tend to inflict cruel acts directly on those who condemn our ego, our nature or, if that is not possible, we show our cruelty to some other beings who have to helplessly accept our cruel nature. If they do not get human beings, they go the extent of being cruel even to the horses/cows etc. which they maintain at their place. 

Ajñāna means ignorance, which is the basis of all topsy-turvy perception of things and wrong evaluation of the world—a lack of spiritual knowledge. 

He knows not himself, that he is ignorant of the scheme of the world around him, and consequently, he is blind to the right relationship that he should maintain with the world around him. 

This ignorance of oneself and one's relationship with the things and beings around is the secret cause that generally forces one to revolt against the environments and act quixotically.

These are qualities of human beings who behave like demons, a pain-giver, killer, exploiter and destroyer. The good qualities and the undivine qualities are, therefore, characterizations of human beings. 

Love.



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