Sri Sri Ravi Shankar on the Bhagawad Gita

Terrorists are cowards. Whenever terror has struck in any part of the world, we have heard people say it is an act of cowardice. A coward runs away from action but harbours all negative feelings and does it surreptitiously.

This is exactly what happened to Arjuna. Arjuna was angry, upset, sad and wanted to run away. In the Bhagawad Gita, Lord Krishna said not to be a coward. So, it is an antidote to terrorism. Shri Krishna said bravery is the way – face the war when it is inevitable and do your duty.

A terrorist is stuck in his identity – he hides it, has no rationale and inflicts pain. Whereas Bhagawad Gita helps one to transcend one’s identity, encourages reason and infuses wisdom. In this sense, it could be called the antidote to terrorism.

The duty of a policeman, a soldier or a king is to be impartial for the sake of the nation, whether it is their mentors or relatives. Terrorists are never impartial. A soldier is brave and a terrorist is a coward. A soldier is protecting and preventing violence and a terrorist is inflicting pain and suffering. The Bhagawad Gita is the scripture of bravery in both realms of physical and metaphysical.

Terrorism is deeply steeped in hatred. An act without hatred is what Gita propounds. The Gita epitomizes the correct action – of righteousness, of upliftment of spirit and an action or duty that ought to be performed even in the most compelling situation.

In the last 5149 years of the existence of the Gita, there is no evidence of someone becoming a terrorist after reading it. In fact, Mahatma Gandhi wrote commentaries on the Bhagawad Gita and it was an inspiration for his non-violent movement. The Bhagawad Gita is a unique scripture which caters to the entire range of human evolution, comprising every level of this vast existence.

Gita stands for poise and equanimity and for performing one’s designated duty. Krishna does not encourage everyone to take the weapons and fight but a soldier cannot sell bananas in the market. He has to take his weapon to bring security to his people. If Bhagawad Gita is a terrorist scripture then all military academies in the world are nothing but terrorist organizations. Doesn’t this sound strange? Would the courts ban Lenin, Marx and Mao Tso-Tung, who to stay in power inflicted terror on millions?

A terrorist or a coward hides and inflicts pain on others whereas a soldier sacrifices his own life to bring security and peace to people. They both may take the gun but their intentions are poles apart.

Gita encourages reasoning and dialogue while terrorists are blind to any reasoning and are closed to any form of dialogue.

Interestingly, in any military training all over the world, the soldiers are asked to see the enemies as dangerous objects which need to be eliminated. The psychology behind indoctrination of such an idea is that when they think the enemy is a human being the soldiers are unable to raise their arms. There are many such survival tactics where the army men are desensitized.

A similar situation happened to Arjuna. Lord Krishna went step by step to deal with Arjuna’s emotions, ego, mindsets and concepts. He finally touched on the nature of his spiritual being; revealing him the highest knowledge and making him realize his eternal nature. This brought him enormous strength and then propelled him to perform his worldly duties. A doctor cannot be taken as a dacoit just because he opens up the stomach of the patient.

Krishna says, no sin begets him whose intellect is unattached and free from cravings and aversions, even if he kills the whole world. Now, the condition of an intellect free from cravings and aversions itself counters terrorism. Terrorism is done when the intellect is deeply attached and is hateful. The metaphors and the high standards of humanism exhibited in the Gita are unparalleled.

Jesus had said, “I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I came to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and a man’s enemies will be the members of his household.” In the Quran, there are many verses which talk about striking terror in the hearts of the infidels and cutting off their fingers. By these standards if you still call Gita a terrorist scripture then you have to precede such statements by Bible and Quran.

The fact is that it is not the scriptures that inflict terrorism; it is the mis-interpretation of an ignorant and stressed mind which justifies their actions quoting scriptures.

By Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

This article is to cater to the common man. This piece was written in December 2011, in the midst of a Russian court case against the Bhagawad Gita. The case ended with the Russian court rejecting the ban.

The Adjustment Bureau: Does God Change Our Minds, or Do We Change God’s? ~ Cathleen Falsani (updated)

Cathleen Falsani
Religion Columnist aka “God Girl”

It goes by many names: Kismet. Adrsta. Predestination. Determinism. Destiny. “God’s will.”

The ancient Greeks dubbed it “Moirae” and gave it personality — Fate. Or, rather, “The Fates,” three female supernatural beings who spun, pulled and cut the literal threads of life that controlled when a person was born, what they did with their life and when and how they
died.

In an intriguing new film that explores themes of fate, destiny, divine and human (free) will, that same idea is called “The Adjustment Bureau” — an otherworldly bureaucratic organization controlled by an unseen entity (or, perhaps, deity) known as “the Chairman.”

A cadre of caseworkers in fedoras and dark suits — a cross between G-men, IRS agents and guardian angels — carry out the Chairman’s will by making sure we humans don’t stray off course. They track our movements and decisions on a kind of heavenly GPS device and make small “adjustments” to our decision-making processes.

The idea is to keep us on a predetermined track — on a course we know nothing about and can do nothing to change.

In “The Adjustment Bureau,” God’s G-men carry out their duties on the periphery of the natural world where the curtain separating the here from there is as sheer as gossamer. They’re around us all the time, everywhere, watching and, occasionally, tinkering as needed.

The clandestine machinations of the Adjustment Bureau are revealed to David Norris (Matt Damon) a young, rising political star running for U.S. Senate in New York. On the eve of his first unsuccessful bid for the Senate, Norris has a chance encounter in the men’s room of the Waldorf Astoria with a beautiful ballet dancer, Elise Sellas (Emily Blunt), who is hiding from hotel security after crashing a wedding reception upstairs.

Their attraction is immediate and powerful. Emily is charming, whimsical and passionate. David is enchanted and transformed by her honesty. They kiss — instant soul mates — and then Elise makes a Cinderella-esque exit without ever giving David her name.

That encounter was part of David’s fate, we learn, but it was “fated” to just be a one-time thing. They were not “supposed” to meet again, ever. But when they do meet again on a city bus, David strays from his preordained course. That’s when the Adjustment Bureau’s agents
intervene.

The curtain is pulled all the way back when David walks in on Bureau agents “adjusting” his business partner in the conference room of their venture capital firm. He tries to run, but the Bureau minions capture him. In an empty warehouse, Bureau honcho Richardson (John Slattery of “Mad Men”) explains to David what they’re up to and then warns him not to tell a soul, unless he wants his brain to be rebooted (i.e. erased) at the Chairman’s behest. He is not to see Elise again. It’s not part of the plan.

But the heart wants what it wants, and David begins searching for Elise. After three years, he finds her on the street, and their bond is cemented a bit more than with just a kiss.

A romantic comedy wrapped in a science-fiction thriller with ample chase scenes and intrigue, “The Adjustment Bureau” traces David’s attempts to alter his destiny, a move that will, he’s warned, have significant consequences for the fate of his ladylove and the rest of the world.

The film poses a question that is left open-ended when the credits roll: Is it possible to change our fate?

The Chairman — i.e., God — has written the stories of our lives and the Big Story of the world. God knows how the story begins and ends. But is that story set in stone? If God is all-powerful and all-knowing, is there anything that happens in our lives that isn’t part of God’s
will and design?

Are human beings, created with a free will, capable of changing God’s mind? And if we are, what does that say about the nature of the Divine?

It’s a question theologians have wrestled with throughout the ages, without ever finding a true consensus. It’s no wonder that the filmmakers appear unable — or unwilling — to provide a clear answer to such a spiritual/existential conundrum.

In the film, David appears to change his fate first by chance and then through his own volition.

His story changes. The Chairman does a rewrite. Or does he?

In a universe ordered by such an Almighty, perhaps there is no such thing as chance.

With the Chairman holding the eternal pen, what passes for serendipity might just be kismet in a clever disguise