Bhagavad Gita Commentary–Twenty-eight
by Swami Nirmalananda Giri
Freedom From Karma
Do you remember the television ad that asked: “Why trade a headache for an upset stomach?”? Many people trade fear of sin and hell for fear of bad karma and bad karmic consequences. That is a perfect example of Jesus’ statement that “no man putteth new wine into old bottles; else the new wine will burst the bottles, and be spilled, and the bottles shall perish. But new wine must be put into new bottles; and both are preserved.” It is pointless to adopt new ideas while retaining the old attitudes that were consistent with or shaped by the old rejected ideas. The inconsistency will have a negative, even a disruptive, effect. As Jesus said before the passage just cited: “No man putteth a piece of a new garment upon an old; if otherwise, then both the new maketh a rent, and the piece that was taken out of the new agreeth not with the old.” Putting a new top layer over the old leads to the ruin of both. This is why the majority of Westerners who think they have adopted Hinduism or Buddhism have really only created their personal simulations of those religions. For they have only changed or rearranged their intellectual furniture; everything else remains the same. In fact, under pressure the old ideas emerge as entrenched as ever. For example, those who for years have professed belief in karma immediately wail: “Why did this happen to me?” when something unpleasant occurs. After 9/11 a multitude of American book-Hindus began demanding why it took place, many of them suggesting far-fetched reasons; but not one of them said the k-word. As Sri Ramakrishna observed, you can teach a parrot to call out: “Radha-Krishna! Radha-Krishna!” but when you pull its tail it only squawks. It is a simple matter to jump from Western religion to Western religion, but to BECOME a Hindu or a Buddhist is a matter of profound transformation, having little to do with mere ideas.
That is what I have to say: now we should listen to what Krishna tells us about freedom from karma. (Let us not forget that good karma is as binding as bad karma.)
Right action
“If a man keeps following my teaching with faith in his heart, and does not make mental reservations, he will be released from the bondage of his karma.” Karma need not be “worked out” or “worked through.” As Krishna says later on: “His act falls from him, its chain is broken.”
This is one of the most important verses in the Gita, for it tells us how to attain moksha (liberation) in the simplest possible way. (I said, simple; not easy.) If the Gita is diligently studied daily by the serious sadhaka and followed with faith and without any reservation (“fudging”) whatsoever, “he will be released from the bondage of his karma.” A knowledge of the Gita and a living out of its precepts are a guarantee of liberation. Nothing more is needed. It may seem too simple, but why not try it out?
On the other hand…
“But those who scorn my teaching, and do not follow it, are lost. They are without spiritual discrimination. All their knowledge is a delusion.”
There is not much need to comment on this verse. Those who in their ignorance disregard or even despise the principles set forth in the Gita are hopeless. Everything they think they “know” is an illusion. Life itself proves the truth of this.
Read the Bhagavad Gita online: The English text of the Gita posted on this Web Site is arranged according to the meter of the original Sanskrit text so it can be sung–as it is done every morning in our ashram and in most of the ashrams of India.
1) Luke 5:37, 38
[Go back]
2) Luke 5:36 [Go back]
3) Bhagavad Gita 3:31 [Go back]
4) Bhagavad Gita 4:19 [Go back]
5) Bhagavad Gita 3:32 [Go back]
