[Prev][Next][Index][Thread]
Re : Arjuna
> Dear Friends:
>
> This should be a hot topic. Last week, in our study group, this question
> came up. What kind of person was Arjuna spiritually ? Was he a yogi, a
> jnAni, a muni, a pandita or a mudha?
>
> He was a great warrior, capable of great concentration and heroic feats,
> but he seems to be simply a mudha in spiritual matters. I cite just one
> example from the chapter 11; after he has seen the vishvarupa, he
> says," Oh God, you are so big! I had no idea, I called you mistakenly
> my friend, pardon me!". That does not sit well with a Self-realized
> person, or does it?. What do you think?
>
This is what I believe-
When Arjuna was once eating his supper at night, a breeze blew the lamp out.
But he still went on eating. This made him realise that since his hand
knew where his mouth was, he need not "aim" for his mouth. The mouth was
a part of his being...
So he practised archery in the dark. How did he know where the target was?
He could sense it's presence in the dark (that's what the Mahabharata says).
In a great following of Buddhism called Zen Buddhism in Japan, it is
believed that perfection in archery comes in two levels. In the first level,
the archer simply understands that there is something called a target and
that he must "aim" for it. This is the intellectual level where there
is a clear distinction between the archer, aim and the target. The superior
level is when the archer, "aim" and the target become one and there is really
no distinction between the subject(archer), verb(aiming) and the
object(target). This is a kind of "being", very different from "becoming".
This level of being is considered to be just short of the "Buddha" being,
when the subject, verb and object are transcended altogether.
I believe that Arjuna had reached that superior level of archery, when he
could kinda "make" the target part of his being. He was "almost" an
enlightened person, and this was why Krishna imparted the supreme knowledge
to him.
> With best regards,
>
> Dhruba.
>
regards,
Kartik
