honr 101: bhagavad gita

svadharma

social duty

kshatriya

warrior caste

atman

eternal self or soul

brahman

eternal infinite substance of the universe

maya

illusion, veil

samsara

cycle of birth and death

moksha

liberation from samsara

buddhi

unity of brahman and atman

jnana-yoga

pursuit of knowledge of the sameness of atman and brahman, taken to its extreme by the sanyasi

sanyasin

renunciate monk, jnana-yoga practitioner, focused on study, ascetic

karma-yoga

yoga of unattached action and performance of dharma

yogi/yogin

non-renunciate, karma-yoga practitioner, performs pranayama (breath control), non-ascetic

bhakti-yoga

yoga of devotion, worship, love of the divine—ultimately the best one

two conceptions of the universe in the bhagavad gita

• vedanta monistic: atman = brahman

• samkhya dualistc: prakrti = nature (the three gunas) animated by the force of purusha
  

author

vyasa (meaning complier or arranger)

arjuna’s reason for hesitating

killing one’s kin is morally wrong, especially over a battle motivated by greed

krishna’s four counterarguments

• he can’t actually kill them — their atman is one with brahman

• they’ll reincarnate anyways as part of samsara

• it’s his dharma as a part of the kshatriya caste

• would look really bad if he backed out now

prakrti

forces of nature that make up the world

purusha

eternal creative force

three gunas

• sattva = source of potential consciousness, lightness, joy, pleasure

• rajas = source of activity, pain, dynamism, passion, stimulating, unstable

• tamas = source of resistance to activity, restrictive obscurity, heaviness, inertia, indifference or delusion

four kinds of karma

• from previous lives

• in process / “bearing fruits” in th epresent

• future, as informed by present actions

• immediate, as generated by present actions

om

sonic representation of the divine, brahman as sound, the primordial vibration of the universe

three parts of brahmanic infinity

• manifest world = material world, samsara, prakrti

• unmanifest world = potential manifest, non-material (but on the cusp), metaphorical soil of the material world, purusha

• unmanifest eternal state = non-differentiated, brahman, pure potential

ex. the source of life → universal idea/potential for a horse to exist → a real horse

three gods represented in “aum”

• brahma = creator

• vishnu = preserver

• shiva = destroyer