Recitation of Chapter 12 of Bhagavad Geeta
The audio recording is Hymon Johnson reciting Chapter 12 of the Bhagavad Geeta by heart in his puja room on Thursday, August 3, 2017. Hymon lives in Southern California and has been a Sai devotee and SSSIO member for many years including seven years as ISSE-USA Director. He recounts two incidents which lead him to memorise Chapter 12 of the Geeta.
“I was given a copy of a New Zealand edition of the Bhagavad Geeta in which the following quote appears:
This translation of the glorious and all-important Chapter 12 (on bhakthi yoga) comes from Bhagawan Baba Himself. About this chapter, Dr. John Hislop wrote: 'Swami gave the translation in 1984 in one of His Discourses. He told us in that discourse that we should memorise the twelfth chapter of the Bhagavad Geeta, paying careful attention to what is said, and put these slokas (verses) into use in daily life.'
"The second incident came about when he was given a small, yet very potent pamphlet, written by Professor N. Kasturi’s daughter, which described a true devotee.
"To my small surprise, it focused largely on what was expressed in Chapter 12. At the time I naturally believed I was completely unable to embody the characteristics described, yet was later encouraged as I re-read Lord Krishna’s reassuring words regarding our innate capacity to cross the sea of life – with His grace and our own one-pointed, relentless and persistent effort. After more endearing dreams of Sai, including one in which He affirmed that I was indeed His devotee, and another in which He and Jesus merged into one form, I finally decided the time had come to memorise Chapter 12.”
Chapter 12: Bhakti Yoga, The Path of Devotion
Geeta is the Messenger of God.
Geeta is the Universal Mother.
Geeta is the means for man to cross the ocean of life.
Geeta is the support for all spiritual endeavor.
- Arjuna asked: My Lord, of those who love thee as the Lord of Love, and those who seek thee as a Nameless, Formless Reality, which way leads sure and swift, Love or Knowledge?
- Lord Sri Krishna replied: “For those who set their hearts on Me, and worship Me with faultless devotion and faith, the way of Love leads sure and swift to Me.
- Those who seek the Transcendental Reality, Unmanifested, without name and form, beyond the reach of feeling and thought;
- With their senses subdued and mind serene, and striving for the good of all beings, they too will verily come to Me.
- Yet, hazardous and slow is the path to the Unrevealed, difficult for physical man to tread.
- But they for whom I am the Goal Supreme, who do all work renouncing self to Me, and meditate on Me with single-hearted devotion;
- These will I swiftly rescue from the cycle of birth and death to fullness of Eternal Life in Me.
- Still thy mind in Me; still thyself in Me; and without doubt thou shall be united with Me, Lord of Love, dwelling in thy heart.
- If thou canst not still thy mind, then learn thou to do so with the practice of meditation.
- If thou lackest the will for such self-discipline, engage thyself in selfless service to all around thee, for selfless service can lead thee at last to Me.
- If unable to do even this, surrender thyself to Me in Love, receiving success and failure with equal calmness, as granted by Me.
- Better indeed is Knowledge than mechanical practice. Better still is meditation. But better than meditation is surrender in Love, for there follows immediate Peace.
- That one I Love who is incapable of hatred, and who returns love for hatred. Living beyond the reach of ‘i’ and ‘mine,’ and of pleasure and pain;
- Contented, self-controlled, firm in faith, with all his mind and all his heart given to Me, such a one is dear to Me.
- Not agitating the world, nor agitated by it; he stands above the sway of elation, competition and fear; accepting life, good and bad, as it comes.
- He is pure, efficient, detached, ready to meet every demand I place upon him, as a humble instrument of My work.
- He is dear to Me who runs not after the pleasant, or away from the painful; grieves not over the past; lusts not today; but lets things come and go as they happen.
- Who serves both friend and foe with equal love, not buoyed up by praise, or cast down by blame; alike in heat and cold, pleasure and pain, free of selfish attachment and self-will, in harmony everywhere, firm in faith- such a one is dear to Me.
- But dearest to Me are those who seek Me in Love and Faith, as Life’s Eternal Goal. They go beyond death to Immortality.”
Thus ends the twelfth chapter entitled Bhakti Yoga, in the dialogue between Sri Krishna and Arjuna, on the science of Yoga (Yogasastra), as a part of the Knowledge of the Brahman (Brahmavidya), in the Upanishad called the Bhagavad Geeta.