Bhagavad Gita Chapter 10: Divine Glories

The two armies stood where they had stood since sunrise, drawn up rank upon rank, waiting. Between them the single chariot rested with its white horses still, and in it the greatest archer of the age listened to his charioteer as a student listens to a teacher he has only just begun to understand.

"Listen again, mighty-armed one," said Krishna. "Listen to my highest word, which I speak to you for your good, because you are dear to me and your heart delights in it.

"Neither the hosts of the gods nor the great sages know my origin. There is no one among them who can point to the place I came from, for I am the beginning of the gods and of the great sages alike. They arose in me. How then should the stream tell the tale of its own spring?

"He who knows me as unborn and without beginning, as the great Lord of the worlds, he alone among mortals is undeluded, and he is freed from every sin."

Arjuna did not answer. The wind moved along the plain and stirred the banners of the waiting kings, and the sound of it was the only sound.

"Intelligence and knowledge," Krishna went on, "freedom from delusion, patience, truth, self-restraint and calm, pleasure and pain, birth and death, fear and fearlessness, harmlessness, evenness of mind, contentment, austerity, charity, fame and disgrace - all the varied conditions of living beings arise from me alone. The seven great sages, the four who came before them, and the Manus from whom these peoples of the earth are descended, all were born of my mind and sprang from me.

"He who knows in truth this glory and this power of mine is joined to me by unshakable yoga. Of this there is no doubt."

"I am the source of all," said Krishna, and his voice did not rise, though the words were larger than the field they were spoken on. "From me all things proceed. Knowing this, the wise worship me with hearts overflowing.

"Their thought is fixed on me, their very life is surrendered to me. They kindle one another, and they speak of me always among themselves, and in that speaking they are content and they are glad. To those who are constantly devoted, who worship me with love, I give the yoga of understanding, buddhi yoga, by which they come to me.

"Out of compassion for them, dwelling within their own hearts, I destroy the darkness born of ignorance with the shining lamp of knowledge."

Arjuna heard the last words as a man hears water in a dry country. He let the reins of his own thoughts fall, and he spoke.

"You are the supreme Brahman," he said, "the supreme abode, the supreme purifier. You are the eternal divine Person, the first of the gods, unborn and everywhere present. So the sages have called you, Narada and Asita, Devala and Vyasa, and now you yourself tell me so.

"All that you say to me I hold to be true, Krishna. Neither the gods nor the demons know your manifestation. Only you know yourself, by yourself, O supreme Person, source of beings, Lord of beings, God of gods, ruler of the world.

"So tell me, and leave nothing out, of those divine glories of yours, those vibhutis by which you pervade these worlds and abide in them. How may I know you, Lord of yoga, if I meditate on you always? In what forms and in what things am I to think of you? Tell me again, and in full, of your power and your glory, for I have not had my fill of hearing you. Your words are nectar, and I cannot drink enough."

"So be it," said Krishna. "I shall tell you of my divine glories, but only the chief of them, best of the Kurus, for to my extent there is no end.

"I am the Self seated in the heart of every being. I am the beginning and the middle of beings, and their end as well.

"Among the Adityas I am Vishnu. Among lights I am the radiant sun. Among the winds I am Marichi, and among the stars of night I am the moon.

"Of the Vedas I am the Sama Veda, the one that is sung. Among the gods I am Indra. Of the senses I am the mind, and in living beings I am consciousness itself.

"Among the Rudras I am Shankara. Among the yakshas and rakshasas I am the lord of wealth. Among the Vasus I am fire, and of mountains I am Meru.

"Know me, Partha, as Brihaspati, the chief among household priests. Among warlords I am Skanda, and of bodies of water I am the ocean.

"Among the great sages I am Bhrigu. Of words I am the one imperishable syllable, Om. Of offerings I am the offering of quiet repetition, and of things that do not move I am the Himalaya.

"Of all trees I am the ashvattha, the sacred fig. Among the divine seers I am Narada. Among the perfected ones I am Kapila the sage.

"Among horses know me as the one that rose from the churning of the nectar, and among elephants the white elephant of Indra. Among men I am the king.

"Of weapons I am the thunderbolt, and among cows the cow of plenty. I am the god of love who begets, and among serpents I am Vasuki.

"Among the Nagas I am the endless one, and among water dwellers I am Varuna. Among the ancestors I am Aryaman, and among those who keep the law I am Yama.

"Among the Daityas I am Prahlada the devoted, and among reckoners I am Time. Among beasts I am the lion, and among birds the son of Vinata who carries me."

Krishna did not pause, and the catalog went on like a river naming its own tributaries.

"Of purifiers I am the wind. Among those who bear arms I am Rama. Among fishes I am the crocodile, and of flowing rivers I am the Ganga.

"Of creations I am the beginning, the middle, and the end. Of all knowledge I am the knowledge of the Self, and of those who argue I am the argument that seeks the truth.

"Of letters I am the letter A, the first sound the mouth can make. Of compounds I am the one that binds two things as equals. I am imperishable Time. I am the ordainer whose face is turned in every direction.

"I am death that carries all away, and I am the birth of all that is yet to be. Among the qualities that are named as feminine I am fame and fortune, speech and memory, wisdom, steadfastness and forgiveness.

"Of the chants I am the great chant, and of meters the Gayatri. Of months I am Margashirsha, when the harvest is in, and of seasons I am the flower-bearing spring.

"I am the gambling of the cunning. I am the splendor of the splendid. I am victory, I am resolve, I am the goodness of the good.

"Among the Vrishnis I am Vasudeva, and of the Pandavas," said Krishna, and here he turned his head, "I am Arjuna. Among sages I am Vyasa, and among poets I am Ushanas the wise."

Arjuna felt the words strike him and pass through him. He had been named among the glories of God, and it did not swell him. It emptied him. For a moment the field, the banners, the numberless faces of his kinsmen, all of it seemed the furniture of a house he had wandered into by accident, and only the voice beside him was real.

"I am the rod that chastises," Krishna said, "and the statecraft of those who seek to win. Of things kept hidden I am silence, and of the wise I am the wisdom."

"Whatever is the seed of all beings, Arjuna, that also am I. There is nothing that moves or stands still that could exist without me.

"There is no end to my divine glories. What I have declared to you is a mere indication of the extent of them, one handful lifted from an ocean that has no farther shore.

"Whatever being there is that is glorious, or prosperous, or mighty, know with certainty that it has sprung from a spark of my splendor. The strength of the strong, the beauty of the beautiful, the sweetness of every song that ever moved you, each is a single ember carried out from one fire.

"But what need have you, Arjuna, of all this manifold knowledge?" Krishna's voice grew quiet, and the last words fell into the waiting morning like a stone into still water. "I stand supporting this entire universe with a single fragment of myself."

Arjuna stood in the chariot and said nothing. Behind him the seven divisions of his brothers' army waited with drawn bows. Before him the eleven divisions of Duryodhana waited likewise, and the sun climbed, and the horses shifted in their traces.

He had known this man for a lifetime. He had eaten beside him, hunted with him, slept in the same forest camps and quarrelled with him over trifles. He had called him cousin and friend, and had thought that in the calling he had said something true.

Now he understood that every glory he had ever admired in the world - the height of the mountain, the roar of the sea, the first syllable of the Veda, the fierce spring flowering of the plains, and yes, the skill of his own hands upon the Gandiva - had been one voice speaking in many tongues, and that the voice had been sitting an arm's length from him, holding his reins.

Knowing a thing and seeing it are not the same. Arjuna's heart, which had already been broken open by grief that morning, opened once more, and into that opening came a desire he did not yet know how to speak.