5 - Hinduism / Brahminism

The deity said, you have grieved for those who deserve no grief. … Learned men grieve not for the living nor the dead.  Never did I not exist, nor you, nor these rulers of men; nor will any one of us ever hereafter cease to be.  As in this body, in fancy and youth and old age come to the embodied self so does the acquisition of another body; a sensible man is not deceived about that.  The contacts of the senses, O son of [Arjuna]! which produce cold and heat, pleasure and pain, are not permanent, they are ever coming and going.  Bear them…that sensible man whom they [pain and pleasure being alike to him] afflict not, he merits immortality.  There is no existence for that which is unreal; there is no non-existence for that which is real.  And the correct conclusion about both is perceived the truth.  Know that to be indestructible which pervades all. … He who thinks it to be the killer and he who thinks it to be killed, both know nothing.  It kills not, is not killed.  It is born, nor does it ever die, nor, having existed, does it exists no more. … As a man, casting off old clothes, puts on others and new ones, so the embodied self casting off old bodies, goes to others and new ones. … It is everlasting, all pervading, stable, firm, and eternal.   It is said to be unperceived, to be unthinkable, to be unchangeable.   

Therefore knowing it to be such, you ought not to grieve.  But even if you think that it is constantly born, and constantly dies, still, O you of mighty arms!  You ought not to grieve thus.  For to one that is born, death is certain; and to one that dies birth is certain. … This embodied self, O descendant of Bharata!  Within every one’s body is ever indestructible.  Therefore you ought not to grieve for any being.  Having regard to your own duty also, you ought not to falter for there is nothing better for a Kshatriya than a righteous battle.  Happy those Kshatriyas, O son of Pritha!  Who can find such a battle…an open door to Heaven!  But if you will not fight this righteous battle, then you will have abandoned you own duty...and will incur sin.  … Your business is with action alone; not by any means with fruit.  Let not the fruit of action be your motive to action.  Let not your attachment be fixed on inaction.  Having recourse to devotion…perform action, casting off all attachment, and being equable in success or ill-success; such equability is called devotion. … The wise who have obtained devotion cast off the fruit of action, and released from the shackles of repeated births, repair to that seat where there is no unhappiness. … The man who, casting off all desires, lives free from attachments, who is free from egoism, and from the feeling that this or that is mine, obtains tranquility.  This, O son of Pritha! is the Brahmic state; attaining to this, one is never deluded; and remaining in it one’s last moments, one attains the Brahmic bliss. …

I have passed through many births, O Arjuna, and you also.  I know them all, but you, O terror of your foes, do not know them. … Whensoever, O descendant of Bharata, piety languishes, and impiety is ascendant, I create myself.  I am born age after age, for the protection of the good, for the destruction of evil-doers, and the establishment of piety. … The fourfold division of castes [classes] was created by me according to the appointment and qualities and duties. … The duties of Brahmins, Kshatriyas, and Vaisyas, and of Sudras, too.  [You] are distinguished according to the qualities born of nature.  Tranquility, restraint of the senses, penance, purity, forgiveness, straightforwardness, also knowledge, experience, and belief in a future world, this is the natural duty of Brahmins.  Valor, glory, courage, dexterity, not slinking away from battle, gifts, exercises of lordly power, this is the natural duty of Kshatriyas.  Agriculture, tending cattle, trade, this is the natural duty of Vaisyas.  And the natural duty of Sudras, too, consists in service.  Every man intent on his own respective duties obtains perfection.  Listen, now, how one intent on one’s duty obtains perfection.  Worshiping, by the performance of his own duty, him from who all things proceed, and by whom all this is permeated, a man obtains perfection.  One’s duty, though defective, is better than another’s duty well performed.  Performing the duty prescribed by nature, one does not incur sin.  O son of [Arjuna]! one should not abandon a natural duty though tainted with evil; for all actions are enveloped by evil, as fire by smoke.