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Chapter 6
kaccinnobhayavibhrastaichinnabhramiva nasyati
apratistho mahabaho vimudho brahmanah pathi
O mighty-armed, the deluded and fallen in the path of God, without any hold, upon the world does he not perish like a broken cloud, deprived of both God-realization and worldly enjoyment? 38
Comment:-
[Arjuna seeks clarification, about the fate of a striver who has failed to attain perfection in Yoga.]
Apratistho mahabaho vimudho brahmanah pathi:—He renounces the desire, for worldly pleasures, honour and praise etc., and follows a spiritual discipline. But, he is not able to realize God, and at the time of death deviates, from Yoga viz., does not think of God.
Kaccinnobhayavibhrastaichinnabbramiva nafyati:—Does he not perish like a broken cloud, deprived of both God-realization and worldly enjoyments? A split cloud does not descend on earth as rain, is separated from the main body and cannot join the other parts. Thus it is shattered. In similar the fate of a striver who renounces his dependence on the world, but at the same time fails to realize God? Does he meet with damnation?
Here, the illustration of a cloud is not quite apt, because a part of a cloud and the main body of clouds and the part to which it was going to rejoin—all the three belong to the same class, they are matter. But in the case of a striver, the world is matter (insentient), while he himself and God, are sentient. Thus they do not belong, to the same category.
In this verse, Arjuna means to say, that the soul being a fragment of God, is imperishable. If it has the aim to attain heaven, it might have gone to heaven or hell or the other lower births of beasts and birds, but still would have remained in the world. What is the fate of a striver, who has renounced dependence on the world with the aim of attaining God, but could not realize the same and at the time of death, could not think of God?
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