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Chapter 11
VISION OF THE COSMIC FORM OF GOD
55. Arjuna’s Eagerness To Behold The Cosmic Form Of God.
3. This vast creation is but one aspect of the Lord. Another aspect is that of time. If we consider the past, our knowledge of history goes back at most to ten thousand years. Of the future, we know nothing. Span of known history is ten thousand years, and our own lifespan is of hardly hundred years! Time is, in fact, without beginning and without end. It is impossible to count the time that has passed into the past. It is equally impossible to have any idea of the time that is yet to come. Just as our world is insignificant compared to the universe, the ten thousand years of known history are insignificant compared to the infinite time. The past is without a beginning and the future is without an end. As for the infinitesimal present, it is slipping into the past every moment. Even as we try to point out a finger at its presence, it has already passed into the past. This fleeting present is all that is with us. I am speaking now, but the moment I utter a word, it becomes a part of the past. The stream of time is flowing continuously. We know neither its beginning nor its end. What comes to our view is just a tiny portion of that stream in the middle. 4. Thus, when we look at creation we find a vast expanse of space on one hand, and on the other there is flow of time that has neither beginning nor end. It then becomes clear that howsoever much we stretch our imagination, we can never see the limits of it. In Arjuna’s mind arises a desire to have a vision of the Lord in His omnipresent and all-pervading form, the form that fills all the three-dimensional space and all the three-dimensional time. He wants to see Him all at once, at the same moment. This Chapter has its genesis in that desire. 5. Arjuna was very dear to the Lord; so dear that, in the Tenth Chapter, while mentioning different manifestations in which He is to be contemplated, the Lord has said, “Among the Pandavas, contemplate Me in the form of Arjuna.” Can love ever be more crazy? This is the height of madness in love. The Lord’s Love for Arjuna knew no bounds. The Eleventh Chapter is the blessed gift of that Love. The Lord endowed Arjuna with the divine vision and fulfilled his desire to see His cosmic form.
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