Essays on the Gita -Aurobindo 472

Essays on the Gita -Sri Aurobindo Second Series : PART-2 : Chapter 20 Swabhava and Swadharma All action on the normal level is determined by the gunas; the action which is to be done, kartavyam karma, takes the triple form of giving, askesis and sacrifice, and any or all of these three may assume the character of any of the gunas. Therefore we have to proceed by the raising of these things to the highest sattwic height of which they are capable and go yet farther beyond to a largeness in which all works become a free self-giving, an energy of the divine Tapas, a perpetual sacrament of the spiritual existence. But this is a general law and all these considerations have been the enunciation of quite general principles and refer indiscriminately to all actions and to all men alike. All can eventually arrive by spiritual evolution to this strong discipline, this large perfection, this highest spiritual state. But while the general rule of mind and action is the same for all men, we see too that there is a constant law of variation and each individual acts not only according to the common laws of the human spirit, mind, will, life, but according to his own nature; each man fulfils different functions or follows a different bent according to the rule of his own circumstances, capacities, turn, character, powers. What place is to be assigned to this variation, this individual rule of nature in the spiritual discipline? The Gita has laid some stress on this point and even as- signed to it a great preliminary importance. At the very start it has spoken of the nature, rule and function of the Kshatriya as Arjuna’s own law of action, svadharma; it has proceeded to lay it down with a striking emphasis that one’s own nature, rule, function should be observed and followed, — even if defective, it is better than the well-performed rule of another’s nature.