8. pantranaya sadhunam
vinasaya ca dukrtam
dharmasamsthdpanarthaya
saimbhavami yuge yuge
(8) For the protection of the good, for the destruction of the wicked and for the establishment of righteousness, I come into being from age to age.
It is the function of God as Visnu, the protector of the world, to keep the world going on lines of righteousness. He assumes birth to re-establish right when wrong prevails.
9. janma karma ca me divyam
evam yo vetti tattvatah
tyaktva deham punezrjanma
nail 'ti mama Ceti so 'Arjuna
(9) He who knows thus in its true nature My divine birth and works, is not born again, when he leaves his body but comes to Me, 0 Arjuna.
Krsna as an avatar or descent of the Divine into the human world discloses the condition of being to which the human souls should rise. The birth of the mirthless means the revelation of the mystery in the soul of man.
The avatar fulfils a number of functions in the cosmic process. The conception makes out that there is no opposition between spiritual life and life in the world. If the world is imperfect and ruled by the flesh and the devil, it is our duty to redeem it for the spirit. The avatar points out the way by which men can rise from their animal to a spiritual mode of existence by providing us with an example of spiritual life. The Divine nature is not seen in the incarnation in its naked splendour but is mediated by the instrumentality of manhood. The Divine greatness is conveyed to us in and through these great individuals. Their lives dramatize for us the essential constituents of human life ascending to the fulfilment of its destiny.
