BG23

Today 43^rd sloka was taken up from the Sri Vedantha Desika sannidi near the Sri SoudaraRaja Perumal temple. This is an old sannidi and here Sri Lakshmi Narasimha, Sri Lakshmi Hayagreeva and Swami Sri Desika are all present to grace the devotees. Sri Desika has made a detailed commentary on Gita, called Tatparya Chandrika, which is based on Sri Ramanuja’s Gita Bhashyam. Sri Lakshmi Narasimha is present here with Lion head and Human body. This is an unusual mix of beast and man. The Lord has descended on this earth as beasts such as Fish, Boar etc. and also in human forms such as Sri Rama and Sri Krishna. But in Sri Narasimha avatar only He appears as a mixture. Anyone who had worshipped this mixture will find this more tasteful similar to the case where a person who daily drinks milk alone, finds mixture of milk and sugar more tasteful and makes it a habit to drink milk with sugar. We can also have a darshan of Swami Sri Desika, Sri Hayagreeva and Sri Anjaneya. There is also a sannidi of Sri Sudarsana on one side and Sri [Yoga] Narasimha on the other side. There is a relation between the Sri Lakshmi Narasimha image and the 43^rd sloka we are to see. Sri Narasimha is the impossible mixture of Beast and Human forms. In this sloka Arjuna pleads for avoiding the mix up of Kula. The 43^rd sloka is:

dosair etaih kula-ghnanam
varna-sankara-karakaih
utsadyante jati-dharmah
kula-dharmas ca sasvatah

“He who destroys a Kula or dynasty suffers from a dosha or curse of mixing up of varnam and jathi or caste. Everyone has a family traditional duty to be performed and all these will perish.” Here it is not to say about the [present] caste systems but about the family dharma or good deeds one has to practice. Sri Krishna is happy if everyone clings to one’s family dharma. Arjuna is afraid that all these will perish and he will be surrounded by sins. Sri Krishna Himself had taken so much of efforts in preserving a family. [After the war] when Duryodana was slained, Aswattama, the son of Drona is very angry and he directs Apandava [no pandava] missile to kill all the progenies of the Pandava family. At that time Arjuna’s wife Draupathi and Abimanyu’s wife Uththara surrender to Sri Krishna to protect the child in the womb of Uththara. Sri Krishna protects the child with His Sri Sudarsana chakra or discus and later Parikshit was born and the family was continued. So when Sri Krishna Himself is so careful to preserve a family, Arjuna does not want to destroy a Kula and incur the fault of perishing of Kula and jathi dharma.

All the castes have emanated from the God and it is not one is superior or inferior to another. Every organ of the same body has distinct functions but it cannot be said one organ is superior to other. Just like all the fingers of one’s hand are different in size and have different functions and at the same time all are equal in functioning of the hand as a whole. Differentiation is inevitable but discrimination should not be there. All should be considered equal without at the same time not forgetting one’s work in the society. The traditional dharma should not be allowed to perish. But Arjuna fears this will happen if the Kula is destroyed. In Ramayana also Sri Sita asks Sri Rama in the Dandakaranya forests as to why He is determined to kill the Rakshasas or demons. She reminds Him of a story She heard when she was in Mithila, before marriage. Here lived a sage who was very pious and was meditating. A king known to the sage, wanted the sage to look after a sword of the king for some days as the king had to go somewhere. The sage agreed and after the king departed the sage’s concentration was disturbed and he thought it would be better to keep it with him so that it did not get stolen. This finally made the sage to handle the sword and he started killing various animals etc. Similarly Sri Sita wanted to know whether Sri Rama would drop the bow and avoid killing the demons. Sri Rama replied that He may forsake Sri Sita or Lakshmana but will never forsake the pratigya or the promise He had made to the Sages in the forest, that He will protect them by killing the demons; because He considered keeping up promise was His [Ikshwaku] Kula dharma. So it is important to preserve one’s Kula dharma and Arjuna is doubtful that by destroying a family there is the possibility of mixing of varnams, which will stop Kula dharma.