Documente Academic
Documente Profesional
Documente Cultură
John Kennedy
The Bhagavad Gita, a beloved and widely influential Hindu scripture, presents a
revelatory vision that calls for a response. The vision is one of impermanence and the
inevitability of death; the ultimate ruin of all we create and strive for. The called for response is
to detach oneself from the fruits of action, and instead to focus attention on conducting oneself
with integrity and discipline. This is karma (action) yoga (discipline). The vision is also one of a
world in which all things are thoroughly and equally suffused with the presence of the divine.
The right response is to devote oneself lovingly to God, both in spiritual discipline as well as
engaged action in the world - bhakti (devotion) yoga. These two visions, and the responses they
call forth, are ultimately shown to be two sides of the same coin. They also have great potential
to ground an ecological consciousness and ethic that could be especially fruitful in our current
planetary moment.
In the opening chapters of the Bhagavad Gita we meet our protagonist Arjuna, an archer
and warrior, preparing to go into battle against an opposing army. Accompanied by the Lord
Krishna, his guide and charioteer who also happens to be God, Arjuna sinks into despair as he
recognizes the army lined up against him as his own family members and friends. Faced with
this intolerable situation he makes his dejection known to Krishna, saying it would be better to
be killed himself than to destroy his own kin at the height of their power, while their goals were
still desires. (Bhagavad Gita 2.5) Krishna offers his counsel, teaching Arjuna of the
impermanence of all phenomena and the inevitability of death: Death is certain for anyone born,
and birth is certain for the dead; since the cycle is inevitable, you have no cause to grieve! (Gita
2.27). Since all things are passing away and fleeting, Krishna exhorts Arjuna to let go of
attachment to pleasure and pain (2.14), to transcend identification with the ephemeral sorrows
and joys of life and to endure fleeting things for they come and go! (2.14).
objects (2.62), in this case his cherished friends and family. Furthermore, Krishna identifies
all (10.34). In this view of things, all of life come from the hand of God, even death, and so
attachment to anything in form is rendered futile and bound to end in suffering. This can seem
like a cold and unsympathetic philosophy on its face, but this is only part of the revelation; like
the Hebrew prophet Isaiah who needed a burning coal to be placed on his tongue by angels
before he could behold the vision of God (Isaiah 6:6-8), and like Christ who first had to undergo
the crucifixion before being raised to new and unending life (Luke 9:22), desolation often and
However, even here on the other side of hope we can find a useful critique of the
consumer culture that has fueled and continues to sustain the unfettered capitalism that has so
ravaged our planet. The dung of the devil, as Pope Francis has called it, with its endless-
growth paradigm and unquenchable fire that burns through the earths limited resources as if they
were as bottomless as human greed, is at the root of the environmental crisis. In 1973s The
Denial of Death, cultural anthropologist Ernest Becker posited that human civilization is an
elaborate defense mechanism that guards against the terror of dying. This is achieved,
imperfectly but powerfully, by focusing our attention and efforts on cultivating our symbolic self,
in contrast to the finite and mortal physical self. The symbolic self can live on in legacy and
memory, and it is where, according to Becker, we place our hopes for transcending death and
achieving immortality. 1
Our consumer culture, and the advertising machine that drives it, is of course all about
the maintenance and aggrandizement of the symbolic self. Symbolic complexes, or brands, are
the psychically charged drivers of consumerism, and we tend to locate our identity within them.
It is the reason why I bought NyQuil instead of the store-brand generic that was a little less
expensive when I last had a cold. It is why everything that James Bond wears, drives, or
consumes in a movie, from watches to cars to liquor, tends to immediately sell out. Thomas
Merton, Trappist monk and pioneer of East-West religious dialogue, wrote that we would rather
buy a bad toothpaste that is well advertised than a good one that is not advertised at all. Most
Americans wouldnt be seen dead in a car their neighbors had never heard of.2 We are taught
that we can become more through the acquisition of more, and yet more never seems to be
enough; the goal post is perpetually moved forward and, for the wise, is eventually discovered to
be a desert mirage. Satisfaction and joy is not found in possessions or acquisition because as
soon as we lay claim to something we begin to lose it. Nothing lasts, everything changes, but
rather than confront this reality we are, like clockwork, ferried along to the next momentarily
distracting and fleetingly satisfying purchase by the next alluring advertisement. The Gita
confronts us with the inevitability of death that this cultural machinery systematically denies on
our behalf, taking an ax to root of the unsustainable ways of life that have given rise to the
climate crisis. The great irony is that by denying and repressing the necessary and inevitable
1 Ernest Becker, The Denial of Death (New York: The Free Press, 1973)
2 Thomas Merton, No Man Is an Island, (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1955), 193.
suffering and death in our own lives, we create unnecessary suffering and death for others and on
As alluded to earlier, Krishna calls Arjuna to respond to this reality of ultimate defeat
in the form of death by cultivating an attitude of detachment from ones karmic actions. This
detachment is not, however, a retreat from action and engagement in the world. Instead,
detachment from ones karmic actions means detachment from the fruit of ones karmic actions
(karma phala), not withdrawal from action itself. Conversely, disciplined action (karma yoga) is
a central feature of the teachings in the Bhagavad Gita. Be intent on action, not on the fruits of
action; avoid attraction to the fruits and attachment to inaction! (2.47) Since all is
impermanent, since nothing can ultimately be laid claim upon as the lasting fruits of ones action,
and yet since action in this world is entirely inescapable, as even inaction and retreat create their
own karmic effects, Krishna calls for a higher form of detachment. In this disciplined action, one
is fully engaged in performing their dharma, the sacred duty called for by ones geographical,
temporal, and social situation, and yet does so without any regard for the outcome, or the fruit of
their actions. Relinquishing the fruit of action, the disciplined man attains perfect peace; the
undisciplined man is in bondage, attached to the fruit of his desire. (5.11) To do the task at hand
skillfully, simply, and attentively, without anxiety from being tied up in the outcome, is to find
peace and serenity for one is free of the unnecessary burden of trying to know and determine
This has the potential to be of great practical value to those engaged in the struggle
against a different kind of enemy than Arjuna was faced with. That enemy is, of course, climate
change and those in high places who actively deny and exacerbate it while systematically
working to undermine efforts for a sustainable and flourishing future. Like Arjuna, contemporary
warriors for peace and ecology are faced with what can often appear to be an intolerable
situation. Climate scientists, activists, politicians, and religious leaders have been sounding the
bells of alarm for decades. Even oil companies like ExxonMobil have been aware of the effects
of greenhouse gas emissions since the 1970s3 and have elevated ocean drilling rigs in
anticipation of rising sea levels4. The writing has been on the wall for some time, and yet the
response has been far from adequate. We have heard the call to repent many times but it has not
been heeded. The damage done by climate change is already immense and some of it
irreversible, leading climate activist Bill McKibben to go so far as to propose a new name for our
planet in his book Eaarth, claiming that the Earth has been fundamentally altered by human
activity.5
In what is just one example of the challenges facing us, we are now seeing the beginnings
of permafrost thaw. Permafrost occupies about 24% of the landmass of the Northern
Hemisphere, and it is beginning to melt. Permafrost is composed of frozen water, microbes, and
other organic material, and it contains vast amounts of methane and carbon, two greenhouse
gases.6 As the permafrost melts, these gases are released into the air, further accelerating the rate
of global temperature increase and creating a feedback loop which will cause the permafrost to
thaw at at increasingly higher rates. Unless permafrost thaw is contained, we may be faced with a
3Shannon Hall, Exxon Knew about Climate Change almost 40 years ago, Scientific American, October 26, 2015, https://
www.scientificamerican.com/article/exxon-knew-about-climate-change-almost-40-years-ago/
4 Amy Lieberman and Susanne Rust, Big Oil braced for global warming while it fought regulations, LA Times, December 31,
2015, http://graphics.latimes.com/oil-operations/
know it.7
This state of affairs can, and does, lead to despair. Some feel its too late. Its natural to be
overwhelmed and immobilized by feelings of futility in the face of realities such as these. Like
Krishna to Arjuna, the Gita speaks to us in precisely this state of despair induced paralysis,
counseling us to take courage and perform our dharma, our sacred duty, even in the most
repugnant of situations, surrendering the outcome to God. Dharma comes from the Sanskrit root
dir, meaning to sustain. According to Sanskrit scholar Barbara Stoler Miller, its basic
meaning is that which sustains, i.e., the moral order that sustains the individual, the society and
the cosmos, and if each unit or group in the manifold and complex universe performs its own
function correctly, the whole will be harmonious and ordered.8 Dharma, then, has powerful
resonances with our present predicament. To do our part in sustaining the balance and harmony
of our individual, societal, and global life is to challenge decidedly adharmic actors and
enterprises. Even if we are not assured a favorable outcome on the global scale, we can take
heart in the Gitas teaching that if we do our part in working for a harmonious and flourishing
Duty, of course, can have limits as a motivator, especially when that duty is to God,
whom many in our time and place have ceased believing in, and with whom many more have
very limited conscious experiential contact with; functional atheism in our day and age is surely
more prevalent than professed atheism. Furthermore, Krishna and the theology of the Gita
cannot seamlessly be mapped onto God as understood and worshipped in Christianity, the
7Zo Schlanger, Melting Permafrost Is Turbocharging Climate Change, Newsweek, June 2, 2016, http://www.newsweek.com/
2016/06/10/permafrost-greenhouse-gases-global-warming-465585.html
8 Barbara Stoler Miller, translator, The Bhagavad Gita: Krishnas Counsel in Time of War (New York: Bantam Dell, 1986), 158.
religion closest to the heart of American history and identity, accounting for around 75% of the
religious affiliation of contemporary Americans. 9 However, the monotheism and devotion to the
incarnate Lord Krishna that is expressed in the Bhagavad Gita strongly echoes the theological
and spiritual core of Christianity, in which believers lovingly adore and worship the incarnation
of God in Jesus, and thus can serve as inspiration to socially and spiritually engaged Christians.
Spiritual engagement is crucial here, as the Gita has limited applicability to a purely
secular worldview or ethic; the whole philosophical system of snkhya which it is founded upon
is unintelligible without the divine or transcendent. The vision of the Gita is neither biocentric
nor anthropocentric, but rather theocentric. In this, it stands as a challenge to the secular
materialism prevalent among progressives, who are among the most sensitive and responsive to
the realties of climate change. Thomas Merton wrote that the Gita brings to the West a salutary
reminder that our highly activistic and one-sided culture is faced with a crisis that may end in
In the Hindu philosophy of snkhya, the cosmos is constituted of both immortal, transcendent,
unmanifest spirit (purusa) and the manifestation of this divine reality in space, time, and form
(prakrti). The Gita puts it this way: My nature has eight aspects: earth, water, fire, wind, space,
mind, understanding, and individuality. [prakrti] This is my lower nature; know my higher nature
too, the life-force that sustains this universe [purusa]. To live in balance, to live in peace, one
must be rooted in purusa even as they lead engaged lives in the world of prakrti.
This God-consciousness is cultivated, and the heavy burden of materialism lifted, through
loving devotion to Krishna, or bhakti yoga. Krishna, the supreme Lord, loves all that he has
9Frank Newport, Percentage of Christians in U.S. Drifting Down, but Still High, Gallup, December 24, 2015, http://
www.gallup.com/poll/187955/percentage-christians-drifting-down-high.aspx
10 Thomas Merton, The Asian Journal of Thomas Merton (New York: New Directions Books, 1973), 349.
made, dwelling compassionately deep in the self, (10.11) and calls Arjuna to respond to him
with that same divine love. This is the way of liberation from the vicissitudes of life that the Gita
teaches, and it forms the basis for the ethic of detachment from the fruits of ones actions. The
Gita also teaches that Krishna, as the source and life of all that exists, is present in all creation, in
all life, in all form: He who sees me everywhere and sees everything in me will not be lost to
me, and I will not be lost to him. I exist in all creatures, so the disciplined man devoted to me
grasps the oneness of life; wherever he is, he is in me. (6.29-31) The entire world, then, is a
vehicle for loving devotion and worship of Krishna for the natural world is interpreted as the
manifestation of Gods body. 11 This surely can engender an ecological consciousness and ethic,
for if every leaf that turns, every squirrel that scurries, every hawk that flies overhead, and every
deer that returns your gaze is the incarnate Lord to whom you are devoted looking back at you,
then the natural response is to fall in love with the world. We can see something like this in the
spirituality of St. Francis of Assisi. This equanimous and spacious, free of attachment and
anxiety even when faced with the death and dissolution of the forms we have come to know and
love, for the beloved on whom all is woven like a web of pearls on a thread (7.7) is eternal and
Bhakti also proves to be an ecologically valuable spiritual path for another similar but
distinct reason. Union or atonement with the divine, or the ultimate, is at the heart of most paths
of liberation across religious traditions. These ways of salvation have sometimes been in tension
with, or disconnected from, concern for the natural world because God, or the ultimate, is usually
believed to be beyond the natural world. However, in the Gita Krishna teaches Arjuna that by
devotion (bhakti) alone can I, as I really am, be known and seen and entered into and that
11 John Grim and Mary Evelyn Tucker, Ecology and Religion (Washington, DC: Island Press, 2014), 149.
acting only for me, intent on me, free from attachment, hostile to no creature, Arjuna, a man of
devotion comes to me (11.54-55). Here we have love for the natural world and a path of
Like Arjuna on the battlefield, many men and women of good will today may find
themselves occasionally slumped in their chariot (or chair), laying down their bow and arrows,
(1.47) feeling dejected, filled with pity, sad eyes blurred by tears. (2.1) Efforts to reverse
climate change can seem increasingly unsure and there is danger of widespread moral malaise in
the face of a repugnant US president and his administrations policies. The courage and faith
needed to rise to the fight (2.3) can be difficult to come by. The Bhagavad Gita, a masterwork
of religious literature that has inspired and shaped spirituality and activism since its composition
over two thousand years ago, can speak to us today precisely in this hour of great distress. The
verses of the Gita counsel us to be open to the sacred and the divine as we care for the natural
world, and to ground our caring in that openness. It calls upon us to take courage, release
attachment to the fruit of our action, and to find nourishment, motivation, and guidance in the
performance of our sacred work for a sustainable and flourishing planetary future in spiritual