The Bhagavad Gita ("Song of the Lord") is the best-loved Hindu scripture. It is not a separate text but part of the great epic the Mahabharata, in the section just before the climactic battle of Kurukshetra. It is around 700 verses long.

The Setting

Two armies are facing each other for a war over a kingdom. The warrior prince Arjuna asks his charioteer - the god Krishna, an avatar of Vishnu - to drive him between the two armies. When Arjuna sees that the enemy includes his own family, teachers and friends, he drops his bow and refuses to fight. The whole Gita is Krishna's reply.

Krishna's Teaching

Krishna explains:

The atman is eternal - bodies can be destroyed but souls cannot. "Just as a person discards old clothes and puts on new ones..."
Arjuna's dharma as a warrior is to fight in a just war. To run away would be wrong.
He should act without attachment to the results of his actions - this is karma yoga.

Krishna then describes the three main paths to moksha: karma yoga (action), jnana yoga (knowledge) and bhakti yoga (devotion). At the end of the Gita, Krishna reveals his cosmic form as Vishnu - the universal god.

Why It Matters

The Bhagavad Gita is admired around the world. Gandhi said he turned to it whenever life was difficult. It teaches that doing your duty with the right inner attitude is more important than the results - a message that applies far beyond the battlefield.

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The Bhagavad Gita