Bhagavad Gita, Clay Jenkinson, Message on the Wind

Monday, September 23, 2002

There are no fairer days anywhere in the world in any age than these upcoming autumn days in Dakota, the land of no Spring and long, langourous Fall — what a wondrous word, “langourous”—meaning, as it does, both lethargy of the kind that saps one to near inaction — and that dreamy, deliciously indolent mood.

The text for today comes from the Bhagavad Gita, II, 49-50, to wit:

“O Dhananyaya, work (with desire for results) is far inferior to work with understanding. Therefore seek refuge in the Yoga of understanding. Wretched indeed are those who work for results. Being possed with this understanding, one frees one's self even in this life from good and evil. Therefore engage thyself in this Yoga. Skillfullness in action is called Yoga.”

Jump. Fast-forward to 71: “That man attains peace who, abandoning all desires, moves about without attachment and longing, without the sense of ‘I’ and ‘mine’.

Is there anything further from our basic notion of being in western civilization than this? Perhaps the greatest curse of our culture is our preoccupation with ourselves and our place in history, a peculiar passion to be recognized as different from and better than our fellow humans.

To the degree that we foster education in the arts and humanities as a means to that end which would allow us to prove ourselves superior to others, we have failed miserably. To the extent that we foster the notion that reading Homer or glancing at the Bhagavad Gita can somehow get a university student a higher paying job and thus be able to acquire possessions as an extension of our ego, we approach the sin against the Holy Ghost.

I make no pretense toward really understanding the Bhagavad Gita — how could I? I have no more than a glimpse, the briefest of glimpses.

Today, I commend you, my friends in the humanities, to an extraordinary humanities text by Clay Jenkinson, Message on the Wind. We would have it both ways, friends; we would pay lip service to the life of the mind and spirit while we lazily get on with “getting and spending” — that Wordsworthian condemnation of our greatest sin. I offer you but two passages from a book of great humor, high style, and brutal honesty.

One is a short characterization of one of our two monuments to sorry times in North Dakota, the place, Fort Union (page 16): “. . . Clark [William, in 1805] suggested that the confluence of the Yellowstone and the Missouri ‘affords a butifull commnding situation for a fort.’ And the forts came. The great Sitting Bull surrendered here at the U.S. Army's Fort Buford in the year 1881. A replica of the commercial Fort Union has been constructed recently on the north bank of the Missouri, a tasteless memorial to racism, imperialism, militarism, epidemia, and the systematic bilking and demoralizing of Native American peoples. Buffs flock to it. it is a beautiful white building with a black karma.”

The second paragraph comes from near the end (page 294-295): “The message on the wind was also a call to thoroughness and integrity that had nothing to do with one's mating rites. It's no good to cleanse the soul and leave a lonely little turd of curruption behind. Whatever the soul's quest — responsible gender or environmental relations, the alchemy of soul transmutation from lead to gold, the search for the essence of coyoteness in the dark abyss of the night — our duty is to pursue that gril with a whole and a pure consciousness. There is no seeking macrobiotic integrity by night and Big Macs by day, no day-trading with Cargill and night-trading with Gaea, no sacramental commitment to eros and a subscription to Playboy.”

Ah, my friends, that's hard, that's hard. And I don't mean giving up Playboy—but to the greater notion of getting beyond “I” — once more, a bit from Second Chapter of the Bhagavad Gita, “Sankhya-Yoga,” or “The Path of Wisdom.”

“52. When thine intellect will cross beyond the mire of delusion, then alone shalt thou attain to indifference regarding things heard and yet to be heard.

53. When thine intellect, tossed by the various conflicting opinions of the Scriptures, will become firmly established in the Self, then thou shalt attain Yoga (Self -realization or union with God).”

And, finally, “70. As the ocean remains calm and unaltered though the waters flow into it, similarly a self-controlled saint remains unmoved when desires enter into him; such a saint alone attains peace, but not he who craves the objects of desire.”

For some thoughts about Emerson and his notion of culture and our educational system in the arts and humanities, check the entry for September 22, 2002.

Be well, friends — enjoy this great autumn, wherever you are. If you are not in Dakota this glorious time of year, think about coming. There's no finer place to be.

Ev Albers
ealbers@nd-humanities.org