title: Bhagavad Gita

text: According to Jeaneane Fowler, "the dating of the Gita varies considerably" and depends in part on whether one accepts it to be a part of the early versions of the "Mahabharata", or a text that was inserted into the epic at a later date. The earliest "surviving" components therefore are believed to be no older than the earliest "external" references we have to the "Mahabharata" epic. The "Mahabharata" – the world's longest poem – is itself a text that was likely written and compiled over several hundred years, one dated between "400 BCE or little earlier, and 2nd century CE, though some claim a few parts can be put as late as 400 CE", states Fowler. The dating of the Gita is thus dependent on the uncertain dating of the "Mahabharata". The actual dates of composition of the Gita remain unresolved. While the year and century is uncertain, states Richard Davis, the internal evidence in the text dates the origin of the Gita discourse to the Hindu lunar month of "Margashirsha" (also called "Agrahayana", generally December or January of the Gregorian calendar).


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Bhagavad Gita is the best known, and most influential of Hindu scriptures. While Hinduism is known for its diversity and its synthesis therefrom, the Bhagavad Gita has a unique pan-Hindu influence. Gerald James Larson – an Indologist and scholar of classical Hindu philosophy, states that "if there is any one text that comes near to embodying the totality of what it is to be a Hindu, it would be the Bhagavad Gita."


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Bhagavad Gita is part of the Prasthanatrayi, which also includes the Upanishads and Brahma sutras. These are the three starting points for the Vedanta school of Hindu philosophy. The Brahma sutras constitute the "Nyāya prasthāna" or the "starting point of reasoning canonical base", while the principal Upanishads constitute the "Sruti prasthāna" or the "starting point of heard scriptures", and the Bhagavad Gita constitutes the "Smriti prasthāna" or the "starting point of remembered canonical base". The Bhagavad Gita is a "summation of the Vedanta", states Sargeant. It is thus one of the key texts for the Vedanta, a school that provides one of the theoretical foundations for Hinduism, and one that has had an enormous influence over time, becoming the central ideology of the Hindu renaissance in the 19th century, according to Gavin Flood – a scholar of Hinduism.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Some Hindus give it the status of an Upanishad, and some consider it to be a "revealed text". Others consider the Bhagavad Gita as an important Smriti, or secondary text that exist in alternate versions such as one found in Kashmir though it does not affect the basic message of the text.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Bhagavad Gita is the sealing achievement of the Hindu synthesis, incorporating its various religious traditions. The synthesis is at both philosophical and socio-religious levels, states the Gita scholar Keya Maitra. The text refrains from insisting on one right "marga" (path) to spirituality. It openly synthesizes and inclusively accepts multiple ways of life, harmonizing spiritual pursuits through action ("karma"), knowledge ("gyaana"), and devotion ("bhakti"). According to the Gita translator Radhakrishnan, quoted in a review by Robinson, Krishna's discourse is a "comprehensive synthesis" that inclusively unifies the competing strands of Hindu thought such as "Vedic ritual, Upanishadic wisdom, devotional theism and philosophical insight". Aurobindo described the text as a synthesis of various Yogas. The Indologist Robert Minor, and others, in contrast, state that the Gita is "more clearly defined as a synthesis of Vedanta, Yoga and Samkhya" philosophies of Hinduism.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The synthesis in Bhagavad Gita addresses the question of what constitutes the virtuous path that is necessary for spiritual liberation or release from the cycles of rebirth ("moksha"). It discusses whether one should renounce a householder lifestyle for a life as an ascetic, or lead a householder life dedicated to one's duty and profession, or pursue a householder life devoted to a personalized God in the revealed form of Krishna. Thus Gita discusses and synthesizes the three dominant trends in Hinduism: enlightenment-based renunciation, dharma-based householder life, and devotion-based theism. According to Deutsch and Dalvi, the Bhagavad Gita attempts "to forge a harmony" between these three paths.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Bhagavad Gitas synthetic answer recommends that one must resist the "either-or" view, and consider a "both-and" view. It states that the dharmic householder can achieve the same goals as the renouncing monk through "inner renunciation" or "motiveless action". One must do the right thing because one has determined that it is right, states Gita, without craving for its fruits, without worrying about the results, loss or gain. Desires, selfishness, and the craving for fruits can distort one from spiritual living. The Gita synthesis goes further, according to its interpreters such as Swami Vivekananda, and the text states that there is Living God in every human being and the devoted service to this Living God in everyone – without craving for personal rewards – is a means to spiritual development and liberation. According to Galvin Flood, the teachings in the Gita differ from other Indian religions that encouraged extreme austerity and self-torture of various forms ("karsayanta"). The Gita disapproves of these, stating that not only is it against tradition but against Krishna himself, because "Krishna dwells within all beings, in torturing the body the ascetic would be torturing him", states Flood. Even a monk should strive for "inner renunciation" rather than external pretensions.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Gita synthesizes several paths to spiritual realization based on the premise that people are born with different temperaments and tendencies ("guna"). According to Winthrop Sargeant, the text acknowledges that some individuals are more reflective and intellectual, some affective and engaged by their emotions, some are action driven, yet others favor experimentation and exploring what works. It then presents different spiritual paths for each personality type respectively: the path of knowledge ("jnana yoga"), the path of devotion ("bhakti yoga"), the path of action ("karma yoga"), and the path of meditation ("raja yoga"). The "guna" premise is a synthesis of the ideas from the Samkhya school of Hinduism. According to Upadhyaya, the Gita states that none of these paths to spiritual realization is "intrinsically superior or inferior", rather they "converge in one and lead to the same goal".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: According to Hiltebeitel, "Bhakti" forms an essential ingredient of this synthesis, and the text incorporates "Bhakti" into "Vedanta". According to Scheepers, The Bhagavad Gita is a Brahmanical text which uses Shramanic and Yogic terminology to spread the Brahmanic idea of living according to one's duty or "dharma", in contrast to the ascetic ideal of liberation by avoiding all karma. According to Galvin Flood and Charles Martin, the Gita rejects the Shramanic path of non-action, emphasizing instead "the renunciation of the fruits of action". The Bhagavad Gita, according to Raju, is a great synthesis of impersonal spiritual monism with personal God, of "the "yoga" of action with the "yoga" of transcendence of action, and these again with the "yogas" of devotion and knowledge".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Bhagavad Gita manuscript is found in the sixth book of the "Mahabharata" manuscripts – the "Bhisma-parvan". Therein, in the third section, the Gita forms chapters 23–40, that is 6.3.23 to 6.3.40. The Bhagavad Gita is often preserved and studied on its own, as an independent text with its chapters renumbered from 1 to 18.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Bhagavad Gita manuscripts exist in numerous Indic scripts. These include writing systems that are currently in use, as well as early scripts such as the now dormant Sharada script. Variant manuscripts of the Gita have been found on the Indian subcontinent Unlike the enormous variations in the remaining sections of the surviving "Mahabharata" manuscripts, the Gita manuscripts show only minor variations.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: According to Gambhirananda, the old manuscripts may have had 745 verses, though he agrees that “700 verses is the generally accepted historic standard." Gambhirananda's view is supported by a few versions of chapter 6.43 of the "Mahabharata". According to Gita exegesis scholar Robert Minor, these versions state that the Gita is a text where "Kesava [Krishna] spoke 574 slokas, Arjuna 84, Sanjaya 41, and Dhritarashtra 1". An authentic manuscript of the Gita with 745 verses has not been found. Adi Shankara, in his 8th-century commentary, explicitly states that the Gita has 700 verses, which was likely a deliberate declaration to prevent further insertions and changes to the Gita. Since Shankara's time, "700 verses" has been the standard benchmark for the critical edition of the Bhagavad Gita.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Bhagavad Gita is a poem written in the Sanskrit language. Its 700 verses are structured into several ancient Indian poetic meters, with the principal being the "shloka" ("Anushtubh chanda"). It has 18 chapters in total. Each "shloka" consists of a couplet, thus the entire text consists of 1,400 lines. Each "shloka" has two quarter verses with exactly eight syllables. Each of these quarters is further arranged into two metrical feet of four syllables each. The metered verse does not rhyme. While the "shloka" is the principal meter in the Gita, it does deploy other elements of Sanskrit prosody. At dramatic moments, it uses the "tristubh" meter found in the Vedas, where each line of the couplet has two quarter verses with exactly eleven syllables.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Gita is a dialogue between Krishna and Arjuna right before the start of the climactic Kurukshetra War in the Hindu epic "Mahabharata". Two massive armies have gathered to destroy each other. The Pandava prince Arjuna asks his charioteer Krishna to drive to the center of the battlefield so that he can get a good look at both the armies and all those "so eager for war". He sees that some among his enemies are his own relatives, beloved friends, and revered teachers. He does not want to fight to kill them and is thus filled with doubt and despair on the battlefield. He drops his bow, wonders if he should renounce and just leave the battlefield. He turns to his charioteer and guide Krishna, for advice on the rationale for war, his choices and the right thing to do. The Bhagavad Gita is the compilation of Arjuna's questions and moral dilemma and Krishna's answers and insights that elaborate on a variety of philosophical concepts. The compiled dialogue goes far beyond the "rationale for war"; it touches on many human ethical dilemmas, philosophical issues and life's choices. According to Flood and Martin, although the Gita is set in the context of a wartime epic, the narrative is structured to apply to all situations; it wrestles with questions about "who we are, how we should live our lives, and how should we act in the world". According to Sargeant, it delves into questions about the "purpose of life, crisis of self-identity, human Self, human temperaments, and ways for spiritual quest".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Bhagavad Gita comprises 18 chapters (section 23 to 40) in the Bhishma Parva of the epic "Mahabharata". Because of differences in recensions, the verses of the Gita may be numbered in the full text of the "Mahabharata" as chapters 6.25–42 or as chapters 6.23–40. The number of verses in each chapter vary in some manuscripts of the Gita discovered on the Indian subcontinent. However, variant readings are relatively few in contrast to the numerous versions of the "Mahabharata" it is found embedded in.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The original Bhagavad Gita has no chapter titles. Some Sanskrit editions that separate the Gita from the epic as an independent text, as well as translators, however, add chapter titles. For example, Swami Chidbhavananda describes each of the eighteen chapters as a separate yoga because each chapter, like yoga, "trains the body and the mind". He labels the first chapter "Arjuna Vishada Yogam" or the "Yoga of Arjuna's Dejection". Sir Edwin Arnold titled this chapter in his 1885 translation as "The Distress of Arjuna".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Translators have variously titled the first chapter as "Arjuna vishada yoga", "Prathama Adhyaya", "The Distress of Arjuna", "The War Within", or "Arjuna's Sorrow". The Bhagavad Gita is opened by setting the stage of the Kurukshetra battlefield. Two massive armies representing different loyalties and ideologies face a catastrophic war. With Arjuna is Krishna, not as a participant in the war, but only as his charioteer and counsel. Arjuna requests Krishna to move the chariot between the two armies so he can see those "eager for this war". He sees family and friends on the enemy side. Arjuna is distressed and in sorrow. The issue is, states Arvind Sharma, "is it morally proper to kill?" This and other moral dilemmas in the first chapter are set in a context where the Hindu epic and Krishna have already extolled "ahimsa" (non-violence) to be the highest and divine virtue of a human being. The war feels evil to Arjuna and he questions the morality of war. He wonders if it is noble to renounce and leave before the violence starts, or should he fight, and why.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Translators title the chapter as "Sankhya Yoga", "The Book of Doctrines", "Self-Realization", or "The Yoga of Knowledge (and Philosophy)". The second chapter begins the philosophical discussions and teachings found in the Gita. The warrior Arjuna whose past had focused on learning the skills of his profession now faces a war he has doubts about. Filled with introspection and questions about the meaning and purpose of life, he asks Krishna about the nature of life, Self, death, afterlife and whether there is a deeper meaning and reality. Krishna answers. The chapter summarizes the Hindu idea of rebirth, samsara, eternal Self in each person (Self), universal Self present in everyone, various types of yoga, divinity within, the nature of knowledge of the Self and other concepts. The ideas and concepts in the second chapter reflect the framework of the Samkhya and Yoga schools of Hindu philosophy. This chapter is an overview for the remaining sixteen chapters of the Bhagavad Gita. Mahatma Gandhi memorized the last 19 verses of the second chapter, considering them as his companion in his non-violent movement for social justice during colonial rule.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Translators title the chapter as "Karma yoga", "Virtue in Work", "Selfless Service", or "The Yoga of Action". Arjuna, after listening to Krishna's spiritual teachings in Chapter 2, gets more confounded and returns to the predicament he faces. He wonders if fighting the war is "not so important after all" given Krishna's overview on the pursuit of spiritual wisdom. Krishna replies that there is no way to avoid action (karma), since abstention from work is also an action. Krishna states that Arjuna has an obligation to understand and perform his duty (dharma), because everything is connected by the law of cause and effect. Every man or woman is bound by activity. Those who act selfishly create the Karmic cause and are thereby bound to the effect which may be good or bad. Those who act selflessly for the right cause and strive to do their dharmic duty do God's work. Those who act without craving for fruits are free from the Karmic effects, because the results never motivated them. Whatever the result, it does not affect them. Their happiness comes from within, and the external world does not bother them. According to Flood and Martin, chapter 3 and onwards develops "a theological response to Arjuna's dilemma".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Translators title the fourth chapter as "Jñāna–Karma-Sanyasa yoga", "The Religion of Knowledge", "Wisdom in Action", or "The Yoga of Renunciation of Action through Knowledge". Krishna reveals that he has taught this yoga to the Vedic sages. Arjuna questions how Krishna could do this, when those sages lived so long ago, and Krishna was born more recently. Krishna reminds him that everyone is in the cycle of rebirths, and while Arjuna does not remember his previous births, he does. Whenever dharma declines and the purpose of life is forgotten by Man, says Krishna, he returns to re-establish dharma. Every time he returns, he teaches about the inner Self in all beings. The later verses of the chapter return to the discussion of motiveless action and the need to determine the right action, performing it as one's dharma (duty) while renouncing the results, rewards, fruits. The simultaneous outer action with inner renunciation, states Krishna, is the secret to the life of freedom. Action leads to knowledge, while selfless action leads to spiritual awareness, state the last verses of this chapter. The 4th chapter is the first time where Krishna begins to reveal his divine nature to Arjuna.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Translators title this chapter as "Karma–Sanyasa yoga", "Religion by Renouncing Fruits of Works", "Renounce and Rejoice", or "The Yoga of Renunciation". The chapter starts by presenting the tension in the Indian tradition between the life of "sannyasa" (monks who have renounced their household and worldly attachments) and the life of "grihastha" (householder). Arjuna asks Krishna which path is better. Krishna answers that both are paths to the same goal, but the path of "selfless action and service" with inner renunciation is better. The different paths, says Krishna, aim for—and if properly pursued, lead to—Self-knowledge. This knowledge leads to the universal, transcendent Godhead, the divine essence in all beings, to Brahman – to Krishna himself. The final verses of the chapter state that the self-aware who have reached self-realization live without fear, anger, or desire. They are free within, always. Chapter 5 shows signs of interpolations and internal contradictions. For example, states Arthur Basham, verses 5.23–28 state that a sage's spiritual goal is to realize the impersonal Brahman, yet the next verse 5.29 states that the goal is to realize the personal God who is Krishna.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Translators title the sixth chapter as "Dhyana yoga", "Religion by Self-Restraint", "The Practice of Meditation", or "The Yoga of Meditation". The chapter opens as a continuation of Krishna's teachings about selfless work and the personality of someone who has renounced the fruits that are found in chapter 5. Krishna says that such self-realized people are impartial to friends and enemies, are beyond good and evil, equally disposed to those who support them or oppose them because they have reached the summit of consciousness. The verses 6.10 and after proceed to summarize the principles of Yoga and meditation in the format similar to but simpler than Patanjali's "Yogasutra". It discusses who is a true yogi, and what it takes to reach the state where one harbors no malice towards anyone.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Translators title this chapter as "Jnana–Vijnana yoga", "Religion by Discernment", "Wisdom from Realization", or "The Yoga of Knowledge and Judgment". The chapter 7 opens with Krishna continuing his discourse. He discusses "jnana" (knowledge) and "vijnana" (realization, understanding) using the Prakriti-Purusha (matter-Self) framework of the Samkhya school of Hindu philosophy, and the Maya-Brahman framework of its Vedanta school. The chapter states that evil is the consequence of ignorance and attachment to the impermanent, the elusive Maya. It states that Self-knowledge and union with Purusha (Krishna) are the highest goal of any spiritual pursuit.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Translators title the chapter as "Aksara–Brahma yoga", "Religion by Devotion to the One Supreme God", "The Eternal Godhead", or "The Yoga of the Imperishable Brahman". The chapter opens with Arjuna asking questions such as what is Brahman and what is the nature of "karma". Krishna states that his own highest nature is the imperishable Brahman, and that he lives in every creature as the "adhyatman". Every being has an impermanent body and an eternal Self, and that "Krishna as Lord" lives within every creature. The chapter discusses cosmology, the nature of death and rebirth. This chapter contains eschatology of the Bhagavad Gita. Importance of the last thought before death, differences between material and spiritual worlds, and light and dark paths that a Self takes after death are described.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Translators title the ninth chapter as "Raja–Vidya–Raja–Guhya yoga", "Religion by the Kingly Knowledge and the Kingly Mystery", "The Royal Path", or "The Yoga of Sovereign Science and Sovereign Secret". Chapter 9 opens with Krishna continuing his discourse as Arjuna listens. Krishna states that he is everywhere and in everything in an unmanifested form, yet he is not in any way limited by them. Eons end, everything dissolves and then he recreates another eon subjecting them to the laws of "Prakriti" (nature). He equates himself to being the father and the mother of the universe, to being the Om, to the three Vedas, to the seed, the goal of life, the refuge and abode of all. The chapter recommends devotional worship of Krishna. According to theologian Christopher Southgate, verses of this chapter of the Gita are panentheistic, while German physicist and philosopher Max Bernhard Weinstein deems the work pandeistic. It may, in fact, be neither of them, and its contents may have no definition with previously developed Western terms.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Translators title the chapter as "Vibhuti–Vistara–yoga", "Religion by the Heavenly Perfections", "Divine Splendor", or "The Yoga of Divine Manifestations". When Arjuna asks of the opulences (Vibhuti) of Krishna, he explains how all the entities are his forms. He reveals his divine being in greater detail as the ultimate cause of all material and spiritual existence, as one who transcends all opposites and who is beyond any duality. Nevertheless, at Arjuna's behest, Krishna says the following are his major opulences. He says he is the "atman" in all beings, Arjuna's innermost Self, also compassionate Vishnu, Surya, Indra, Shiva-Rudra, Ananta, Yama, as well as the Om, Vedic sages, time, Gayatri mantra, and the science of Self-knowledge. Krishna says, "Among the Pandavas, I am Arjuna," implying he is manifest in all the beings, including Arjuna. He also says that he is Rama when he says, "Among the wielders of weapons, I am Rama". Arjuna accepts Krishna as the "purushottama" (Supreme Being).


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Translators title the chapter as "Vishvarupa–Darshana yoga", "The Manifesting of the One and Manifold", "The Cosmic Vision", or "The Yoga of the Vision of the Cosmic Form". On Arjuna's request, Krishna displays his "universal form" ("Viśvarūpa"). This is an idea found in the "Rigveda" and many later Hindu texts, where it is a symbolism for "atman" (Self) and "Brahman" (Absolute Reality) eternally pervading all beings and all existence. Chapter 11, states Eknath Eswaran, describes Arjuna entering first into "savikalpa samadhi" (a particular form), and then "nirvikalpa samadhi" (a universal form) as he gets an understanding of Krishna. A part of the verse from this chapter was recited by Robert Oppenheimer as he witnessed the first atomic bomb explode.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Translators title the chapter as "Bhakti yoga", "The Religion of Faith", "The Way of Love", or "The Yoga of Devotion". In this chapter, Krishna glorifies the path of love and devotion to God. Krishna describes the process of devotional service (Bhakti yoga). This chapter of the Gita, states Easwaran, offers a "vastly easier" path to most human beings to identify and love God in an anthropomorphic representation. He can be projected as "a merciful father, a divine mother, a wise friend, a passionate beloved, or even a mischievous child", according to Easwaran. The text states that combining "action with inner renunciation" with the love of Krishna as a personal God leads to peace. In the last eight verses of this chapter, Krishna states that he loves those who have compassion for all living beings, are content with whatever comes their way, who live a detached life that is impartial and selfless, unaffected by fleeting pleasure or pain, neither craving for praise nor depressed by criticism.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Translators title this chapter as "Ksetra–Ksetrajna Vibhaga yoga", "Religion by Separation of Matter and Spirit", "The Field and the Knower", or "The Yoga of Difference between the Field and Field-Knower". The chapter opens with Krishna continuing his discourse. He describes the difference between the transient perishable physical body ("kshetra") and the immutable eternal Self ("kshetrajna"). The presentation explains the difference between "ahamkara" (ego) and "atman" (Self), from there between individual consciousness and universal consciousness. The knowledge of one's true self is linked to the realization of the Self. The 13th chapter of the Gita offers the clearest enunciation of the Samkhya philosophy, states Basham, by explaining the difference between field (material world) and the knower (Self), "prakriti" and "purusha". According to Miller, this is the chapter which "redefines the battlefield as the human body, the material realm in which one struggles to know oneself" where human dilemmas are presented as a "symbolic field of interior warfare".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Translators title the fourteenth chapter as "Gunatraya–Vibhaga yoga", "Religion by Separation from the Qualities", "The Forces of Evolution", or "The Yoga of the Division of Three Gunas". Krishna continues his discourse from the previous chapter. Krishna explains the difference between "purusha" and "prakriti", by mapping human experiences to three "Guṇas" (tendencies, qualities). These are listed as "sattva", "rajas" and "tamas". All phenomena and individual personalities are a combination of all three "gunas" in varying and ever-changing proportions. The "gunas" affect the ego, but not the Self, according to the text. This chapter also relies on Samkhya theories.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Translators title the chapter as "Purushottama yoga", "Religion by Attaining the Supreme Krishna", "The Supreme Self", or "The Yoga of the Supreme Purusha". The fifteenth chapter expounds on Krishna's theology, in the Vaishnava Bhakti tradition of Hinduism. Krishna discusses the nature of God, according to Easwaran, wherein Krishna not only transcends the impermanent body (matter) but also transcends the "atman" (Self) in every being. According to Franklin Edgerton, the verses in this chapter, in association with select verses in other chapters, make the metaphysics of the Gita to be dualistic. However, its overall thesis, according to Edgerton, is more complex because other verses teach the Upanishadic doctrines and "through its God the Gita seems after all to arrive at an ultimate monism; the essential part, the fundamental element, in every thing, is after all One — is God."


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Translators title the chapter as "Daivasura–Sampad–Vibhaga yoga", "The Separateness of the Divine and Undivine", "Two Paths", or "The Yoga of the Division between the Divine and the Demonic". According to Easwaran, this is an unusual chapter where two types of human nature are expounded, one leading to happiness and the other to suffering. Krishna identifies these human traits to be divine and demonic respectively. He states that truthfulness, self-restraint, sincerity, love for others, desire to serve others, being detached, avoiding anger, avoiding harm to all living creatures, fairness, compassion and patience are marks of the divine nature. The opposite of these are demonic, such as cruelty, conceit, hypocrisy and being inhumane, states Krishna. Some of the verses in Chapter 16 may be polemics directed against competing Indian religions, according to Basham. The competing tradition may be the materialists (Charvaka), states Fowler.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Translators title the chapter as "Shraddhatraya-Vibhaga yoga", "Religion by the Threefold Kinds of Faith", "The Power of Faith", or "The Yoga of the Threefold Faith". Krishna qualifies the three divisions of faith, thoughts, deeds, and even eating habits corresponding to the three modes (gunas).


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Translators title the chapter as "Moksha–Sanyasa yoga", "Religion by Deliverance and Renunciation", "Freedom and Renunciation", or "The Yoga of Liberation and Renunciation". In the final and longest chapter, the Gita offers a final summary of its teachings in the previous chapters. It begins with the discussion of spiritual pursuits through "sannyasa" (renunciation, monastic life) and spiritual pursuits while living in the world as a householder. It re-emphasizes the "karma-phala-tyaga" teaching ("act while renouncing the fruits of your action").


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Gita adopts the Upanishadic concept of Absolute Reality (Brahman), a shift from the earlier ritual-driven Vedic religion to one abstracting and internalizing spiritual experiences. According to Jeaneane Fowler, the Gita builds on the Upanishadic Brahman theme, conceptualized to be that which is everywhere, unaffected, constant Absolute, indescribable and "nirguna" (abstract, without features). This Absolute in the Gita is neither a He nor a She, but a "neuter principle", an "It or That". Like some of the Upanishads, the Gita does not limit itself to the "nirguna" Brahman. It teaches both the abstract and the personalized Brahman (God), the latter in the form of Krishna. It accomplishes this synthesis by projecting the "nirguna" Brahman as higher than "saguna" or personalized Brahman, where the "nirguna" Brahman "exists when everything else does not". The text blurs any distinction between a personalized God and impersonal absolute reality by amalgamating the two and using the concepts interchangeably in later chapters. This theme has led scholars to call the Gita panentheistic, theistic as well as monistic.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Gita, states Fowler, "thoroughly accepts" "atman" as a foundational concept. In the Upanishads, this is the Brahmanical idea that all beings have a "permanent real self", the true essence, the Self it refers to as "Atman" (Self). In the Upanishads that preceded the Gita, such as the "Brihadaranyaka Upanishad", the salvational goal is to know and realize this Self, a knowledge that is devoid of the delusions of the instinctive "I, mine" egoism typically connected with the body and material life processes that are impermanent and transient. The Gita accepts "atman" as the pure, unchanging, ultimate real essence.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Gita considers the world to be transient, all bodies and matter as impermanent. Everything that constitutes "prakriti" (nature, matter) is process driven and has a finite existence. It is born, grows, matures, decays, and dies. It considers this transient reality as Maya. Like the Upanishads, the Gita focuses on what it considers real in this world of change, impermanence, and finitude. To build its theological framework about the world, the text relies on the theories found in the Samkhya and Vedanta schools of Hinduism.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Upanishads developed the equation "Atman = Brahman", states Fowler, and this belief is central to the Gita. This equation is, however, interpreted in a number of ways by different sub-schools of Vedanta. In the Gita, the Self of each human being is considered to be identical to every other human being and all beings, but it "does not support an identity with the Brahman", according to Fowler. According to Raju, the Gita supports this identity and spiritual monism, but as a form of synthesis with a personal God. According to Edgerton, the authors of the Gita rely on their concept of a personalized God (Krishna) to ultimately arrive at an ultimate monism, where the devotee realizes that Krishna is the essential part, the real fundamental element within everyone and everything. Krishna is simultaneously one and all. According to Huston Smith, the Gita is teaching that "when one sees the entire universe as pervaded by the single Universal Spirit [Krishna], one contemplates, marvels, and falls in love with its amazing glory. [...] Having experienced that Truth oneself, all doubts are dispelled. This is how the flower of devotion evolves into the fruit of knowledge."


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Gita teaches several spiritual paths – jnana, bhakti and karma – to the divine. However, states Fowler, it "does not raise any of these to a status that excludes the others". The theme that unites these paths in the Gita is "inner renunciation" where one is unattached to personal rewards during one's spiritual journey.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Gita teaches the path of Karma yoga in Chapter 3 and others. It upholds the necessity of action. However, this action should "not simply follow spiritual injunctions", without any attachment to personal rewards or because of craving for fruits. The Gita teaches, according to Fowler, that the action should be undertaken after proper knowledge has been applied to gain a full perspective on "what the action should be".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The concept of such detached action is also called "Nishkama Karma", a term not used in the Gita but equivalent to other terms such as "karma-phala-tyaga". This is where one determines what the right action ought to be and then acts while being detached to personal outcomes, to fruits, to success or failure. A karma yogi finds such work inherently fulfilling and satisfying. To a "karma yogi", right work done well is a form of prayer, and "karma yoga" is the path of selfless action.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: According to Mahatma Gandhi, the object of the Gita is to show the way to attain self-realization, and this "can be achieved by selfless action, by desireless action; by renouncing fruits of action; by dedicating all activities to God, i.e., by surrendering oneself to Him, body and Self." Gandhi called the Gita "The Gospel of Selfless Action". According to Jonardon Ganeri, the premise of "disinterested action" is one of the important ethical concepts in the Gita.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: In the Bhagavad Gita, bhakti is characterized as the "loving devotion, a longing, surrender, trust and adoration" of the divine Krishna as the "ishta-devata". While bhakti is mentioned in many chapters, the idea gathers momentum after verse 6.30, and chapter 12 is where is fully developed. According to Fowler, the bhakti in the Gita does not imply renunciation of "action", but the bhakti effort is assisted with "right knowledge" and dedication to one's "dharma". Theologian Catherine Cornille writes, "The text [of the Gita] offers a survey of the different possible disciplines for attaining liberation through knowledge ("Jnana"), action (karma), and loving devotion to God (bhakti), focusing on the latter as both the easiest and the highest path to salvation."


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: According to M. R. Sampatkumaran, a Bhagavad Gita scholar, the Gita's message is that mere knowledge of the scriptures cannot lead to final release, but "devotion, meditation, and worship are essential." The Gita likely spawned a "powerful devotionalism" movement, states Fowler, because the text and this path was simpler, and available to everyone.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Jnana yoga is the path of knowledge, wisdom, and direct realization of the Brahman. In the Bhagavad Gita, it is also referred to as "buddhi yoga" and its goal is self-realization. The text states that this is the path that intellectuals tend to prefer. The chapter 4 of the Bhagavad Gita is dedicated to the general exposition of "jnana yoga".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Gita praises the path, calling the jnana yogi to be exceedingly dear to Krishna, but adds that the path is steep and difficult.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Sivananda's commentary regards the eighteen chapters of the Bhagavad Gita as having a progressive order, by which Krishna leads "Arjuna up the ladder of Yoga from one rung to another." The influential commentator Madhusudana Sarasvati divided the Gitas eighteen chapters into three sections with six chapters each. Swami Gambhirananda characterises Madhusudana Sarasvati's system as a successive approach in which Karma yoga leads to Bhakti yoga, which in turn leads to Jnana yoga:


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Some scholars treat the "yoga of meditation" to be a distinct fourth path taught in the Gita, referring to it as Raja yoga. Others consider it a progressive stage or a combination of Karma yoga and Bhakti yoga. Some, such as Adi Shankara, have considered its discussion in the 13th chapter of the Gita and elsewhere to be an integral part of Jnana yoga.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Gita rejects ascetic life, renunciation as well as Brahminical Vedic ritualism where outward actions or non-actions are considered a means of personal reward in life, after-life or as a means of liberation. Instead it recommends the pursuit of an active life where the individual adopts "inner renunciation", acts to fulfill what he determines to be his "dharma", without craving for or being concerned about personal rewards, viewing this as an "inner sacrifice to the personal God for a higher good".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: According to Edwin Bryant, the Indologist with publications on Krishna-related Hindu traditions, the Gita rejects "actionless behavior" found in some Indic monastic traditions. It also "relegates the sacrificial system of the early Vedic literature to a path that goes nowhere because it is based on desires", states Bryant.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Dharma is a prominent paradigm of the "Mahabharata", and it is referenced in the Gita as well. The term "dharma" has a number of meanings. Fundamentally, it refers to that which is right or just. Contextually, it also means the essence of "duty, law, class, social norms, ritual and cosmos itself" in the text, in the sense "the way things should be in all these different dimensions". According to Zaehner, the term "dharma" means "duty" in the Gitas context; in verse 2.7, it refers to the "right [and wrong]", and in 14.27 to the "eternal law of righteousness".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Few verses in the Bhagavad Gita deal with dharma, according to the Indologist Paul Hacker, but the theme of dharma is broadly important. In Chapter 1, responding to Arjuna's despondency, Krishna asks him to follow his "sva-dharma", "the dharma that belongs to a particular man (Arjuna) as a member of a particular "varna", (i.e., the "kshatriya" – the warrior varna)". According to Paul Hacker, the term "dharma" has additional meanings in the context of Arjuna. It is more broadly, the "duty" and a "metaphysically congealed act" for Arjuna. According to the Indologist Jacqueline Hirst, the "dharma" theme is "of significance only at the beginning and end of the Gita" and this may have been a way to perhaps link the Gita to the context of the "Mahabharata".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: According to Malinar, "Arjuna's crisis and some of the arguments put forward to call him to action are connected to the debates on war and peace in the "Udyoga Parva"." The "Udyoga Parva" presents many views about the nature of a warrior, his duty and what calls for heroic action. While Duryodhana presents it as a matter of status, social norms, and fate, Vidura states that the heroic warrior never submits, knows no fear and has the duty to protect people. The "Bhishma Parva" sets the stage of two ideologies in conflict and two massive armies gathered for what each considers as a righteous and necessary war. In this context, the Gita advises Arjuna to do his holy duty ("sva-dharma") as a warrior; fight and kill.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: According to the Indologist Barbara Miller, the text frames heroism not in terms of physical abilities, but instead in terms of effort and inner commitment to fulfill a warrior's "dharma" in the battlefield. War is depicted as a horror, the impending slaughter a cause for self-doubt, yet at stake is the spiritual struggle against evil. The Gita's message emphasizes that personal moral ambivalence must be addressed, the warrior needs to rise above "personal and social values" and understand what is at stake and "why he must fight". The text explores the "paradoxical interconnectedness of disciplined action and freedom".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The first reference to "dharma" in the Bhagavad Gita occurs in its first verse, where Dhritarashtra refers to the Kurukshetra, the location of the battlefield, as the "Field of Dharma", "The Field of Righteousness or Truth". According to Fowler, dharma in this verse may refer to the "sanatana dharma", "what Hindus understand as their religion, for it is a term that encompasses wide aspects of religious and traditional thought and is more readily used for religion". Therefore, "field of dharma" implies the field of righteousness, where truth will eventually triumph, states Fowler. According to Jacqueline Hirst, the "field of dharma" phrase in the Gita epitomizes that the struggle concerns dharma itself. This dharma has "resonances at many different levels".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Unlike any other religious scripture, the Bhagavad Gita broadcasts its message in the centre of a battlefield. Several modern Indian writers have interpreted the battlefield setting as an allegory for "the war within". Eknath Easwaran writes that the Gitas subject is "the war within, the struggle for self-mastery that every human being must wage if he or she is to emerge from life victorious".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Swami Nikhilananda, takes Arjuna as an allegory of Ātman, Krishna as an allegory of Brahman, Arjuna's chariot as the body, and Dhritarashtra as the ignorant mind. Nikhilananda's allegorical interpretation is shared by Huston Smith. Swami Vivekananda interprets the first discourse in the Gita as well as the "Kurukshetra war" allegorically. Vivekananda states that "when we sum up its esoteric significance, it means the war which is constantly going on within man between the tendencies of good and evil".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, in his commentary on the Gita, interprets the battle as an allegory in which the battlefield is the soul and Arjuna embodies man's higher impulses struggling against evil.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: In Aurobindo's view, Krishna was a historical figure, but his significance in the Gita is as a "symbol of the divine dealings with humanity", while Arjuna typifies a "struggling human soul". However, Aurobindo rejected the interpretation that the Gita, and the "Mahabharata" by extension, is only "an allegory of the inner life", and it has nothing to do with our outward human life and actions.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Other scholars such as Steven Rosen, Laurie L. Patton and Stephen Mitchell have seen in the Gita a religious defense of the warrior class' (Kshatriya Varna) duty ("svadharma"), which is to wage war with courage. They do not see only an allegorical teaching but also a real defense of just war.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Indian independence leaders like Lala Lajpat Rai and Bal Gangadhar Tilak saw the Gita as a text which defended war when necessary and used it to promote armed rebellion against colonial rule. Lajpat Rai wrote an article on the "Message of the Bhagavad Gita". He saw the main message as the bravery and courage of Arjuna to fight as a warrior. Bal Gangadhar Tilak saw the Gita as defending killing when necessary for the betterment of society, such as, for example, the killing of Afzal Khan.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Liberation or "moksha" in Vedanta philosophy is not something that can be acquired. "Ātman" (Self) and Self-knowledge, along with the loss of egotistic ignorance, the goal of "moksha", is something that is always present as the essence of the self, and must be realized by each person by one's own effort. While the Upanishads largely uphold such a monistic viewpoint of liberation, the Bhagavad Gita also accommodates the dualistic and theistic aspects of "moksha". The Gita, while including impersonal "Nirguna Brahman" as the goal, mainly revolves around the relationship between the Self and a personal God or "Saguna Brahman". A synthesis of knowledge, devotion, and desireless action is offered by Krishna as a spectrum of choices to Arjuna; the same combination is suggested to the reader as a way to moksha. Christopher Chapple---a scholar focusing on Indian religions---in Winthrop Sargeant's translation of the Gita, states that "In the model presented by the Bhagavad Gita, every aspect of life is in fact a way of salvation."


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: According to Dennis Hudson, there is an overlap between Vedic and Tantric rituals within the teachings found in the Bhagavad Gita. He places the "Pancaratra Agama" in the last three or four centuries of 1st-millennium BCE, and proposes that both the tantric and vedic, the Agama and the Gita share the same Vāsudeva-Krishna roots. Some of the ideas in the Bhagavad Gita connect it to the "Shatapatha Brahmana" of "Yajurveda". The "Shatapatha Brahmana", for example, mentions the absolute Purusha who dwells in every human being. According to Hudson, a story in this Vedic text highlights the meaning of the name Vāsudeva as the 'shining one (deva) who dwells (vasu) in all things and in whom all things dwell', and the meaning of Vishnu to be the 'pervading actor'. In Bhagavad Gita, similarly, 'Krishna identified himself both with Vāsudeva, Vishnu and their meanings'. The ideas at the center of Vedic rituals in "Shatapatha Brahmana" and the teachings of the Bhagavad Gita revolve around this absolute Person, the primordial genderless absolute, which is the same as the goal of Pancaratra Agama and Tantra.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The first English translation of the Bhagavad Gita was published by Charles Wilkins in 1785. The Wilkins translation had an introduction to the Gita by Warren Hastings. Soon the work was translated into other European languages such as French (1787), German, and Russian. In 1849, the Weleyan Mission Press, Bangalore published "The Bhagavat-Geeta, Or, Dialogues of Krishna and Arjoon in Eighteen Lectures", with Sanskrit, Canarese and English in parallel columns, edited by Rev. John Garrett, with the effort being supported by Sir. Mark Cubbon.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: In 1981, Larson stated that "a complete listing of Gita translations and a related secondary bibliography would be nearly endless". According to Larson, there is "a massive translational tradition in English, pioneered by the British, solidly grounded philologically by the French and Germans, provided with its indigenous roots by a rich heritage of modern Indian comment and reflection, extended into various disciplinary areas by Americans, and having generated in our time a broadly based cross-cultural awareness of the importance of the Bhagavad Gita both as an expression of a specifically Indian spirituality and as one of the great religious "classics" of all time."


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: According to Sargeant, the Gita is "said to have been translated at least 200 times, in both poetic and prose forms". Richard Davis cites a count by Callewaert & Hemraj in 1982 of 1,891 translations of the Bhagavad Gita in 75 languages, including 273 in English. These translations vary, and are in part an interpretative reconstruction of the original Sanskrit text that differ in their "friendliness to the reader", and in the amount of "violence to the original Gita text".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The translations and interpretations of the Gita have been so diverse that these have been used to support apparently contradictory political and philosophical values. For example, Galvin Flood and Charles Martin note that interpretations of the Gita have been used to support "pacifism to aggressive nationalism" in politics, from "monism to theism" in philosophy. According to William Johnson, the synthesis of ideas in the Gita is such that it can bear almost any shade of interpretation. A translation "can never fully reproduce an original and no translation is transparent", states Richard Davis, but in the case of the Gita the linguistic and cultural distance for many translators is large and steep which adds to the challenge and affects the translation. For some native translators, their personal beliefs, motivations, and subjectivity affect their understanding, their choice of words and interpretation. Some translations by Indians, with or without Western co-translators, have "orientalist", "apologetic", "Neo-Vedantic" or "guru phenomenon" biases.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: According to the exegesis scholar Robert Minor, the Gita is "probably the most translated of any Asian text", but many modern versions heavily reflect the views of the organization or person who does the translating and distribution. In Minor's view, the Harvard scholar Franklin Edgerton's English translation and Richard Garbe's German translation are closer to the text than many others. According to Larson, the Edgerton translation is remarkably faithful, but it is "harsh, stilted, and syntactically awkward" with an "orientalist" bias and lacks "appreciation of the text's contemporary religious significance".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Gita has also been translated into European languages other than English. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, in the Mughal Empire, multiple Persian translations of the Gita were completed. In 1808, passages from the Gita were part of the first direct translation of Sanskrit into German, appearing in a book through which Friedrich Schlegel became known as the founder of Indian philology in Germany. The most significant French translation of the Gita, according to J. A. B. van Buitenen, was published by Émile Senart in 1922. More recently, a new French translation was produced by the Indologist Alain Porte in 2004. Swami Rambhadracharya released the first Braille version of the scripture, with the original Sanskrit text and a Hindi commentary, on 30 November 2007.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Gita Press has published the Gita in multiple Indian languages. R. Raghava Iyengar translated the Gita into Tamil in the sandam metre poetic form. The Bhaktivedanta Book Trust associated with ISKCON has re-translated and published A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada's 1972 English translation of the Gita in 56 non-Indian languages. Vinoba Bhave has written the Geeta in Marathi as Geetai (or "Mother Geeta") in a similar shloka form.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Paramahansa Yogananda's commentary on the Bhagavad Gita called "" has been translated into Spanish, German, Thai and Hindi so far. The book is significant in that unlike other commentaries of the Bhagavad Gita, which focus on karma yoga, jnana yoga, and bhakti yoga in relation to the Gita, Yogananda's work stresses the training of one's mind, or raja yoga.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Bhagavad Gita integrates various schools of thought, notably Vedanta, Samkhya and Yoga, and other theistic ideas. It remains a popular text for commentators belonging to various philosophical schools. However, its composite nature also leads to varying interpretations of the text and historic scholars have written "bhashya" (commentaries) on it. According to Mysore Hiriyanna, the Gita is "one of the hardest books to interpret, which accounts for the numerous commentaries on it—each differing from the rest in one essential point or the other".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: According to Richard Davis, the Gita has attracted much scholarly interest in Indian history and some 227 commentaries have survived in the Sanskrit language alone. It has also attracted commentaries in regional vernacular languages for centuries, such as the one by Sant Dnyaneshwar in Marathi (13th century).


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Bhagavad Gita is referred to in the "Brahma Sutras" and numerous scholars, including Shankara, Bhaskara, Abhinavagupta of the Shaivism tradition, Ramanuja and Madhvacharya, wrote commentaries on it. Many of these commentators state that the Gita is "meant to be a "moksa-shastra" ("moksasatra"), and not a "dharmasastra", an "arthasastra" or a "kamasastra"".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The oldest and most influential surviving commentary was published by Adi Shankara (Śaṅkarācārya). Shankara interprets the Gita in a monist, nondualistic tradition (Advaita Vedanta). Shankara prefaces his comments by stating that the Gita is popular among the laity, that the text has been studied and commented upon by earlier scholars (these texts have not survived), but that "I have found that to the laity it appears to teach diverse and quite contradictory doctrines". He calls the Gita "an epitome of the essentials of the whole Vedic teaching". To Shankara, the teaching of the Gita is to shift an individual's focus from the outer, impermanent, fleeting objects of desire and senses to the inner, permanent, eternal atman-Brahman-Vasudeva that is identical, in everything and in every being.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Abhinavagupta was a theologian and philosopher of the Kashmir Shaivism (Shiva) tradition. He wrote a commentary on the Gita as "Gitartha-Samgraha", which has survived into the modern era. The Gita text he commented on is a slightly different recension than the one of Adi Shankara. He interprets its teachings in the Shaiva Advaita (monism) tradition quite similar to Adi Shankara, but with the difference that he considers both Self and matter to be metaphysically real and eternal. Their respective interpretations of "jnana yoga" are also somewhat different, and Abhinavagupta uses Atman, Brahman, Shiva, and Krishna interchangeably. Abhinavagupta's commentary is notable for its citations of more ancient scholars, in a style similar to Adi Shankara. However, the texts he quotes have not survived into the modern era.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Ramanuja was a Hindu theologian, philosopher, and an exponent of the Sri Vaishnavism (Vishnu) tradition in 11th and early 12th century. Like his Vedanta peers, Ramanuja wrote a "bhashya" (commentary) on the Gita. Ramanuja's commentary disagreed with Adi Shankara's interpretation of the Gita as a text on nondualism (Self and Brahman are identical), and instead interpreted it as a form of dualistic and qualified monism (Vishishtadvaita).


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Madhva, a commentator of the Dvaita (modern taxonomy) Tatvavada (actually quoted by Madhva) Vedanta school, wrote a commentary on the Bhagavad Gita, which exemplifies the thinking of the Tatvavada school (Dvaita Vedanta). According to Christopher Chapelle, in Madhva's school there is "an eternal and complete distinction between the Supreme, the many Selfs, and matter and its divisions". His commentary on the Gita is called . Madhva's commentary has attracted secondary works by pontiffs of the Dvaita Vedanta monasteries such as Padmanabha Tirtha, Jayatirtha, and Raghavendra Tirtha.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Keśava Kāśmīri Bhaṭṭa, a commentator of Dvaitādvaita Vedanta school, wrote a commentary on the Bhagavad Gita named . The text states that "Dasasloki"—possibly authored by Nimbarka—teaches the essence of the Gita; the "Gita tattva prakashika" interprets the Gita also in a hybrid monist-dualist manner.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Vallabha, the proponent of "Suddhadvaita" or pure non-dualism, wrote a commentary on the Gita, the "Sattvadipika". According to him, the true Self is the Supreme Brahman. Bhakti is the most important means of attaining liberation.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: With its translation and study by Western scholars beginning in the early 18th century, the Bhagavad Gita gained a growing appreciation and popularity. According to the Indian historian and writer Khushwant Singh, Rudyard Kipling's famous poem "If—" is "the essence of the message of the Gita in English."


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Bhagavad Gita has been highly praised, not only by prominent Indians including Mahatma Gandhi and Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, but also by Aldous Huxley, Henry David Thoreau, J. Robert Oppenheimer, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Carl Jung, Herman Hesse, and Bülent Ecevit.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: At a time when Indian nationalists were seeking an indigenous basis for social and political action against colonial rule, Bhagavad Gita provided them with a rationale for their activism and fight against injustice. Bal Gangadhar Tilak and Mahatma Gandhi used the text to help inspire the Indian independence movement. Mahatma Gandhi expressed his love for the Gita in these words:


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: A. P. J. Abdul Kalam, 11th President of India, despite being a Muslim, used to read Bhagavad Gita and recite its mantras.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: J. Robert Oppenheimer, American physicist and director of the Manhattan Project, learned Sanskrit in 1933 and read the Bhagavad Gita in the original form, citing it later as one of the most influential books to shape his philosophy of life. Oppenheimer later recalled that, while witnessing the explosion of the Trinity nuclear test, he thought of verses from the Bhagavad Gita (XI,12):


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Ralph Waldo Emerson, remarked the following after his first study of the Gita, and thereafter frequently quoted the text in his journals and letters, particularly the "work with inner renunciation" idea in his writings on man's quest for spiritual energy:


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Narendra Modi, the 14th prime minister of India, called the Bhagavad Gita "India's biggest gift to the world". Modi gave a copy of it to the then President of the United States of America, Barack Obama in 2014 during his U.S. visit.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The world's largest Bhagavad Gita is in the ISKCON Temple Delhi, which is the world's largest sacred book of any religion. It weighs 800 kg and measures over 2.8 metres by 2.0 metres. It was unveiled by Narendra Modi, the Prime Minister of India on 26 February 2019. On 27 February 2021, the Bhagavad Gita, was launched into outer space in a SD card, on a PSLV-C51 rocket launched by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: In the Gita, Krishna persuades Arjuna to wage war where the enemy includes some of his own relatives and friends. In light of the "Ahimsa" (non-violence) teachings in Hindu scriptures, the Gita has been criticized as violating the "Ahimsa" value, or alternatively, as supporting political violence. The justification of political violence when peaceful protests and all else fails, states Varma, has been a "fairly common feature of modern Indian political thought" along with the "mighty antithesis of Gandhian thought on non-violence". During the independence movement in India, Hindus considered the active "burning and drowning of British goods". While technically illegal under colonial legislation, these acts were viewed as a moral and just war for the sake of liberty and righteous values of the type that the Gita discusses. According to Paul Schaffel the influential Hindu nationalist V.D. Savarkar "often turned to Hindu scripture such as the Bhagavad Gita, arguing that the text justified violence against those who would harm Mother India."


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: V. R. Narla, in his book length critique of the text titled "The Truth About the Gita," criticizes the ethical teachings of the Gita. He argues that the ethics of the Gita are so ambiguous, that one can use it to justify any ethical position. Narla argues that the Gita is mainly a theological argument in favor of the warrior ethos. Narla argues that the fact that the Gita tries constantly to make Arjuna kill his kin in order to gain a petty kingdom shows it is not a pacifist work. Narla compares the Krishna of the Gita with a modern day terrorist, who uses theology to excuse violence. Narla also cites D.D. Kosambi who argued that the apparent moral of the Gita is "kill your brother if duty calls, without passion; as long as you have faith in Me, all sins are forgiven...".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: In his "Myth and Reality", the Indian historian D.D. Kosambi argued that the Gita was written as a religious text that could provide support for the actions of the upper castes, including the warrior caste. These sort of exhortations to battle would not have been uncommon in ancient India as it was the job of Indian bards. Kosambi writes that in the Gita, "the high god repeatedly emphasizes the great virtue of non-killing ("ahimsa"), yet the entire discourse is an incentive to war." He also cites the Gita, which states: "if slain, you gain heaven; if victorious, the earth; so up, son of Kunti, and concentrate on fighting." Kosambi argues that the injunctions and excuses for killing found in the Gita are unethical.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Indian jurist and politician B. R. Ambedkar also saw the Gita's defense of violence based on the eternity of the soul (atman) as unethical. Ambedkar wrote that "to say that killing is no killing because what is killed is the body and not the soul is an unheard of defense of murder...If Krishna were to appear as a lawyer acting for a client who is being tried for murder and pleaded the defense set out by him in the Bhagvat Gita there is not the slightest doubt that he would be sent to the lunatic asylum."


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: In his introduction to his translation of the Gita, Purushottama Lal argues that while Arjuna appears as a pacifist, concerned with ahimsa, Krishna "is the militarist" who convinces him to kill. According to Lal, Krishna makes use of a "startling" argument to convince Arjuna to kill, which Lal outlines as "the atman is eternal; only the body dies; so go ahead and kill - you will kill only the body, the atman will remain unaffected [2:19-21]." Lal states that "there could hardly be a better example of forked-tongue speciousness." Lal further argues that: "the truth of the matter surely is that no rational refutation is possible of the essential humanist position that killing is wrong...many of the answers given by Krishna appear to be evasive and occasionally sophistic. When logic fails, Krishna apparently resorts to divine magic." According to Lal, in the Gita, Krishna "stuns Arjuna with a glorious 'revelation' of psychedelic intensity." This "confidence trick" is problematic for Lal, who sees Arjuna's plight as a "painful and honest problem that Krishna should have faced on its own terms, painfully and honestly, and did not."


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Mahatma Gandhi credited his commitment for "ahimsa" to the Gita. For Gandhi, the Gita is teaching that people should fight for justice and righteous values, that they should never meekly suffer injustice to avoid a war. According to the Indologist Ananya Vajpeyi, the Gita does not elaborate on the means or stages of war, nor on "ahimsa", except for stating that ""ahimsa" is virtuous and characterizes an awakened, steadfast, ethical man" in verses such as 13.7–10 and 16.1–5. For Gandhi, states Vajpeyi, "ahimsa" is the "relationship between self and other" as he and his fellow Indians battled against colonial rule. Gandhian ahimsa is in fact "the essence of the entire Gita", according to Vajpeyi. The teachings of the Gita on "ahimsa" are ambiguous, states Arvind Sharma, and this is best exemplified by the fact that Nathuram Godse stated the Gita as his inspiration to do his dharma after he assassinated Mahatma Gandhi. Thomas Merton, the Trappist monk and author of books on Zen Buddhism, concurs with Gandhi and states that the Gita is not teaching violence nor propounding a "make war" ideology. Instead, it is teaching peace and discussing one's duty to examine what is right and then act with pure intentions, when one faces difficult and repugnant choices.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Gita has been cited and criticized as a Hindu text that supports "varna-dharma" and the caste system. B. R. Ambedkar, born in a Dalit family and the principal architect of the Constitution of India, criticized the text for its stance on caste and for "defending certain dogmas of religion on philosophical grounds". According to Jimmy Klausen, Ambedkar in his essay "Krishna and his Gita" stated that the Gita was a "tool" of Brahmanical Hinduism and for its latter-day saints such as Mahatma Gandhi and Lokmanya Tilak. To Ambedkar, states Klausen, it is a text of "mostly barbaric, religious particularisms" offering "a defence of the "kshatriya" duty to make war and kill, the assertion that "varna" derives from birth rather than worth or aptitude, and the injunction to perform "karma"" neither perfunctorily nor egotistically.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: In his "Myth and Reality", D.D. Kosambi argued that "practically anything can be read into the Gita by a determined person, without denying the validity of a class system." Kosambi argued that the Gita was a scripture that supported the superiority of the higher varnas while seeing all other varnas as "defiled by their very birth, though they may in after-life be freed by their faith in the god who degrades them so casually in this one." He quotes the Gita which states that Krishna says "The four-caste (class) division has been created by Me." Similarly, V. R. Narla also argues that the Gita states that God created the caste (varna) system. Narla also critiques the Gita for stating that those who are not kshatriyas or brahmins are "born from sinful wombs".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The Gita presents its teaching in the context of a war where the warrior Arjuna is in inner crisis about whether he should renounce and abandon the battlefield, or fight and kill the enemy (which includes many relatives and friends of his). He is advised by Krishna to do his "sva-dharma", a term that has been variously interpreted. According to the Indologist Paul Hacker, the contextual meaning in the Gita is the "dharma of a particular varna". In this case, Arjuna is part of the warrior ("kshatriya") varna (social class), so Krishna is telling Arjuna to do what warrior social class must do by virtue of his belonging to that class.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Neo-Hindus such as Bankim Chandra Chatterjee, states Hacker, have preferred to not translate it in those terms, or "dharma" as religion, but leave "Gita's" message as "everyone must follow his "sva-dharma"". According to Chatterjee, the Hindus already understand the meaning of that term. To render it in English for non-Hindus for its better understanding, one must ask "what is the sva-dharma for the non-Hindus"? The Lord, states Chatterjee, created millions and millions of people, and he did not ordain "dharma" only for Indians [Hindus] and "make all the others dharma-less", for "are not the non-Hindus also his children"? According to Chatterjee, the Krishna's religion of Gita is "not so narrow-minded". This argument, states Hacker, is an attempt to "universalize Hinduism".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Nadkarni and Zelliot present the opposite view, citing early Bhakti saints of the Krishna-tradition such as the 13th-century saint Dnyaneshwar. According to Dnyaneshwar, the Gita starts off with the discussion of "sva-dharma" in Arjuna's context but ultimately shows that caste differences are not important. For Dnyaneshwar, people err when they see themselves distinct from each other and Krishna, and these distinctions vanish as soon as they accept, understand and enter with love unto Krishna.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: According to Swami Vivekananda, "sva-dharma" in the Gita does not mean "caste duty", rather it means the duty that comes with one's life situation (mother, father, husband, wife) or profession (soldier, judge, teacher, doctor). For Vivekananda, the Gita was an egalitarian scripture that rejected caste and other hierarchies because of its verses such as 13.27—28, which states "He who sees the Supreme Lord dwelling equally in all beings, the Imperishable in things that perish, he sees verily. For seeing the Lord as the same everywhere present, he does not destroy the Self by the Self, and thus he goes to the highest goal."


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Aurobindo modernises the concept of "dharma" by internalising it, away from the social order and its duties towards one's personal capacities, which leads to a radical individualism, "finding the fulfilment of the purpose of existence in the individual alone." He deduced from the Gita the doctrine that "the functions of a man ought to be determined by his natural turn, gift, and capacities", that the individual should "develop freely" and thereby would be best able to serve society.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Gandhi's view differed from Aurobindo's view. He recognised in the concept of "sva-dharma" his idea of "svadeshi" (sometimes spelled "swadeshi"), the idea that "man owes his service above all to those who are nearest to him by birth and situation." To him, "svadeshi" was ""sva-dharma" applied to one's immediate environment."


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: According to Jacqueline Hirst, the universalist neo-Hindu interpretations of "dharma" in the Gita are modernist readings, though any study of pre-modern distant foreign cultures is inherently subject to suspicions about "control of knowledge" and bias on the various sides. Hindus have their own understanding of "dharma" that goes much beyond the Gita or any particular Hindu text. Further, states Hirst, the Gita should be seen as a "unitary text" in its entirety rather than a particular verse analyzed separately or out of context. Krishna is presented as a teacher who "drives Arjuna and the reader beyond initial preconceptions". The Gita is a cohesively knit pedagogic text, not a list of norms.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Novel interpretations of the Gita, along with apologetics on it, have been a part of the modern era revisionism and renewal movements within Hinduism. Bankim Chandra Chatterji, the author of "Vande Mataram" – the national song of India, challenged orientalist literature on Hinduism and offered his interpretations of the Gita, states Ajit Ray. Bal Gangadhar Tilak interpreted the "karma yoga" teachings in Gita as a "doctrine of liberation" taught by Hinduism, while Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan stated that the Bhagavad Gita teaches a universalist religion and the "essence of Hinduism" along with the "essence of all religions", rather than a private religion.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Vivekananda's works contained numerous references to the Gita, such as his lectures on the four yogas – Bhakti, Jnana, Karma, and Raja. Through the message of the Gita, Vivekananda sought to energise the people of India to reclaim their dormant but strong identity. Aurobindo saw Bhagavad Gita as a "scripture of the future religion" and suggested that Hinduism had acquired a much wider relevance through the Gita. Sivananda called Bhagavad Gita "the most precious jewel of Hindu literature" and suggested its introduction into the curriculum of Indian schools and colleges.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: According to Ronald Neufeldt, it was the Theosophical Society that dedicated much attention and energy to the allegorical interpretation of the Gita, along with religious texts from around the world, after 1885 and given H. P. Blavatsky, Subba Rao and Anne Besant writings. Their attempt was to present their "universalist religion". These late 19th-century theosophical writings called the Gita as a "path of true spirituality" and "teaching nothing more than the basis of every system of philosophy and scientific endeavor", triumphing over other "Samkhya paths" of Hinduism that "have degenerated into superstition and demoralized India by leading people away from practical action".


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: Philip Glass retold the story of Gandhi's early development as an activist in South Africa through the text of the Gita in the opera "Satyagraha" (1979). The entire libretto of the opera consists of sayings from the Gita sung in the original Sanskrit.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: In Douglas Cuomo's "Arjuna's dilemma", the philosophical dilemma faced by Arjuna is dramatised in operatic form with a blend of Indian and Western music styles.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The 1993 Sanskrit film, "Bhagavad Gita", directed by G. V. Iyer won the 1993 National Film Award for Best Film.


title: Bhagavad Gita

text: The 1995 novel by Steven Pressfield, and its adaptation as the 2000 golf movie "The Legend of Bagger Vance" by Robert Redford has parallels to the Bhagavad Gita, according to Steven J. Rosen. Steven Pressfield acknowledges that the Gita was his inspiration, the golfer character in his novel is Arjuna, the caddie is Krishna, states Rosen. The movie, however, uses the plot but glosses over the teachings unlike in the novel.


title: Burkina Faso

text: Burkina Faso (, ; , ) is a landlocked country in West Africa with an area of , bordered by Mali to the northwest, Niger to the northeast, Benin to the southeast, Togo and Ghana to the south, and the Ivory Coast to the southwest. It has a population of 20,321,378. Previously called Republic of Upper Volta (1958–1984), it was renamed Burkina Faso by President Thomas Sankara. Its citizens are known as "Burkinabè" ( ), and its capital and largest city is Ouagadougou.


title: Burkina Faso

text: The largest ethnic group in Burkina Faso is the Mossi people, who settled the area in the 11th and 13th centuries. They established powerful kingdoms such as the Ouagadougou, Tenkodogo, and Yatenga. In 1896, it was colonized by the French as part of French West Africa; in 1958, Upper Volta became a self-governing colony within the French Community. In 1960, it gained full independence with Maurice Yaméogo as president. Throughout the decades post independence, the country was subject to instability, droughts, famines and corruption. Various coups have also taken place in the country, in 1966, 1980, 1982, 1983, 1987, and twice in 2022, in January and in September, as well as an attempt in 1989 and another in 2015.


title: Burkina Faso

text: Thomas Sankara served as the country's president from 1982 until he was killed in the 1987 coup led by Blaise Compaoré, who became president and ruled the country until his removal on 31 October 2014. Sankara had conducted an ambitious socioeconomic programme which included a nationwide literacy campaign, land redistribution to peasants, railway and road construction, and the outlawing of female genital mutilation, forced marriages, and polygamy.


title: Burkina Faso

text: Burkina Faso has been severely affected by the rise of Islamist terrorism in the Sahel since the mid-2010s. Several militias, partly allied with the Islamic State (IS) or al-Qaeda, operate in Burkina Faso and across the border in Mali and Niger. More than one million of the country's 21 million inhabitants are internally displaced persons. Burkina Faso's military seized power in a coup d'état on 23–24 January 2022, overthrowing President Roch Marc Kaboré. On 31 January, the military junta restored the constitution and appointed Paul-Henri Sandaogo Damiba as interim president, who was himself overthrown in a second coup on 30 September and replaced by military captain Ibrahim Traoré.


title: Burkina Faso

text: Burkina Faso is one of the least developed countries with a GDP of $16.226 billion. Approximately 63.8 percent of its population practices Islam, while 26.3 percent practice Christianity. The country's official language of government and business is French. There are 60 indigenous languages officially recognized by the Burkinabè government, with the most common language, Mooré, spoken by over half the population. The country is governed as a semi-presidential republic with executive, legislative and judicial powers. Burkina Faso is a member of the United Nations, La Francophonie and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation. It is currently suspended from ECOWAS and the African Union.


title: Burkina Faso

text: Formerly the Republic of Upper Volta, the country was renamed "Burkina Faso" on 4 August 1984 by then-President Thomas Sankara. The words "Burkina" and "Faso" stem from different languages spoken in the country: "Burkina" comes from Mossi and means "upright", showing how the people are proud of their integrity, while "Faso" comes from the Dioula language (as written in N'Ko: "faso") and means "fatherland" (literally, "father's house"). The "-bè" suffix added onto "Burkina" to form the demonym "Burkinabè" comes from the Fula language and means "women or men". The CIA summarizes the etymology as "land of the honest (incorruptible) men".


title: Burkina Faso

text: The French colony of Upper Volta was named for its location on the upper courses of the Volta River (the Black, Red and White Volta).


title: Burkina Faso

text: The northwestern part of present-day Burkina Faso was populated by hunter-gatherers from 14000 BCE to 5000 BCE. Their tools, including scrapers, chisels and arrowheads, were discovered in 1973 through archaeological excavations. Agricultural settlements were established between 3600 and 2600 BCE. The Bura culture was an Iron-Age civilization centred in the southwest portion of modern-day Niger and in the southeast part of contemporary Burkina Faso. Iron industry, in smelting and forging for tools and weapons, had developed in Sub-Saharan Africa by 1200 BCE. To date, the oldest evidence of iron smelting found in Burkina Faso dates from 800 to 700 BC and form part of the Ancient Ferrous Metallurgy World Heritage Site. From the 3rd to the 13th centuries CE, the Iron Age Bura culture existed in the territory of present-day southeastern Burkina Faso and southwestern Niger. Various ethnic groups of present-day Burkina Faso, such as the Mossi, Fula and Dioula, arrived in successive waves between the 8th and 15th centuries. From the 11th century, the Mossi people established several separate kingdoms.


title: Burkina Faso

text: There is debate about the exact dates when Burkina Faso's many ethnic groups arrived to the area. The Proto-Mossi arrived in the far Eastern part of what is today Burkina Faso sometime between the 8th and 11th centuries, the Samo arrived around the 15th century, the Dogon lived in Burkina Faso's north and northwest regions until sometime in the 15th or 16th centuries and many of the other ethnic groups that make up the country's population arrived in the region during this time.


title: Burkina Faso

text: During the Middle Ages, the Mossi established several separate kingdoms including those of Tenkodogo, Yatenga, Zandoma, and Ouagadougou. Sometime between 1328 and 1338 Mossi warriors raided Timbuktu but the Mossi were defeated by Sonni Ali of Songhai at the Battle of Kobi in Mali in 1483.


title: Burkina Faso

text: During the early 16th century the Songhai conducted many slave raids into what is today Burkina Faso. During the 18th century the Gwiriko Empire was established at Bobo Dioulasso and ethnic groups such as the Dyan, Lobi, and Birifor settled along the Black Volta.


title: Burkina Faso

text: Starting in the early 1890s during the European Scramble for Africa, a series of European military officers made attempts to claim parts of what is today Burkina Faso. At times these colonialists and their armies fought the local peoples; at times they forged alliances with them and made treaties. The colonialist officers and their home governments also made treaties among themselves. The territory of Burkina Faso was invaded by France, becoming a French protectorate in 1896.


title: Burkina Faso

text: The eastern and western regions, where a standoff against the forces of the powerful ruler Samori Ture complicated the situation, came under French occupation in 1897. By 1898, the majority of the territory corresponding to Burkina Faso was nominally conquered; however, French control of many parts remained uncertain.


title: Burkina Faso

text: The Franco-British Convention of 14 June 1898 created the country's modern borders. In the French territory, a war of conquest against local communities and political powers continued for about five years. In 1904, the largely pacified territories of the Volta basin were integrated into the Upper Senegal and Niger colony of French West Africa as part of the reorganization of the French West African colonial empire. The colony had its capital in Bamako.


title: Burkina Faso

text: The language of colonial administration and schooling became French. The public education system started from humble origins. Advanced education was provided for many years during the colonial period in Dakar.


title: Burkina Faso

text: The indigenous population was highly discriminated against. For example, African children were not allowed to ride bicycles or pick fruit from trees, "privileges" reserved for the children of colonists. Violating these regulations could land parents in jail.


title: Burkina Faso

text: Draftees from the territory participated in the European fronts of World War I in the battalions of the Senegalese Rifles. Between 1915 and 1916, the districts in the western part of what is now Burkina Faso and the bordering eastern fringe of Mali became the stage of one of the most important armed oppositions to colonial government: the Volta-Bani War.


title: Burkina Faso

text: The French government finally suppressed the movement but only after suffering defeats. It also had to organize its largest expeditionary force of its colonial history to send into the country to suppress the insurrection. Armed opposition wracked the Sahelian north when the Tuareg and allied groups of the Dori region ended their truce with the government.


title: Burkina Faso

text: French Upper Volta was established on 1 March 1919. The French feared a recurrence of armed uprising and had related economic considerations. To bolster its administration, the colonial government separated the present territory of Burkina Faso from Upper Senegal and Niger.


title: Burkina Faso

text: The new colony was named "Haute Volta," named for its location on the upper courses of the Volta River (the Black, Red and White Volta), and François Charles Alexis Édouard Hesling became its first governor. Hesling initiated an ambitious road-making program to improve infrastructure and promoted the growth of cotton for export. The cotton policy – based on coercion – failed, and revenue generated by the colony stagnated. The colony was dismantled on 5 September 1932, being split between the French colonies of Ivory Coast, French Sudan and Niger. Ivory Coast received the largest share, which contained most of the population as well as the cities of Ouagadougou and Bobo-Dioulasso.


title: Burkina Faso

text: France reversed this change during the period of intense anti-colonial agitation that followed the end of World War II. On 4 September 1947, it revived the colony of Upper Volta, with its previous boundaries, as a part of the French Union. The French designated its colonies as departments of metropolitan France on the European continent.


title: Burkina Faso

text: On 11 December 1958 the colony achieved self-government as the Republic of Upper Volta; it joined the Franco-African Community. A revision in the organization of French Overseas Territories had begun with the passage of the Basic Law (Loi Cadre) of 23 July 1956. This act was followed by reorganization measures approved by the French parliament early in 1957 to ensure a large degree of self-government for individual territories. Upper Volta became an autonomous republic in the French community on 11 December 1958. Full independence from France was received in 1960.


title: Burkina Faso

text: The Republic of Upper Volta () was established on 11 December 1958 as a self-governing colony within the French Community. The name "Upper Volta" related to the nation's location along the upper reaches of the Volta River. The river's three tributaries are called the Black, White and Red Volta. These were expressed in the three colors of the former national flag.


title: Burkina Faso

text: Before attaining autonomy, it had been French Upper Volta and part of the French Union. On 5 August 1960, it attained full independence from France. The first president, Maurice Yaméogo, was the leader of the Voltaic Democratic Union (UDV). The 1960 constitution provided for election by universal suffrage of a president and a national assembly for five-year terms. Soon after coming to power, Yaméogo banned all political parties other than the UDV. The government lasted until 1966. After much unrest, including mass demonstrations and strikes by students, labor unions, and civil servants, the military intervened.


title: Burkina Faso

text: The 1966 military coup deposed Yaméogo, suspended the constitution, dissolved the National Assembly, and placed Lt. Col. Sangoulé Lamizana at the head of a government of senior army officers. The army remained in power for four years. On 14 June 1976, the Voltans ratified a new constitution that established a four-year transition period toward complete civilian rule. Lamizana remained in power throughout the 1970s as president of military or mixed civil-military governments. Lamizana's rule coincided with the beginning of the Sahel drought and famine which had a devastating impact on Upper Volta and neighboring countries. After conflict over the 1976 constitution, a new constitution was written and approved in 1977. Lamizana was re-elected by open elections in 1978.


title: Burkina Faso

text: Lamizana's government faced problems with the country's traditionally powerful trade unions, and on 25 November 1980, Col. Saye Zerbo overthrew President Lamizana in a bloodless coup. Colonel Zerbo established the Military Committee of Recovery for National Progress as the supreme governmental authority, thus eradicating the 1977 constitution.


title: Burkina Faso

text: Colonel Zerbo also encountered resistance from trade unions and was overthrown two years later by Maj. Dr. Jean-Baptiste Ouédraogo and the Council of Popular Salvation (CSP) in the 1982 Upper Voltan coup d'état. The CSP continued to ban political parties and organizations, yet promised a transition to civilian rule and a new constitution.


title: Burkina Faso

text: Infighting developed between the right and left factions of the CSP. The leader of the leftists, Capt. Thomas Sankara, was appointed prime minister in January 1983, but was subsequently arrested. Efforts to free him, directed by Capt. Blaise Compaoré, resulted in a military coup d'état on 4 August 1983.


title: Burkina Faso

text: The coup brought Sankara to power and his government began to implement a series of revolutionary programs which included mass-vaccinations, infrastructure improvements, the expansion of women's rights, encouragement of domestic agricultural consumption, and anti-desertification projects.


title: Burkina Faso

text: On 2 August 1984, on President Sankara's initiative, the country's name changed from "Upper Volta" to "Burkina Faso", or "land of the honest men"; (the literal translation is "land of the upright men".) The presidential decree was confirmed by the National Assembly on 4 August. The demonym for people of Burkina Faso, "Burkinabè", includes expatriates or descendants of people of Burkinabè origin.


title: Burkina Faso

text: Sankara's government comprised the National Council for the Revolution (CNR – ), with Sankara as its president, and established popular Committees for the Defense of the Revolution (CDRs). The Pioneers of the Revolution youth programme was also established.


title: Burkina Faso

text: Sankara launched an ambitious socioeconomic programme for change, one of the largest ever undertaken on the African continent. His foreign policies centred on anti-imperialism, with his government rejecting all foreign aid, pushing for odious debt reduction, nationalising all land and mineral wealth and averting the power and influence of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank. His domestic policies included a nationwide literacy campaign, land redistribution to peasants, railway and road construction and the outlawing of female genital mutilation, forced marriages and polygamy.


title: Burkina Faso

text: Sankara pushed for agrarian self-sufficiency and promoted public health by vaccinating 2,500,000 children against meningitis, yellow fever, and measles. His national agenda also included planting over 10,000,000 trees to halt the growing desertification of the Sahel. Sankara called on every village to build a medical dispensary and had over 350 communities build schools with their own labour.


title: Burkina Faso

text: In the 1980s, when ecological awareness was still very low, Thomas Sankara, was one of the few African leaders to consider environmental protection a priority. He engaged in three major battles: against bush fires "which will be considered as crimes and will be punished as such"; against cattle roaming "which infringes on the rights of peoples because unattended animals destroy nature"; and against the anarchic cutting of firewood "whose profession will have to be organized and regulated". As part of a development program involving a large part of the population, ten million trees were planted in Burkina Faso in fifteen months during the revolution. To face the advancing desert and recurrent droughts, Thomas Sankara also proposed the planting of wooded strips of about fifty kilometers, crossing the country from east to west. He then thought of extending this vegetation belt to other countries. Cereal production, close to 1.1 billion tons before 1983, was predicted to rise to 1.6 billion tons in 1987. Jean Ziegler, former UN special rapporteur for the right to food, said that the country "had become food self-sufficient."


title: Burkina Faso

text: On 15 October 1987, Sankara, along with twelve other officials, was assassinated in a coup d'état organized by Blaise Compaoré, Sankara's former colleague, who would go on to serve as Burkina Faso's president from October 1987 until October 2014. After the coup and although Sankara was known to be dead, some CDRs mounted an armed resistance to the army for several days. A majority of Burkinabè citizens hold that France's foreign ministry, the Quai d'Orsay, was behind Compaoré in organizing the coup. There is some evidence for France's support of the coup.


title: Burkina Faso

text: Compaoré gave as one of the reasons for the coup the deterioration in relations with neighbouring countries. Compaoré argued that Sankara had jeopardised foreign relations with the former colonial power (France) and with neighbouring Ivory Coast. Following the coup Compaoré immediately reversed the nationalizations, overturned nearly all of Sankara's policies, returned the country back into the IMF fold, and ultimately spurned most of Sankara's legacy. Following an alleged coup-attempt in 1989, Compaoré introduced limited democratic reforms in 1990. Under the new (1991) constitution, Compaoré was re-elected without opposition in December 1991. In 1998 Compaoré won election in a landslide. In 2004, 13 people were tried for plotting a coup against President Compaoré and the coup's alleged mastermind was sentenced to life imprisonment. , Burkina Faso remained one of the least-developed countries in the world.


title: Burkina Faso

text: Compaoré's government played the role of negotiator in several West-African disputes, including the 2010–11 Ivorian crisis, the Inter-Togolese Dialogue (2007), and the 2012 Malian Crisis.


title: Burkina Faso

text: Between February and April 2011, the death of a schoolboy provoked protests throughout the country, coupled with a military mutiny and a magistrates' strike.


title: Burkina Faso

text: Starting on 28 October 2014 protesters began to march and demonstrate in Ouagadougou against President Blaise Compaoré, who appeared ready to amend the constitution and extend his 27-year rule. On 30 October some protesters set fire to the parliament building and took over the national TV headquarters. Ouagadougou International Airport closed and MPs suspended the vote on changing the constitution (the change would have allowed Compaoré to stand for re-election in 2015). Later in the day, the military dissolved all government institutions and imposed a curfew.


title: Burkina Faso

text: On 31 October 2014, President Compaoré, facing mounting pressure, resigned after 27 years in office. Lt. Col. Isaac Zida said that he would lead the country during its transitional period before the planned 2015 presidential election, but there were concerns over his close ties to the former president. In November 2014 opposition parties, civil-society groups and religious leaders adopted a plan for a transitional authority to guide Burkina Faso to elections. Under the plan Michel Kafando became the transitional President of Burkina Faso and Lt. Col. Zida became the acting Prime Minister and Defense Minister.


title: Burkina Faso

text: On 16 September 2015, the Regiment of Presidential Security (RSP) seized the country's president and prime minister and then declared the National Council for Democracy the new national government. However, on 22 September 2015, the coup leader, Gilbert Diendéré, apologized and promised to restore civilian government. On 23 September 2015 the prime minister and interim president were restored to power.


title: Burkina Faso

text: General elections took place in Burkina Faso on 29 November 2015. Roch Marc Christian Kaboré won the election in the first round with 53.5% of the vote, defeating businessman Zéphirin Diabré, who took 29.7%. Kaboré was sworn in as president on 29 December 2015.


title: Burkina Faso

text: In 2020 general election, President Roch Marc Christian Kaboré was re-elected. However, his party Mouvement du people MPP, failed to reach absolute parliamentary majority. It secured 56 seats out of a total of 127. The Congress for Democracy and Progress (CDP), the party of former President Blaise Compaoré, was distant second with 20 seats.


title: Burkina Faso

text: In February 2016 a terrorist attack occurred at the Splendid Hotel and Capuccino café-bar in the centre of Ouagadougou: 30 people died. Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) and Al-Mourabitoun, two groups which until then had mostly operated in neighbouring Mali, claimed responsibility for the attack. Since then, similar groups have carried out numerous attacks in the northern and eastern parts of the country. One terrorist attack occurred on the evening of Friday, 11 October 2019, on a mosque in the village of Salmossi near the border with Mali, leaving 16 people dead and two injured.


title: Burkina Faso

text: On 8 July 2020, the United States raised concerns after a Human Rights Watch report revealed mass graves with at least 180 bodies, which were found in northern Burkina Faso where soldiers were fighting jihadists.


title: Burkina Faso

text: On 4 June 2021, the Associated Press reported that according to the government of Burkina Faso, gunmen killed at least 100 people in Solhan village in northern Burkina Faso near the Niger border. A local market and several homes were also burned down. A government spokesman blamed jihadists. This was the deadliest attack recorded in Burkina Faso since the West African country was overrun by jihadists linked to al-Qaida and the Islamic State about five years ago, said Heni Nsaibia, senior researcher at the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project.


title: Burkina Faso

text: Christians in Burkina Faso have been specifically targeted in a number of occasions. Catholic priest Joël Yougbaré was abducted in 2019 and as of November 2022 had not been heard of again, and American sister Suellen Tennyson was kidnapped in April 2022, and released in August. After a series of other attacks on Christian targets, a Burkinabé priest told Aid to the Church in Need that direct persecution of Christians was increasing in the country.


title: Burkina Faso

text: In a successful coup on 24 January 2022, mutinying soldiers arrested and deposed President Roch Marc Christian Kaboré following gunfire. The Patriotic Movement for Safeguard and Restoration (MPSR) supported by the military declared itself to be in power, led by Lieutenant Colonel Paul-Henri Sandaogo Damiba. On 31 January, the military junta restored the constitution and appointed Damiba interim president. In the aftermath of the coup, ECOWAS and the African Union suspended Burkina Faso's membership. On 10 February, the Constitutional Council declared Damiba president of Burkina Faso. He was sworn in as President on 16 February. On 1 March 2022, the junta approved a charter allowing a military-led transition of 3 years. The charter provides for the transition process to be followed by the holding of elections. President Kaboré, who had been detained since the military junta took power, was released on 6 April 2022.


title: Burkina Faso

text: On 30 September, Damiba was ousted in a military coup led by Capt. Ibrahim Traoré. This came eight months after Damiba seized power. The rationale given by Traore for the coup d'état was the purported inability of Paul-Henri Sandaogo Damiba to deal with an Islamist insurgency. Damiba resigned and left the country. On 6 October 2022, Captain Ibrahim Traore was officially appointed as president of Burkina Faso. Apollinaire Joachim Kyélem de Tambèla was appointed interim Prime Minister on 21 October 2022.


title: Burkina Faso

text: With French help, Blaise Compaoré seized power in a coup d'état in 1987. He overthrew his long-time friend and ally Thomas Sankara, who was killed in the coup.


title: Burkina Faso

text: The constitution of 2 June 1991 established a semi-presidential government: its parliament could be dissolved by the President of the Republic, who was to be elected for a term of seven years. In 2000, the constitution was amended to reduce the presidential term to five years and set term limits to two, preventing successive re-election. The amendment took effect during the 2005 elections. If passed beforehand, it would have prevented Compaoré from being reelected.


title: Burkina Faso

text: Other presidential candidates challenged the election results. But in October 2005, the constitutional council ruled that, because Compaoré was the sitting president in 2000, the amendment would not apply to him until the end of his second term in office. This cleared the way for his candidacy in the 2005 election. On 13 November 2005, Compaoré was reelected in a landslide, because of a divided political opposition.