By: C.S. Dinesh
Sai Baba identified himself with Brahma Vishnu and Maheshwara.
“I am mighty Maha Kala, the eternal Time-spirit, the destroyer of the worlds. I am out to exterminate these people. Even without you all those warriors, arrayed in the enemy’s camp shall die.” This Bhagwad Gita’s verse 11: 32 became very famous because of a film on the physicist, Robert Oppenheimer, in which he was shown reciting it when the first Atom Bomb was detonated in 1945 in New Mexico.
Time occupies a central place in the Indic philosophical tradition. For example, in the Yoga Sutras, section I, verse 26, Patanjali clearly states that Ishwar – the creator of the Universe — is beyond Time. Sai Satcharita reverberates this concept through Sai Baba.
In the Indian philosophical system, it is also believed that in the beginning three forces, sattva, rajas, and tamas were in equilibrium. When the equilibrium was disturbed, Vedas state that the Universe came into being, though there is no explanation for why and how it happened.
This tallies with the modern concept of the time-space matrix. In the beginning, time and space were together and in equilibrium. We do not know how this equilibrium was disturbed. But once it did, time came out and space started flowing and that was the beginning of the Universe.
Time, therefore, occupies a unique position in the scheme of things. So, when Krishna says. “I have become Time”, he shows Arjuna his divine attribute by saying he has presently come down from being ‘beyond time’ to become it; and with time running its course the Universe has a beginning and an end. And that is what Krishna implies in the verse that all warriors on the Mahabharata battlefield will die, irrespective of what one does or does not do.
Ancient Indians understood the concept of time and space and it is very prominently mentioned in Patanjali Yoga Sutras. There are close to 20 sutras in it on the concept of time.
Incidentally, verse 11:32 is the only verse in the Gita on the concept of Time. The Gita, some believe, is the distillation of all the yogic systems practiced in India and thus this verse has a great meaning.
Regarding all our ancient texts, we are not quite sure whether what we have today about them, is really the original text or something else. This is because they were transmitted by oral tradition and not by writing. With time, the text could have been corrupted or lost.
Since these scriptures talked about complex things like space-time and the origin of the Universe, probably enigmatic verses were either omitted or distorted. The same could be true of Gita also.
Interestingly, Krishna decided to show Arjuna his Viratroopa, the divine, form as written in Chapter 11 which was basically about galaxy formation, brighter than a thousand suns, and a glimpse of black hole creation. So, from the discussion of how to live a good life and follow a great Kshatriya dharma, Krishna talks about space-time and the origin of the Universe. This was quite a leap of imagination on the part of Gita’s author.
Nevertheless, one hopes that anything – book, film, or documentary on Oppenheimer encouraged young people to study the Gita and understand its true meaning.
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