What is Anger (क्रोध )?
Bhagavad Gita Verse 2.62 Explained
Introduction
Bhagavad Gita is a conversation between Krishna and Arjun. This dialogue begins just before the war of Mahabharata is about to begin. On seeing his family in opposition, Arjun is gripped with fear and confusion and wants to run away, but Krishna convinces him to fight and tells Arjun why he today must raise his weapons to kill his brothers and relatives in this war.
Bhagavad Gita teaches us how to live life!
The core message of the Bhagavad Gita is considered very powerful for it can fundamentally transform the way you live your life. Bhagavad Gita is also called a summary of Vendantic Knowledge or simply ancient Knowledge.
Bhagavad Gita is crystallized form of the Hindu thought.
Bhagavad Gita is 700 verses long, spread across 18 chapters. Here we will understand Verse 62 of Chapter 2 of the Bhagavad Gita.
Verse 2.62
ध्यायतो विषयान्पुंस: सङ्गस्तेषूपजायते |
सङ्गात्सञ्जायते काम: कामात्क्रोधोऽभिजायते || 62||
dhyayato vishayan pumsah sangas teshupajayate
sangat sabjayate kamah kamat krodho abhijayate
Translation
While thinking about sense objects, one develops an attachment to them. This attachment gives birth to Desire and from this desire is born Anger (क्रोध).
Commentary
In this verse Krishna mentions “Anger” (क्रोध)for the first time in Bhagavad Gita. Up till now, Krishna has spoken deeply on “Desire” but never on Anger.
Let’s understand this verse and understand what Anger really is.
What is Anger?
Krishna says that Anger is born out of Desire.
An unfulfilled Desire gives birth to Anger
Krishna says that one who indulges with sense objects, over a period of time he develops attachment to such sense objects. This attachment give rise to craving of indulging more with these sense objects. This craving is nothing but Desire. As long as this Desire is being fulfilled, a person experiences pleasure and remains satisfied. But this fulfilment makes the Desire even stronger. The craving increases. He wants more of what he craves or he wants to consume what he wants in a different manner or in a different setting. Thus Desire gives way to a stronger desire or morphs into a different Desire. But the Desire remains.
When Desire is not fulfilled, then a person experiences aversion and discontentment. This is like a spark of disappointment, which with time grows into a fire of Anger!
Nothing causes more Anger than Love!
Let’s take an example:
Love between a man and woman is a very strong form of Desire. When a boy and a girl fall in love in their early twenties, the love is intense. It is intense emotionally, physically, and psychologically. The rush of hormones make the lovers feel that nothing in life is more important than the love they are experiencing.
However this love can very easily transform into hate. And it often so happens that great love is born from a seed of hate.
When two lovers meet early on, during the wooing and flirting phase of their relationship, there is a part jealously, an element of hate between both these people. They hate a few aspects about their lover’s life. The girl hates it when the boy doesn’t give her attention. The boy hates it when the girl ignores him. The girl hates the other women who are likely to attract her lover. The boy hates the men who want to lure her girl. This very hatred, gives birth to intense love.
The seeds of love are planted by mild hatred.
After all hate is also an equally intense emotion as love, and it takes split of a second for this hate to transform into love.
Love and Hate are the two sides of the same coin!
Hence great love stories always start with mild jealousy and great rivalries start with some love.
When trust is broken, hate is born like a spark which when given the fuel of jealously transforms into a fire of anger
Hence breakups between lovers in their early years are often rough. The love which there once was, burning like an intense flame, gets transformed into a raging volcano of anger.
Love is attachment morphed into an intense Desire. Hence when this Desire is not fulfilled, it gives way to intense Anger!
Attachment leads to Desire
Desire is indeed a habit of mind. The mind craves for what it likes. At a neuro-chemical level, when a Desire is met, different neuro-chemicals like Dopamine, Serotonin, Oxytocin et al are released in the brain. This cocktail of neurochemicals make us experience pleasure and joy. The mind likes this cocktail and the affect it produces, hence it develops an attachment towards the activities which produce these neurochemicals and that is how Desire for a particular thing is born.
The boy who liked Pizza
There was a boy who grew up in a small hilly town. He was food lover and enjoyed the meals cooked at home. Back in his town, there was no culture for eating out, nor there were restaurants. Hence the boy never experienced food which was served in the cities. When this boy turned 18, he went to a metro city to pursue his education. There one of his friends asked him if he liked Pizza. The boy had never eaten a Pizza in his life. His friend was shocked. He immediately ordered Pizza in their hostel and the boy tasted pizza for the first time in his life. He really liked it. The taste of molten grilled cheese along with crispy baked bread was out of his world. He truly enjoyed the pizza. And that started his love affair with Pizza.
Over the years Pizza became his favourite food and as he grew in age, his taste got more refined. He would now desire pizza, but not the one which they ordered in their hostel for the first time, rather he would now Desire pizza from a fine dine Italian restaurant who used best of the class ingredients to make the pizza in a authentic Italian style.
The attachment to pizza which started years ago, over a period of time had developed into core Desire, which got refined with time. The boy who once loved the take away pizza was now a grown man who desired authentic Italian food.
His Attachment has turned into a Desire!
The very same man once went into a fine dine Italian restaurant. It was his first visit. He ordered for a thin crust Margherita Pizza. The pizza served to him looked a bit odd. When the man tastes the pizza, he was immediately appalled. The pizza tasted weird. The cheese was watery, and the base layer of tomato ketchup was sour. The pizza lacked salt, and the bread was dry and soggy. The man got angry. To the man this a was disrespect to the dish itself. He refused to eat the pizza anymore, and called for the chef and the restaurant manager. He gave them the piece of his mind. They offered to replace the pizza and waive the bill but the man was angry. He rushed away from the restaurant with anger and disappointment and his whole day went into thinking what a waste it was. This memory lingered in his mind for the rest of his life.
This shows us how when a Desire is not fulfilled, it turns into Anger. Anger makes a man do things which he would never do, and such actions remain in his mind as poor memories.
Desire never Ends
A strange truth about Desire is that it never ends. It just changes its form.
The nature of Desire is like that of a Dream.
You only Dream of things which are not with you. Hence once you get what you Desire, you start desiring for something else.
So thinking that when you get something what you crave, what you Desire, will lead to the end of Desire is a fallacy.
Remember the boy who fell in love with Pizza?
The boy who used to Desire and crave for a normal home delivered pizza, now as a man can no longer eat a subpar pizza in a high end fine dine Italian restaurant. He must have eaten thousands of pizzas, but his craving for Pizza never really ended. It just changed it nature from normal pizza to a finer taste.
Krishna’s Message
Krishna is telling Arjun that our lives are just like this boy, who didn’t have any experience of eating pizza and hence never Desired for it. But when he tasted pizza for the first time, he liked it, and he developed an attachment towards it. The experience of eating Pizza really gave him sensual pleasure and satisfaction, and it became his core desire.
But even after years of indulgence in Pizza, this desire never ended, rather it morphed into finer tastes and now the same boy who is now a man with wealth and success, can’t even stand to enjoy a pizza which is less than “Authentic” in a slightest of manner.
Hence Krishna is saying that one must know that indulgence in sensual objects leads to attachment, which can turn into addiction. This addiction is a Desire which is unending, and this very Desire gives birth to Anger, which can spoil a man’s happiness and peace in both the short and long term.
The bigger the Desire, the stronger the Anger!
Hence the way of avoiding Anger in life is to minimise our attachments.
The Key to Happiness is minimization of Selfish Desires
A man who drops all selfish Desires is the man who attains Moksha!
Chapter 2 to be continued..
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Hare Krishna
