GITA 1.26

GITA 1.26

Today it is the 27th sloka of Chapter1:

tan samiksya sa kaunteyah

sarvan bandhun avasthitan

kripaya parayavisto

visidann idam abravit

When the son of Kunti, Arjuna, saw all these different grades of friends and relatives, he became overwhelmed with compassion and spoke thus:

Sa = that, kaunteyah = Kunti's son (here, Arjuna), bandhun avasthitan = assembled relatives, samiksya = fully saw. Why that Arjuna? Here it means that Arjuna, full of compassion and mercy! Those with compassion are always great people. Karuna, daya, krupa, etc., are all synonyms. Paraya = overwhelming, kripaya = with mercy, avista = full of, visidann = suffering (trembling), idam abravit = told this. Thus, seeing relatives on both armies, Arjuna was suffering mentally and body trembled. Was Arjuna, a very bold archer, capable of taking on anyone, gift of Indra and favourite of Sri Krishna, trembling? He was well versed with wielding all weapons. But his great quality was compassion. .Today's lecture was delivered from the Sri Ramanuja Matham in the North Uthira [ul +thiru] street. Now it is occupied by H.H.Sri Sriranga Jeer, who accepts all the rituals gifted to Sri Bhashyakarar[Sri Ramanuja].In this place only Ramanuja lived in Srirangam and administered the entire SriVaishnava community. He was born in the star Arudra also known as Ardra. In Sanskrit, ardra means wet or water soaked. Normally those with compassion or sympathy are referred to in Tamil [as also in other languages] as with a wet mind [ as opposed to dry mind or heart]. This is a very essential quality. Without this the importance of other qualities will be nil. For example, we refer to God as all knowing and all powerful. His knowledge is boundless and He knows all and everyone. His power also is limitless and He can tackle everyone anywhere and always. On the other side, we are all mortal humans with limited capabilities and we commit endless mistakes knowingly and otherwise also. This God knows and He has the full authority to punish. So if only He did not have that quality of mercy we can not imagine what will happen to us. So it is the quality of mercy makes us all approach Him and get what we want for our welfare,[TGS:in a sloka in Daya sathakam, by Swamy Sri Desikan says,"Hey! Mother Mercy! But for you all other qualities of Him will be dangerous for us"]. God also expects us to have compassion for others.We are all children of God and what use is there if we can not help each other in distress. Just as, if one hand gets help from another hand because all belong to same body, we should help each other. This will happen only when there is the quality of mercy 

During Ramanuja's time there was another sanyasin disciple called Sri Embar. His original name was Sri Govinda and was the cousin of Sri Ramanuja. Once he bathed in Cauvery and came out and on the bank he saw a snake struggling because of a thorn stuck in its tongue. Embar, out of pity, removed the thorn carefully and again took bath and returned to the math.
His sishyas asked as to why did he remove the thorn from the deadly snake and enabled it to start biting people and killing them. For this his reply was: Did the snake put the poison on its teeth or is it God's creation? Did it have the option to take birth as snake? It is the nature of snakes and we can not see it suffering.
Though Arjuna was a great warrior and his prowess in archery was famous , yet because he had that quality of mercy in him he was overwhelmed with compassion at the sight of the relatives and friends in the battlefield.

                                                         (continued)