Vedic Perspective
Editorial Commentary
10-15-87

  In the Bhagavad-gita, Lord Krishna tells Arjuna:  sarvasya caham hridi
sannivishtho mattah smritir jnanam apohanam cha.  In this verse the Lord is
giving Arjuna some idea of the powers of the Supreme Lord.
  Lord Shri Krishna is saying to Arjuna,  "My dear Arjuna, I am sitting in
the hearts of all the living beings."  "Hridi" is a sanskrit word meaning
"the heart" and "sarvasya" means "everyone".  "Sarvasya caham hridi
sannivishtho" means "I am sitting within the heart of every living being."
So Krishna is describing His own inconceivable power to his friend Arjuna.
  Then the Lord goes on to explain, "mattah smritir jnanam apohanam cha".
"Mattah" is a word meaning "from Me".  "Mattah smritir jnanam apohanam cha".
"Smritir" means "the power of memory", "jnanam" means "knowledge, wisdom"
and "apohanam" means "forgetfulness".
  In this verse from the Bhagavad-gita, Krishna is telling Arjuna, "My dear
Arjuna, you should know that whatever knowledge is there within this world,
know it that such knowledge is coming from Me only."
  When we think about this verse, we can understand that whatever knowledge
there is about anything, it is all coming from Krishna.
  This is a very reasonable proposal.  Krishna is the Supreme Father of
everyone.  He's always concerned about His children.  So out of His concern,
He is there sitting down inside of the hearts of everyone.  Everywhere you
go, at every moment, Krishna is there sitting there within the core of your
heart.
  But what kind of children of God we are, we cannot see how Krishna is
there sitting inside of the heart?  But still, we are receiving knowledge by
Krishna's mercy.
  Just like our modern civilization is based on technology.  How has all the
knowledge to build the wonderful technical machinery come about?  All that
knowledge to build computers, space shuttles, color TVs--that knowledge has
come from Krishna.
  Because everyone wants something to become happy, he makes that hard
struggle to get it.  So Krishna, who is there sitting down inside the heart
of--say, for example--the scientist, sees the scientist working very hard.
The scientist is thinking, "Yes, wouldn't it be nice if I could make a space
machine to go to Mars."  "Yes, wouldn't it be nice if I could make a
supercolliding machine and break open the atoms and study the inside of an
atom."  So Krishna is there witnessing the desires of the scientist, and
relents, "Ok, Sir, if you think that a space vehicle is happiness, all
right, here is the knowledge to build the space machine to go to Mars.  If
you think you'll be very happy by going to Mars, ok, here's how to do it."
But not only the scientist, but everyone is wishing how to become happy, how
to become happy.  In this way, they don't want to serve God but they just
want to become happy by getting God to supply them.  And when they create
such wonderful technology, they don't give any credit to God who gave them
the knowledge within their heart.  Rather they claim that it was through
their own effort that such hi-tech machinery is made.  They even go as far
as to claim that there is no need to worship God now that man has become
very powerful in the matter of controlling the powerful forces of nature.
In this way, technology becomes intoxicating and the man becomes drunk with
false pride.
  Even though mankind is very proud at the present moment that he has
created wonderful scientific machinery, he has become overly proud and
claiming that God is imagination.  "Life has come not from God, but from
chance chemical combination" is the scientific theory.  "There is no life
after death.  No there is no scientific evidence for it."  And so on.  So
rather than understand that they are getting knowledge by the mercy and
kindness of God, they become more antagonistic and deny the existence of
God.  In such circumstances, the advancement of technology becomes a tool,
not for the upliftment of good civilization, but as a means whereby the
population can live very comfortably here in this world and try to forget
about the problems of the hard struggle for existence.  The limit of
technology is that if it is used to forget about God and create
counterpropaganda against God, then it cannot bring happiness to the human
society.

--Vaishnava dasa