Krishna mentions the modes throughout the Bhagavad-gita; devotes the entire fourteenth chapter to explaining what they are and how they function; and uses them to analyze various key elements of reality in the seventeenth and eighteenth chapters. Why so much discussion about the modes?
To understand, let’s consider textual and contextual reasons.
Textual reason: The Gita’s last six chapters begin with Arjuna’s questions about basic concepts of sankhya philosophy. Though Krishna explains those concepts in that very chapter, he continues discussing sankhya to show how it fits into his Gita teachings. Because a central element of sankhya is the modes, Krishna naturally talks about them — just as a person discussing maths will naturally talk about numbers.
Contextual reason: Krishna uses the three modes to reiterate his central message to Arjuna: he can do his duty of fighting without being entangled. Through his fourteenth chapter analysis of the modes and seventeenth chapter analysis of faith using the modes, he highlights the huge difference the modes make in one’s dispositions and destinations. Continuing that theme in the eighteenth chapter, he demonstrates how all action is not the same. By breaking action into its various components and analyzing those components in terms of the three modes, he establishes that those who act in the mode of goodness can be internally detached even while being engaged in their duties externally — and thus they can stay disentangled.
Krishna has already explained this link between detachment and disentanglement in the Gita’s first six chapters. Here, he illuminates that link from another perspective, the framework of the three modes. Such is Krishna’s teaching genius — he effortlessly integrates the answer to an incidental question into his overall flow of thought and reinforces his consistent conclusion.
One-sentence summary:
Krishna discusses the modes extensively to explain how the sankhya worldview fits into his teachings, especially the teaching that Arjuna can fight without being entangled.
Think it over:
- What is the textual reason for Krishna’s extensive discussion about the modes?
- What is the contextual reason for that discussion?
- How does Krishna’s discussion about the modes reveal his teaching genius?
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18.19: According to the three different modes of material nature, there are three kinds of knowledge, action and performer of action. Now hear of them from Me.
To know more about this verse, please click on the image
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