Link to purport by A C Bhaktivedanta Swami Srila Prabhupada

Transcript of Bhakti-Shastri class on this verse by Chaitanya

10-32: From practice to perfection in yoga

  • 10-32 defines how one will achieve perfection when one is practicing yoga.
  • 16-23: Realization of Paramatma

 

So now again Sri Krishna will start from the basics over here and what does He says over here 

 

Bg 6.16

nāty-aśnatas tu yogo ’sti
na caikāntam anaśnataḥ
na cāti-svapna-śīlasya
jāgrato naiva cārjuna

Word for word: 

na — never; ati — too much; aśnataḥ — of one who eats; tu — but; yogaḥ — linking with the Supreme; asti — there is; na — nor; ca — also; ekāntam — overly; anaśnataḥ — abstaining from eating; na — nor; ca — also; ati — too much; svapna–śīlasya — of one who sleeps; jāgrataḥ — or one who keeps night watch too much; na — not; eva — ever; ca — and; arjuna — O Arjuna.

Translation: 

There is no possibility of one’s becoming a yogī, O Arjuna, if one eats too much or eats too little, sleeps too much or does not sleep enough.

 

nāty-aśnatas, one should not eat too much.  tu yogo ’sti
na caikāntam anaśnataḥ, nor should one fast too much anaśnataḥ, one should not go without food too much
na cāti-svapna-śīlasya, one should not sleep too much
jāgrato naiva cārjuna, nor should one stay awake for too long.

So here Sri Krishna is recommending balance, Srila Prabhupada would say that if you sleep too much you become lazy, if you sleep too less you become crazy, because we just can’t think clearly. Same way with respect to eating if you eat too less you would not have energy to serve Sri Krishna and you would be thinking about food-food-food, And if we eat too much then the purpose of eating is to get energy but often if we eat too much then our energy goes in digesting food and sleeping. We don’t feel energized by that. So don’t eat too much don’t eat too little have balance. 

Srila Prabhupada said in purport don’t eat too much means eating meat and the he talks about 

Sril Prabhupada Purport: One should not sleep more than six hours daily. One who sleeps more than six hours out of twenty-four is certainly influenced by the mode of ignorance.

Now this is a broad general statement and as a devotee we try to sleep less to get more and more things done and at the same time goal is not less sleeping the goal is more service, if we are sleeping 5.5 hours or 6 hrs and we find that half of the time I am feeling sleepy and not awake I am not able to concentrate, so if somebody need 6.5 hrs or 7 hrs or 5 hrs he can do as the point is more and more service and we should be having quality attention so that we can do the service well, otherwise we will not be able to do things best so Idea is devotee wanted to decrease the time spent on body. So in general serious spiritualist are miserly, miserly about giving time to the body, miser is one who spent less money, if somebody ask for money he will ask questions and give as less as possible. 

That means we should not spent time lavishly on body we should spent time as it is required as we understand this body is a vehicle, this is not a process of denial, if I am going by car I have to take care about the car, I have to fuel it I may have to put air in the tyres, sometimes it may require servicing and maintenance also, but then the purpose of the car is to go, it is not the purpose of the car that you stand next to the car and watch how beautiful the car is, that is not the purpose of the car, purpose of the car is to take the car to a destination like that the purpose of the body is not to take care of the body. Yes we wanted to take care of the body so that we uses it for the purpose, and the purpose is to move towards Sri Krishna, to make spiritual advancement and of course since we have to live in this world so we also have worldly profession and our worldly profession can also be spiritualized if we connect our whole life to Krishna and we make Sri Krishna as purpose of our life.

So here Sri Krishna is talking about the negative point of view don’t do this and in next verse He will talk about positive point of view.

End of transcription.