Ravi Ranganathan Podcast

Episode 26 brings out appreciation of chapter five. It addresses the complexity of this chapter.

Episode 25 brings the Sankhyan to the same highest state as the Self realized yogi.  Pandita of chapter two comes back and we understand why this Pandita treat the living and the dead same.  With both the karma sannyasa yogi and Sankhyan achieve the highest brahma nirvana state, Bhagavan gives a quick summary and reminds once again about the hurdles of sense objects. Having given the full map for...

Episode 24 brings in the Yogins and the Sankhyans who both attain jeevanmukti, liberation while living in the body.  In three verses Bhagavan brings in the culmination of all practices he has taught so far. It is the merging of the practicing contemplative yogi to Self and indicates that it is same as merging with Paramatma, the all pervading brahman.

Episode 23 introduces chapter five titled as Karma Sannyasa Yoga. Karma Sannyasam is used with two meanings, one by arjuna and the other by Bhagavan. Check out this episode to know about the difference. Also in this episode Bhagavan brings in the podcast title "yah pashyati sa pashyati"!

Episode 22 covers chapter four appreciations. It talks about the only reason for taking incarnations,  battlefield context of "even the wise gets deluded",  what did Bhagavan mean when He said "he will become the author of confusion", what is the connection of faith to knowledge and the story of shri krishna's disciple uddhava asking krishna about the gambling that took pl...

Episode 21 talks about the 13 yagnas (sacrifituals) BhagavAn has mentioned as part of Jnana Karma Sannyasa Yoga. Out of these 13, the first is post Self realization and the other 12 are pre Self realization. Bhagavan redefines Yagna from a mere fire ritual performed to attain this and other world goodies to selfless actions with brahman as the only image  in mind. This is followed by the four bene...

Episode 20 unwraps the puzzle "Action-in-Inaction" and "Inaction-in-Action". This is followed by the five verse summary of a karma yogi becoming a jeevanmukta,  attaining liberation while living in the body.

In Episode 19 Bhagavan explains what one should do to become one with Him, the Supreme Consciousness and  why He created the varna division, the division of work. 

Episode 18 gives an introduction to chapter four titled jnana karma sannyasa yogam -  yoga of renunciation of action in knowledge and explains God's avatar, incarnation - its purpose, when and where such incarnations takes place and what should we learn from such incarnations.

Episode 17 continues from where it left in Episode 16.  The author is continuing his discussions with Ms. Varunika Raja on svabhava and svadharma. The author also shares some of his life experiences related to this topic.

In Episode 16 and Episode 17, the author is having a chat with a listener of this podcast, Ms. Varunika Raja. In Episode 16 they discuss svabhava and svadharma as explained in BG. It looks at the spiritual as well as the transactional world point view of these two terms.   

Episode 15 explains our real enemies in this world. They are not too far away from us. This is followed by chapter 3 appreciation.

Episode 14 talks about the fourth major point addressed in  chapter 3 , svadharmA . Last two episodes talked about the first three points, viz., naishkarmyam, yagna and loka sangraham. 

In Episode 13, BhagavAn talks about rain making, role models and prakriti. What has these to do with arjunA's confusion. Check out episode 13.

In Episode 12 BhagavAn pitches heavily in support of environment. What has environment to do with the solution for arjunA's problem? Listen to this episode. 

Episode 11 gives the introduction to chapter 3 titled karma yoga. This chapter covers four major ideas - naishkarmyam, yajna, lokasamgraham and svadharma.  In this episode we will see what is naishkarmyam mean.

This episode gives the major points of chapter two as a summary followed by chapter two appreciation. As part of appreciation you will see how BhagavAn is teaching even through his scolding, how BhagavAn's teaching has penetrated His own teachings, a discussion of past, present and future in the teaching and finally about the two chandAs used in BG. 

Episode 09 explains the hurdles in realizing the Brahma Nirvana state followed by Chapter 2 summary.

Parents teach kid to be good and not to be bad. In this episode, BhagavAn teaches to go beyond good and bad.  He also explains a Sthitha prajnA, a person of steady wisdom, the goal to be for all human beings.

After tacking the issue of death, Bhagavan moves on to explain how to perform any action without incurring sin. He moves from why we should perform actions to how we should perform actions. 

Episode 06 dwells with the dharmic and material world considerations for acting in this world and how we can avoid sin from any action we perform.

Episode 05 starts chapter two. In this episode, Bhagavan scolds Arjuna and Arjuna makes one last bit attempt to escape from the action in the battlefield. Confused he surrenders and becomes a disciple of Bhagavan. Bhagavan teaches Sankhya yoga, the knowledge about our true inner Self.

In Episode 04, the author looks back into chapter 1 with appreciative thoughts. This covers a deeper analysis of the first, middle and last verses of the chapter, Arjuna's monologue and a comparison of Arjuna with Mauryan king Ashoka.

Episode 3 explains what happens on the eve and also before the sunrise  of the first day of war.  The war starts and yet there is no Bhagavad Gita.  What happened? Listen to this episode.

Episode 02 gives the background story leading to the kurukshetra war.