January 19, 2011
In an earlier post, I discussed Geeta in the Hollywood film, "The Legend of Bagger Vance". Today, I'll take an example from Bollywood.
Some famous shlokas of the Bhagavad Gita have become part of the idiom, in most Indian languages. There is an obvious favorite in this category - the one that embodies the fundamental attitude of karma yoga.
कर्मण्येवाधिकारस्ते मा फलेषु कदाचन |
मा कर्मफलहेतुर्भूर्मा ते सङ्गोऽस्त्वकर्मणि ||२-४७||
karmaNyevaadhikaaraste maa phaleshhu kadaachana .
maa karmaphalaheturbhuurmaa te saN^go.astvakarmaNi .. 2-47..
Your right is to work only, but never to its fruits; let not the fruit-of-action be your motive, nor let thy attachment be to inaction.
Unfortunately, the idiomatic can easily become idiotic. One example is the song based on this shloka in the 1975 film Sanyasi, starring Manoj Kumar and Hema Malini.
The song begins with chanting of the shloka followed by the line "karam kiye ja phal ki iccha mat kar ai insaan" (Act on, with no expectation of the result). The chorus line goes - "jaise karam karega waise phal dega bhagavan, yeh hai gita ka gyaan" (The lord will give you the fruits in accordance with your action, this is what the Geeta teaches). The problem is that this popular understanding misses the import of the shloka by a huge margin.
If you like this Geeta shloka, BE WARNED - DO NOT LISTEN TO THE WHOLE SONG. The verses are pure nonsense.
All of the above should have disqualified the film's music from being nominated for the Filmfare award but it was nominated. Fortunately, it did not win.
Would love to know if you have examples of film songs that are better representations of the Geeta.
Hari Om and Namaskaar until the next post.
In an earlier post, I discussed Geeta in the Hollywood film, "The Legend of Bagger Vance". Today, I'll take an example from Bollywood.
Some famous shlokas of the Bhagavad Gita have become part of the idiom, in most Indian languages. There is an obvious favorite in this category - the one that embodies the fundamental attitude of karma yoga.
कर्मण्येवाधिकारस्ते मा फलेषु कदाचन |
मा कर्मफलहेतुर्भूर्मा ते सङ्गोऽस्त्वकर्मणि ||२-४७||
karmaNyevaadhikaaraste maa phaleshhu kadaachana .
maa karmaphalaheturbhuurmaa te saN^go.astvakarmaNi .. 2-47..
Your right is to work only, but never to its fruits; let not the fruit-of-action be your motive, nor let thy attachment be to inaction.
Unfortunately, the idiomatic can easily become idiotic. One example is the song based on this shloka in the 1975 film Sanyasi, starring Manoj Kumar and Hema Malini.
The song begins with chanting of the shloka followed by the line "karam kiye ja phal ki iccha mat kar ai insaan" (Act on, with no expectation of the result). The chorus line goes - "jaise karam karega waise phal dega bhagavan, yeh hai gita ka gyaan" (The lord will give you the fruits in accordance with your action, this is what the Geeta teaches). The problem is that this popular understanding misses the import of the shloka by a huge margin.
If you like this Geeta shloka, BE WARNED - DO NOT LISTEN TO THE WHOLE SONG. The verses are pure nonsense.
All of the above should have disqualified the film's music from being nominated for the Filmfare award but it was nominated. Fortunately, it did not win.
Would love to know if you have examples of film songs that are better representations of the Geeta.
Hari Om and Namaskaar until the next post.
The principle makes complete sense but it is hard to follow. We usually are motivated by the results and if the results are not what we want, then one does get upset. What are we supposed to do ? Look back and say that the effort was fun ? May be... Or may be, we should be so mature that the result won't be able to move us at all -- good or bad.
ReplyDeleteSomeone once said that life is a journey - enjoy it. There are no destinations other than the ultimate destination of death.
No bollywood scenes or songs that explain the above :)
Some people say that the movie matrix is based on the Bhagavad Gita!.
ReplyDeleteFor e.g.
In the first movie Morpheus tells Neo:
What if you were to wake up from a dream which was so real that you found it difficult to differentiate between the dream world, and the real world? urf Maya ...
There are quite a few other similarities ... the Architect's speech also has some glaring similarities http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQSXNq7b8GQ ...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vmo2LTC3iC0
ReplyDelete