Raja-Vidya: The King of Knowledge – In India, there are disciplic successions coming from Ramanujacarya, Madhvacarya, Nimbarka, Vishnusvami and other great sages.
The Vedic literatures are understood through the superior spiritual masters. Arjuna understood Bhagavad-gita from Krishna, and if we wish to understand it, we have to understand it from Arjuna, not from any other source. If we have any knowledge of Bhagavad-gita, we have to see how it tallies with the understanding of Arjuna.
If we understand Bhagavad-gita in the same way that Arjuna did, we should know that our understanding is correct. This should be the criteria for our studying of Bhagavad-gita. If we actually want to receive benefit from Bhagavad-gita, we have to follow this principle. Bhagavad-gita is not an ordinary book of knowledge which we can purchase from the market place, read and merely consult a dictionary to understand. This is not possible. If it were, Krishna would never have told Arjuna that the science was lost.
It is not difficult to understand the necessity of going through the disciplic succession to understand Bhagavad-gita. If we wish to be a lawyer, an engineer or doctor, we have to receive knowledge from the authoritative lawyers, engineers and doctors.
A new lawyer has to become an apprentice of an experienced lawyer, or a young man studying to be a doctor has to become an intern and work with those who are already licensed practitioners. Our knowledge of a subject cannot be perfectionalized unless we receive it through authoritative sources..
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