Krishna – Arjuna – Thoreau?

— OSHO Online Library

osho.com/osho-online-library/osho-talks/krishna-arjuna-thoreau-86d18025-90e

Remember, often life does not end in the same way that it begins.
The end is always unknown; it is always invisible. Mostly what we
think will happen doesn’t happen. Life is an unknown journey. Hence,
whatever is believed in the first moments of life, in the first moments
of any event, does not necessarily turn out to be the outcome at the
end. We can engage ourselves in shaping our destiny but we can
never become the one who decides it. The outcome is always
something different.

Duryodhana’s clear understanding was that Bheema would be the

central figure. And had Bheema been the central figure, then
perhaps what Duryodhana was saying about being victorious would
have come true. That Duryodhana’s viewpoint did not prove to be
true and that an unexpected element came into the picture is worth
reflecting on.

Duryodhana forgot Krishna, he forgot that Krishna would be able to

bring Arjuna back into the war if he decided to escape. We, too,
never remember that the invisible, the intangible may also have a
hand in our lives. Our calculations are made according to what can
be seen. We never remember that at some point the invisible may
also penetrate, the invisible may also enter into the midst of
everything.

Here in the midst of everything, the invisible has entered in the form
of Krishna, and consequently the whole story has taken a different
turn. What could have happened didn’t happen; and that which had
the least possibility of happening did happen. The arrival of the
unknown cannot be predicted. Whoever reads this tale for the first
time cannot be but shocked when he finds Krishna driving the
escaping Arjuna back into the war – certainly the reader is shocked.

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When Emerson read this tale for the first time, he shut the book, he
was horrified – because what Arjuna was saying would be accepted
by all so-called religious people. The argument Arjuna was making
was exactly that of a so-called religious person. When Henry
Thoreau came across Krishna counseling Arjuna to enter into war,
he too was horrified. Henry Thoreau has written that he never
believed, he never had the slightest idea, that the story would take
such a turn – Krishna counseling Arjuna to enter into war. Gandhi,
too, faced the same difficulty; he was troubled for the same reason.

But life never proceeds according to set principles. Life is a very

extraordinary phenomenon. It never runs on railway tracks, it flows
like the current of the river Ganges – its course is never
predetermined. And when the invisible unknown appears in the midst
of it all, it disturbs everything. Whatever was planned, whatever man
has woven, whatever man’s mind has thought – everything goes
topsy-turvy.

Duryodhana had never imagined that this invisible presence would

enter into the war. So what he is saying is just an initial statement of
the kind we all make in the first stages of any situation in our lives.
Meanwhile, the invisible, the unknown, keeps intervening and the
entire story changes.

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