People give me credit that, "Swāmījī, you have done wonderful. Nobody could do it." I am not a wonderful man. Neither I do know anything magic. I have presented Bhagavad-gītā as it is. That's all. This is the secret. Anyone can do that. You present the thing as it is. Don't adulterate it. Then it will be accepted. Just like paramānna, kṣīra. Kṣīra is very nice food, but if you adulterate it with some grains of sand, it is spoiled. It is spoiled.
So that was being done. Bhagavad-gītā is the science of God, the spiritual science. But it was being adulterated by so many grains of sands. So people could not understand it. We do not present Bhagavad-gītā with some adulteration. Kṛṣṇa says, bhakto 'si priyo 'si arjuna. Kṛṣṇa is instructing Arjuna to begin the paramparā system, because the paramparā system was supposed to be broken. People misunderstood. Or some way or other, it was broken, as it is going on now also.
So Kṛṣṇa said that, "I shall speak to you this same old philosophy of Bhagavad-gītā again." "Why unto me?" Why Kṛṣṇa selected Arjuna? There are many others, learned scholars. Now, Kṛṣṇa says, bhakto 'si priyo 'si. Kṛṣṇa was a military man . . . er, Arjuna was a military man. He was not a Vedāntist. He was a gṛhastha, not even a sannyāsī. Why Kṛṣṇa selected to instruct Arjuna as the disciple of the renovated paramparā system? That is also spoken by Kṛṣṇa: bhakto 'si priyo 'si (BG 4.3), rahasyam etad uttamam, "Because you are My dear friend, because you are My devotee, you can understand the mysteries of Bhagavad-gītā."
Kṛṣṇa did not select a so-called Vedāntist to understand Bhagavad-gītā. Because Arjuna was not a Vedāntist; he was a military man. He's not supposed to become a great philosopher. He was a gṛhastha. But the real qualification is to become a devotee of Kṛṣṇa. Then one can understand what is Bhagavad-gītā. Not by so-called knowledge. No. Knowledge is not perfect unless one understands Kṛṣṇa. That is not knowledge, that is still illusion.
Therefore in the Bhagavad-gītā it is said, bahūnāṁ janmanām ante jñānavān māṁ prapadyate (BG 7.19). Māṁ prapadyate: "He surrenders unto Me." Vāsudevaḥ sarvam iti sa mahātmā sudurlabhaḥ. When one understands Kṛṣṇa, Vāsudeva, as everything, as the origin of everything, janmādy asya yataḥ (SB 1.1.1), then his knowledge is perfect. And so long he's hovering here and there, without any understanding of Kṛṣṇa, his knowledge is not perfect. That perfection of knowledge is attained, as it is described by Kṛṣṇa: bahūnāṁ janmanām ante (BG 7.19).
So Bhagavad-gītā is to be understood by the paramparā system. Śrī-bhagavān uvāca. Kṛṣṇa is the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Bhagavān, ṣaḍ-aiśvarya-pūrṇa. He has no defects because He is in full knowledge. Aiśvaryasya samagrasya vīryasya yaśasaḥ śriyaḥ jñāna (Viṣṇu Purāṇa 6.5.47). He has got full knowledge. Vedāhaṁ sama . . . (BG 7.26). He says that "I know past, present, future—everything."
This past, present and future, knowledge, how Kṛṣṇa knew, that was also proved. When Kṛṣṇa said that, "I spoke this philosophy to Vivasvān . . ." Vivasvān means to the sun god, in the beginning, before Manu. That means about forty thousand millions of years ago, according to Manu-saṁhitā. Then Arjuna inquired, "My dear Kṛṣṇa, we are contemporaries. We are born some years ago. How is that—You instructed the sun god, Vivasvān, this philosophy?" This inquiry was made by Arjuna. Why? How Kṛṣṇa knows the past so long, long years ago? So Kṛṣṇa replied that, "Yes, at that time you were also present, but you have forgotten. I have not forgotten."
That is the difference between ordinary human being and God. That is the difference. God does not forget past, present, future. God knows future. God knows past. And present, what to speak of? In the Second Chapter you'll find also. Kṛṣṇa says that, "It is not that you, Me and all these kings and soldiers were not existing in the past. And we are existing at present. And it is not that we shall not existed in the future." These are the things.