Human life is meant for tapasya. Tapo-divyaṁ putrakā yena śuddhyed sattvam (SB 5.5.1). Don't be carried away by the general, menial, abominable tendencies. Therefore tapasya required. Tapa, we prescribe for tapasya no illicit sex, no meat-eating, no intoxication and no gambling. This is tapasya. This is tapasya. We have to accept if we want superior position of life. Tapo divyam. Tapasya, the aim of tapasya is to be situated on the transcendental platform of knowledge, tapo divyam. So this life, this human form of life, is meant for tapasya and transcendental knowledge. This is the purport. Not to waste this life, this human form of life, ayaṁ deha. The cats and dogs also have deha, body. The . . . Analyze the body of a dog and analyze your body, what is the difference? No difference. There is blood, there is flesh, there is vein, there is so many things, all common things. Then what is the difference between the cat's body and dog's body and your body? The advancement of knowledge and consciousness. So for that divyam, knowledge, one has to be initiated. Divyam. Dīkṣā means beginning of transcendental knowledge. So Vedic civilization is janmanā jāyate śūdraḥ. By birth, everyone is born a śūdra, fourth-class man. But there is chance of the fourth-class man to become the first-class man. That is possible. Janmanā jāyate śūdraḥ. Everyone, when he's born by the sex behavior of the father and mother, he's a śūdra. Then saṁskārād-bhaved dvija. By saṁskāra, by the purificatory method, this tapasya, he becomes a dvija. Dvi means "twice" and ja means "birth," second birth. Saṁskārād-bhaved dvija. Then when he becomes dvija, properly initiated, then he's allowed to read Vedic literature, veda-patha. Śūdra cannot. If you remain a śūdra, no saṁskāra, no purification, then you have no right to understand Vedic knowledge. Either you have no right or you cannot understand. Why . . . The Bhagavad-gītā is there. Throughout the whole world, everyone knows Bhagavad-gītā. But they have misunderstood, because they are kept śūdra. Veda-patha. First of all, by birth, he's a śūdra, and when he's purified, then he becomes dvija. Dvija, the sacred thread is . . . means that this man . . . Upanayana. This is called upanayana. Upa, upa means "near," and nayana means "bringing." So when one is brought nearer to the spiritual master and he accepts him as his disciple, he gives the sacred thread as badge, that "This man is now dvija, twice-born. He's no more śūdra. He's brāhmaṇa. So he has the right to read the Vedic literature."
So the Bhagavad-gītā is the summary of all Vedic knowledge. So if we pass through this process of divya-jñāna, dīkṣā, then we rightly understand what is Bhagavad-gītā or we become interested that what is the lesson of Bhagavad-gītā. Veda pathād bhaved vipra. After reading . . . Bhagavad-gītā is the summary of Vedic literature. You cannot read all the Vedas at the present moment, neither you have time, nor you have got the capacity. In this Kali-yuga, mandāḥ sumanda-matayo (SB 1.1.10), everyone is fallen, manda-bhāgyā. So this human life should be utilized for understanding the Vedic knowledge, divya-jñāna; then he'll be purified, tapo divyaṁ yena śuddhyed sattvam (SB 5.5.1). My existential identity will be purified. At the present moment it is not purified. Because it is not purified, therefore we are repeatedly dying. But there is no knowledge how to stop death. They think death is natural. It is not natural. It is unnatural. They do not know it. But in the Bhagavad-gītā you'll get the information, na jāyate na mriyate vā kadācit: "The soul is never born, never dies." Na jāyate na mriyate vā kadācit. "I see he's died, he is dead." No, he's not dying, his body is being annihi . . . Na hanyate hanyamāne śarīre (BG 2.20). By seeing the body is destroyed, don't think he's destroyed. He'll get another body. Tathā dehāntara-prāptir dhīras tatra na muhyati (BG 2.13). So this is our position. We have accepted one body, and we live in that body for some days, and then again we give up this body, tathā dehāntara-prāptir. So this is disease. So in order to get out of this disease there is necessity of tapasya, how to stop this disease.