The Bhagavad-gītā begins, therefore, this self-realization. Dehino 'smin yathā dehe (BG 2.13). Asmin dehe, this body, contains the dehī, really the proprietor. So such person, apaśyatām ātma-tattvam, they are simply busy with all these things: body and children and wife and relationship. Dehāpatya-kalatrādiṣu (SB 2.1.4). Because through kalatra we increase. Strī means "which expands," strī. Strī, one accepts strī, wife, means to expand his relationship. As soon as I get one strī, one family becomes my father-in-law, and in relation to, I have got my family, and she has got her family. We combine together. Then boys, children.
Then get them married. Increase. Increase relationship: "He is my brother-in-law, he is my father-in-law, he is my father, he is my brother, he is brother's brother-in-law, father's father-in-law . . ." Just like Arjuna was seeing. "Oh," Arjuna was seeing like that: "How can I kill them? They are all my . . ." The same. As ordinary man has got, so Arjuna was playing the ordinary man, just like. He was thinking, "Here is my brother-in-law, here is my brother, here's my nephew, here's my father-in-law, here's my grandfather. How can I kill them?" So . . . but they will be killed. Nobody can protect. But we are paśyann api na paśyati, that "I have my father; he was killed. He is gone, dead and gone. So I will be also dead and gone, and my son will be also dead and gone."
So why we are depending on these things which will be dead and gone? Nobody will live. Nobody will live. Take big, big leaders in our country or any country. They are absorbed in nationalism, cannot give up the post of prime ministership, presidentship or leadership. Even great leader like Gandhi, he was always . . . he got sva-rājya. I wrote him letter: "Mahatma Gandhi, you have got respect as a religious personality. If you . . ."
(aside) Don't bother, don't . . .
"If you take preaching these things, what I am doing, preach Bhagavad-gītā . . . you are also lover of Bhagavad-gītā." No. Even after getting sva-rājya, he was implicated. Unless he was killed he would not leave it. Everyone has to leave it, voluntarily or by force. But they will not leave it voluntarily.
This is the disease, material disease. Everyone will be forced. You cannot live here forever. They are making very nice arrangement: nice house, nice kingdom, nice city, nice bank balance, nice society, nice community, nice nation. But they are missing one point that, "Any moment I shall be kicked out. Any moment." There is no guarantee. Parīkṣit Mahārāja got seven days' time that, "You shall die within seven days." We have no even one second's guarantee. This is our position. But still, we are so much attached. Dehāpatya-kalatrādiṣu ātma-sainyeṣu (SB 2.1.4). Everyone is thinking, "I am very comfortable at home. I have got my wife. I have got my children. I have got my bank balance. I have got so many things. I have got my nation, community. I am secure. I am secure." Why he is thinking like that? Pramatta: mad, madman. That is described:
- piśācī pāile yena mati-cchanna haya
- māyā-grasta jīvera se dasa upadaya
- (Prema-vivarta 1)
Ghostly haunted, every one of us. This māyā-grasta, one who is under the influence of this material energy, just like . . . exactly like a man who is ghostly haunted. Ghostly haunted. Perhaps some of you have seen a man ghostly haunted. He talks all nonsense. Similarly, the māyā-grasta jīva, those who are in this material . . . too much absorbed in the bodily concept of life, without any self-realization . . . everyone is thinking like madman that, "These things will give me protection." Because he has become mad, pramatta. Pramatta. Teṣāṁ pramatto nidhanam. You are fighting with soldiers. That's all right. But if you know, "All my soldiers will die," then what is the use of your fighting? Or you take some means that your fighting will be victorious. No. They do not know.