Gita Reflections
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ham Vaishvanaro bhutva’...is a very famous
sloka of one of the most famous 15th chapter of Srimad Bhagwad Geeta. In this Lord Krishna gives us the ‘Vaishvanara Upasana’. Sri Krishna here reveals that ‘I’ alone am the conscious principle that manifests as the Vaishvanara agni (fire) in the stomach of all living beings. The Geeta is one of the exclusive scriptures that divinises the various powers that help in the functioning of this beautiful world. Be it in the very body of a living being or the various forces of the world outside.
We all are aware of the fire in the outside world at the
macro level which is the nucleus of our life. This same element of fire supports the individual body too at the micro level. This agni is known as the ‘Jathara Agni. ‘Jatharam’ means the ‘stomach’, so ‘Jatharagni’ means the fire within the stomach. It is also known by another name, ‘The Vaishvanara agni’ and this fire is called the digestive fire, which cooks the eaten food. The food we eat goes through two types of cooking before the body actually assimilates it. One is the external cooking or any preparation that makes food edible, and the other is the internal cooking. In each cooking the food gets transformed. When the food is cooked outside it is made palatable and easy to consume it from the mouth to the stomach. Sri Krishna says, Once we have consumed the food
V edanta Sandes h
then the process of digesting and assimilating the food that we
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