- Forum
- Sanghas
- Dharma Forum Refugees Camp
- Dharma Refugees Forum Topics
- Reading, Listening and Viewing Recommendations
- Bhagavad Gita
Bhagavad Gita
-- tomo
- Posts: 1139
When I first got a copy I did research into all the different translations and the one I came down on was Eliot Deutsch which gets described like this:
Professor Deutsch's new rendition, similarly, is intended for a special audience; the students of philosophy and religion. From that standpoint, it is a unique and surprisingly readable version, with explanatory and terminological notes that go a long way toward dispelling the ambiguities and obscurities that generally plague the readers of more ""literary"" translations.
There is also a free "Gita Super Site" at which you can get a whole bunch of translations in parallel:
www.gitasupersite.iitk.ac.in/
There is also a great book on all the different interpretations of the Gita and its 'life' as a text, by Richard Davis in the Lives of Great Religious Books series, which I'm partway through: www.amazon.com/Bhagavad-Lives-Great-Reli...-Books/dp/150120050X
Personally I think there is a lot that's very valuable in the Gita but I can't come at its central message - "you should go ahead and massacre your friends and relations." Of course, this can be interpreted metaphorically. It also has some dubious passages on women and on caste.
every3rdthought wrote: It's funny you should mention this b/c we've just been doing it in my yoga teacher training. Out of interest, why are you wanting to learn more about it?
When I first got a copy I did research into all the different translations and the one I came down on was Eliot Deutsch which gets described like this:
Professor Deutsch's new rendition, similarly, is intended for a special audience; the students of philosophy and religion. From that standpoint, it is a unique and surprisingly readable version, with explanatory and terminological notes that go a long way toward dispelling the ambiguities and obscurities that generally plague the readers of more ""literary"" translations.
There is also a free "Gita Super Site" at which you can get a whole bunch of translations in parallel:
www.gitasupersite.iitk.ac.in/
There is also a great book on all the different interpretations of the Gita and its 'life' as a text, by Richard Davis in the Lives of Great Religious Books series, which I'm partway through: www.amazon.com/Bhagavad-Lives-Great-Reli...-Books/dp/150120050X
Personally I think there is a lot that's very valuable in the Gita but I can't come at its central message - "you should go ahead and massacre your friends and relations." Of course, this can be interpreted metaphorically. It also has some dubious passages on women and on caste.
Thank you, I'll check those out. As to "why", I have come across the name in passing a bunch of times over the last few years, and I know nothing about it. But then it strangely came up in a private telescope makers mailing list I participate in, and so it sparked my curiosity. The few online things I found so far had a lot of "thee" and "thou" in the translations, which seem kind of pointless to me unless you were reading it for the poetry. If I were to read the Bible (not that I would), I don't think the KJ version would be my go-to translation if i wanted to actually absorb the message.
-- tomo
It kiiiind of apporaches pop-yoga a little bit, but I got a lot of value out of Stephen Cope's The Great Work Of Your Life. Cope uses stories from his therapeutic clients, and yoga students from his time at Kripalu, to illustrate concepts and lessons from the Gita. www.amazon.ca/Great-Work-Your-Life-Journ...HPBGP2WRAVAFE57P8KG6
- Posts: 1139