[Advaita-l] Shankara and Madhusudana

[Venkata sriram P]

Namaste,

Several saints commented on BG from their philosophical perspective. Sri.Abhinava Gupta
wrote from the perspective of "trika-siddhAnta"; Maharashtra Saint Sri.Jnaneshwar Maharaj
wrote magnum opus "jnAnEshwari" which is based on "nAtha-sampradAya"; Balga Gangadhar Tilak
wrote from karma yOga perspective; Sri.Aurobindo wrote from "pUrNa-yOga" perspective etc.

But, personally, I like two commentaries on BG. One is "sAdhak-sanjeevani" written by 
Swami Ramsukhdas Maharaj Ji which is published by Gita Press, Gorakhpur and another
is Srimad Bhagavatgita with sAdhana vyAkhya by Sri.Sista Subba Rao Garu.  

The above two touched my heart.  The latter one ie., Commentary by 
Sri.Sista Shanta Subba Rao Garu has special place for me. 
Prof. Subba Rao was a great scholar of telugu, english & sanskrit and 
worked as english professor in Andhra University.  He was suffering from poor eyesight which
turned out to be glaucoma. Eventually, he lost his eyesight and became totally blind. 
Not knowing what to do and having heard the greatness of Bhagavan Ramana Maharishi, came 
to Tiruvannamalai and approached Bhagavan.  After serving Him, pleaded Bhagavan for
restoring the eye sight. Bhagavan turned deaf ears and later wrote on a small piece of paper
and gave to Prof.Subba Rao.  It read as "develop INNER VISION rather than striving for
OUTER VISION.  Inner Vision would take care of everything".

This advice of Bhagavan was Upadesa for Prof.Rao and he performed intense sadhana in the
presence of Bhagavan.   Later, he became steadfast in "Atma-vichAra" and wrote commentary
on BG with his own anubhava.  Prof.Rao passed away on 20th April 1981 and cast off his 
mortal frame just like a ripe cucumber separates itself from creeper. 

Apart from these, Anandagiri, Sridhara Swami etc. wrote the commentaries. But to understand
the advaita commentaries to BG, one must be good in it's concepts.  

Audio lectures of Swami Ranganathananda Maharaj (former President of Ramakrshna Mutt, Hyd)
are available. Sri.Maharaj was also a great scholar and votary of Gita.  

Swami Chinmayananda Ji and Swami Sivananda Ji also wrote beautiful commentaries to BG
that are simple & sweet. 

To start with the books of Sw.Chinmayananda Ji (Chinmaya Mission), Sw.Sivananda Ji (Divine Life Society) & Sw.Ramsukhdas Maharaj (Sadhak Sanjeevani of Gita Press) are wonderful books. Gita Press has published a book called "Gita Darpan" which is the essence of BG.

However, it all depends on one's level of maturity to understand.

regs,
sriram


--------------------------------------------
On Sun, 5/7/15, Vivek <ammasfeet at icloud.com> wrote:

 Subject: Re: [Advaita-l] Shankara and Madhusudana
 To: "Venkata sriram P" <venkatasriramp at yahoo.in>
 Cc: "advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org" <advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org>
 Date: Sunday, 5 July, 2015, 6:50 AM
 
 Hari Om,
 
 Thanks for sharing that.
 
 To take this one step further.
 Which are the commentaries really worth studying on Gita
 beside these two?