SrI: SrImathE SatakOpAya nama: SrImathE rAmAnujAya nama: SrImath varavaramunayE nama:
mātrā-sparśās tu kaunteya
śītoṣṇa-sukha-duḥkha-dāḥ
āgamāpāyino ’nityās
tāṁs titikṣasva bhārata
The sense-contacts, Kaunteya1! produce pleasures and pains through ‘cold-heat’2 experiences. They come and go, and are inconstant. Take them coolly, Bhārata3!
The qualities viz: sound, touch, color, taste, and smell, with their functioning seats viz., the senses, are called mātras (or tan-mātras), because they are the evolutes from mātras or the rudimentary elements. The contacts of the senses with sound etc., produce cold, heat, soft, hard, etc., experiences, and cause pleasures and pains4.
The expression “cold and heat”5 is to imply or typify the sum of all experiences. Bear them up with courage till thou carriest out thy Śāstra-enjoined war etc., to completion. As these experiences accrue and depart, they are but fit to be tolerated (i.e., disregarded) by men of courage.
Also they are un-enduring (anitya), meaning that him, – whose karma (i.e., the fruit of deeds done) has ceased, (as in the case of the mukta, or the freed soul), – the ‘cold-heat’6 adventitious experiences can never disturb (or distract).
Is this passive or dull disposition to ‘cold-heats’ any use? The following verse tells us:
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- Son of Kunti = Arjuna. ↩
- The sense-contacts with external phenomena is sensations which are the sense-with-mind-contacts, ‘cold-heat’, etc., and then follow the reactions, pleasures and pains. ↩
- Descendent of Bharata = Arjuna. … ↩
- The sense-contacts with external phenomena is sensations which are the sense-with-mind-contacts, ‘cold-heat’, etc., and then follow the reactions, pleasures and pains. ↩
- The sense-contacts with external phenomena is sensations which are the sense-with-mind-contacts, ‘cold-heat’, etc., and then follow the reactions, pleasures and pains. ↩
- The sense-contacts with external phenomena is sensations which are the sense-with-mind-contacts, ‘cold-heat’, etc., and then follow the reactions, pleasures and pains. ↩