Samyak Is Samadhi – In Gita Verse 3.13 The devotees of the Lord are released from all kinds of sins because they eat food which is offered first for sacrifice. Others, who prepare food for personal sense enjoyment, verily eat only sin.
Krishna in this verse says live a balanced life. Live for your needs. When you are hungry eat, when you are thirsty drink water. But we do exactly the opposite, because of the taste we eat even when we are not hungry.
Buddha has used the word Right.
Gautama the Buddha has no leaning toward abstraction, philosophy, or metaphysics. He’s very practical, down-to-earth practical. He’s very scientific. His approach is not that of a thinker; his approach is existential. When he attained and became a buddha, it is said that the god of the gods, Brahma, came to him and asked, “Who is your witness? You declare that you have become a buddha, but who is your witness?” Buddha laughed, touched the earth with his hand, and said, “This earth, this solid earth is my witness.”
He is very earthy; he made the earth his witness. He could have said so about the sky, but no; he could have said so about the sun or the moon or the stars, but no. He touched the earth and said, “This solid earth is my witness.” His whole approach is like that.
Buddha’s way is called “the eightfold way.” He has divided it into eight parts. Those divisions are arbitrary, just utilitarian. The way is one, it is not really divided. It is divided so that you can understand it easily. This is very fundamental: if you can understand these eight steps or eight divisions of the way, the way will open just in front of you. You are already standing on it, but not aware; your mind is wandering somewhere.
The way is in front of you. So try to understand these eight steps as deeply as possible.
All these eight steps are concerned with rightness – right view, right intention, right speech, right morality, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and the eighth, the ultimate, right samadhi. The word right has to be understood first because the Sanskrit word samyak is so meaningful, and is so pregnant with meaning that it cannot be translated. Right is a very poor translation for many reasons.
First, the word right immediately gives the idea that it is against the wrong. Samyak never gives that idea; samyak is not against the wrong. Buddha’s right is not against wrong because Buddha says wrongs are many, right is one – so how can right be against wrong? Health is one, diseases are many. There are not as many healths as there are diseases, so health cannot be against the diseases – otherwise there would be so many healths. Somebody is suffering from TB and then he becomes healthy, somebody is suffering from cancer and he becomes healthy, and somebody is suffering from flu and he becomes healthy. These three healths are not three healths. The diseases were different, but health is one, and one cannot be against the many.
Exactly the same is true about right and wrong. Right is one. Wrongs are millions. You can go on inventing wrongs, but right cannot be invented; it does not depend on you. Right is a state of affairs where you are in tune with the whole. That is the meaning of health too: when you are in tune with the whole you are healthy. The music flows between you and the whole, there is no obstruction. You feel well-being, there is no noise, everything is in harmony. When the individual is in tune with the universal, right exists, health exists. When you fall out of tune, then so many wrongs arise there is no limit to them, they are endless. And you can invent new wrongs.
Buddha says right is that which is not your invention. It is already there. If you go away from it you are wrong, if you come close to it you are right. The closer you are, the more right you are. One day when you are exactly home, you are perfectly right. Samyak and samadhi both come from the same root, sam. Samyak is the step toward samadhi. If you don’t understand samyak, you will not be able to understand samadhi.
So seven steps ultimately lead to the final step. Samadhi means now everything has fallen in tune with existence; not a flaw exists, the music is utterly perfect. But there is no better word in English than right, so you have to understand it. Right in the Buddhist meaning of the term means balanced, centered, grounded, harmonious, tranquil – all these things. But the basic thing can be understood even if there is no synonymous term in English to translate it.
Krishna simply says that if you live Samyak life you live in Samadhi, with your open eyes. Just try for a few days and don’t follow your schedule of any food time but just eat when you are hungry and see the difference. You will eat the food as per your body requirements. This is what Krishna says that if you live Samyak life you are released from all the sins.
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