Jnani and Action

 Sri Sadgurubhyoh Namah

Jnani and action:

Jnani do not act for karma phala. No kamya karma for selfish gains.

Jnani uses body-mind for loka kalyana, self less service.

Jnani is not bound by karma. 

An ajnani is one who thinks that 'i am the doer. I will do this karma to attain this result. ' so, ajnani is one who thinks he is karta (doer) and bhokta(enjoyer). 

So ajnani has many desires. To fulfil those desires he will do many karmas which yield karma phala. To enjoy those karma phala he takes birth again and another body. Body means trouble like birth, growth, disease, oldage, death. 

This cycle will repeat continuously. That is samsara. 

Jnani knows through sadguru teaching and vedanta teaching that 'i am not karta, bhokta' . I am not having any desires, so no kamya karma. No phala. No further birth or body or samsara. 

That raise a question, does jnani sit idle? Good for nothing? No. 

Jnani acts. But he does not do karma for his desires. He does karma to help others. 

Helping world and others without expecting anything for oneself is called 'yajna'

Yajna purifies. Yajna karma is liberation. Selfishness is bondage

Purushartha 

Dharma, artha, kama, moksha. 

These are not sequential steps. They are integrated whole. 

A normal person has a kama (desire), to fullfil that desire he needs artha (wealth). That wealth has to be earned in a dharmic way. 

The kama can be loukika(worldly) or other worldly(heaven etc). So to earn loukika kama he does loukika karma. For other worldly he does religious karma. Then, he has a concept of moksha (liberation). Probably stay in a loka along with God. To attain this, he will do japa, tapa, etc. 

All these assume that one is a separate entity from other beings and God. 

So an ajnani viewpoint is he is seperate from totality. 

All the karma is done for purushartha with this seperateness in mind. 

Whereas Vedanta says, 

1. You are full, complete, you dont need anything

2. Atma is akarta and abhokta, and changeless and full

3. Atma is the reality, world is an appearance, including purushartha.

Normal person is bound in samsara by ajnana. 

He will do punya, papa karma and goes through heaven, hell, earth repeatedly. 

All actions of a normal person, bind him to samsara. no matter the kind of karma, which ever purushartha it is. 

Only jnana can break this cycle, and give mukti. 

Karma leads to bondage irrespective of type of karma. Good karma is like golden chain. Bad karma is like iron chain. 

Both good karma and bad karma are chains only. Good karma takes you to heaven, bad karma to hell. After exhaustion of good or bad karma, you come back to earth. This cycle keeps going on. 

Karma cannot lead to mukti. No matter how great karma. 

Jnanadeva kaivalyam

Mukti is only through atmajnana. 

Na anyah panthah ayanaya vidyate

There is no other path known other than knowledge and wisdom that can make you free