Is krishan's justification to kill opponents right?

[shastarSingh]

https://www.holy-bhagavad-gita.org/chapter/2

Arjuna says

It would be better to live in this world by begging, than to enjoy life by killing these noble elders, who are my teachers. If we kill them, the wealth and pleasures we enjoy will be tainted with blood.

krishan says

Never was there a time when I did not exist, nor you, nor all these kings; nor in the future shall any of us cease to be.

.....

Only the material body is perishable; the embodied soul within is indestructible, immeasurable, and eternal. Therefore, fight, O descendent of Bharat.

 

[shastarSingh]

Tomorrow if a person kills his opponent, he will say in the court that I hv not done any wrong. I hv only killed my opponent's body, not his soul.

[shastarSingh]

Dr. Ambedkar on gita

https://roundtableindia.co.in/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4347:essays-on-the-bhagwat-gita-philosophic-defence-of-counter-revolution-krishna-and-his-gita&catid=119:feature&Itemid=132

[Ranjeet01]

17 hours ago, shastarSingh said:

https://www.holy-bhagavad-gita.org/chapter/2

Arjuna says

It would be better to live in this world by begging, than to enjoy life by killing these noble elders, who are my teachers. If we kill them, the wealth and pleasures we enjoy will be tainted with blood.

krishan says

Never was there a time when I did not exist, nor you, nor all these kings; nor in the future shall any of us cease to be.

.....

Only the material body is perishable; the embodied soul within is indestructible, immeasurable, and eternal. Therefore, fight, O descendent of Bharat.

 

Never was there a time when I did not exist, nor you, nor all these kings; nor in the future shall any of us cease to be.

If there is ever a quote that proves he is not the Akaal then this is it.

I have not read the Gita but I have watched Mahabharat (the late 80's version) and I do recall in the beginning of the credits, Krishna was calling himself rime. 

Clearly Doordarshan was taking artistic liberties. 

The society at that time had diferent moralities than maybe people in medieval times let alone today.

[Ranjeet01]

In terms of the killing part of the Gita. 

This is a war that was taking place and to come to terms to killing a certain level of detachment that needs to take place. 

Krishan being a higher level being in a human body understood what mortality really is. That the human body is just a shell and the soul is forever. So by killing all you are doing is releasing the soul.

It was a Dharam Yudh and certain things had to be done to uphold Dharma. Killing had to be done and detachment was required to prevent the hesitancy.

[Ranjeet01]

12 hours ago, Ranjeet01 said:

In terms of the killing part of the Gita. 

This is a war that was taking place and to come to terms to killing a certain level of detachment that needs to take place. 

Krishan being a higher level being in a human body understood what mortality really is. That the human body is just a shell and the soul is forever. So by killing all you are doing is releasing the soul.

It was a Dharam Yudh and certain things had to be done to uphold Dharma. Killing had to be done and detachment was required to prevent the hesitancy.

In the Gita for all it's flaws from a Sikhi perspective saw the upholding Dharma as the upmost ideal. Killing for upholding Dharma is seen as righteous. 

The Pandavas had to fight and kill their own cousins the Kauravas. 

Arjuna had to kill his own half brother Karna, Bhim had to kill Dhuroydhana. 

For all the adharmic things the Kauravas did,  they had people like Bhishma  (their great uncle ), Dronacharya and Kripacharya on their side. I cannot remember whether it was Dronacharya or Kripacharya that was their teacher. One of them was a Brahmin if I am correct which busts the myth that a Brahmin should not take arms and fight. 

These were people who were largely honorable people (except the time they allowed the Pandavas wife to be stripped naked after the bet they had until Krishna stepped in).

In those times, there were rules of engagement in war such as fighting during the day and going back to camp when the sunset.

The Kauravas broke this when they killed Abhimanyu  (Arjuna''s son) in the night time when he was asleep.

[shastarSingh]

https://roundtableindia.co.in/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4347:essays-on-the-bhagwat-gita-philosophic-defence-of-counter-revolution-krishna-and-his-gita&catid=119:feature&Itemid=132

Dr. Ambedkar

The first instance one comes across in reading the Bhagvat Gita is the justification of war. Arjuna had declared himself against the war, against killing people for the sake of property. Krishna offers a philosophic defence of war and killing in war. This philosophic defence of war will be found in Chapter II verses II to 28. The philosophic defence of war offered by the Bhagvat Gita proceeds along two lines of argument. One line of argument is that anyhow the world is perishable and man is mortal. Things are bound to come to an end. Man is bound to die. Why should it make any difference to the wise whether man dies a natural death or whether he is done to death as a result of violence? Life is unreal, why shed tears because it has ceased to be? Death is inevitable, why bother how it has resulted ? The second line of argument in justification of war is that it is a mistake to think that the body and the soul are one. They are separate. Not only are the two quite distinct but they differ in-as-much as the body is perishable while the soul is eternal and imperishable. When death occurs it is the body that dies. The soul never dies. Not only does it never die but air cannot dry it, fire cannot burn it, and a weapon cannot cut it. It is therefore wrong to say that when a man is killed his soul is killed. What happens is that his body dies. His soul discards the dead body as a person discards his old clothes—wears a new ones and carries on. As the soul is never killed, killing a person can never be a matter of any movement. War and killing need therefore give no ground to remorse or to shame, so argues the Bhagvat Gita.

==============

The philosophic defence offered by the Bhagvat Gita of the Kshtriya's duty to kill is to say the least puerile. To say that killing is no killing because what is killed is the body and not the soul is an unheard of defence of murder. This is one of the doctrines which make some people say that the doctrines make one's hair stand on their end. If Krishna were to appear as a lawyer acting for a client who is being tried for murder and pleaded the defence set out by him in the Bhagvat Gita there is not the slightest doubt that he would be sent to the lunatic asylum. 

[Ranjeet01]

4 hours ago, shastarSingh said:

https://roundtableindia.co.in/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4347:essays-on-the-bhagwat-gita-philosophic-defence-of-counter-revolution-krishna-and-his-gita&catid=119:feature&Itemid=132

Dr. Ambedkar

The first instance one comes across in reading the Bhagvat Gita is the justification of war. Arjuna had declared himself against the war, against killing people for the sake of property. Krishna offers a philosophic defence of war and killing in war. This philosophic defence of war will be found in Chapter II verses II to 28. The philosophic defence of war offered by the Bhagvat Gita proceeds along two lines of argument. One line of argument is that anyhow the world is perishable and man is mortal. Things are bound to come to an end. Man is bound to die. Why should it make any difference to the wise whether man dies a natural death or whether he is done to death as a result of violence? Life is unreal, why shed tears because it has ceased to be? Death is inevitable, why bother how it has resulted ? The second line of argument in justification of war is that it is a mistake to think that the body and the soul are one. They are separate. Not only are the two quite distinct but they differ in-as-much as the body is perishable while the soul is eternal and imperishable. When death occurs it is the body that dies. The soul never dies. Not only does it never die but air cannot dry it, fire cannot burn it, and a weapon cannot cut it. It is therefore wrong to say that when a man is killed his soul is killed. What happens is that his body dies. His soul discards the dead body as a person discards his old clothes—wears a new ones and carries on. As the soul is never killed, killing a person can never be a matter of any movement. War and killing need therefore give no ground to remorse or to shame, so argues the Bhagvat Gita.

==============

The philosophic defence offered by the Bhagvat Gita of the Kshtriya's duty to kill is to say the least puerile. To say that killing is no killing because what is killed is the body and not the soul is an unheard of defence of murder. This is one of the doctrines which make some people say that the doctrines make one's hair stand on their end. If Krishna were to appear as a lawyer acting for a client who is being tried for murder and pleaded the defence set out by him in the Bhagvat Gita there is not the slightest doubt that he would be sent to the lunatic asylum. 

Did Dr Ambedkar take this stance after he became buddhist and take on the concept of Ahimsa?