The Dhaarmik Traditions - Indic Studies Foundation

The Bhagavad Gita describes the mind as turbulent and obstinate. 'The Chariot of the
Body': Typically depicted as a chariot drawn by 5 horses which represent the five
senses (tongue, eyes, nose, ears and skin), the rein symbolises the mind, the driver is
the intelligence, and the passenger is the spirit soul.
Yohyam yogastvaya proktaha samyen Madhusudan
Aitasyaham pashyami chanchalatwatsthitim sthiram
Chanchal hi manaha Krishna
pramathi balwad dridham
Tasyaham nigraham manye vayorivam sudushkaram
Meaning - This yoga that has been declared by Thee of the nature of equanimity, O,
Madhusudan, I see no stable foundation for it owing to restlessness.
Restless indeed is the mind, O, Krishna; it is vehement, strong and difficult to bend; I
deem it as hard to control as the wind.
(Gita 6/33, 34)
5.2 Dating of the text
Though it is not exactly clear when the Bhagavad Gita was written, there is ample
evidence that the Mahabharata of which the Bhagavad Gita is a part (Chapters 23 to
40) of the Bhishma Parva was composed by Veda Vyaasa around 3100 BCE. In our
series of essays on Vedic Mathematicians elsewhere we try to reconstruct the timeline
of the birth of the codified Sanskrit Language attributed to Panini. Such a codified form
of Sanskrit (Classical Sanskrit) must post date the works of Panini (it is of course
possible that Pannini’s work was the culmination of others whom he makes mention
of) and hence the Mahabharata in its present form could not have been written prior to
Panini. Currently, we have dated Panini to have made his contributions circa 3500
BCE. However, the construction of many sentences, as also archaic forms of words in
the Gita do not conform to the grammatical rules of Panini, Besides the word Yoga,
according to Swami Gambhirananda is used in the Gita in a much wider sense than
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