Krishna tells Arjuna about His qualities, and now Arjuna wants to see His form as the Supreme One. So far, Arjuna has been seeing the Lord as Krishna, but now he is anxious to behold the Supreme Rupa of the Lord. The Lord then says, “Behold my Supreme Form.” But Arjuna is unable to see His rupa. Yet he does not want to say so, because that would be like doubting the Lord’s words. So he remains quiet, said Valayapet Ramachariar, in a discourse.
But the Lord knows that Arjuna cannot see His rupa, and gives him divine eyesight. This is very similar to Ramanuja discerning Kooratazhvan’s disagreement with some of his interpretations while he (Ramanuja) came up with Sri Bhashya, his commentary on Brahma Sutra. Both Kooratazhvan and Ramanuja had read Bodhayana’s work in the Kashmir library. As Ramanuja came up with his interpretations of the Brahma Sutra, Kooratazhvan wrote down what the Acharya said. Wherever he disagreed with Ramanuja’s interpretation, he simply stopped writing. He did not contradict the Acharya. Ramanuja would know at once that Kooratazhvan had stopped taking down his dictations, because he had a different interpretation. Like Kooratazhvan, Arjuna maintained silence when he could not see the Lord’s rupa, and Krishna, like Ramanuja, knew the reason for Arjuna’s silence. Krishna then told Arjuna that he could not see Him with the ordinary sight of a mortal, and He conferred divine sight on Arjuna. Here again, one is reminded of Kooratazhvan.
When he had been in Kanchipuram, he had never missed delighting in the beauty of Varadaraja. But he was blinded by a fanatic Chola king, and when he visited Kanchi after many years, he was still able to see and enjoy Lord Varadaraja’s beauty. That was possible because he was blessed with divine sight.
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