Arjuna’s Vision of Krishna: On the Edge of Transcendence

In reading the Bhagavad-Gita from chapter four on, it may be tempting to collapse all of Hinduism into a monotheism in which Lord Krishna is God. Even in the context of bhukti being directed exclusively to Krishna, other deities are alluded to in the text. To claim that those other deities came out of Krishna, and even that Krishna surpasses even Brahman, which is infinite being that is imperishable awareness, thought (but not mind), power, and bliss, in terms of ultimacy does not mean that the Gita is a monotheist scriptural faith-narrative. Not even Krishna’s unmanifest form by which the deity’s creative energy gives rise to the cosmos transcends form itself, and thus reaches the unmanifest and formless Brahman. To be sure, that Krishna, as the Supreme Person metaphysically and ontologically, is ultimately Self renders the deity identical to brahman, but this does not mean that Krishna transcends brahman. Regardless of where the Krishna-Brahman debate lands, and there are admittedly shlokas in the Gita that support the ultimacy of Krishna and shlokas that favor the ultimacy of Brahman, Krishna need not be more ultimate than Brahman for a devotee of the deity to be able to experience a lot of transcendence from ordinary experience. In fact, because either referent that is the Absolute lies beyond the limits of human cognition, perception, and sensibility (emotion), according to the Christian theologian Pseudo-Dionysius, the human experience of distinctly religious transcendence is where our attention can fruitfully be directed. This is not to say that a referent (i.e., a divine, transcendent object) is thereby relegated or even discarded in favor of the quality of experience as its own referent. Rather, it is to say that we can know a lot more than we do about distinctly religious, and thus transcending, experience, and that such knowledge is part of the human condition—part of being human as homo religios as distinct from being a political, economic, and social species. First I investigate the question of whether the Gita is monotheist, after which I argue that Arjuna’s vision of Krishna in chapter 11 of the Gita is can be viewed as the “event horizon” of sorts in terms of how much we can transcend as we approach the limits of our faculties.

The full essay is at "Arjuna's Vision of Krishna."

The Hindu Festival of Holi: Polytheism in Practice

On March 14, 2025, “(m)illions of people in South Asia celebrated Holi, the Hindu festival of colors . . . by smearing each other with brightly colored powder, dancing to festive music and feasting on traditional sweets prepared for the occasion.”[1] Lest the various eats and drinks be dismissed for analytical purposes as trivial, a particular kind of drink or food that is traditional can have religious significance by reflecting Hinduism as a polytheistic rather than a monotheist religion. Whereas monotheism allows for only one deity, etymologically mono theos, a polytheist religion has more than one deity, even if one is deemed to be superior over the others.

The full essay is at "The Hindu Festival of Holi."

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1. “Millions of  People Celebrate Holi, the Hindu Festival of Colors,” The Associated Press, March 14, 2025.

Lord Krishna in the Bhagavadgita

The Hindu myth, the Bhagavadgita, is typically regarded as placing the god Krishna above not only the other Hindu gods—here rendered merely as Krishna’s various functionalities—but also Brahman, which is being and consciousness writ large. Because Krishna is incarnated in human form, placing him at the peak of the Hindu pantheon—in fact, even reducing the latter to the point that Hinduism is regarded by some scholars as monotheist—compromises the wholly-other quality of the divine that is based on it extending beyond the limits of human cognition, perception, and emotion, and thus beyond things we encounter in our world. In other word, the highlighting of Krishna’s role in the Gita comes at a cost. Depicting Krishna as the “Supreme Person” connotes less transcendence than does depicting Brahman as being and consciousness (of the whole). In going against the grain by making Brahman the unmanifested basis or foundation even of Krishna as well as Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva, Shankara, a Hindu theologian, philosopher, and ascetic of the eighth century, CE, can be interpreted as highlighting  transcendence in Hinduism, an element that establishes religion itself as a distinctive domain.

The full essay is at "Lord Krishna in the Bhagavadgita."

Is the Hindu Bhagavadgita Monotheist?

Even though the Bhagavadgita is just a small part of the Mahabharata Hindu epic, the popularity of the former book in Hindu households has led to it being referred to as the Hindu Bible. This likeness should be taken at face value, for the contents in the Gita are very different than the theological context of the Bible, whether just the Torah, the Talmud, or the New Testament. Even though the virtue of kindness or love issuing out in compassion to other people is a shared descriptor of the Hindu Lord Krishna, which is the highest god in the Gita, and the Christian Lord Jesus, the ideational dissimilarities between the Gita and the Bible should not be glossed over. Put another way, not even the symbol of the mandala, which Joseph Campbell includes as the religious archetype of wholeness in The Power of Myth, should dispel the notion that religions contain unique and thus different philosophical and theological ideas and even just stances.

The full essay is at "Is the Hindu Bhagavadgita Monotheist?"

Christianity and Hinduism: On Manifestations of Divinity

Hinduism is a polytheist religion whereas Christianity is monotheist. Many gods versus one seems like a clear distinction, and I submit that it basically holds. Yet nuances exist that make the distinction murky both in Hinduism and Christianity. The key to clearing up the ambiguity lies in deciding whether being a manifestation of something else is enough to count as existing as an entity. In simpler terms, is a manifestation real, or is it merely an appearance?

The full essay is at "Christianity and Hinduism."

Why Do Atrocities Occur in the Name of God?

Why have atrocities been associated with religion—even having been committed under religious auspices? Four Crusades were fought, for example, by popes whose God is love—whose god-man extolls love of enemies and turning the other cheek rather than hitting back. In the modern era, Christianity has been tame, but terrorist acts have been committed in the name of God by people who presume that they cannot possibly be wrong in their beliefs. If Feuerbach is correct, the underlying problem inheres in the belief in God's very existence—that belief pointing us to a still deeper problem in the very nature of faith itself, to a vulnerability or susceptibility that has been overlooked or conveniently glossed over for as long as religion has existed on the face of the Earth.

The full essay is at "Monotheism and Atrocities."