I am a little puzzled why The Durango Herald printed the article about the “Bhagavad Gita” recently with headline “What the ‘Bhagavad Gita’ can teach about work.” The "Gita“ promotes the ideal that everyone belongs to a caste in a highly hierarchical and stratified society, one that is antithetical to our American ideal of mobility.
Belonging to a caste means that one is bound for life in the confines of one’s caste. As Krishna tells Arjuna, “Better one’s own duty (dharma) though imperfect, than another’s duty well-performed" (III.35). The article in the Herald recommends to workers that they need not aspire to positions of advancement, rather that they be content with a dead-end job.
Some may take solace in such an ideal, but that is not what made America great.
Bill Malandra
Durango
