Edwin Arnold

Sir Edwin Arnold - The Bhagavad-Vita

The Bhagavad Gita is the most famous Indian scripture and is said to contain eternal knowledge and regarded as a spiritual and literary masterpiece. The Gita is an epic poem consisting of 18 chapters, each named after a form of yoga, and 700 verses. Its framework is a dialogue between warrior Prince Anjuna and his spiritual guide and charioteer, Krishna, and explores ethical and moral dilemmas of man's existence. It remains the central sacred text to Hindus and Gandhi referred to it as his "spiritual dictionary. Whilst most scholars agree that it was written by Sage Ved Vyasa, no clear date of the work has been established but it is thought to definitely have been written between the fifth and second century BCE. Still today it continues to be relevant to hundreds of millions of people throughout the world and new translations abound in many languages. This early English translation by Sir Edwin Arnold brought wider attention to the book and remains an acclaimed work.