3 Thursdays, April 18, 25, and May 2 at 7p to 8:30p. $60 (Circle of Giving discounts apply). In person at the Bothell Temple (yoga hall) and online

In America, the Bhagavad Gita was first encountered in the early 19th century by Thoreau and Emerson who, together with Walt Whitman, were termed the “Transcendentalists.” The beloved “Gita” has had a growing impact on American and Western society. Robert Oppenheimer, “father of the atomic age” and a student of Sanskrit, is said to have quoted the Gita when he saw the fist atomic bomb exploded at a test at Los Alamos, New Mexico.

The Gita is the summation of the revealed wisdom of India distilled from the Vedas, Upanishads and other scriptures far earlier than the Gita’s own composition in the last millennia of the BC era. It is, in fact, a scripture for OUR times for it shines with wisdom, clarity, poetry and practicality.

In this four-week series with Nayaswami Hriman we will focus on the core messages of the Gita such as:

• A brief history
• Does non-attachment require that we refrain from involvement in the world?
• What actions in this world lead to enlightenment?
• How is ego-transcendence achieved?
• Does meditation and yoga practice eliminate the need for grace?
• What makes “the world go round?”
• Have I lived before? At death, where will I go?
• How can I reconcile action with non-attachment?
• What is devotion and is it needed?
• What is the nature of meditation?