Gautama, the father of Nachiketas, was performing a sacrifice. Nachiketas asked his father: “To whom will you give me?” The father replied: “To Death I will give you.” Nachiketas went to the house of Yama, the Lord of Death. He stood there for three days and nights without receiving any hospitality, as Yama had gone out and as there was none to receive him.
The Lord of Death returned and found Nachiketas waiting in obedience to his father’s promise to give him to Death. Yama said to Nachiketas: “O Brahmin; as thou, a venerable guest, hast dwelt in my house three nights without eating, choose now three boons in return.” Then Nachiketas first asked that his father might again be pleased with him. Yama said: “Your father will recognise you as before. He will sleep peacefully at night and when he sees you released from me, he will lose his anger.” The second boon was that of the heavenly fire and Yama said that that fire will be known to him and called by his name. As for the third boon, the boy asked for the secret of Death. “There is that doubt, when a man is dead—some say that he is and some say he is not—this! I should like to know. Tell me, O Lord of Death, thy secret. Can man escape from thy clutch?”
Yama said: “Do not ask that. On this point even the gods of olden times had doubt. Verily, it is not easy to understand it. Subtle is its nature. O Nachiketas! Choose another boon.” Nachiketas said: “These things are ephemeral. They wear out the vigour of all the senses. Even the longest life is short. It is nothing when compared to Eternity. Keep thou thy chariots, the damsels, the dance and music. No one can be made happy by wealth. Give me the one boon, the only boon I seek—How may man escape thy mouth?”
Lord Yama found out that the boy was a qualified student for the attainment of Jnana or wisdom of the Soul. He told him how man might escape from the hands of Death. He said: “O Nachiketas! Just listen to me with rapt attention. I shall tell you the way to attain Immortality. Man is bound by desires. The desires are born of the senses. These bind him to the wheel of birth and death. He must destroy the desires and subjugate the mind and the senses. This is the first step to be taken. The body is like a chariot, the senses are the horses, the mind is the reins and the intellect is the driver. The Atman or the Self is the Lord of the chariot.
The sensual objects are the roads. The horses gallop after the objects of senses and carry the chariot with them. They must be guided along the right path. He who has no discrimination and whose mind is always uncontrolled, his senses (horses) are not controlled like the turbulent horses of a driver. He does not reach the goal, but enters into the round of births and deaths. But, he, who has understanding and whose mind is always controlled, his senses are under control like the good trained horses of a driver. He reaches that goal whence he is not born again. He reaches the end of his journey, that highest place of Vishnu.
Meditate on the One, the Eternal, the Atman, which dwells in the cavity of the heart. Fix your mind on the Supreme Self. When all the desires of the senses are destroyed, when the knots of ignorance are broken, then you will attain Immortality or Self-realisation or Brahma-Jnana. Thus you may conquer Death. O Nachiketas! This is the secret of Death.
When the spear pierced his chest and the blood gushed out, then he spoke only one sentence of the Upanishads: tattvamasi, shvetketu – means “you are also that, Shvetketu”. People gathered round him and asked him, “What do you mean?”
He said,”I mean that the divine can come in any guise; he will not be able to deceive me. Today he has come with the spear in his hand. The spear has pierced my chest but I can see that inside the soldier it is only him. He cannot deceive me.” The blood was oozing out of his chest, but the sannyasin was dancing because he could see godliness in his murderer.
Bhishma’s father had granted him a treasured boon. ‘I grant you a boon. You can hold death at arm’s length. You can die when you please.’ After a long life of righteous action and purity in every aspect of his illustrious career, Bhishma delayed his death until the end of the Kurukshetra War. Throughout the battle, Bhishma gave his inner blessing to the virtuous Pandava brothers and told them they would attain victory over the Kauravas. Although he was obliged to fight on the side of the Kauravas, his heart was with the Pandavas because theirs was a righteous cause.
In vedic literature, there is a beautiful analogy of a bowman.
When the bowman shoots the arrow, the arrow once shot cannot be recalled back. Suppose this arrow shot misses the target. Now the bowman prepares himself to shoot another arrow with much more focus, alertness and awareness he had while he shot the fist arrow with the motive of getting to the target this time.
So now, the bundle of arrows in the quiver on his back is the Sanchit Karma. Being one of the three types of karma, it is the sum of one’s past karma – all actions( accumulated good and bad) born out of ones past life.
The first arrow shot by the bowman that missed the target, was the prarabdha karma. The past that has already began to take effect, he has to experience it. He has no control over his prarabdha. He can merely learn from his past actions and thus prepare for his future which was the second arrow that he was preparing to shoot. But with more alertness & awareness this time, the second arrow that becomes his agami karma. He now has total control over his actions and can rectify them so that his future actions will now be perfect to produce good karma (good agami karma).
There is another beautiful analogy also. The granary represents the sanchita karma; that portion taken from the granary and put in the shop for future daily sale corresponds to agami; that which is sold daily represents prarabdha.
Sanchita karma is one of the three kinds of karma. It is the sum of one's past karmas – all actions (accumulated good and bad) from one's past life follow through to the next life which becomes the prarabdha and those that fructify with time either the next moment, several years or even next birth is called as agami karma.
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