Opinion ‘Oppenheimer’ sweeps Golden Globes: The atomic bomb and two verses from the Bhagavad Gita
J Robert Oppenheimer believed that the Gita was the most beautiful philosophical song that existed in any language of the world
After working at various universities in Europe, and later at Harvard as well as Caltech in the US, Oppenheimer started teaching at the University of California, Berkeley. (Photo: Wikimedia Commons) 
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Oppenheimer, directed by Christopher Nolan — one of the most critically acclaimed films of 2023 — has all but swept the Golden Globes, winning five awards including for best actor, director and film. J Robert Oppenheimer, an American physicist, is considered the father of the atomic bomb. He was born into a Jewish family in New York. In 1927, he received his doctorate in Physics from the University of Göttingen in Germany. After working at various universities in Europe, and later at Harvard as well as Caltech in the US, Oppenheimer started teaching at the University of California, Berkeley. He had been interested in Indian philosophy for a long time. He studied Sanskrit with Arthur Ryder, a Professor of Sanskrit at Berkeley, so that he could read the original texts, instead of merely reading their translations. He was particularly fond of the Shrimad Bhagavad Gita. He believed that the Gita was the most beautiful philosophical song that existed in any language of the world.
After entering World War II, the US began major efforts to develop the atomic bomb. The Manhattan Project began in 1942 and General Leslie Groves was put in charge of it. In addition to the work of the scientists at various places like Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and Hanford, Washington, a new laboratory was established in April 1943 at Los Alamos, New Mexico, under Oppenheimer.
Oppenheimer invited several eminent scientists to stay and work at Los Alamos. It was a huge challenge to come up with new discoveries and engineer them into the atomic bomb. Moreover, this had to be accomplished before Germany could do the same. In the summer of 1945, Oppenheimer’s group succeeded in making two atomic bombs, one by fission of Uranium-235, and another by implosion of Plutonium-239. By then, Germany had conceded defeat, but the US was still at war with Japan. At 5:39 am on July 16, 1945, the Trinity Test — so named by Oppenheimer — took place in Alamogordo, New Mexico. Soon after the detonation, a very bright light was produced, and intense heat was created.
Oppenheimer then remembered the following verse from the Gita, which reads as follows when rearranged in prose form: Yadi surya-sahasrasya bhaah divi yugapat utthitaa bhavet, saa tasya Mahaatmanah bhaasah sadrshii syaat. (If a thousand suns would shine at once in the sky, then the brilliant glow would be like that of the Great One.)
In the 11th chapter of the Gita, titled ‘Vishwaroopadharshana’, Arjuna requests Shri Krishna to reveal his divine form. Krishna endows Arjuna with a special vision of his radiant yet terrifying form. The above-quoted verse is how Sanjaya, the narrator, describes it to Dhritarashtra. Oppenheimer must have felt the same way when he saw the first explosion of the atomic bomb.
After the success of the Trinity Test, Oppenheimer was, of course, proud of his achievement but he soon realised the profound consequences of this act. The roar of the explosion spread a hundred miles in forty seconds, and the resulting mushroom cloud reached a height of seven and a half miles. The detonation released an energy which was more than the explosive energy of twenty kilotons of the chemical compound TNT (trinitrotoluene). Everything nearby was destroyed. It was clear to Oppenheimer that such nuclear weapons would be produced, and used in the near future. The possibility of destroying the entire world could not be ruled out. Oppenheimer must have felt responsible, at least partially, for such a bleak future. He recalled the first line of another verse from the 11th chapter of the Gita. To him, it meant “I am Death, the destroyer of worlds”. The entire verse, rearranged in prose, reads as follows: Lokakshayakrt pravrddhah kaalah (aham) asmi|iha lokaan samaahartum pravrttah (asmi)| ye pratyaniikeshu yodhaah (te) sarve twaa rte api na bhavishayanti. (I am Death, the destroyer of peoples, grown wildly. Here I am ready to demolish people. Even if you were not present, all the warriors in the opposing armies will [eventually] be no more.)
Shri Krishna uttered this verse while exhibiting his divine form to Arjuna. The purpose of this verse was to remove Arjuna’s hesitation to battle his teachers and relatives and to encourage him to follow his duty as a Kshatriya warrior. In the Gita, Arjuna follows the “natural duties” (swadharma) of a Kshatriya, and leaves the responsibility of his actions to Shri Krishna. Oppenheimer had followed the swadharma of a scientist to discover new things and was forced to leave the consequences of his discovery to US President Harry Truman.
Devdutt Pattanaik, a commentator on Indian mythology, said in an interview (IE, July 24, 2023) that Oppenheimer’s reference “I am become death” is nowhere to be found in the Gita. He says that “Kalosmi” in verse 11.32 means “I am time”. I know at least three meanings of the word “kaal” — the colour black, time, and death or Yama. Which of these meanings is intended depends on the context. If we see the adjective “lokakshayakrit”(meaning the destroyer of people), which occurs immediately after, we must take “kaal” here to mean death. The traditional commentators of the Gita have given the same meaning.
Late in life, Oppenheimer was asked which 10 books had the most profound influence on him. On his list were Shakespeare’s Hamlet and T S. Eliot’s The Waste Land, along with the Gita and Bhartrihari’s Shatakatraya. In the Bradbury Science Museum of the Los Alamos Laboratory, is the US National Security Research Center. There are only two personal items of Oppenheimer in their collection: One is his office chair, and the other is his copy of the Gita; its cover page bears his initials at the top right.
The writer is former Professor of Mathematics at IIT-Bombay
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