c. 200 BC 2026
This is an AI modernization of The Bhagavad Gita into contemporary English. The original is available from GRETIL (the critical edition of the Mahabharata, Bhishma Parva 23-40). Also available as an epub.
The Bhagavad Gita, "the Song of the Lord," is eighteen chapters of the Mahabharata, the longest epic in Sanskrit. Tradition names its author as Vyasa, who is also a character in the epic. Nobody knows who actually composed it or exactly when. Scholars place the poem in its present form somewhere between about the second century BC and the second century AD, and many think it grew in stages. It runs to seven hundred verses, almost all in the short couplet called the shloka.
The epic tells of a war between two branches of one royal family, the Kurus. The five Pandava brothers have been cheated out of their kingdom by their cousins, the hundred sons of the blind king Dhritarashtra, led by the eldest, Duryodhana. Every attempt at peace has failed. The Gita opens on the field of Kurukshetra, with both armies drawn up and the battle about to begin. Arjuna, the third Pandava brother and the greatest archer of his age, asks his charioteer to drive out between the lines. Looking across, he sees his teachers, his great-uncle and his cousins, and he drops his bow and refuses to fight. His charioteer is Krishna, his friend and kinsman, who is also God. The rest of the poem is Krishna's answer.
That answer moves from the self that does not die when the body is killed, to the duty of acting without being driven by the reward, to the paths of knowledge, meditation and devotion, and finally to a vision of Krishna's universal form, which shows Arjuna the whole world, both armies included, pouring into the mouths of Time. The whole conversation is reported by Sanjaya, the king's minister, who has been given the power to see the battlefield from far away. So every chapter is told to Dhritarashtra, the father of the men Arjuna is being urged to kill.
A few things will help. The speakers are named at each change, as they are in the Sanskrit. Krishna and Arjuna are called by dozens of epithets in the original; here they are simply Krishna and Arjuna, except where an epithet's meaning matters. A handful of Sanskrit words are kept because English has no single equivalent: dharma, yoga, Brahman and the three gunas. Each is explained in the sentence the first time it appears. Arjuna's class, the kshatriyas, were the warriors and rulers, and much of Krishna's argument turns on what a warrior owes.
This edition is translated from the Sanskrit of the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute's critical edition of the Mahabharata, which does not include one verse found in some printings at the start of chapter 13. The verse is rendered as prose. One line will look unfamiliar: J. Robert Oppenheimer, who had studied Sanskrit, remembered Krishna's words in chapter 11 as "Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds." The Sanskrit says "Time," and so does this translation.
Dhritarashtra said:
Sanjaya, tell me. My sons and the sons of Pandu have gathered at Kurukshetra, the field of the Kurus, which is also the field of dharma, the sacred order that holds the world together. They have met there spoiling for battle. What did they do?
Sanjaya said:
King Duryodhana, your son, saw the army of the Pandavas drawn up for battle. He went over to his teacher, Drona, and spoke to him.
"Teacher, look at this huge army of the sons of Pandu, put into battle order by Drupada's son, your own clever pupil. Here are heroes, mighty archers, every one of them a match for Bhima and Arjuna in a fight: Yuyudhana, and Virata, and Drupada, a great chariot-fighter; Dhrishtaketu and Chekitana, and the brave king of Kashi; Purujit and Kuntibhoja, and Shaibya, a bull among men; Yudhamanyu the bold and Uttamaujas the brave; Subhadra's son, and the sons of Draupadi. Great chariot-fighters, every one.
"Now hear about ours, best of Brahmins: the finest men on our side, the commanders of my army. I will name them for you so that you know who they are. There is you yourself, and Bhishma, and Karna, and Kripa, who wins his battles; Ashvatthaman and Vikarna, and Somadatta's son as well. And there are many other heroes ready to give their lives for me, armed with every kind of weapon, and all of them masters of war. And yet this strength of ours, with Bhishma guarding it, is not enough, while that strength of theirs, with Bhima guarding it, is enough. So all of you, every one, hold your positions at every point along the line, and above all, protect Bhishma."
Then the oldest of the Kurus, Bhishma, grandfather to both armies and a mighty warrior, let out a lion's roar and blew his conch, loud and high, to put heart into Duryodhana. At that, conches and kettledrums, tabors and drums and trumpets of cow-horn all broke out at once, and the noise was deafening.
Then Krishna and Arjuna, the son of Pandu, standing in their great chariot yoked to white horses, blew their heavenly conches. Krishna blew Panchajanya; Arjuna blew Devadatta; and Bhima, the man with a wolf's appetite and a terrible hand in a fight, blew his great conch, Paundra. King Yudhishthira, the son of Kunti, blew Anantavijaya; Nakula and Sahadeva blew Sughosha and Manipushpaka. The king of Kashi, a superb archer, and Shikhandi, the great chariot-fighter, Dhrishtadyumna and Virata, and Satyaki, who had never been beaten, Drupada and the sons of Draupadi, and Subhadra's strong-armed son: all of them, my king, on every side, blew their conches, each his own. That roar tore at the hearts of your sons, and the uproar made the sky and the earth ring.
Then Arjuna, the son of Pandu, whose banner bears the monkey, saw your sons standing in their ranks. The arrows were about to start flying. He raised his bow, and he said this to Krishna, my king: "Krishna, drive my chariot out and halt it between the two armies, so that I can look at these men standing here hungry for battle, and see whom I have to fight in this struggle that is about to begin. I want to see the men who have come here to fight, eager to do a favor in battle for Dhritarashtra's wicked son."
When Arjuna had said this, my king, Krishna drove that finest of chariots out between the two armies and halted it in front of Bhishma and Drona and all the rulers of the earth, and said, "Arjuna, look at all the Kurus gathered here."
And there Arjuna saw, standing in both armies, fathers and grandfathers, teachers, uncles, brothers, sons and grandsons, and friends, fathers-in-law and dear companions. The son of Kunti looked at them all, all these kinsmen standing there in their ranks, and he was overcome by a deep pity. In despair, he said:
"Krishna, when I see these kinsmen of mine standing here, eager to fight, my legs give way under me and my mouth goes dry. My body is shaking and my hair is standing on end. Gandiva, my bow, is slipping from my hand, and my skin is burning all over. I can't stand still, and my mind seems to be spinning. I see bad omens, Krishna, and I can see no good coming from killing my own people in battle.
"I don't want victory, Krishna, or a kingdom, or pleasures. What use is a kingdom to us, or enjoyment, or even life? The very people for whose sake we wanted a kingdom, enjoyments and pleasures are standing here in battle, ready to give up their lives and their riches: teachers, fathers, sons, and grandfathers too, uncles, fathers-in-law, grandsons, brothers-in-law and other relations. I don't want to kill them, Krishna, even if they kill me. I would not do it to rule all three worlds, heaven and earth and the sky between, so how could I do it for this earth alone?
"What joy could we ever have from killing Dhritarashtra's sons, Krishna? Sin would cling to us for killing them, even though they came at us with weapons drawn. So it is not right for us to kill Dhritarashtra's sons and their kin. How could we be happy, Krishna, after killing our own people? Their minds are ruined by greed, and they can see nothing wrong in destroying a family and no crime in betraying friends. But even so, we can see the wrong in destroying a family, Krishna, so why shouldn't we know enough to turn back from this evil?
"When a family is destroyed, its ancient sacred laws are lost, and when those laws are lost, lawlessness overruns the whole family. And when lawlessness takes over, Krishna, the women of the family are corrupted; and when the women are corrupted, the classes become mixed. That mixing drags to hell both the family and the men who destroyed it, for their ancestors fall too, cut off from the offerings of rice and water that the living make to their dead. Through these crimes of the men who destroy families, which bring about the mixing of the classes, the laws of birth and the eternal laws of the family are wiped out. And men whose family laws have been wiped out, Krishna, are sure to live in hell. So we have always been told.
"Oh, how terrible! We are set on committing a great sin, ready to kill our own people out of greed for the pleasures of a kingdom. If Dhritarashtra's sons, weapons in hand, killed me in battle while I stood unarmed and did not fight back, it would be better for me."
With these words, there on the battlefield, Arjuna sank down onto the seat of his chariot. He let his bow and arrows fall, and his heart was drowned in grief.
Sanjaya said:
Arjuna sat there overwhelmed by pity, sunk in despair, his eyes so full of tears he could not see. And Krishna spoke to him.
Krishna said:
Arjuna, where has this faintness of heart come from, at a crisis like this? It is not how a noble man behaves. It does not lead to heaven, and it brings disgrace. Don't give in to this unmanliness, Arjuna. It isn't worthy of you. Throw off this petty weakness of heart and stand up, you who make your enemies tremble!
Arjuna said:
Krishna, you who killed the demon Madhu, you who destroy your enemies: how can I fight Bhishma and Drona in battle, shooting arrows at men I ought to worship? Surely it is better to live in this world on a beggar's scraps than to kill my teachers, these great-souled men. If I kill my teachers, even if they are greedy for gain, then every pleasure I enjoy here, in this world, will be smeared with blood. We don't even know which is better for us, that we should win or that they should win. The very men we would not care to live after killing are standing there facing us: Dhritarashtra's sons.
This flaw of weakness, this pity, has crippled my own nature, and my mind is confused about what is right. So I am asking you: tell me for certain what is best. I am your student. I have come to you for refuge. Teach me! For I can see nothing that would drive away this grief that is drying up my senses, not even if I won a rich kingdom on earth without a rival, or lordship over the gods themselves.
Sanjaya said:
When he had said this to Krishna, my king, Arjuna told him, "I will not fight," and fell silent. And as he sat there in despair between the two armies, my king, Krishna, with what looked almost like a smile, spoke these words to him:
Krishna said:
You are grieving for people who need no grief, and yet you talk like a wise man. The wise grieve neither for the dead nor for the living. There was never a time when I did not exist, nor you, nor these kings; and there will never be a time from now on when any of us ceases to be. Just as the one who lives in this body passes through childhood, youth and old age, so it passes on to another body. A steady person is not confused by this.
When your senses meet the things of the world, Arjuna, they bring cold and heat, pleasure and pain. These come and go; they do not last. Bear them patiently. The person they cannot shake, the steady person who stays the same in pain and pleasure, finest of men, is fit for immortality.
What is unreal never comes to be; what is real never stops being. Those who see things as they truly are have seen to the bottom of both. Know that what spreads through this whole world cannot be destroyed. No one can destroy what is imperishable. These bodies come to an end, but the one who lives in them is said to be eternal, indestructible, beyond all measure. So fight, Arjuna!
Whoever thinks this self is a killer, and whoever thinks it is killed, neither one understands: it does not kill, and it is not killed. It is never born, and it never dies. It did not come into being, and it will never cease to be. Unborn, eternal, everlasting, ancient beyond all time, it is not killed when the body is killed. If someone knows that it is indestructible and eternal, unborn and unchanging, Arjuna, how can that person kill anyone, or make anyone kill?
Just as a man throws off worn-out clothes and puts on new ones, so the one who lives in the body throws off worn-out bodies and enters others that are new. Weapons do not cut it, fire does not burn it, water does not wet it, and wind does not dry it. It cannot be cut, it cannot be burned, it cannot be wetted or dried. It is eternal, present everywhere, steady, unmoving, everlasting. It is called unmanifest, beyond the reach of the senses; it is called unthinkable and unchanging. So, now that you know it is like this, you should not grieve.
And even if you think it is forever being born and forever dying, even then, Arjuna, you should not grieve for it. For death is certain for whatever is born, and birth is certain for whatever has died. So you should not grieve over what cannot be avoided. Living beings are unmanifest at their beginning, manifest in their middle, Arjuna, and unmanifest again at their end. What is there to mourn in that?
Someone sees it as a wonder. Someone else speaks of it as a wonder. Another hears of it as a wonder. And even having heard of it, no one knows it at all. The one who lives in the body of every being is eternal and can never be killed, Arjuna. So you should not grieve for any creature at all.
Look at your own duty too, and you will not waver. For a kshatriya, someone born to the warrior class, there is nothing better than a just war. Happy are the warriors, Arjuna, who are handed a war like this one: it comes to them unsought, a door to heaven standing open. But if you will not fight this just war, then you will have thrown away your own duty and your good name, and you will bring sin on yourself.
People will tell the story of your disgrace forever, and for a man who has been honored, disgrace is worse than death. The great chariot-fighters will think you ran from the battle out of fear, and those who thought so highly of you will think little of you. Your enemies will say many unspeakable things about you and sneer at your strength. What could be more painful than that? If you are killed, you will win heaven; if you win, you will enjoy the earth. So stand up, Arjuna, determined to fight! Treat pleasure and pain alike, gain and loss alike, victory and defeat alike, and then get ready for battle. That way you will bring no sin on yourself.
What I have told you so far is the understanding that Sankhya teaches, the way of reasoned knowledge. Now hear it as yoga teaches it: yoga, the discipline that yokes the whole mind to its work. Once you are yoked to this understanding, Arjuna, you will throw off the chains that action binds you with. On this path no effort is ever wasted, and nothing can turn it against you. Even a little of this practice saves you from great fear. Here, Arjuna, the understanding of a resolute person is single and focused, but the thoughts of the irresolute branch out endlessly in every direction.
There are people without insight, Arjuna, who love to argue about the words of the Vedas and say there is nothing beyond them. They speak a flowery language, people whose very selves are desire, whose highest aim is heaven: a language that promises rebirth as the reward of what they do, and that lays down all kinds of special rites for gaining pleasure and power. Those who cling to pleasure and power, whose minds are carried away by that language, never reach the resolute understanding that stays fixed in deep concentration.
The Vedas deal with the three gunas, the three strands that all of nature is woven from. Rise above the three gunas, Arjuna. Be free of the pairs of opposites. Stand firm always in goodness, don't worry about getting things and keeping them, and be self-possessed. For a Brahmin who truly knows, all the Vedas are of as much use as a well when the whole country is under water.
Your right is to action alone, never to its fruits. Don't let the fruit of action be your motive, and don't let yourself get attached to doing nothing. Do your work steady in yoga, Arjuna, letting go of attachment, the same in success and failure. Evenness of mind is called yoga. Action on its own is far below the discipline of understanding, Arjuna. Seek refuge in understanding. Those who act for the sake of the fruit are to be pitied.
A person whose understanding is disciplined leaves behind, here and now, both good deeds and bad. So yoke yourself to yoga. Yoga is skill in action. The wise, disciplined in understanding, give up the fruit that action brings; freed from the chains of birth, they go to the place where there is no more suffering. When your understanding has made its way out of this thicket of delusion, you will have had enough of all the scripture you have heard and all you have still to hear. When your understanding, now bewildered by everything it has heard, stands firm and unmoving, steady in deep concentration, then you will reach yoga.
Arjuna said:
Krishna, how would you describe someone whose wisdom is steady, who stands firm in deep concentration? How does a person of steady mind talk? How does he sit? How does he walk?
Krishna said:
When a person gives up every desire that rises in the mind, Arjuna, and is content in the self, by the self alone, then he is called a person of steady wisdom. Someone whose mind is not shaken by sorrows, who has no craving for pleasures, from whom longing and fear and anger have gone, is called a sage of steady mind. Whoever has no clinging attachment to anything, who neither rejoices nor resents it when good or bad comes his way: his wisdom stands firm. And when, like a tortoise drawing in its limbs, he draws his senses in from the things of the senses on every side, his wisdom stands firm.
When someone living in a body stops feeding the senses, the things of the senses fall away from him, but the taste for them stays; and even the taste falls away once he has seen the highest. For the senses are violent, Arjuna. Even when a wise man is struggling against them, they carry his mind off by force. He should restrain them all and sit disciplined, with me as his highest goal. Whoever has his senses under control: his wisdom stands firm.
When a man dwells on the things of the senses, attachment to them is born. From attachment comes desire, and from desire comes anger. From anger comes confusion; from confusion, the loss of memory; from the loss of memory, the ruin of understanding; and from the ruin of understanding, he is lost. But a person who moves among the things of the senses with senses free of longing and loathing, held under the self's control, a person whose self is disciplined, reaches serenity. In that serenity all his sorrows come to an end, for when the heart is serene, the understanding soon stands steady.
The undisciplined have no understanding, and the undisciplined have no inner focus. Without focus there is no peace, and without peace, how can there be happiness? When the mind runs after the wandering senses, it carries off a person's wisdom, as the wind carries off a ship on the water. So, Arjuna, the one whose senses are held back completely from the things of the senses: his wisdom stands firm.
What is night for all beings is the time when the self-controlled person is awake, and when all beings are awake, that is night for the sage who sees. The waters pour into the ocean, and it is filled and filled, and still it never stirs from its steady bed: the person into whom all desires pour in the same way finds peace, and not the one who hungers after his desires. The person who gives up all desires and moves through life without longing, without any thought of "mine," without ego, the sense of "I," finds peace.
This, Arjuna, is the state of standing firm in Brahman, the ultimate reality behind everything. Whoever reaches it is never confused again. Whoever stays in it, even at the hour of death, reaches the nirvana of Brahman, its perfect peace.
Arjuna said:
Krishna, if you think understanding is better than action, then why are you pushing me into this terrible action? You keep mixing your words, and you seem to be confusing my understanding. Tell me one thing, and tell me for certain: what will bring me to the highest good?
Krishna said:
Long ago, Arjuna, I taught that there are two ways to stand firm in this world: for the followers of Sankhya, the yoga of knowledge; for the yogis, the yoga of action. No one reaches freedom from action by simply not starting anything, and no one reaches perfection just by giving things up. For nobody can stay without acting even for a moment. Everyone, whether they like it or not, is made to act by the gunas, which are born of nature.
Someone who holds back his hands and feet and tongue but sits there with his mind dwelling on the things of the senses fools himself, and he is called a hypocrite. But someone who reins in his senses with his mind, Arjuna, and without attachment sets his body to work in the yoga of action — that person stands out. Do the work that is yours to do, since action is better than doing nothing. Without action you could not even keep your body alive.
This whole world is bound by action, except for action done as a sacrifice. So do your work as a sacrifice, Arjuna, and let go of attachment.
In the beginning, when Prajapati, the Lord of Creatures, made all beings, he made sacrifice along with them, and he told them: "Grow and multiply by this. Let it be your wishing cow, the cow that gives whatever you wish for. With it, nourish the gods, and let the gods nourish you. By nourishing one another, you will reach the highest good. For the gods, nourished by sacrifice, will give you the pleasures you want." Whoever enjoys what they give and gives nothing back to them is nothing but a thief. Good people, who eat what is left over from the sacrifice, are freed from every fault. But the wicked, who cook only for themselves, are eating their own sin.
Living beings come from food; food comes from rain; rain comes from sacrifice; and sacrifice comes from action. Know that action comes from Brahman, and Brahman comes from the imperishable. So Brahman, which reaches everywhere, is always present in sacrifice. This is the wheel that has been set turning, Arjuna. Whoever does not help keep it turning here lives a sinful life, delighting only in his senses, and he lives in vain.
But a person who delights only in the self, who is satisfied with the self and finds his whole contentment in the self — for him there is nothing he has to do. He has nothing to gain here by acting and nothing to gain by not acting, and he does not depend on any being for anything. So do the work you have to do, always, without attachment. A person who acts without attachment reaches the highest.
It was by action that King Janaka and others like him reached perfection. You should act too, if only with an eye to holding the world together. Whatever the best person does, everyone else does too. Whatever standard he sets, the world follows.
There is nothing in the three worlds, Arjuna, that I have to do. There is nothing I lack and nothing I have to get. And yet I keep on working. For if I ever stopped working, ever let up for a moment, people everywhere would follow my path, Arjuna. These worlds would fall into ruin if I did not act. I would be the cause of the mixing of the classes, and I would destroy all these creatures.
The ignorant act because they are attached to their work, Arjuna. The wise should act just as hard, but without attachment, wanting to hold the world together. A wise man should not unsettle the understanding of ignorant people who are attached to their work. He should do all his own work in a disciplined way, and so get them to enjoy theirs.
All actions, everywhere, are done by the gunas of nature. But a person whose self is confused by ego thinks, "I am the one doing this." But the person who knows the truth about how the gunas and their workings are divided up, Arjuna, understands that it is only the gunas acting on the gunas, and he does not get attached. People confused by the gunas of nature get attached to the workings of the gunas. Someone who knows the whole should not unsettle these slow people who know only part of it.
Lay all your actions on me, with your mind fixed on the self within. Be free of hope and of any thought of "mine," and fight, with this fever gone from you.
People who always follow this teaching of mine, full of faith and without finding fault with it, are set free from the bonds of action as well. But those who find fault with it and do not follow my teaching — know that they are confused about everything there is to know, that they are mindless, and that they are lost.
Even a wise man behaves according to his own nature. All beings follow their nature. What good will holding it back do? Longing and loathing lie in wait in every sense, fixed on its object. Don't fall under their power. They are the robbers waiting by your road.
Better your own duty done imperfectly than another's duty done well. Better to die doing your own duty; another's duty is full of danger.
Arjuna said:
Then what is it, Krishna, that drives a person to sin, even against his will, as if he were being forced?
Krishna said:
It is desire. It is anger. It is born of the guna of passion. It is a great devourer and a great evil. Know that this is the enemy here. As fire is covered by smoke, as a mirror is covered by dust, as an unborn child is wrapped in the womb, so all this is wrapped in desire. Knowledge is covered over by it, Arjuna: by this constant enemy of the wise, which takes the form of desire, never satisfied, like a fire.
The senses, the mind and the understanding are said to be its home. Through them it covers knowledge and leads the one who lives in the body astray. So first rein in your senses, Arjuna, and then kill this evil thing that destroys knowledge and insight.
The senses, they say, are high. Higher than the senses is the mind. Higher than the mind is the understanding. And higher than the understanding is he — the self. Know, then, what is higher than the understanding. Steady yourself by your self, Arjuna, and kill this enemy that takes the form of desire, so hard to get at.
Krishna said:
I taught this yoga, which never perishes, to Vivasvat, the sun. Vivasvat taught it to Manu, the father of the human race, and Manu told it to Ikshvaku, the first of the kings. Handed down like this from one to the next, it was known to the royal seers, the kings who were also sages. But over a great stretch of time, Arjuna, this yoga was lost to the world. And this is the same ancient yoga I have taught you today, because you are devoted to me and you are my friend. It is the highest secret there is.
Arjuna said:
But you were born recently, and Vivasvat was born long ago. How am I supposed to understand that you taught it to him in the beginning?
Krishna said:
I have lived through many births, Arjuna, and so have you. I know them all. You do not know yours.
Though I am unborn, and my self never changes, and though I am the Lord of all beings, I take command of my own nature and come into being by my own power of illusion. Whenever dharma fails, Arjuna, and lawlessness rises up, then I send myself forth. To protect the good, to destroy those who do evil, and to set dharma firmly in its place again, I come into being age after age.
Whoever truly understands my birth and my action, and that they are divine, does not come back to be born again when he leaves his body. He comes to me, Arjuna. Many people, free of longing and fear and anger, filled with me, taking refuge in me, made pure by the austerity of knowledge, have come into my own state of being. However people come to me, that is how I welcome them. Everywhere, Arjuna, people follow my path.
People who want their actions to succeed make sacrifices here to the gods, since in the world of human beings success that comes from action comes quickly. I created the four classes, dividing them according to their gunas and their work. Know that though I made them, I am not a doer, and I never change. Actions do not stain me, and I have no longing for the fruit of action. Whoever knows me like this is not bound by his actions. The people of old who wanted freedom knew this, and they acted. So you too should act, just as the people of old acted long ago.
What is action, and what is inaction? Even the wise are confused about this. So I will tell you what action is, and once you know it you will be set free from evil. You have to understand what action is, you have to understand what wrong action is, and you have to understand what inaction is. The way of action is deep and hard to see into.
The person who sees inaction in action, and action in inaction, is the one with real understanding among human beings. He is disciplined, even while he is doing every kind of work. When everything a person sets out to do is free of desire and of selfish intention, and his actions have been burned up in the fire of knowledge, the wise call him a truly learned man.
He has given up his attachment to the fruit of action. He is always content, and he leans on nothing. Even when he throws himself into action, he is not really doing anything at all. He hopes for nothing; his mind and his self are under control; he has given up everything he owned. Doing only what the body has to do, he commits no fault. He is content with whatever comes to him by chance. He has gone beyond the pairs of opposites, and he envies no one. He is the same in success and failure. Even when he acts, he is not bound.
When a person has let go of attachment, when he is free, when his mind stands firm in knowledge, and when he does his work as a sacrifice, all of his action melts away.
The offering is Brahman, the butter poured out is Brahman, and it is poured by Brahman into the fire that is Brahman. A person whose every action is deep concentration on Brahman will go to Brahman.
Some yogis offer sacrifice to the gods. Others offer sacrifice itself as a sacrifice into the fire of Brahman. Some offer hearing and the other senses into the fires of restraint. Others offer sound and the other things of the senses into the fires of the senses. Others offer all the work of the senses and all the work of the breath into the fire of the yoga of self-control, kindled by knowledge.
There are others too, those who strive, bound by strict vows, whose sacrifice is their wealth, or their austerity, or their yoga, or reciting the Vedas to themselves and knowing them. Others again, devoted to the control of the breath, offer the outgoing breath into the incoming breath and the incoming breath into the outgoing, and stop the passage of both. Still others eat only a measured amount of food and offer their life-breaths into their life-breaths.
All of these people know what sacrifice is, and their sacrifices have washed away their stains. Those who eat what is left over from the sacrifice, the nectar of immortality, go to Brahman, which lasts forever. Even this world is not for someone who makes no sacrifice, Arjuna, so how could the other one be? Sacrifices of many kinds are spread out like this, offered into the mouth of Brahman. Know that all of them are born of action. Once you know that, you will be set free.
The sacrifice of knowledge is better than any sacrifice of things, Arjuna. All action, every bit of it, comes to its fulfillment in knowledge. Learn it by bowing at the feet of those who know, by asking them questions, by serving them. The wise, who see things as they truly are, will teach you knowledge. Once you know it, Arjuna, you will never fall into confusion like this again, and by it you will see every being, without exception, in the self, and then in me.
Even if you were the worst sinner of all sinners, you would cross over all your wrongdoing on the raft of knowledge alone. Just as a blazing fire burns its firewood to ash, Arjuna, the fire of knowledge burns all actions to ash. Nothing in this world purifies like knowledge. A person who has been perfected in yoga finds it, in time, in himself.
A person with faith gains knowledge, if he is devoted to it and has his senses under control, and once he has gained knowledge he soon reaches the highest peace. But the ignorant person, who has no faith and whose very self is doubt, is lost. For the one whose self is doubt, there is neither this world nor the next, and no happiness either.
Actions do not bind a person who has renounced action through yoga, who has cut his doubt to pieces with knowledge, and who is self-possessed, Arjuna. So take up your own sword of knowledge, cut away this doubt that was born of ignorance and is sitting in your heart, and hold fast to yoga. Stand up, Arjuna!
Arjuna said:
Krishna, you praise renunciation of action, and then you praise yoga again. Tell me for certain: which one of the two is better?
Krishna said:
Renunciation and the yoga of action both lead to the highest good. But of the two, the yoga of action is better than the renunciation of action. The person who neither hates nor craves should be known as one who has always renounced. Free from the pairs of opposites, Arjuna, he is easily set free from his bonds.
It is children, not the learned, who talk about Sankhya and yoga as if they were different. Anyone who truly commits himself to just one of them gets the fruit of both. The place the followers of Sankhya reach is reached by the followers of yoga too. Whoever sees that Sankhya and yoga are one, sees truly.
But renunciation is hard to reach without yoga, Arjuna. A sage who is disciplined in yoga reaches Brahman before long. The one who is disciplined in yoga, whose self is pure, who has mastered himself and conquered his senses, whose self has become the self of all beings — he is not stained, even when he acts.
The disciplined person who knows the truth will think, "I am not doing anything at all," even while he is seeing, hearing, touching, smelling, eating, walking, sleeping, breathing, talking, letting go, taking hold, even opening and closing his eyes. He keeps it firmly in mind that it is only the senses at work on the things of the senses.
A person who acts while setting all his actions down in Brahman and giving up attachment is not stained by sin, just as a lotus leaf is not wetted by the water. Yogis do their work with the body, with the mind, with the understanding, even with the senses alone, giving up attachment, so as to make themselves pure.
The disciplined person gives up the fruit of action and reaches a peace that lasts. The undisciplined person, driven by desire and attached to the fruit, is bound.
The one who lives in the body, once he is master of himself and has renounced all action in his mind, sits at ease in the city of nine gates, the body, neither acting nor making anything act. The Lord does not create anyone's sense of being the doer, or anyone's actions, or the link between action and its fruit. It is the nature of things that does all that. The Lord who is everywhere does not take on anyone's sin, or anyone's good deeds either. Knowledge is covered over by ignorance, and that is why living creatures are confused.
But in those whose ignorance has been destroyed by knowledge of the self, knowledge shines like the sun and lights up that highest reality. Their understanding is fixed on that, their self is in that, they stand firm in that, and that is their whole aim. Their stains washed away by knowledge, they go to the place from which there is no coming back.
The learned look with the same eye on a Brahmin rich in learning and good manners, on a cow, an elephant, a dog, and an outcaste who cooks dogs for food. Those whose minds rest in that sameness have conquered the world of birth here and now. Brahman is flawless and the same in everything, so they stand firm in Brahman.
Such a person does not rejoice when he gets what he likes, or shudder when he gets what he dislikes. His understanding is steady, he is not confused; he knows Brahman, and he stands firm in Brahman. When his self is not attached to the touch of outside things, he finds the happiness that is in the self. His self disciplined in the yoga of Brahman, he enjoys a happiness that never fades.
The pleasures born of contact with the world are nothing but wombs of pain, Arjuna. They have a beginning and an end, and the wise take no delight in them. The person who can hold out against the surge of desire and anger here in this life, before he is freed from his body — he is disciplined, and he is happy.
The person whose happiness is within, whose delight is within, and whose light is within: that yogi becomes Brahman and reaches the nirvana of Brahman. Seers whose stains have worn away, whose doubts have been cut through, who have mastered themselves and who delight in the good of all beings, reach the nirvana of Brahman. For those who strive, who are free of desire and anger, who have mastered their thoughts and come to know the self, the nirvana of Brahman is all around them.
The sage shuts out the touch of the outside world and fixes his gaze between his eyebrows. He makes the breath going out and the breath coming in even as they pass through his nostrils. His senses, his mind and his understanding are under control. Freedom is his highest aim, and longing, fear and anger have left him. A sage like that is free for good.
Whoever knows me as the one who enjoys every sacrifice and every austerity, the great Lord of all the worlds, the friend of all beings, reaches peace.
Krishna said:
The person who does the work he has to do without leaning on the fruit of action is a renouncer and a yogi. It is not the one who has stopped lighting the sacred fire, or the one who has given up the rites. What people call renunciation, Arjuna, know that it is yoga. No one becomes a yogi without renouncing his intentions.
For a sage who wants to climb up to yoga, action is said to be the means. For that same sage, once he has climbed up to yoga, calm is said to be the means. When a person is no longer attached to the things of the senses or to his actions, and has renounced every intention, then he is said to have climbed up to yoga.
Lift yourself up by yourself. Don't let yourself sink. For you are your own friend, and you are your own enemy. You are a friend to yourself if you have conquered yourself by yourself. But if you have not taken hold of yourself, your own self will turn against you like an enemy.
When a person has conquered himself and is at peace, his supreme self stays collected in cold and heat, in pleasure and pain, in honor and in disgrace. The yogi who is satisfied with knowledge and insight, who stands unchanging, who has conquered his senses, to whom a lump of earth, a stone and a piece of gold are all the same, is called disciplined. And the best of all is the one whose understanding is the same toward those who wish him well, his friends and his enemies, the indifferent and those who stand neutral between two sides, those he cannot stand and his own relatives, good people and wicked ones alike.
A yogi should always be disciplining himself, staying somewhere secluded, alone, his thoughts and his self under control, hoping for nothing and owning nothing. In a clean place he should set up a firm seat for himself, not too high and not too low, made of the sacred kusha grass with a deerskin over it and a cloth over that. Sitting on that seat, he should bring his mind to a single point, keep his thoughts and the work of his senses under control, and practice yoga to make himself pure.
He should hold his body, head and neck straight and still, and sit steady, gazing at the tip of his own nose and not looking around in any direction. Calm in himself, free of fear, firm in his vow of chastity, like a young student of the Vedas, his mind under control, he should sit disciplined, his thoughts on me, with me as his highest goal. By always disciplining himself like this, the yogi whose mind is under control reaches the peace that rests in me, the peace whose highest point is nirvana.
But yoga is not for the person who eats too much, Arjuna, or for the one who eats nothing at all, or for the one who sleeps too much, or for the one who stays awake too long. Yoga destroys all suffering for the person who is disciplined in eating and in play, disciplined in the way he goes about his work, disciplined in sleeping and waking.
When his thinking is held in check and rests in the self alone, and he no longer craves anything he might desire, then he is called disciplined. A lamp in a place where no wind blows does not flicker: that is the comparison people use for the yogi whose thinking is held in check, as he practices the yoga of the self.
There is a state in which the mind, held still by the practice of yoga, comes to rest, and in which a person sees the self by the self and is content in the self. In it he knows a happiness without end, which understanding can grasp and the senses cannot reach, and once he stands in it he never wanders from the truth. Once he has it, he thinks there is no gain greater than this, and standing in it he is not shaken even by the heaviest sorrow. Know that this state is called yoga: the unyoking of the yoke of pain. This yoga must be practiced with determination, and with a heart that does not lose heart.
He should give up, completely and without exception, all the desires that intention gives birth to, and use the mind itself to rein in the whole crowd of senses on every side. Little by little he should come to rest, with his understanding held firm by resolve. He should settle his mind in the self and think of nothing at all. Wherever the restless, unsteady mind wanders off, he should rein it in from there and bring it back under the control of the self.
For the highest happiness comes to the yogi whose mind is at peace, whose passion is stilled, who has become Brahman and is free from stain. By always disciplining himself like this, the yogi, his stains gone, easily enjoys the endless happiness of the touch of Brahman.
The person whose self is disciplined by yoga sees the self in all beings and all beings in the self. He sees the same everywhere. Whoever sees me everywhere and sees everything in me: I am never lost to him, and he is never lost to me. Whoever stands firm in oneness and loves me as the one who lives in all beings, that yogi lives in me, however he lives. The one who measures everything by himself, Arjuna, and sees the same in everything, whether it is pleasure or pain, is thought to be the highest yogi.
Arjuna said:
Krishna, this yoga you have described as evenness of mind — I don't see how it can ever stand steady, because the mind is so restless. The mind is restless, Krishna, violent, strong and stubborn. I think holding it still is as hard as holding the wind.
Krishna said:
No doubt about it, Arjuna, the mind is restless and hard to hold still. But it can be held, by practice and by detachment. My view is that yoga is hard to reach for a person who has not mastered himself. But a person who has mastered himself and keeps working at it can reach it, if he goes about it the right way.
Arjuna said:
What about someone who has faith but does not master himself, whose mind wanders away from yoga, so that he never reaches perfection in yoga? What becomes of him, Krishna? Fallen from both, with nothing to stand on, lost on the path to Brahman, isn't he destroyed, like a cloud torn apart in the sky? You must cut through this doubt of mine completely, Krishna. There is no one but you who can cut through it.
Krishna said:
Arjuna, there is no destruction for him, not in this world and not in the next. No one who does good ever comes to a bad end, my friend. The one who has fallen away from yoga goes to the worlds of those who have done good, lives there for countless years, and then is born again into the house of pure and prosperous people. Or else he is born into a family of wise yogis, though a birth like that is even harder to come by in this world. There he gets back the understanding he had in his earlier body, and from there he strives again, harder than before, for perfection, Arjuna.
The practice he did before carries him along, even without his willing it. Even someone who only wants to know about yoga goes beyond Brahman as it is set down in words, in the Vedas. But the yogi who strives with all his effort, purified of his faults and perfected over many births, then reaches the highest goal.
The yogi is greater than the ascetics. He is thought greater even than the learned, and the yogi is greater than those who perform the rites. So be a yogi, Arjuna. And of all yogis, the one who loves me with faith, whose inmost self has gone to me — I count him the most disciplined of all.
Krishna said:
Arjuna, listen to how you will come to know me completely, beyond any doubt, if you keep your mind fixed on me, practice yoga, and make me your refuge. I will teach you this knowledge, and the insight that goes with it, leaving nothing out. Once you know it, there will be nothing left in this world for you to know.
Among thousands of people, hardly one strives for perfection. And even among those who strive and succeed, hardly one knows me as I truly am.
Earth, water, fire, air, space, mind, understanding, and ego: this is my nature, divided eight ways. That is my lower nature. But know that I have another, beyond it, my higher nature, Arjuna: the one that has become life itself, by which this whole world is held up. Understand that all beings are born from these two natures. I am where the whole world comes from, and I am where it ends. There is nothing whatever higher than I am, Arjuna. All of this is strung on me, like pearls on a thread.
I am the taste in water, Arjuna. I am the light in the moon and the sun, the sacred syllable Om in all the Vedas, the sound in space, the manhood in men. I am the pure scent of the earth and the blaze in the fire. I am the life in all beings, and the austerity in ascetics. Know that I am the eternal seed of all beings, Arjuna. I am the understanding of those who understand, the brilliance of the brilliant. I am the strength of the strong, free of desire and passion. And in all beings, Arjuna, I am the desire that does not go against what is right.
And whatever states of being there are, of goodness, of passion, or of darkness, know that they come from me alone. But I am not in them; they are in me. This whole world is confused by these three states that the gunas make, and so it does not recognize me, who stand beyond them and never change. For this divine illusion of mine, made of the gunas, is hard to get past. But those who come to me, and to me alone, cross over this illusion.
Evildoers do not come to me: the deluded, the lowest of men, whose knowledge has been stolen by illusion and who have taken on the nature of demons. Four kinds of good people worship me, Arjuna: the one who is suffering, the one who wants to know, the one who wants to gain something, and the one who knows. Of these, the one who knows, always disciplined, devoted to me alone, is the best. For I am dear beyond measure to the one who knows, and he is dear to me. All of them are noble. But the one who knows I count as my very self, for with his self disciplined he has set himself on me alone, the highest goal there is. At the end of many births the person of knowledge comes to me, knowing that Krishna, Vasudeva's son, is everything. Such a great soul is very hard to find.
People whose knowledge has been carried off by this desire or that turn to other gods, following this rule or that, driven by their own natures. Whatever form a devoted person wants to worship with faith, I make that person's faith in it unshakable. Held by that faith, he seeks to win that god's favor, and from it he gets what he desires; but it is I who grant those things. Yet the fruit that these people of little understanding win does not last. Those who sacrifice to the gods go to the gods; those who are devoted to me come to me.
People without understanding think that I, the unmanifest, have come into visible form. They do not know my highest state, which never changes and has nothing above it. I am not revealed to everyone, for I am veiled by the illusion my yoga makes. This deluded world does not recognize me, unborn and unchanging. I know all the beings that have been, Arjuna, all that are now, and all that are still to come; but no one knows me.
All beings are born into confusion, Arjuna, led astray by the pairs of opposites that spring from longing and loathing. But people whose deeds are good, in whom sin has come to an end, are freed from the confusion of the pairs of opposites, and they worship me, firm in their vows.
Those who take refuge in me and strive to be free of old age and death know Brahman, the whole of it; they know the adhyatma, all that belongs to the self; and they know action, entire. Those who know me together with the adhibhuta, what belongs to the world of beings, the adhidaiva, what belongs to the gods, and the adhiyajna, what belongs to sacrifice, will know me even at the hour of death, with their minds held steady.
Arjuna said:
Krishna, Supreme Person, what is that Brahman? What is the adhyatma? What is action? And what is it that is called the adhibhuta, and what is meant by the adhidaiva? Who is the adhiyajna here in this body, Krishna, and how? And how are you to be known at the hour of death by those who have mastered themselves?
Krishna said:
Brahman is the imperishable, the highest. The adhyatma is a being's own essential nature. Action is the name for the creative outpouring that brings beings into existence. The adhibhuta is everything that perishes. The adhidaiva is the spirit, the Person. And the adhiyajna is I myself, here in this body, Arjuna, best of all who wear a body.
Whoever leaves the body at the hour of death and goes forth thinking of me alone comes into my own state of being. There is no doubt about it. Whatever state of being a person is thinking of when he finally leaves the body, Arjuna, that is the state he goes to, since he has always been shaped by it. So at all times remember me, and fight. With your mind and your understanding fixed on me, you will come to me alone, beyond any doubt.
A person whose thoughts are disciplined by the yoga of steady practice, and never stray to anything else, and who keeps meditating on the Supreme Person, the divine one, goes to him, Arjuna. Whoever keeps in mind the seer, the ancient one, the ruler of all, finer than the finest atom, the one who holds up everything, whose form no mind can picture, shining like the sun beyond all darkness; whoever, at the hour of death, with an unwavering mind, held by devotion and by the power of yoga, draws the breath of life up between the eyebrows and holds it there: he reaches that supreme, divine Person.
What those who know the Vedas call the imperishable, what those who strive, free of passion, enter, what people long for when they take the vow of the celibate student: that place I will now describe to you briefly. Whoever closes every gate of the body, shuts the mind up in the heart, draws the breath of life up into the head, and stands firm in the concentration of yoga, and then leaves the body and goes forth saying Om, the one syllable that is Brahman, and remembering me, reaches the highest goal.
When someone thinks of me constantly, day after day, his thoughts never turning to anything else, Arjuna, I am easy to reach for that yogi, who is always disciplined. Once they have come to me, these great souls do not come back to rebirth, that home of suffering, that passes away. They have reached the highest perfection.
All the worlds, up to and including the world of Brahma, the creator god, return again and again, Arjuna. But for whoever comes to me, there is no rebirth. People who truly understand day and night know that a day of Brahma lasts a thousand ages, and that his night ends only after a thousand ages more. When his day dawns, everything that can be seen comes streaming out of the unmanifest; when his night falls, all of it dissolves back into that same thing, which is called the unmanifest. This same great multitude of beings comes into existence again and again, Arjuna, and dissolves helplessly when night falls, and streams out again when day dawns.
But beyond that unmanifest there is another state of being, another unmanifest, eternal, which does not perish when all beings perish. This unmanifest is called the imperishable, and they say it is the highest goal. Those who reach it never come back. That is my supreme home. That Supreme Person, Arjuna, in whom all beings live and by whom this whole world is spread out, can be reached by devotion that turns to nothing else.
Now I will tell you about the times at which yogis who go forth from the body either never return or return again, Arjuna. Fire, light, daytime, the bright half of the month, the six months when the sun travels north: those who know Brahman and go forth then go to Brahman. Smoke, night, the dark half of the month, the six months when the sun travels south: the yogi who goes forth then reaches the light of the moon, and returns. These two paths, the bright and the dark, are thought to be the world's eternal paths. By one a person goes and does not return; by the other he comes back again.
Arjuna, no yogi who knows these two paths is ever confused. So at all times, be disciplined in yoga. There is a reward of merit laid down for the Vedas, for sacrifices, for austerities, and for giving. The yogi who knows all this goes beyond every one of those rewards, and reaches the supreme place, where everything began.
Krishna said:
Now, because you do not find fault, I will tell you the deepest secret of all: knowledge, together with insight. Once you know it, you will be set free from all that is evil. This is the king of all knowledge, the king of secrets, the supreme purifier. You can see it for yourself, directly. It is in keeping with what is right, it is very easy to practice, and it never perishes. People who have no faith in this teaching, Arjuna, do not reach me. They come back to the road of the round of birth and death.
This whole world is spread out by me, in my unmanifest form. All beings rest in me, but I do not rest in them. And yet beings do not rest in me either: see my divine power, my yoga! My self brings beings into being and holds them up, but it does not rest in them. Just as the great wind, moving everywhere, always rests in space, understand that all beings rest in me in the same way.
At the end of an age of the world, Arjuna, all beings pass into my nature, and at the beginning of the next age I send them out again. Taking hold of my own nature, I send out this whole multitude of beings again and again. They have no power over it; it is nature's power. And these actions do not bind me, Arjuna, for I sit among them as if I had no part in them, unattached to all these doings. With me watching over her, nature gives birth to everything, moving and unmoving; and that, Arjuna, is why the world goes round.
Fools look down on me when I take on a human body. They do not know my highest state, as the great Lord of all beings. Their hopes are empty, their actions empty, their knowledge empty, and their minds are lost. They have taken on the deluding nature of fiends and demons. But the great souls, Arjuna, who have taken on the divine nature, worship me with minds that turn to nothing else, knowing me as the source of all beings, the one who never changes. Always singing my praises, striving, firm in their vows, bowing down to me with devotion, always disciplined, they worship me. And others worship me by offering the sacrifice of knowledge: as the one, and as the many, and in countless ways, me whose face is turned in every direction.
I am the ritual, I am the sacrifice, I am the offering to the ancestors, I am the healing herb. I am the sacred chant, I am the melted butter poured on the fire, I am the fire, and I am the offering itself. I am the father of this world, its mother, its sustainer, its grandfather. I am what is to be known, the purifier, the syllable Om, and the Rig, Sama and Yajur Vedas. I am the goal, the support, the lord, the witness, the home, the refuge, the friend; the beginning and the dissolving, the ground, the treasure house, the seed that never perishes. I give out heat. I hold back the rain and I send it down. I am deathlessness, and I am death. I am what is, Arjuna, and what is not.
Those who know the three Vedas, who drink the soma, the sacred drink of the sacrifice, and are made clean of sin, worship me with sacrifices and pray for the way to heaven. Their merit carries them to the holy world of Indra, king of the gods, and there in heaven they feast on the divine pleasures of the gods. When they have enjoyed that wide world of heaven, and their merit is used up, they come back into the world of mortals. So it is that those who follow the rules laid down by the three Vedas, wanting what they want, get only coming and going.
But there are people who think of me and nothing else, and worship me with all their hearts. They are always disciplined, and for them I myself carry the burden of getting things and keeping them. Even those who are devoted to other gods, and sacrifice to them full of faith, are really sacrificing to me, Arjuna, though not in the way the rules lay down. For I am the one who enjoys every sacrifice, and I am its lord. But they do not know me as I truly am, and so they fall back. Those whose vows are to the gods go to the gods. Those whose vows are to the ancestors go to the ancestors. Those who sacrifice to the spirits go to the spirits. And those who sacrifice to me come to me.
If someone offers me with devotion a leaf, a flower, a fruit, or water, I accept it, offered with devotion from a heart that strives to be pure. Whatever you do, whatever you eat, whatever you offer in sacrifice, whatever you give, whatever austerity you practice, Arjuna, do it as an offering to me. That way you will be freed from the chains of action, with their good and bad fruits. With your self disciplined by the yoga of renunciation, set free, you will come to me.
I am the same to all beings. There is no one I hate, and no one I favor. But those who worship me with devotion are in me, and I am in them. Even if someone who has lived a truly wicked life worships me and turns to nothing else, he should be thought of as good, for he has made the right decision. Soon he becomes a person of righteous soul, and he finds lasting peace. Arjuna, you can promise it: no one who is devoted to me is ever lost.
For those who take refuge in me, Arjuna, even those who may be born of sinful wombs, women, vaishyas, who farm and herd and trade, and shudras too, who labor for the other classes, even they reach the highest goal. How much more, then, holy Brahmins, and devoted royal seers! Since you have come into this passing and joyless world, worship me. Keep your mind on me; be devoted to me; sacrifice to me; bow down to me. Disciplining yourself this way, with me as your highest goal, you will come to me.
Krishna said:
Listen again, Arjuna, to my highest word. You take delight in what I say, and because I want what is good for you, I will tell you more. Neither the hosts of the gods nor the great seers know where I come from, for I am the beginning of the gods and of the great seers, every one of them. Whoever knows me as unborn, without beginning, the great Lord of the worlds, is free of confusion among mortals, and is set free from every sin.
Understanding, knowledge, freedom from confusion, patience, truth, self-control, calm, pleasure and pain, being and not-being, fear and fearlessness too, not harming, evenness of mind, contentment, austerity, giving, fame and disgrace: all these different states of beings come from me alone. The seven great seers of old, and the four Manus came from my own being, born of my mind; and from them come all the creatures in the world.
Whoever truly knows this glory of mine, and this power of my yoga, is joined to me by a yoga that never wavers. There is no doubt about it. I am the source of everything; everything comes forth from me. Knowing this, the wise worship me, full of love. With their thoughts on me, their lives given to me, they awaken one another and talk about me always, and they are content, and they rejoice. To those who are always disciplined and worship me with love, I give the discipline of understanding, by which they come to me. Out of compassion for them, I dwell in their own hearts, and with the shining lamp of knowledge I destroy the darkness that ignorance breeds.
Arjuna said:
You are the supreme Brahman, the supreme home, the supreme purifier; the eternal and divine Person, the first of the gods, unborn and present everywhere. All the seers say so of you, and the divine seer Narada, and Asita, Devala and Vyasa; and now you tell me so yourself. I believe that everything you tell me is true, Krishna. For neither the gods nor the demons, my Lord, know how you show yourself. You alone know yourself, by yourself, Supreme Person: you who bring beings into being, Lord of beings, God of gods, master of the world!
Please tell me, leaving nothing out, of your own divine glories, the glories by which you fill these worlds and remain in them. How shall I come to know you, master of yoga, by meditating on you always? In what forms of being, my Lord, should I think of you? Tell me again, in full, Krishna, about your power and your glory. For I can never hear enough of these words; they are the nectar of immortality to me.
Krishna said:
Very well. I will tell you of my divine glories, Arjuna, but only the chief of them, for there is no end to how far I reach.
I am the self, Arjuna, that dwells in the heart of every being. I am the beginning of beings, their middle, and their end. Among the Adityas, the sons of Aditi, I am Vishnu; among lights, the shining sun. Among the Maruts, the gods of the wind, I am Marichi; among the stars of the night, the moon. Among the Vedas I am the Sama Veda, the Veda of chants; among the gods, Indra. Among the senses I am the mind, and in living beings I am awareness.
Among the Rudras, the fierce gods, I am Shankara, who is Shiva. Among the yakshas, the spirits of the wild, and the fiends, I am Kubera, the lord of wealth. Among the Vasus, the gods of the elements, I am Agni, the fire; among mountain peaks, Meru, the mountain at the center of the world. Among household priests, Arjuna, know that I am the chief, Brihaspati, the priest of the gods. Among generals I am Skanda, the god of war; among bodies of water, the ocean.
Among the great seers I am Bhrigu. Among words I am the one syllable, Om. Among sacrifices I am the sacrifice of quiet prayer, repeated over and over; among things that do not move, the Himalaya. Among all trees I am the ashvattha, the sacred fig; among the divine seers, Narada. Among the Gandharvas, the musicians of heaven, I am Chitraratha; among those who have reached perfection, the sage Kapila.
Among horses, know that I am Ucchaihshravas, the horse that rose from the ocean when the gods churned it for the nectar of immortality. Among lordly elephants I am Airavata, and among men, the king. Among weapons I am the thunderbolt; among cows, Kamadhuk, the wishing cow. I am Kandarpa, the god of love, who brings new life into being; among serpents I am Vasuki, their king.
Among the nagas, the snake spirits, I am Ananta, the endless one; among the creatures of the waters, Varuna, their lord. Among the ancestors I am Aryaman, their chief; and among those who keep order, I am Yama, the god of death. Among the Daityas, the demon race, I am Prahlada, and among those who count, I am Time. Among beasts I am the lion, the king of beasts, and among birds, Garuda, the son of Vinata.
Among things that purify, I am the wind. Among those who bear arms, I am Rama. Among the creatures of the sea I am the makara, the great sea monster, and among rivers, the Ganges. Of all creation I am the beginning, the end, and the middle too, Arjuna. Among the kinds of knowledge I am the knowledge of the self; and in those who debate, I am the reasoning itself.
Among letters I am the letter A, and among ways of joining words, the compound that simply pairs them. I alone am Time that never runs out; I am the one who sets all things in order, facing every direction. I am death, which carries off everything, and the birth of all that is still to be. And among the powers that are feminine, I am fame, fortune, and speech, memory, wisdom, steadfastness, and patience.
Among the chants of the Sama Veda I am the Brihat Saman, the great chant; among metres, the Gayatri. Among months I am Margashirsha, when the year turns cool; among seasons, spring, the bringer of flowers. In those who cheat, I am the game of dice. I am the brilliance of the brilliant. I am victory, I am resolve, I am the goodness of the good.
Among the Vrishnis, my own clan, I am Krishna, Vasudeva's son; among the Pandavas, I am Arjuna, you. Among the sages I am Vyasa as well, and among poets, the poet Ushanas. In those who tame others I am the rod of punishment; in those who want to win, I am good policy. Among secret things I am silence, and in those who know, I am their knowledge.
Whatever is the seed of all beings, Arjuna, that is what I am. There is nothing, moving or unmoving, that could exist without me. There is no end to my divine glories, Arjuna. What I have told you is only a sketch of how far my glory reaches. Whatever is glorious, whatever is splendid or mighty, understand that every one of these was born from a single spark of my brilliance.
But what use is it to you, Arjuna, to know all this in detail? I hold up this whole world with a single fragment of myself, and remain.
Arjuna said:
Out of kindness to me, you have told me the highest secret, the teaching about the self, and your words have driven this confusion of mine away. I have heard from you in full how living beings come into existence and how they pass away, Krishna, you whose eyes are like lotus petals, and I have heard about your greatness, which never fails.
It is just as you say, supreme Lord. But I want to see it: your form as God, Supreme Person. If you think I am able to see it, master of yoga, then show me your own imperishable self.
Krishna said:
Look, Arjuna. See my forms, by the hundreds and by the thousands, of every kind, divine, of every color and every shape. See the gods of every order: the Adityas, the Vasus, the Rudras, the two Ashvins, and the Maruts too. See wonders, many wonders, that no one has ever seen before. Here, today, see the whole universe, everything that moves and everything that does not, gathered in one place in my body, and anything else you want to see.
But you cannot see me with these eyes of yours. I will give you a divine eye. See the power that makes me Lord!
Sanjaya said:
When he had said this, my king, Krishna, the great master of yoga, showed Arjuna his highest form, his form as Lord of all. It had countless mouths and eyes, countless marvelous things to see, countless heavenly ornaments, countless heavenly weapons raised to strike. He wore heavenly garlands and heavenly robes, he was anointed with heavenly perfumes: God, made of every wonder there is, endless, with faces turned in every direction.
If the light of a thousand suns were to blaze up in the sky all at once, it might be something like the light of that great being.
There, in the body of the God of gods, Arjuna, the son of Pandu, saw the whole universe gathered in one place, with all its countless divisions. Then, overwhelmed with wonder, his hair standing on end, Arjuna bowed his head to God, joined his palms, and spoke.
Arjuna said:
God, I see the gods in your body, and every kind of living thing, crowd upon crowd: Brahma the lord, seated on his lotus throne, and all the seers, and the heavenly serpents. I see you everywhere, endless in form, with arms and bellies and mouths and eyes beyond counting. I see no end of you, no middle, and no beginning, Lord of the universe, you whose form is everything.
I see you crowned, carrying a mace and a discus, a mass of light blazing on every side, so bright that from any direction it is hard to look at you: the glare of a burning fire, of the sun, beyond all measure. You are the imperishable, the highest thing there is to know. You are the final resting place of this universe. You never fail; you are the guardian of the eternal law. You are the everlasting Person. That is what I believe.
I see you without beginning, middle or end, your strength endless, your arms endless, the sun and the moon your eyes, your mouth a blazing fire that devours the offerings, scorching this whole universe with your heat. The space between heaven and earth, and every direction there is, are filled with you alone. Seeing this wonderful and terrible form of yours, great one, the three worlds are shaking.
There, crowds of gods are entering into you. Some, terrified, join their palms and call out your praises. Crowds of great seers and of Siddhas, the beings made perfect, cry "May all be well!" and praise you with hymns, rich and full. The Rudras and the Adityas, the Vasus and the Sadhyas, the All-Gods, the two Ashvins, the Maruts and the Ushmapas, the ancestors who drink the steam of the offerings, crowds of Gandharvas, of yakshas, of demons and Siddhas: all of them are staring at you in amazement.
You of the mighty arms, seeing your vast form, with its many mouths and eyes, its many arms and thighs and feet, its many bellies, its many terrible tusks, the worlds are shaking, and so am I. When I see you touching the sky, blazing, colored every color, your mouths gaping wide, your huge eyes on fire, my innermost self shakes, and I can find no courage and no peace, Vishnu.
When I see your mouths, jagged with tusks, glowing like the fire of Time that burns the world at its end, I lose all sense of direction, and I find no shelter. Have mercy, Lord of gods, home of the world!
And all those sons of Dhritarashtra, together with the crowds of kings, Bhishma, Drona, and Karna there, the charioteer's son, along with the chief warriors on our side too, are rushing into your mouths, terrible with tusks, frightening to see. Some hang caught between your teeth, their heads crushed to powder.
As the many rushing currents of the rivers race toward the sea, so these heroes of the world of men pour into your flaming mouths. As moths fly faster and faster into a blazing fire, to their death, so these people rush faster and faster into your mouths, to their death. You lick your lips again and again, swallowing whole worlds on every side with your flaming mouths. Your fierce rays fill the whole universe with their fire, and they scorch it, Vishnu.
Tell me who you are, you with this terrible form! I bow to you, greatest of the gods: have mercy! I want to understand you, you who were there at the beginning, for I do not know what you are doing.
Krishna said:
I am Time, the destroyer of worlds, grown to my full strength, and I am at work here to sweep these worlds away. Even without you, not one of these warriors drawn up in the opposing ranks will live.
So stand up and win glory! Defeat your enemies and enjoy a rich kingdom. I have already killed them myself, long before this. Be only the instrument, Arjuna, you who can draw a bow with either hand. Drona and Bhishma, Jayadratha and Karna, and the other great warriors too: I have killed them already, and you must kill them. Don't be afraid. Fight! You will defeat your rivals in battle.
Sanjaya said:
When he heard these words of Krishna's, Arjuna, the wearer of the crown, joined his palms, trembling, and bowed. Then, terrified, stammering, bowing down again, he spoke to Krishna once more.
Arjuna said:
It is right, Krishna, that the world rejoices and delights in your glory, that the fiends run in terror in every direction, and that all the crowds of Siddhas bow down to you. And why should they not bow to you, great one? You are greater even than Brahma; you are the first maker of all. Endless one, Lord of gods, home of the world: you are the imperishable, what is and what is not, and what lies beyond them both.
You are the first of the gods, the ancient Person. You are the final resting place of this universe. You are the knower and what is to be known, and the highest home. You run all through this universe, you whose forms are endless. You are Vayu, the wind; you are Yama, Agni, Varuna, and the moon. You are Prajapati, and the great-grandfather of all. I bow to you, I bow to you a thousand times, and again, and once more I bow to you, I bow to you! I bow to you in front of you and behind you; I bow to you on every side, you who are everything. Your strength is endless, your might beyond measure. You fill everything, and so you are everything.
Whatever I said rashly, thinking of you as my friend, calling out "Krishna!" or "Yadava!" as if you were just one more man of your clan, or "Hey, friend!" because I did not know this greatness of yours, whether out of carelessness or out of love; and whatever disrespect I showed you as a joke, when we were playing or resting, sitting or eating, alone or in front of others: for all of it I ask you to forgive me, you who are beyond all measure.
You are the father of the world, of everything that moves and everything that stands still. You are the one it worships, its teacher, greater than any teacher. There is no one equal to you in all three worlds. How could anyone else be greater, you whose power has no match? So I bow down, I lay my body at your feet, and I beg your grace, Lord who deserves all praise. As a father bears with his son, as a friend with his friend, as a lover with the one he loves, so please, God, bear with me.
I have seen what no one ever saw before, and I am thrilled, but my mind is shaking with fear. Show me that other form of yours, God, the one I know. Have mercy, Lord of gods, home of the world! I want to see you just as before, crowned, holding the mace, with the discus in your hand. Take on that four-armed form again, you of the thousand arms, you whose body is the universe.
Krishna said:
Arjuna, I was pleased with you, and so, by my own power, I showed you this highest form, made of light, the whole universe, endless, the first of all, a form that no one but you has ever seen. Not by the Vedas, not by sacrifice or by study, not by gifts, not by rituals, not by fierce austerities can I be seen in this form in the world of men by anyone but you, greatest hero of the Kurus.
Don't be shaken, and don't be bewildered at the sight of this terrible form of mine. Put away your fear, let your heart be glad, and look again: here is my form, the one you know.
Sanjaya said:
When Krishna, Vasudeva's son, had said this to Arjuna, he showed him his own form once more. The great being took on his gentle shape again and comforted the terrified man.
Arjuna said:
Krishna, now that I see this gentle human form of yours, I have come to my senses, and I am myself again.
Krishna said:
This form of mine that you have seen is very hard to see. Even the gods long, always, for a sight of it. Not by the Vedas, not by austerity, not by giving and not by sacrifice can I be seen as you have seen me. But by devotion, devotion to me alone, Arjuna, I can be known like this, and seen as I truly am, and entered into.
Whoever does my work, whoever has me as his highest goal, whoever is devoted to me, free from attachment, without hatred for any creature: that person comes to me, Arjuna.
Arjuna said:
There are those who are always disciplined, devoted to you, who worship you; and there are those who worship the imperishable, the unmanifest. Which of them knows yoga best?
Krishna said:
Those who fix their minds on me and worship me, always disciplined, filled with the highest faith: those, I hold, are the most disciplined of all.
But those who worship the imperishable, which no words can describe, the unmanifest, present everywhere, beyond all thought, unchanging, unmoving, constant, who hold the whole crowd of their senses in check, whose understanding is even toward everything, who delight in the good of every creature: they too reach me. The struggle is greater for those whose minds cling to the unmanifest, because the way to the unmanifest is hard for anyone who has a body to travel.
But those who renounce all their actions in me, who have me as their highest goal, who worship me and meditate on me with a discipline that looks to nothing else, whose minds have entered into me: for them, Arjuna, I soon become the one who lifts them out of the ocean of death, the round of birth and death.
Fix your mind on me alone. Let your understanding enter into me. Then from now on you will live in me. There is no doubt of it. But if you cannot hold your thoughts steady on me, then try to reach me through the yoga of practice, Arjuna. If you can't manage practice either, then make my work your highest aim. Even just doing actions for my sake, you will reach perfection. And if you are not able to do even this, then take refuge in my discipline, hold yourself in check, and give up the fruit of all your actions.
For knowledge is better than practice; meditation is better than knowledge; giving up the fruit of action is better than meditation; and from giving up, peace comes at once.
The one who hates no creature, who is friendly and compassionate, without any thought of "mine," without ego, the same in pain and pleasure, patient, always content, disciplined, self-controlled, firm in his resolve, whose mind and understanding are offered up to me, who is devoted to me: that person is dear to me. The one the world does not shrink from, who does not shrink from the world, who is free of elation and resentment, of fear and agitation: that person is dear to me. The one who wants nothing, who is pure and capable, who stands aside, untroubled, who has given up every undertaking, who is devoted to me: that person is dear to me. The one who neither rejoices nor hates, neither grieves nor craves, who has given up both good fortune and bad, who is full of devotion: that person is dear to me.
The one who is the same to enemy and friend, the same in honor and disgrace, the same in cold and heat, pleasure and pain, free from attachment, who takes blame and praise alike, who keeps silent, content with whatever comes, with no home of his own, steady of mind, full of devotion: that man is dear to me.
But those who hold to this nectar of immortality, this teaching of what is right, just as I have given it, full of faith, with me as their highest goal, devoted to me: they are the dearest of all to me.
Krishna said:
This body, Arjuna, is called the field. The one who knows it is called the knower of the field by those who understand these things. And know that I am the knower of the field in every field. Knowledge of the field and of the knower of the field: that, as I see it, is knowledge.
Now hear from me, in brief, what that field is, what it is like, how it changes, and where each thing in it comes from; and who the knower is, and what his powers are. Seers have sung of it many times over, each in his own way, in sacred verses of every kind, and in the sayings about Brahman, reasoned and conclusive.
The great elements, ego, understanding, and the unmanifest; the ten senses and the one more, the mind; the five ranges of the senses; desire and hatred, pleasure and pain, the body as a whole, awareness and steadiness: this, in brief, is the field, with all its changes.
Freedom from pride and from pretense, not harming any living thing, patience, honesty, service to your teacher, purity, steadiness, self-control; turning away from the things of the senses, and freedom from ego; seeing clearly the pain and the evil in birth and death, old age and sickness; not clinging, not being wrapped up in son and wife and home and the rest, and a mind that stays even, always, whether what happens is wanted or unwanted; devotion to me that never strays, with a discipline that looks to nothing else; a liking for lonely places, and no pleasure in crowds; keeping always to the knowledge of the self, and keeping in view what knowing the truth is for: this is called knowledge, and whatever is different from it is ignorance.
I will tell you what there is to know, and whoever knows it tastes immortality. It is the highest Brahman, which has no beginning, and it is said to be neither what is nor what is not.
Its hands and feet are everywhere; its eyes and heads and mouths are everywhere; its ears are everywhere in the world. It stands, enfolding everything. It shines with the powers of all the senses, yet it has no senses at all. It clings to nothing, yet it holds everything up. It is free of the gunas, yet it is the one who experiences the gunas.
It is outside all beings and inside them, unmoving and moving. It is too subtle to be known. It is far away, and it is near. It is undivided, and yet it stands among beings as if it were divided. Know it as the one that sustains all beings, that swallows them up, and that brings them into being. It is called the light of all lights, beyond all darkness. It is knowledge, and what is to be known, and what knowledge leads to, and it is set in the heart of everyone.
So I have told you in brief about the field, about knowledge, and about what there is to know. Someone devoted to me who understands this comes into my own state of being.
Know that nature and spirit both have no beginning, and know that all the changes, and the gunas, are born of nature. Nature is said to be the cause behind every effect, every means of producing it, and every doing; spirit is said to be the cause behind the experience of pleasure and pain. For spirit, living in nature, experiences the gunas that nature produces, and its attachment to the gunas is why it is born in good wombs and in bad.
The supreme spirit in this body is called the witness, the one who gives consent, the one who sustains, the one who experiences, the great Lord, and also the supreme self. Whoever knows spirit, and nature with its gunas, in this way, will never be born again, however he may live.
Some see the self in themselves, by themselves, through meditation; others through the yoga of Sankhya; and others through the yoga of action. Still others do not know this, but they hear it from others and worship. They too cross beyond death, devoted to what they have heard.
Whatever comes into being, Arjuna, still or moving, know that it comes from the union of the field and the knower of the field. The one who sees the supreme Lord standing the same in all beings, not perishing when they perish: whoever sees this, sees. For when he sees the same Lord standing equally everywhere, he does not harm the self by his own self, and so he goes to the highest goal.
Whoever sees that all actions, in every way, are done by nature alone, and so sees that the self is not the doer: he sees. When he sees that the separate existence of beings rests in the One, and that from there alone it spreads out, then he reaches Brahman.
Because it has no beginning and is free of the gunas, this supreme self never perishes. Even though it lives in the body, Arjuna, it does nothing, and nothing stains it. Space is everywhere, and because it is so subtle, nothing stains it; in the same way the self, present everywhere in the body, is never stained. Just as the one sun lights up this whole world, so the owner of the field lights up the whole field, Arjuna.
Those who see with the eye of knowledge this difference between the field and the knower of the field, and see how beings are set free from nature, go to the highest.
Krishna said:
I will tell you once more the highest knowledge, the best of all knowledge. All the sages who learned it went from here to the highest perfection. Those who have taken refuge in this knowledge have come to share my own nature. They are not born even when the world is created, and they do not suffer when it is dissolved.
The great Brahman is my womb. In it I plant the seed, and from that, Arjuna, all beings are born. Whatever forms come to birth in any womb at all, the great Brahman is their womb, and I am the father who gives the seed.
Goodness, passion and darkness: these gunas, which come from nature, bind the imperishable one who lives in the body fast to the body, Arjuna. Of these, goodness, because it is spotless, gives light and health. It binds you through attachment to happiness and attachment to knowledge, you who are without fault. Know that passion is made of desire, and that it springs from thirst and attachment. It binds the one who lives in the body through attachment to action. And know that darkness is born of ignorance, and that it bewilders everyone who lives in a body. It binds through carelessness, laziness and sleep.
Goodness attaches you to happiness, and passion to action; but darkness covers over knowledge and attaches you to carelessness. Sometimes goodness rises, overpowering passion and darkness; sometimes passion, overpowering goodness and darkness; and sometimes darkness, overpowering goodness and passion.
When the light of knowledge shines out through every gate of the body, then you can know that goodness has grown strong. Greed, activity, the undertaking of actions, restlessness, longing: these arise, Arjuna, when passion has grown strong. Dimness, inertia, carelessness and confusion: these arise when darkness has grown strong.
If someone who lives in a body dies when goodness is strong, he goes to the spotless worlds of those who know the highest. Dying in passion, he is born among people attached to action; and dying in darkness, he is born in the wombs of creatures without understanding.
The fruit of a good action, they say, is pure, and of goodness; the fruit of passion is pain; and the fruit of darkness is ignorance. From goodness, knowledge is born; from passion, greed; and from darkness come carelessness and confusion, and ignorance too. Those who stand in goodness go upward; those of passion stay in the middle; and those of darkness, sunk in the ways of the lowest guna, go down.
When the one who sees sees no doer other than the gunas, and knows what is higher than the gunas, he comes into my own state of being. When the one who lives in the body goes beyond these three gunas, from which the body arises, he is set free from birth and death, old age and pain, and he tastes immortality.
Arjuna said:
Lord, what are the marks of someone who has gone beyond these three gunas? How does he live? And how does he get beyond the three gunas?
Krishna said:
Arjuna, he does not hate light, or activity, or even confusion when they come, and he does not long for them when they go. He sits like an onlooker, and the gunas do not shake him. Knowing that it is only the gunas at work, he stands firm and does not waver. He is the same in pain and pleasure, at home in himself; a lump of earth, a stone and a piece of gold are all the same to him. He is steady and wise, the same toward what he likes and what he dislikes, the same when he is blamed and when he is praised. He is the same in honor and disgrace, the same toward friend and enemy, and he has given up every undertaking: he is said to have gone beyond the gunas.
And the one who serves me with the yoga of devotion, never straying, goes beyond these gunas and is fit to become Brahman. For I am the foundation of Brahman, of the immortal that never perishes, of the eternal law, and of a happiness that is complete.
Krishna said:
There is a tree, they say, that never perishes: the ashvattha fig, with its roots above and its branches below. Its leaves are the hymns of the Vedas. Whoever knows this tree knows the Vedas.
Its branches spread out below and above, fed by the gunas, and the things of the senses are its buds. And down below, its roots stretch on and on into the world of human beings, binding them to action. Here in this world no one can see its true shape — not its end, not its beginning, not what it stands on. This ashvattha has grown deep, strong roots. Take the hard axe of detachment and cut it down. Then you must search out that place from which those who reach it never come back, saying, "I take refuge in that first Person, from whom the ancient stream of all activity flowed out." Those who are free of pride and delusion, who have conquered the fault of attachment, who live always in the self, whose desires have died away, who are freed from the pairs of opposites called pleasure and pain, go undeluded to that place that never perishes.
The sun does not light it, nor the moon, nor fire. Those who go there do not come back. That is my highest home.
An eternal fragment of me becomes a living soul in the world of living things, and it draws to itself the senses, with the mind as the sixth, which rest in nature. When the self, the lord of the body, takes on a body, and when it leaves one, it takes these senses along with it as it goes, the way the wind carries scents away from the flowers. Presiding over the ear and the eye, touch and taste and smell, and the mind as well, it enjoys the things of the senses.
Whether it is leaving the body or staying in it, enjoying the world or caught up in the gunas, the deluded do not see it. Those who have the eye of knowledge see it. Yogis who strive see it too, present within themselves; but those whose selves are unformed, who have no insight, do not see it, however hard they strive.
The brilliance in the sun that lights up the whole world, the brilliance in the moon and the brilliance in fire: know that this brilliance is mine. I enter the earth and hold all beings up with my strength. I become Soma, the moon, which is made of the sap of life, and I nourish all the plants. I become the fire of digestion and live in the bodies of all that breathe, and joined with the breath that goes in and the breath that goes out, I digest the four kinds of food.
I am seated in the heart of every being. From me come memory and knowledge, and their loss. I am the one thing all the Vedas are there to make known. I am the maker of the Vedanta, the end of the Vedas, and I am the one who knows the Vedas.
There are two persons in this world, the perishable and the imperishable. All living beings are the perishable; the one who stands unchanging is called the imperishable. But there is another, the highest Person, called the supreme self: the Lord who never perishes, who enters the three worlds and holds them up. Because I am beyond the perishable, and higher even than the imperishable, I am known in the world and in the Vedas as the Supreme Person.
Whoever is free of delusion and knows me in this way as the Supreme Person knows everything, Arjuna, and worships me with his whole being. So I have told you this most secret teaching, Arjuna, you who are without fault. Whoever understands it will be wise, and will have done everything there is to do.
Krishna said:
Fearlessness, purity of heart, standing firm in the yoga of knowledge; giving, self-control and sacrifice, studying the Vedas, austerity and honesty; doing no harm, truthfulness, freedom from anger, giving things up, peace, never speaking ill of others, kindness to every living thing, freedom from greed, gentleness, modesty, and steadiness; energy, patience, endurance, purity, freedom from malice, and freedom from too much pride: these, Arjuna, belong to someone born with the divine nature.
Hypocrisy, arrogance and conceit, anger and harshness, and ignorance: these, Arjuna, belong to someone born with the demonic nature.
The divine nature leads to freedom, and the demonic nature, it is held, to bondage. Don't grieve, Arjuna. You were born with the divine nature.
There are two kinds of beings created in this world, the divine and the demonic. I have described the divine at length. Now, Arjuna, hear from me about the demonic.
Demonic people do not know when to act and when to hold back. There is no purity in them, no right conduct, and no truth. They say the world has no truth in it, no foundation and no Lord; that it was not brought into being by one thing following from another — what else could it be? — and that desire is its only cause.
Holding on to this view, these lost souls of small understanding and cruel deeds rise up as enemies of the world, to destroy it. They give themselves over to desire that can never be satisfied. They are full of hypocrisy, pride and arrogance; in their delusion they seize on false ideas, and they set to work with unclean purposes. They are gripped by endless worry that ends only with death. The enjoyment of their desires is their highest aim, and they are sure that this is all there is. Bound by a hundred cords of hope, given over to desire and anger, they work to pile up wealth by unjust means, all to satisfy their desires.
"This is what I have gained today, and this is what I want, and I will get it. This much is mine already, and this wealth will be mine too. I have killed that enemy, and I will kill others as well. I am a lord. I enjoy what I like. I am successful, strong and happy. I am rich, and I come from a great family. Who else is there like me? I will make sacrifices, I will give gifts, I will enjoy myself." So they talk, deluded by ignorance.
Led astray by their many thoughts, caught in a net of delusion, addicted to the enjoyment of their desires, they fall into a foul hell. Full of their own importance, stubborn, drunk with the pride of wealth, they make sacrifices in name only, out of hypocrisy and against the rules. Given over to ego, force, arrogance, desire and anger, these jealous people hate me, who live in their own bodies and in the bodies of others.
These cruel, hateful people, the lowest of men, I hurl again and again into demonic wombs, as they go around in the round of birth and death. Fallen into demonic wombs, deluded birth after birth, they never reach me, Arjuna, and from there they sink to the lowest state of all.
There are three gates to this hell, and they destroy the self: desire, anger and greed. So a person should give up these three. The man who is freed from these three gates to darkness, Arjuna, does what is truly good for himself, and so he reaches the highest goal.
Whoever throws away the rules the scriptures lay down and does whatever his desires tell him does not reach perfection, or happiness, or the highest goal. So let the scriptures be your authority in deciding what you should do and what you should not. Know what the rules of scripture say, and then do your work here in the world.
Arjuna said:
Krishna, what about people who set aside the rules of scripture but still make their sacrifices full of faith? Where do they stand? Is it in goodness, or in passion, or in darkness?
Krishna said:
The faith of those who live in bodies is of three kinds, and it springs from each person's own nature: faith of goodness, faith of passion, and faith of darkness. Hear about them. Everyone's faith takes the shape of his own nature, Arjuna. A person is made of his faith: whatever his faith is, that is what he is.
People of goodness worship the gods. People of passion worship the yakshas and the fiends. And the others, the people of darkness, worship the ghosts of the dead and hordes of spirits.
There are people who practice savage austerities that no scripture ever ordered, full of hypocrisy and ego, driven by the force of their desire and passion. Mindlessly they torment the elements that make up their bodies, and they torment me too, who live inside the body. Know that their resolve is demonic.
Even the food that people like is of three kinds, and so are sacrifice, austerity and giving. Hear how they differ.
The foods that people of goodness love are the ones that increase life, purity, strength, health, happiness and good cheer: foods that are tasty, rich, nourishing and good for the heart. People of passion want foods that are bitter, sour, salty, too hot, sharp, dry and burning, foods that bring pain, misery and sickness. People of darkness love food that has gone stale and lost its taste, that is rotten and left over from the day before, scraps from someone else's plate, and food unfit for an offering.
The sacrifice of goodness is offered as the rules lay down, by people who want no fruit from it, who have set their minds on this one thought: "This is a sacrifice that ought to be made." But a sacrifice offered with an eye on its fruit, or just for show, Arjuna: know that sacrifice is of passion. A sacrifice that ignores the rules, where no food is given out, no sacred words are chanted, no fee is paid to the priests, and there is no faith in it, is called a sacrifice of darkness.
Honoring the gods, the twice-born, those initiated into the Vedas, your teachers and the wise; purity, honesty, chastity and doing no harm: these are called the austerity of the body. Words that cause no one distress, words that are true, kind and helpful, and the regular study and recitation of the Vedas: these are called the austerity of speech. A serene mind, gentleness, silence, self-control and a pure heart: these are called the austerity of the mind.
When disciplined people practice this threefold austerity with the highest faith, wanting no fruit from it, it is called austerity of goodness. Austerity practiced to win respect, honor and reverence, or out of hypocrisy, is called austerity of passion here; it is unsteady, and it does not last. Austerity practiced out of some foolish notion, by torturing yourself, or in order to ruin someone else, is called austerity of darkness.
A gift given because it is right to give, to someone who can do nothing for you in return, at the right place and the right time, to the right person: that gift is held to be of goodness. But a gift given to get something back, or with an eye on its fruit, or given grudgingly, is held to be of passion. A gift given at the wrong place and the wrong time, to the wrong people, without respect and with contempt, is called a gift of darkness.
Om Tat Sat: these three words are taught as the threefold name of Brahman. By this name, long ago, the Brahmins, the Vedas and the sacrifices were set in their places. That is why those who speak of Brahman always begin their acts of sacrifice, giving and austerity, as the rules lay down, by saying the word Om. Those who seek freedom say Tat, which means "that," and perform their many acts of sacrifice, austerity and giving without aiming at any fruit.
Sat, which means both "real" and "good," is used for what is real and for what is good; and so too, Arjuna, the word Sat is used for an action worthy of praise. Being steadfast in sacrifice, austerity and giving is also called Sat, and any action done for the sake of that is called Sat as well. But whatever is offered in the fire, or given, or done as austerity, or done at all, without faith, is called asat, "unreal," Arjuna. It counts for nothing, either after death or here in this world.
Arjuna said:
Krishna, mighty one, I want to know the truth about renunciation, and about giving up, and how the two are different.
Krishna said:
The seers understand renunciation as setting aside the actions people do out of desire. The wise call it giving up when you give up the fruit of every action. Some thinkers say that action should be given up because it is full of faults. Others say that acts of sacrifice, giving and austerity should never be given up.
Hear what I have settled on about giving up, Arjuna. For giving up, you who are a tiger among men, has been described as being of three kinds. Acts of sacrifice, giving and austerity should not be given up. They should be done, because sacrifice, giving and austerity make the wise pure. But even these actions should be done with attachment given up, and the fruit given up too, Arjuna. That is my final and highest judgment.
It is not right to renounce an action that is your duty to do. To give it up out of delusion is called giving up of darkness. If someone gives up an action just because it is hard, out of fear of bodily pain, his giving up is of passion, and he will never win the fruit of giving up. But when someone does the action that is his duty, Arjuna, simply because it ought to be done, and gives up both attachment and fruit, his giving up is held to be of goodness.
The one who truly gives things up, filled with goodness, wise, his doubts cut away, does not hate unpleasant work and does not cling to pleasant work. No one who lives in a body can give up action entirely. But whoever gives up the fruit of action is called a person who has truly given up. The fruit of action is of three kinds, unwanted, wanted and mixed, and it comes after death to those who have not given up. It never comes at all to those who have renounced.
Learn from me, Arjuna, the five causes that bring every action about, as they are taught in Sankhya, the doctrine that brings action to its end: the body, which is the base; the doer; the many different instruments; the many separate movements; and the fifth, the power of the gods. Whatever action a person undertakes with body, speech or mind, whether it is right or the reverse, these five are its causes. That being so, anyone who sees himself, the self alone, as the doer sees nothing, because his understanding is untrained. His mind is perverse.
Someone who has no sense of "I am the doer," whose understanding is not smeared by it, does not kill, even if he kills these people, and he is not bound.
Knowledge, what is known, and the knower are the three things that drive action. The instrument, the action and the doer are the three things that action is made of. The teaching on the gunas says that knowledge, action and doer are each of three kinds, according to the gunas. Hear about these too, as they truly are.
The knowledge by which a person sees one being, unchanging, in all beings, undivided in what is divided: know that knowledge is of goodness. But the knowledge that sees in all beings many different beings of different kinds, each one separate: know that knowledge is of passion. And the knowledge that clings to a single thing as though it were everything, without reason, without grasping the truth, small and narrow: that is called knowledge of darkness.
An action that is a duty, done without attachment, without love or hatred, by someone who wants no fruit from it, is called action of goodness. But an action done by someone who wants his desires satisfied, or out of ego, with a great deal of strain, is called action of passion. An action begun out of delusion, without a thought for the consequences, the loss, the harm to others, or one's own strength, is called action of darkness.
A doer who is free of attachment, who does not talk about himself, who is full of resolve and energy, and unchanged by success or failure, is called a doer of goodness. A doer who is full of passion, who wants the fruit of his actions, who is greedy, violent and impure, and swings between joy and grief, is called a doer of passion. A doer who is undisciplined, coarse, stubborn, deceitful, malicious, lazy, gloomy and always putting things off is called a doer of darkness.
Now hear, Arjuna, in full and one by one, how understanding and resolve are each of three kinds, according to the gunas. The understanding that knows when to act and when to hold back, what should be done and what should not, what to fear and what not to fear, what binds and what sets free: that understanding, Arjuna, is of goodness. The understanding that gets right and wrong, and what should be done and what should not, all mixed up: that understanding, Arjuna, is of passion. The understanding that is wrapped in darkness and thinks wrong is right, and sees everything upside down: that understanding, Arjuna, is of darkness.
The resolve that never wavers, by which a person holds steady, through yoga, the workings of the mind, the breath and the senses: that resolve, Arjuna, is of goodness. But the resolve by which a person holds on to duty, pleasure and wealth, clinging to them and wanting their fruit: that resolve, Arjuna, is of passion. The resolve by which a fool will not let go of sleep, fear, grief, gloom and arrogance: that resolve, Arjuna, is of darkness.
And now, Arjuna, hear from me about the three kinds of happiness. There is a happiness a person comes to enjoy with practice, and in which he reaches the end of sorrow. At first it is like poison, but in the end it is like the nectar of immortality. That happiness is called happiness of goodness, and it is born from the clarity of an understanding that knows the self. The happiness that comes from the senses meeting the things of the senses is like nectar at first, but in the end it is like poison. That happiness is held to be of passion. The happiness that deludes the self from beginning to end, the happiness that comes from sleep, laziness and carelessness, is called happiness of darkness.
There is no being on earth, or among the gods in heaven, that is free of these three gunas born of nature.
The work of Brahmins, kshatriyas, vaishyas and shudras, Arjuna, is divided according to the gunas that spring from their own natures. Calm, self-control, austerity, purity, patience and honesty, knowledge, insight and belief in God: these are the work of a Brahmin, born of his nature. Courage, vigor, resolve, skill, not running away from battle, generosity and the bearing of a ruler: these are the work of a kshatriya, born of his nature. Farming, herding cattle and trade are the work of a vaishya, born of his nature. And work that consists of serving others is the work of a shudra, born of his nature too.
A person who is devoted to his own work wins perfection. Hear how someone devoted to his own work finds perfection. By worshipping with his own work the one from whom all beings come forth, the one who pervades this whole world, a human being finds perfection.
Better your own duty done imperfectly than another's duty done well. When you do the work your own nature lays down, you incur no sin. You should not give up the work you were born to, Arjuna, even if it has faults; for every undertaking is wrapped in faults, the way fire is wrapped in smoke.
A person whose understanding is unattached everywhere, who has mastered himself, whose cravings are gone, reaches through renunciation the highest perfection: freedom from action. Hear from me in brief, Arjuna, how someone who has reached perfection reaches Brahman, which is the highest point of knowledge.
Disciplined by a purified understanding, holding himself in check with resolve, setting aside sound and the other things of the senses, casting off longing and loathing, living in solitude, eating little, controlling speech, body and mind, always intent on the yoga of meditation, relying on detachment, letting go of ego, force, arrogance, desire, anger and possessions, with no thought of "mine," at peace: such a person is fit to become one with Brahman. Having become one with Brahman, serene in himself, he neither grieves nor craves. He is the same toward all beings, and he reaches the highest devotion to me. Through devotion he comes to know me as I truly am, how great I am and who I am; and once he knows me as I truly am, he enters into me at once.
Even while doing every kind of action, if he always relies on me, then by my grace he reaches the eternal home that never perishes. In your heart, renounce all your actions to me. Make me your highest goal. Rely on the discipline of understanding, and keep your mind on me always. With your mind on me, you will cross over every difficulty by my grace. But if your ego will not let you listen, you will be destroyed.
If you rely on your ego and think, "I will not fight," your resolve is for nothing. Your own nature will drive you to it. You are bound, Arjuna, by your own work, born of your own nature. What you do not want to do, out of delusion, you will do anyway, even against your will.
The Lord lives in the heart of every being, Arjuna, and by his power of illusion he makes all beings turn round and round, as if they were riding on a machine. Go to him for refuge with your whole being, Arjuna. By his grace you will reach the highest peace, the home that lasts forever.
That is the knowledge I have taught you, more secret than any secret. Think it over fully, and then do as you choose.
Listen once more to my highest word, the most secret of all. You are deeply loved by me, so I will tell you what is for your good. Keep your mind on me; be devoted to me; sacrifice to me; bow down to me. You will come to me — I promise you truly, for you are dear to me. Let go of every dharma, every duty and every law you hold yourself to, and take refuge in me alone. I will set you free from every sin. Don't grieve.
Never tell this to anyone who has no austerity or no devotion, or who does not want to listen, or who speaks against me. But whoever teaches this highest secret to those who are devoted to me, showing the highest devotion to me himself, will come to me; there is no doubt of it. No one among human beings does me dearer service than he does, and no one on earth will ever be dearer to me than he is. And whoever studies this sacred conversation of ours will worship me with the sacrifice of knowledge. That is my belief. Even someone who only listens to it, with faith and without scorn, will be set free and will reach the bright worlds of those who have done good.
Have you heard all this, Arjuna, with your mind fixed on one point? Has the confusion your ignorance caused been destroyed?
Arjuna said:
My confusion is destroyed, Krishna, and through your grace I remember again what I had lost. I stand firm, my doubts are gone. I will do what you say.
Sanjaya said:
That is how I heard this wonderful conversation between Krishna, Vasudeva's son, and the great-souled Arjuna, and it made my hair stand on end. By the grace of Vyasa, who gave me the power to see and hear all this, I heard this highest secret, this yoga, from Krishna himself, the master of yoga, as he spoke it with his own lips.
My king, as I remember this wonderful and holy conversation between Krishna and Arjuna, and remember it again, I rejoice again and again. And as I remember that most wonderful form of Krishna's, and remember it again, my king, my amazement is great, and I rejoice again and again.
Wherever Krishna is, the master of yoga, and wherever Arjuna is, the archer, there you will find good fortune, victory, prosperity, and wise rule that does not waver. That is what I believe.