As the blazing fire reduces wood to ashes, similarly, the fire of Self-knowledge reduces all Karma to ashes. |
Attached action is selfish work that produces Karmic bondage. |
Bear with me as a father to his son, as a friend to a friend, and as a husband to his wife, O Lord. |
Because the calm person, who is not afflicted by these feelings and is steady in pain and pleasure, becomes fit for immortality, O Arjuna. |
Because the mind, indeed, is very unsteady, turbulent, powerful, and obstinate, O Krishna. I think restraining the mind is as difficult as restraining the wind. |
Because, death is certain for the one who is born, and birth is certain for the one who dies. Therefore, you should not lament over the inevitable. |
Because, if I do not engage in action relentlessly, people would follow My path in every way. |
Because, whatever noble persons do, others follow. Whatever standard they set up, the world follows. |
Better indeed is knowledge than mechanical practice. Better than knowledge is meditation. But better still is surrender of attachment to results, because there follows immediate peace. |
Bodies of the eternal, imperishable, and incomprehensible soul are said to be perishable. Therefore, fight, O Arjuna. |
Both you and I have taken many births. I remember them all, O Arjuna, but you do not remember. |
Bound by hundreds of ties of desire and enslaved by lust and anger; they strive to obtain wealth by unlawful means for the fulfillment of desires. |
Brahman is the oblation. Brahman is the clarified butter. The oblation is poured by Brahman into the fire of Brahman. Brahman shall be realized by the one who considers everything as (a manifestation or) an act of Brahman. |
But great souls, who possess divine qualities know Me as the cause of creation and imperishable, and worship Me single-mindedly. |
But their knowledge, whose ignorance is destroyed by the Self-knowledge, reveals the Supreme like the sun (reveals the beauty of objects of the world). |