Verse 11

In plain words

So there stands Arjuna: his mind gone dark on the question of what is right, holding fast to a false knowing, sunk under a vast ocean of grief. And the Lord Vāsudeva, looking at him, could find no rescue anywhere but in knowledge of the Self. So, out of compassion, wanting to pull Arjuna up out of that water, he brought him into that knowledge, and said —

'Those not to be grieved for...' — Bhīṣma, Droṇa, and the rest are not to be grieved for, both because they lived well and because, in their real nature as the Self, they are eternal. And yet you've grieved for exactly these people not to be grieved for, thinking: 'They're dying because of me — without them, what good is a kingdom, what good is happiness?' You talk like a wise man, using the words and phrases of the learned and the sharp-minded. But look what you're actually doing — showing foolishness and learning at the same time, which contradict each other, like someone out of his mind. Here's why: the truly wise, those who know the Self, never grieve for the dead — whose breath has left them — nor for the living, whose breath hasn't. As the scripture says, real wisdom means understanding whose only object is the Self; only that counts as being 'paṇḍita,' having 'gone past mere learning.' But you, in truth, are grieving over people who are eternal — people not to be grieved for at all. That's exactly why you're deluded.

Close to the Sanskrit

There, thus — of Arjuna, whose mind was utterly bewildered about duty, who was possessed of false knowledge, who was sunk in a great ocean of sorrow — seeing no lifting-out other than from knowledge of the Self, the Lord Vāsudeva, thereupon out of compassion, wishing to lift Arjuna out, bringing him down into knowledge of the Self, said —

'Those not to be grieved for' and so on. Bhīṣma, Droṇa, and others are not to be grieved for, because of their good conduct, and because, in respect of their real nature as the Self, they are eternal. You have grieved over those not to be grieved for — [thinking] 'They are dying because of me; having become separated from them, what shall I do with kingdom, happiness, and so on?' — thus. You speak wisdom-talk — the words and utterances of the wise and the intelligent. [Yet] you display in yourself this very foolishness and learning, [which are] contradictory, like a madman; such is the purport. Because the wise, the knowers of the Self, do not grieve for the departed — the dead — nor for those whose breath has not departed — the living. Those whose understanding has the Self as its object are indeed the wise — 'having renounced [mere] learning' (Bṛ. Up. 3.5.1), says the Śruti. But you, in reality, grieve for those who are eternal, [hence] not to be grieved for; therefore you are deluded; such is the purport.

In plain words

“Why, brother-in-law, this weeping like a coward? Because Bhīṣma, Droṇa and the rest will die? Your weeping is not simply because Bhīṣma, Droṇa and the rest will die. It is ‘mamakāra’, the feeling ‘they are mine’, that makes you weep. Of all who weep in the world, three quarters do not weep for the deaths; they weep out of ‘mamakāra’, the feeling ‘those who die are mine’. Brother-in-law! How many who were not your own have you killed before this? Where did this weeping go then? It is ‘mamakāra’, the feeling ‘these people I see are mine’, that has thrown you down into such sorrow. The cause of that mamakāra is Ahaṅkāra. In sleep there is no Ahaṅkāra. That is why one knows nothing at all of what has become of, or is becoming of, one’s own body lying there, the bodies of one’s own people, and the wealth, gold, possessions and vehicles one has amassed. ‘Aham’ is the first case; it is there first, and ‘mama’, the sixth case, comes after. Is that not natural? Madman, to take the body, which is not oneself, for oneself is ignorance itself. To think the anātma to be the Ātma is inverted knowledge; it can never be Jñāna. The notion that the body is the Ātma is itself ignorance. So, Arjuna, nothing else you do will end your ignorance. For this, Jñāna alone is the divine medicine.” With these words He took up the teaching of Ātma-jñāna at the very start. That is the eleventh śloka of the second chapter. From there onward, ‘Ātma-jñāna’ He began. In the pārāyaṇa of the Gītā this śloka is to be regarded as the ‘seed śloka’.

In plain words

Here Kṛṣṇa refutes two objections present in Arjuna. The first is thinking that the destruction which befalls bodies befalls the Ātma itself, and grieving for those who are not to be grieved for. This is “and you speak words of wisdom”. He said, “Calling your svadharma adharma, you are cutting learned argument to pieces.” Here there is something readers must note. Two kinds of moha had taken hold of Arjuna: one ordinary moha, the other extraordinary moha. To think the body is the Ātma and superimpose the properties of the body on the Ātma is ordinary moha. To think that war, his svadharma, is adharma: this is extraordinary moha. This was the moha particular to Arjuna. That is why Kṛṣṇa Paramātma rejects the first, the ordinary moha, and removes the second, the extraordinary moha. For ordinary moha He gave the teaching of the Ātma in the second chapter, from the twelfth śloka to the thirtieth; then, in reply to the second, the extraordinary moha, removing that particular moha, He spoke eight ślokas that establish svadharma. These are called the “Dharmāṣṭaka”. After that He taught niṣkāma karma yoga: how that svadharma is to be done so that it becomes a cause not of birth but of Mokṣa. At the close of this second chapter comes the description of the sthitaprajña, the embodiment in visible form. Listen now to Kṛṣṇa’s next discourse.

“Arjuna! Think a little about who you are and what you are doing. You say you know everything, and yet you wail and weep like women. Your words are a paṇḍita’s words; your doings are an unlettered man’s. Going by your words one would take you for a jñāni; going by your doings one has to fear you are an ajñāni. Looking at your state, there is no making it out. Well, if we say you are indeed a paṇḍita, paṇḍitas do not grieve over death and life, and must not. If they grieve like this, they are not paṇḍitas.

In plain words

“Are not the paṇḍitas those who know the secret of the body and the nature of the Ātma just as they are? Such paṇḍitas grieve neither for those still in their bodies nor for those whose bodies have fallen away. In no situation of the pairs of opposites do they lose the composure of their citta. It is the ajñānis, who know nothing at all, neither of the two (the secret of the body and the nature of the Ātma), who lament for the dead. Those who know and yet do not know grieve over the welfare of the living; the paṇḍitas, who know everything, grieve over nothing. Brother-in-law! Arjuna! Are you weeping because the bodies of Bhīṣma, Droṇa and the rest will die? Or because their Ātmas will die? If you say it is for the bodies alone, for how many will you weep? Well, if bodies were kept standing by weeping, people in the world would have hired labourers to weep and kept their dead alive. That will never be. Even if this body were hidden away in a vessel of amṛta, it would perish; that is the truth. What use is there in weeping for such as these? And suppose you say it is for the Ātma, that is greater folly still. Death cannot come near it. It is eternal, it is Satya, a stainless entity.