Passage 4

¹Expectation of results brings restlessness. One may ask, 'If I give up concern for the fruit, how am I to live?' Why such weakness? He who declared 'yoga-kṣemaṁ vahāmy aham'—'I bear their Yoga and Kṣema'—will look after what is needed. Which is greater: the fleeting happiness of ordinary life or the Ānanda of Mokṣa? Worldly happiness is small; the Ānanda of Mokṣa is abiding and secure. Many commentators have written on this according to their intellectual ability. A large number interpret freedom from fruit-expectation to mean that man has no right at all to the fruit. ²That is a serious mistake. Bhagavān says in the Gītā, 'mā phaleṣu.' 'Mā' means 'do not' or 'let it not be your claim': the fruit exists, but you consciously relinquish your attachment to it. If the meaning were that there is no right or no fruit at all, Kṛṣṇa Paramātma would have used a negation such as 'na phaleṣu.' 'Na' means 'not, nonexistent.' To turn 'mā phaleṣu' into 'na phaleṣu' is to alter Bhagavān's own word, and that is a grave error. ³When a person has the capacity and responsibility to act, the fruit of action also naturally arises in relation to him; this cannot simply be denied. The teaching is that he should willingly relinquish possessive claim to that fruit. Hence the Gītā shows the path: 'Do the work; relinquish the fruit.' Craving for fruit is rajoguṇa. Saying 'there is no fruit' and therefore abandoning the work is tamoguṇa. Acting fully and then relinquishing the fruit is the sāttvic way shown by the Divine. ⁴Nor does the teaching stop there. For the Karma Yogī, sama-buddhi—equanimous intelligence—is more important than saṅga-buddhi, the intelligence of attachment. Kṛṣṇa rejects saṅga because attachment is the root of bondage: 'This Karma is mine; its fruit is mine; I am the doer.' Such identification creates bondage. ⁵Kṛṣṇa Paramātma therefore praises the one who rises beyond saṅga-buddhi. Equanimity itself is Yoga: 'samatvaṁ yoga ucyate'—Yoga is equanimity. ⁶In the second chapter four major stages are set out. First, the tattva of Śaraṇāgati; second, Sāṅkhya-jñāna; third, Yoga-buddhi; fourth, the characteristics of the sthita-prajña. The first three have now been explained. What remains is the nature of the sthita-prajña. Arjuna asks Kṛṣṇa Paramātma to explain it, addressing Him as 'Keśava!' Kṛṣṇa smiles, for Arjuna has begun to know something of Him. 'Keśava' points to the One who embodies the power of the Trimūrti. That Arjuna has come this far is itself the grace of Kṛṣṇa. When he asks for the marks of steady wisdom, Keśava replies: 'Pārtha! One who has completely relinquished all desires that arise in the mind and is content in the Ātma, by the Ātma, is called a sthita-prajña.' ⁷'There are two movements here. One is eliminative, the other constructive. To remove all desires from the mind is eliminative; to abide in inner contentment is constructive. Uprooting the weeds that have grown in the field of the heart and cleansing that field is eliminative. Planting love for Bhagavān in the purified heart is constructive. Growing the crop that is truly needed is constructive; removing the unwanted weeds is eliminative. Viṣaya-vāsanās are the weeds; Bhagavat-rati, love directed toward Bhagavān, is the crop to be cultivated. The mind is nothing but a bundle woven from desires. When the desires disappear, where is the mind as we ordinarily know it?' ⁸'Consider a cloth. Threads crossing one another give it the form of cloth. If every thread is removed, where is the cloth? In the same way, the threads called desires, crossing and binding one another, take the form called mind. When desires are gone, that mind has no independent form. One established beyond such compulsive mind is the sthita-prajña. Therefore kāma must first be mastered. No great outer battle is needed for this, nor will sweet words make desire disappear. Desires concern objects that are seen. Stand as the witness: "I am the seer of these; I am not identical with them." Remain the witness; do not merge with them. Become the one who observes the mind, not the mind itself.' ⁹Mental power is like a tremendously strong electric current. It must be understood and handled from the proper distance; one should not grasp it blindly. Touch a dangerous current carelessly and it burns. In the same way, identification with the mind can become a great hell. The more inner distance one has from its compulsions, the greater the ease. What is required is to learn skilfully how this power is to be used. ¹⁰The sthita-prajña does not depend upon external objects for Ātma-ānanda. No external aid is necessary. Ānanda is naturally present within each being. With a purified antaḥkaraṇa, he is content in the Ātma. This is sva-saṁvedya—a state known directly to oneself. It is not an outward characteristic that others can measure; it is known inwardly by the one who abides in it. ¹¹Because this was not yet clear to Arjuna, Kṛṣṇa explained it more simply through the essence of the fifty-sixth, fifty-seventh and fifty-eighth ślokas. Pleasure and pain are spoken of in three classes: ādhyātmika, arising within one's own embodied condition; ādhibhautika, arising through other beings and material conditions; and ādhidaivika, arising through forces beyond ordinary personal control. Pleasure and pain are related to pāpa and puṇya. One may understand pain as warning against wrongful action and pleasure as encouragement toward right action. But the sthita-prajña is neither tormented by pain nor seduced by pleasure. He does not collapse under hardship or become intoxicated by comfort. Only those who do not know the Ātma rise and fall helplessly with these two. ¹²The sthita-prajña is contemplative; in this sense he is a muni. Stable Buddhi is the basis of stable Prajñā. Control of the senses is necessary for the sādhaka, but it is not the whole of Sādhana. As long as attachment to objects has soaked the mind, external sense-control cannot become complete. Therefore Kṛṣṇa says, 'Dear one, restrain the senses. Then you will be like one before a snake whose fangs have been removed—there is no need for fear. But if thought of the objects begins again, the distorted form of craving will again have to be faced. As there is no end to numbers, there is no completion to kāma.' External restraint must therefore be accompanied by mastery of the mind. Otherwise one becomes not sthita-prajña but gata-prajña—one whose wisdom has departed. Gata-prajña leads downward; sthita-prajña leads upward. When attachment in the mind is destroyed, rāga and dveṣa lose their support and collapse of themselves. Thereafter, even if the senses move among objects, bondage need not arise. For one who has received Ātma-prasāda, what weight can worldly sorrow have? As stars disappear when the sun rises, so sorrow, unrest and the forms of ignorance flee before the grace-light of Jñāna. ¹³Man has three principal instruments: Manas, Buddhi and the senses. Only through their relationship with one another do they lead either toward saṁsāra or toward realisation of the Ātma. Knowing that Arjuna might ask what arises from what, Paramātma explained: 'Pārtha! When Manas joins itself to the senses, saṁsāra is attained. When Manas comes under the guidance of Buddhi, Ātma-prāpti becomes possible. Buddhi must exercise the power of clear determination; Manas must carry out that determination. That is orderly inner government.' ¹⁴Complete mastery of the senses is a mark of the sthita-prajña. 'That which is night to all beings is wakefulness to the sage; that in which beings are awake is night to him.' This should not be taken merely in the literal sense of clock-time, as though a sthita-prajña sleeps by day and stays awake by night. The meaning is subtle. Ordinary people are intensely awake to worldly objects and the movements of the senses; the sthita-prajña is turned away from that field—as though asleep to it. To restrain the senses from their objects is his 'sleep'; to excite them toward objects is ordinary worldly 'wakefulness.' Another way to say it is this: ordinary people forget the state of the Ātma and awaken to body-consciousness. The sthita-prajña is awake in Ātma-sthiti and asleep to identification with the body. What common people neglect, he attends to; toward the vāsanās in which they are alert, he remains inwardly indifferent. That is the subtle meaning. If the verse were merely literal, thieves, night-watchmen and guards—awake at night and asleep by day—would all have to be called sthita-prajñas! ¹⁵One who relinquishes all kāmas, moves without craving, and is free from ahaṁkāra and mamakāra attains peace. Kṛṣṇa concludes the description of the sthita-prajña with the renunciation of desire. This Sāṅkhya Yoga is incomparable; the essence of the Gītā is gathered within it. ¹⁶To man who stands bewildered and desolate upon the Kurukṣetra of life, unable to see direction or path, Mādhava grants the teaching of Sāṅkhya Yoga. The remaining chapters may be seen as unfolding and elaborating what is contained in this second chapter. There is no doubt of its centrality. 'Arjuna! Release identification with the mind and prepare to become absorbed in your own true Self. Like a tortoise withdrawing its limbs, one who can withdraw and restrain the senses from sound and the other objects is the sthita-prajña.' Thus from the eleventh through the thirtieth ślokas of the second chapter, Śrī Kṛṣṇa offers the tattva of the Ātma to Arjuna as plainly as a fruit peeled and placed in the hand. From the thirty-ninth through the fifty-fifth He explains Karma Yoga in the form of sama-buddhi and the Dharmic action by which one reaches Parameśvara. In this portion, the greatness of Karma Yoga is especially emphasised.