Verse 1

¹Bhagavan said: Bound and free are ways of speaking that come from the strands, not from what is real; and because the strands have their root in maya, there is for me neither release nor binding. ²Grief and delusion, happiness and pain, and the falling into a body come about by maya. Like a dream, the round of birth is something the self shows itself, and not a real thing. ³Uddhava, know that knowing and not knowing are two bodies of mine, belonging to those who wear bodies. They are the first two, made by my maya, and they work release and bondage. ⁴For this living one, who is one and a portion of me, great-minded man, the bondage that comes by not knowing has no beginning; and neither has the other, which comes by knowing.

⁵Now I will tell you, dear one, how the bound and the free differ: two of opposite ways, resting in one who has but a single way.