Arjuna said: You are extolling, O Krishna, both renunciation of actions and strict adherence to activity. Tell me decisively which of the two bestows supreme felicity (śreyas).

Now Arjuna raises a pertinent question, after hearing about yajña, sacrifice, which Krishna equates with renunciation. Without renunciation, Arjuna feels spiritual pursuit cannot be meaningful and effective. But Krishna concluded the fourth chapter asking Arjuna to adopt yoga, in which the mind has to remain uniform (sama) with respect to favourable and unfavourable results, while doing all activities amidst pairs of opposites. Renunciation signifies relinquishment. Are not yoga and renunciation different? And which is best suited to shower felicity, the supreme goal of life? Earlier (in chapter three) the doubt was karma versus wisdom. Now it is renunciation versus yoga.

Lord Krishna said: Both renunciation and yoga bring about niḥśreyas (supreme felicity). But, of the two, Karma-yoga excels karma-relinquishment.

Krishna is brief, but specific. Whether it is sannyāsa, renunciation, or pursuit of karma with yoga attitude, it leads to spiritual felicity, the inner goal that crowns human life. As the objective is the same in both cases, can one be superior to the other? Attitude and aim alone shape and distinguish actions. Otherwise actions are but movements of our limbs. As the body and the senses are inert, their movements cannot mean or bring any inner conscious outcome. Sentience belongs to the inner personality. Mind and intelligence are the ones to display it. Judged on the basis of attitude and aim, the paths of yoga and sannyāsa are not different. In yoga, selfishness is sacrificed. In sannyāsa, possessiveness and ego are renounced. Both yield the same placidity, poise.

He is to be known as a 'constant renunciate', who does not desire or hate. O mighty-armed, the one given to nir-dvandvatā (freedom from dual responses) is comfortably freed from bondage.

Sannyāsa, says Krishna, is not a physical or bodily attribute. It is the sublime spiritual enrichment the mind is able to gain and preserve. The adornment is in the nature of inner sublimity and elegance, eliminating all desireful and hateful indulgences. All dvandvas (pairs of opposites) are rooted in love and hate. Normally everyone goes on enhancing these during interactions and involvements. The number, intensity and frequency of love-hate indulgences only increase day by day. These only vitiate life and interactions; but this fact is not recognized and acted upon. Consequently the entanglements become stronger every day. On the other hand, one who rises above dvandvas, gets liberated without courting inflicting disciplines and denials. It is a comfortable practice, resting on the mind and intelligence, with tangible effect every time. Even a little of this practice has great effect.

Only those of immature minds hold sāṅkhya (exclusive wisdom pursuit) and yoga as different; not the enlightened ones. By taking well to either of these, the result of both can be had.

See how firmly Krishna makes his pronouncement! Only immature ones, not the enlightened, regard sāṅkhya and yoga as distinct. Krishna has been stressing all along that they are not different - they do not have separate goals and outcomes. He exposed sāṅkhya first, calling it buddhi-yoga, a pursuit of intelligence. Then he defined Karma-yoga, prefacing it with the statement that it is also the application of yoga-buddhi while pursuing activities. By this it is clear that both are equally intelligence-based pursuits. While answering Arjuna's question in the 3rd chapter, Krishna clarified that right from the beginning spiritual pursuit was but one, yet two-phased. To begin with, it is activity-based, but later it becomes intelligence-based (3.3). In both, the mind gets reformed and refined. Mind alone employs senses for all actions and the resultant effects are also in the mind. The focus should not be missed.

Whatever abode is reached by Sāṅkhya (yoga), that is attained by Yoga (Karma-yoga) too. He who sees Sāṅkhya path and Yoga path as the same, alone has the right vision.

Krishna re-states and confirms that Sāṅkhya, meaning wisdom-path, and Yoga, meaning Karma-yoga path are essentially the same pursuit. Sāṅkhya-yoga instils introspection on the imperishable Self, and on sukha-duḥkha caused by interactions. The focus is extended to all pairs of opposites, which produce sukha-duḥkha alone. Sāṅkhya thus means to meet dvandvas with equipoise. Karma-yoga emphasizes pursuing karmas, which bring favourable, unfavourable and admixed results. Assimilate all of them and be unaffected, equipoised. Focus in both pursuits is internal, not external. Mind and intelligence alone are applied for Sāṅkhya and Yoga. In Sāṅkhya, it is on sukha-duḥkha samatva. In Yoga, it is on siddhi-asiddhi-samatva (equipoise). As sādhanā advances, their difference will narrow down and finally be extinct, making the seeker fulfilled.

The path of sannyāsa is very difficult to attain without the strength and support of yoga. The saint integrated by yoga-sādhanā, attains Brahman (the supreme Reality) before long.

Krishna reinforces what he has already said by adding that the path of exclusive renunciation is hard to achieve without the sublimation and enrichment yoga sādhanā provides. One taking to sannyāsa will have to abandon all secular activities, which are adverse to that path. Active life cannot really be relinquished, as it is instituted and preserved by Nature through its guṇas, namely sattva, rajas and tamas. As long as Nature is unrelenting, where is the question of leaving activities or not taking them up? Let not the seeker strive for anything disharmonious and fruitless. Let him accept active life as the first step and gain maturity. Let desires, possessiveness, etc. of the mind decline, leading to greater purity, making him ripe enough to take up the exclusive wisdom path. Thus the conflict dissolves. Karma-yoga will act as a complement to Jñāna-yoga, both together bringing the desired fruition.

Integrated with Yoga, with heart purified, body, mind and senses under control, seeing his Self as the Self of all, he who does his activity, is not tainted thereby.

Sannyāsa and Karma-yoga having the same inner effect, Krishna equates them and shows both paths have the same spiritual status. Effect of Karma-yoga is primarily in the mind, of sannyāsa also it is the same. Their actual outcome takes one to the mind level, to find both bring about the same purity and elevation. Krishna points that by Yoga the whole personality is integrated. Intelligence, mind and senses work in full harmony. Intelligence enriches and sublimates the mind with knowledge. Mind so enriched employs senses with moderation and refinement, leading to wholesome attunement in the seeker's personality. The heart imbibes purity. Adequate control and moderation result. The yogi realizes the Self, distinct from the body. Permeating everywhere, he experiences the Self in all alike. Egocentricity vanishes; with that, bondage also. Is this not virtually true renunciation?

The Knower of Truth, who has achieved 'yogic integration', will think 'I do nothing' even while seeing and hearing, touching and smelling, eating and moving about, sleeping and breathing, speaking and answering the calls of nature, holding, opening and winking his eyes.

This is one of the greatest statements, rather revelations, in Bhagavad Gita. It is in conformity with Krishna's exposition of the Self. Self has neither birth, nor death (2.20); it neither kills nor gets killed (2.19), nor causes another to kill (2.21). Whatever activities one may perform – domestic, official, societal, national - in and through all of them, the Self in him remains unaffected, untouched. At that level of the personality, actually no change takes place, no effect befalls. Kṛṣṇa emphasizes this truth by including all actions we usually do, like eating, speaking, waking, sleeping, walking – everything that the senses get involved in variously. He extended the truth of impersonality and non-acting (4.18) to all activities of the senses and the bodily limbs. Our personality is part of the Creation. World includes our personality too. Activating power belongs to Nature, activated instruments also are Nature’s. So, in any action, Nature’s guṇas alone meet Nature’s guṇas (3.28). Once this point is grasped, where is the question of doership for anyone? Kṛṣṇa earlier explained more than once that Nature’s guṇas alone are the content and motivation for all activities. It is like water evaporating from the sea and again coming back to the sea as rain from the clouds. Without the clouds, the water could not have reached the mountain tops and come down as huge rivers fulfilling Nature’s multiple purposes. But, in the whole cycle, although many processes are involved, it is water alone that goes up and comes down, without undergoing any essential change. The Knower (yukta) understands this truth about unchanging nature of the Self. Hence no action or interaction unsettles or distracts him. On the other hand, he courses through them efficiently and confidently without getting the least affected. Kṛṣṇa wants to bring home this crucial point, to enlighten our intelligence, and inspire us to aspire for this covetable state.

Dedicating all actions to Brahman, the supreme Reality, he who acts, eschewing 'delusional clinging', is not tainted by evil, just as the lotus leaf, though growing in water, is untouched by it.

Identifying with the immovable Soul, and on that basis understanding the falsity (mithyātva) of actions, will make our life free of agitation and affectation. Spiritual wisdom is to make man inwardly full, content and stable. True to this fact, Krishna presents various ways to actualize the same objective. Here he speaks of full dedication of all actions to Brahman, the supreme Reality. Thereby one should discard saṅga, delusional clinging, the mind fosters to the actions and results thereof. You can act effectively even without saṅga. Saṅga breeds tension, strong and unyielding. Freed of clinging, the mind becomes facile to act. Nature displays instances to illustrate great principles and values. Lotus growing in the pond from slush is typical. Though its leaves float on water, they are not the least affected by it. The yogi should be untouched by the world, like the lotus, says Krishna!

Abandoning saṅga, yogis perform actions only with their body, mind, intelligence and senses, to gain self-purification.

Human activities are in four levels. Sensory and bodily actions are the outermost. Next is the oral, namely articulation. These two are visible. Further next will be mental activity, like thinking, feeling, emotional urges, memorizing, etc. Intelligentian activity, like enquiring, knowing, reasoning, etc., is the last and the most effective. None of these can be forsaken. All should be pursued with equal zeal, but with the sole aim of purifying oneself. Impure mind will be agitated and confused, and peace will be distant for it. Purity consists in leaving delusional clinging, saṅga. For the yogi, whatever be the objective outcome of his actions, the real purpose will be purifying himself. Delusion, clinging, selfishness, etc. are sure to surge forth in various ways, as one remains inactive. In fact, he gets a chance to identify them properly. Thus through activity the seeker should seek his own inner purity and spiritual enrichment - the point Krishna emphasizes here.

Leaving the subjective results (favourable-unfavourable reactions) of actions, the integrated yogi attains well-founded lasting quietude. Instigated by passion, the un-integrated, clings delusionally to results and gets bound thereby.

How strikingly does Krishna compare and contrast the yogi and the non-yogi! Yogi has only one aim, of freeing himself of the saṅga to the results karmas fetch. For the non-yogi, the desired outcomes bind him with undue elation, and others with depression and distaste. These differing responses become his inseparable associates. This is the binding factor for the non-yogi. In contrast, the integrated yogi, right beforehand, enriches his mind with evenness and poise, so that he remains free and stable whatever be the results his actions fetch. In fact, he uses every activity to ensure and strengthen his inner poise. He feels nothing like bondage from any action. Such impersonal, flexible, unsustainable attitude about activity is the real spiritual enrichment. For gaining fulfillment, the path used - that of karma or jñāna - is immaterial.

The self-controlled, having renounced all actions mentally, rests comfortably as the Soul in the nine-gated city, namely the body, virtually neither acting nor causing another to act.

Krishna presents the renunciate's insight as a contrast to the Yogi's. The Knower is given to dispossessing not the results but the actions themselves. He is the Soul, and hence does not act at all. Thus he has sufficient inspiration to renounce all actions. He does this by ascribing all actions to their respective senses and the body. Krishna describes the body as a nine-gated city. Eyes, ears, nostrils, mouth, excretory and reproductive organs together form these gates. To live and act with the consciousness that one does not act is a point Krishna has explained earlier (5.8, 9). The same effect is wrought here too, but by offering all actions as sacrifice to their very source, and feeling completely non-active and free at heart. The Knower feels he does not act; also that he does not cause another to act. It is with this knowledge that Krishna asked Arjuna to fight (2.18, 21, 37, 38).

The Lord of the Universe does not forge any sense of doership or enjoin actions on anyone; nor again does He connect one with the results of his actions. What indeed acts and activates is one's own nature, the qualities each possesses.

People have an overwhelming notion that a Superpower has effected the creation. He alone lords over everything. He links every actor with the result of whatever he does. It is not so, says Krishna categorically. He has stressed right from the 3rd chapter that all actions are caused by Nature's three gunas. Nature is but the tool of God. What does the statement that the Lord does not interfere with man's activities, their character, execution and result mean then? Every form of existence, more so the human, has its inherent qualities. These cause one's tendencies and instigations, called svabhāva, which alone comes into display. Every action is a means to gain a certain outcome. Thus inherent tendencies, their display in the form of actions, and their effects are a sequence Nature preserves. Nothing else has any place anywhere.

The all-powerful Lord does not receive anyone's sin or virtue. True knowledge is covered by ignorance, and hence are beings deluded.

Krishna goes a step further. As the Lord does not prescribe any activities or their doership, so He does not also partake of anyone's sin or virtue. This invalidates the common belief that when sin and virtue are offered to God, He will absorb them and free the offerer from all adverse effects of whatever he has done. God is all-pervading like space. Can such a presence have any form or shape? God is idolized because He is not perceptible to the senses, and some kind of visible agency is necessary to people to focus their devotional thoughts. Ignorance and delusion alone lead to incur sin, as Krishna explained earlier. To avoid it, right knowledge in time and striving earnestly with resolve (3.37-43) are the only means. Enlightenment is the greatest persuasion for any human. Spiritual science provides this in ample measure. Lack of insight alone leads to wrong beliefs and practices. Earlier this plight is redressed, the better.

Those whose ignorance is exterminated by the knowledge of the Self, that knowledge, like the sun, clearly reveals to them the supreme Truth. Knowing That (the supreme Truth), constantly being identified with That, taking That as the wholesome discipline and pursuit, making That the supreme goal, they attain freedom from rebirth, their impurities and sinfulness being completely washed off by Knowledge.

Those whose ignorance is exterminated by the knowledge of the Self, that knowledge, like the sun, clearly reveals to them the supreme Truth. Knowing That (the supreme Truth), constantly being identified with That, taking That as the wholesome discipline and pursuit, making That the supreme goal, they attain freedom from rebirth, their impurities and sinfulness being completely washed off by Knowledge. In spiritual pursuit, the sole emphasis is in removing ignorance and delusion by acquiring true knowledge. Ignorance inheres in the mind and intelligence. And so, the effort to remove it has to be mento-intellectual, as Kṛṣṇa and Arjuna jointly do. For, intelligence alone can act on the mind and bring necessary changes and improvements, to make life smooth, natural, peaceful and harmonious. It is a wonderful state of wisdom and inner splendour, dispelling all kinds of imbalance and disharmony. Kṛṣṇa’s disclosure and Arjuna’s absorption are a mento-intellectual effort. It reforms and refines the mind instantly, making it purer. Intelligence becomes more perceptive. The whole sādhanā is inner. Knowledge is about the ignorance at work and the supreme Self shining within. By gaining the knowledge the Teacher imparts, when ignorance is destroyed, the Self begins to shine without hindrance, and the supreme Truth becomes clearer. The seeker identifies with the Self, the real Subject within, giving rise to a niṣṭhā, intense pursuit as: “I am the Self. I must reflect Selfhood in all I think, speak and act.” Self should become the sole refuge. Everything in life should come under the Self. This knowledge will remove all blemishes of the mind and intelligence. The Knower will become purity, sublimity and homogeneity incarnate. All seeds for further birth, ideas relating to it, will be burnt off. Birth and death are merely ideas, not facts or realities. Likewise re-birth and further death also become fictitious notions, lingering in the impure mind. No doubt about either life here or hereafter will linger. Clarity becomes full, comprehensive.

The enlightened ones look at the Brāhmaṇa endowed with learning and humility, the cow, the elephant, the dog as well as the 'uncultured' with equal eye.

Our life is interactional. And its major part consists of interpersonal dealings, which include domestic, professional and societal interactions. All are equally important. Do not draw a dividing line amongst the three. But invariably a host of likes and dislikes dominate each sphere, leading to havoc. Only with fondness, sensitivity, discrimination, the plight can be redressed. Krishna compels the seeker to foster a wholesome attitude of evenness and harmony towards all beings. The same Self animates and activates all beings. It is the unmistakeable identity of everyone. Thus the same immaculate Soul resides in the brāhmaṇa, cow, elephant and the uncultured. So, the enlightened look at them with the same attitude, a sublimity spirituality insists upon. No feeling of contempt should victimize the mind. Interactions become smooth, benevolent and graceful, making the Knower esteemed and adorable.

The entire worldliness stands conquered by those, whose mind is established in equal vision. Brahman is taintless and equal. Therefore, by attaining equality, they become established in Brahman.

Here Krishna does not refer to Soul or God. Yet he delivers the full spiritual message, a point all should absorb with special attention. Equanimity is the crux of spirituality. See how it makes one pure, wholesome and fulfilled. The entire world and our interactions with it, bring only two experiences, sukha and duhkha. All dvandvas, pairs of opposites, verily fetch only sukha-duhkhas. So, evenness to them virtually means conquest of the world. See how samatva (equipoise) of the mind means victory over the world. Krishna says that such evenness is the core of spirituality, especially for those given to introspection. Brahman, the supreme Reality, is the goal of all spiritual seekers. Brahman is equalness, free of any blemish. Therefore, those whose mind is established in equalness verily abide in Brahman. They become taintless and free.

Delight not unduly on meeting the pleasant, nor be aggrieved by the unpleasant. By being so, with stable intelligence, freed of delusion, knowing Brahman well, abide in Brahman.

Krishna explains again how one wins over the world by making his mind harmonious in daily interactional life. Here also he is quite secular in the disciplines he lays down. See how Gita embraces one and all, without distinction of sex, nationality, race or otherwise. Mind incessantly generates the alternates of delight and depression, while interacting with persons, places and events, at home, in professional or societal fronts. In this, the individual remains the same, other factors alone are variable. Focussing attention on oneself is interactional sādhanā. It is a paradigm shift. The only niṣṭhā is to have a uniform, even attitude towards sukha-duḥkhas. Do not exult or be aggrieved any time. The world can only offer pleasant-unpleasant alternates. So, sādhanā becomes irresistible, ceaseless. Let the intelligence be firm, delusion-free. Inner equalness makes one abide in the equal Brahman.

Whatever happiness one derives inwardly from the Self, by not clinging to and associating with the objects around, the same happiness in interminable measure he gets on identifying with Brahman (and gaining the resulting expanse).

Krishna describes how spiritual wisdom leads irresistibly to its climax of full expanse, from Atma (embodied Self) to Brahman (universal Self). To begin with, it is a centric effort, focussing on the blissful Self. Once this is gained, the seeker gallops to imbibe universal expanse. Whatever senses perceive is but a visible display of the invisible Self, Atman, in Braahmic dimension. Whatever happiness the yogi derives from absorptional meditation gives place to a widespread inundation. Inner Consciousness alone displays all perceptions. Hence there are no distinctions like internal and external, subtle and gross. All are but notions, floats, in Consciousness, which is neither matter nor energy. Matter and energy too are manifestations of the same Consciousness. No more is the need for absorption, which would imply permission for the fictitious two! All that is gone now. The yogi becomes all-filling Consciousness for ever.

Delights born of sense-object contacts are the wombs of misery. They have a beginning and an end. O son of Kunti, the wise one does not rejoice in them.

What prevents one from pursuing spiritual path and being immersed in blissful Brahman? Is not the human wise enough to realize the relevance and merits of spiritual pursuit? Krishna answers that it is lack of discrimination about the nature of world-objects and the pleasures they afford. All delights and thrills, says Krishna, arising from contact of world objects, are wombs of misery! However endearing the objects seem, any pleasure from them leads to subsequent affliction. Every enjoyment, as Nachiketas tells Yama in Kathopanishad, corrodes the senses. By seeing and hearing, eyes and ears get worn out. Sensory enjoyments have a beginning and an end, which are characteristic of the fleeting. One given to introspection will not rejoice in them. This kind of discreet dispassion, Krishna has stressed even in the 2nd chapter (2.61) while describing Sthita-prajna and Sthita-dhee. It is a cardinal lesson of Bhagavad Gita. Dispassion and discretion go together.

Whoever is able to withstand the urges of passion and anger before his body falls, is indeed the spiritually integrated and happy human.

This is another secular statement, proving the dialogue as a non-religious, rational exposition of interactional human life, presenting a host of eternal values to benefit humanity - a point Gita students must grasp wholeheartedly. The text is an administrative and interactional treatise, relevant to all countries of the world. Raga and dvesa, iṣṭa and aniṣṭa, kāma and krodha are synonyms defining the two mutually opposite urges of the mind. Love takes one nearer the object of love, making him intensify his affinity with it. Hate is the opposite urge, dissuading what one hates, seeking to further the dislike and distance. Instead of renouncing these urges, people relish to enhance their incidence and intensity, making life exceedingly miserable. Krishna says: Whoever forbears these emotions, is well integrated and content. Sublimate likes and dislikes - is the core message, as expressed earlier (5.19, 20). Mind alone causes suffering, and mind brings freedom too.

The yogi who lives with inner happiness, revels within himself, and is guided by his own inner light. He, becoming Brahman, attains Braahmic redemption.

Treating the recurring attraction and repulsion at their very source, the yogi's mind becomes a treasure-house of inner happiness, revelry and brilliance. Whatever thrills sense-object-contacts bring, lead only to misery, and hence are not desirable. They only strengthen the seeker's discrimination and dispassion, and he is able to confidently turn inward and lean upon the Self. Before long he starts rejoicing in inner spiritual happiness, which overwhelms him and he becomes an introvert. He realizes that all one sees outside has no ground or reality. One's own inner Consciousness alone is projecting and imprinting the outer phenomena. So far he had felt that external grossness has its independent status, but now its hollowness is revealed beyond doubt. His realization ascends to the Braahmic level, with characteral, behavioural and interactional excellences displaying benevolence, grace and grandeur.

Sages, whose blemishes are attenuated, doubts are dispelled, who have enough self-control, and who are interested in the welfare of all beings, attain Brahmic freedom.

In the previous verse, Krishna referred to inner delight, as a means to attain Brahma-nirvāṇa, the ecstasy of sovereign inner freedom. Here he strikes a different note denoting comprehensive vision and loving interest in the welfare of all beings. Spirituality truly focuses on purifying and expanding the mind and intelligence, thereby generating full contentment and freedom. This implies dispelling all doubts about the Self, world, life, interactions and spiritual attainment. Discontent and doubt are the last notes of impurity and imperfection. When these too drop, the expanse is full and freedom becomes sovereign. It is a very lofty and radiant state by any standard! There is none who will not covet it! The process implies an abiding interest in the welfare of all beings. Spiritual growth and enrichment go along with such societal interest, expanse and identification.

Those of self-control, whose minds are rid of lust and anger, who have regulated their mind and have realized the Self, for them Brahma-nirvāṇa – the freedom and joy arising from the knowledge of supreme Reality – reigns all around.

Krishna explains how interactional sādhanā will take one to the zenith of Self-realization, wherein the seeker experiences universal expanse, even while he is active. As passion and prejudice prey the mind, so the mind can also free itself from their hold. The former is called pravṛtti path, while the latter is the nivṛtti path. By focussing steadily on sublimation of desire-hatred during one’s interactional life, the process grows deeper, and will bestow its crowning glory and fulfilment. Braahmic redemption encircles one freed from the hold of kāma and krodha. No special yearning or effort will be necessary for this. What a lofty fruition, fulfilment! It links well with Krishna’s description in the 2nd chapter (2.70-71) of the sthita-dhee, one of stable mind, while yet remaining active and interactive.

Keeping away the external sensory contacts, fixing the vision between the eyebrows, making the incoming and outgoing breaths equal within the nostrils,restraining the senses, mind and intelligence, that Sage who with one-pointed devotion to liberation, rises above desire, fear and hatred, is indeed ever free.

Spiritual life implies regulating the senses, mind and intelligence alike, and getting into the inner domain of one’s own personality. Sooner or later, this will call for contemplation and meditative absorption, wherein one will be able to strike the plane of the Self and the infinite expanse it embodies. Krishna does not lose sight of this fact. In fact, he wants to explain this inner descent and ascent with their own majesty and profundity. Keeping this in mind, he explains how the seeker can get into a process of withdrawing his mind and intelligence, and steep them in the inner expanse and abundance. He defines the procedure for the purpose. Refrain from all sensory contacts. Keep the eyes focussed in between the eyebrows, preventing thereby the normal, regular vision. Fix your attention on liberation, seeing it as your sole refuge. There is a close relationship between prāṇa and mind. Breathing is generally irregular. Incoming and outgoing breaths are not equal. By watching them, regulate the two and make them even. When breathing becomes light and even, the mind too will be alike. The invisible mind is not accessible. But breath is. By regulating the breath, you can regulate the mind too. Desire, hatred and fear are the three basic mental urges. All the rest are their creations. A spiritual seeker has to rise above these instigations and be soft, gentle, amiable and all-embracing. Gaining such an inner evenness and sublimity is itself true liberation, freedom. In fact, Krishna has been emphasizing this right from the start, pointing to sukha-duḥkhas (2.15), the only resultants of interactional impacts. Then he included attraction and repulsion, rāga-dveṣas, in the list, stating that to evenize them is to be liberated indeed (5.19).

Knowing Me as the partaker of all yajñas (sacrifices and austerities), equally the supreme Lord of all the worlds, as well as the friend of all beings, one attains peace and quietude.

Like the earlier statements of his (4.9,10), this too assures that a proper knowledge of Krishna, as of his instructions, will purify and elevate one, enabling him to gain the spiritual state like his. Krishna defined a variety of Yajñas, some of which were addressed to superhuman powers, whose existence is not experiential, and hence doubtful. But sacrifice, as a noble act, has its auspicious effect, no matter to whom it is addressed. Those who are unable to understand it in this light, can have the satisfaction that Krishna is the bhoktā, partaker, of all yajñas, and feel rewarded. Further, Krishna is also the friend of all. To know Krishna fully is to imbibe Krishnahood in oneself, deriving all peace and quietude. Earlier, Krishna had stressed inner delight, inner rejoicing (5.24) - a clear reference to meditative absorption. He wishes to discuss the subject in detail in the next chapter.