योगसंन्यस्तकर्माणं ज्ञानसंछिन्नसंशयम् ।आत्मवन्तं न कर्माणि निबध्नन्ति धनञ्जय ॥
yogasaṁnyastakarmāṇaṁ jñānasaṁchinnasaṁśayamātmavantaṁ na karmāṇi nibadhnanti dhanañjaya
He who has destroyed all doubt by knowledge and has by Yoga given up all works and is in possession of the Self is not bound by his works, O Dhananjaya.
Compiled rendering · Anilbaran Roy
His translation
Brahman is his giving and Brahman is his sacrifice, Brahman casteth Brahman into the fire that is Brahman, by Samadhi of his works in Brahman unto Brahman he goeth. Of the Yogins some make to the natural Gods their session of sacrifice, others offer the sacrifice by the sacrifice into the fire that is Brahman. And…Read the whole passage · 619 wordsClose the passage
Brahman is his giving and Brahman is his sacrifice, Brahman casteth Brahman into the fire that is Brahman, by Samadhi of his works in Brahman unto Brahman he goeth. Of the Yogins some make to the natural Gods their session of sacrifice, others offer the sacrifice by the sacrifice into the fire that is Brahman. And some offer the hearing and all the senses into the fires of self-mastery and some offer sound and the other things of sense into the fires of the senses. And others offer into the Yoga-fire of a controlled Spirit that knowledge hath kindled with her hands all the works of the senses and all the works of vital breathing. And some make the sacrifice of their goods and some make a sacrifice of austerity. Some offer up their Yoga as a sacrifice, others the knowledge of the Veda; lords of askesis are they all, keen in the vow of their undertaking. Some offer the upper breath into the lower and the lower breath into the upper, stopping the passages of the inbreath and outbreath, absorbed in government of Breath that is life; others eating temperately, offer up the breaths into the breaths as into a sacrificial fire. And all these, yea all are wise in sacrifice & by sacrifice the obscuration of sin fades away from them, for they live on the remnants of their Sacrifice deeming it as the food of Gods and pass over into Brahman that is for ever. This world belongeth not to him who doeth not sacrifice, how then shall another, O prince of the Kurus? Thus are many sorts of Sacrifice extended in the mouth of the eternal; know all these to be born of works; so knowing thou shalt find deliverance. Better than the sacrifice that is all of goods is the sacrifice of knowledge, O scourge of thy foemen, for all man’s work upon earth accomplisheth itself utterly in Wisdom. This Wisdom thou must learn by prostration and questioning and service, then shall the Knowers, they who have seen the Truth of Existence initiate thee in the Knowledge which when thou hast learnt thou shalt not again fall into delusion, O son of Pandou; by the knowledge thou shalt see all creatures even to the meanest in the Self, therefore in Me. Yea wert thou the vilest and most lewd in sin of all sinners, yet shouldest thou pass over to the other shore of Perversity in the ship of the Knowledge. As a fire when it hath been kindled, O Urjoona, burneth to ashes the fuel of it, even so doth the Fire of the Knowledge burn all a man’s works to nothingness. In all the world there is nought that is so great and pure as Wisdom and one who hath been made perfect by Yoga findeth Wisdom in his Self naturally and by the mere lapse of time. The man of faith, the self-devoted who has bridled his senses, he wins the Knowledge, and when a man has got the Knowledge he attains very quickly to the high and perfect peace. But the ignorant, the man of little faith, the soul full of doubts, these go to perdition; this world is not for the doubting soul, nor the other world, nor any kind of happiness. But he that reposeth all his works in Yoga and cleaveth Doubt asunder with the sharp edge of Knowledge, the man that possesseth his Self, O Dhanunjoy, his works cannot bind. Therefore take up the sword of Knowledge, O Urjoona, and cleave asunder this Doubt that hath made his seat in thy heart, the child of Ignorance, lay fast hold upon Yoga, arise, O seed of Bharat.
Essays on the Gita
It is in this sense that the Gita is speaking when it says that all the totality of work finds its completion, culmination, end in4·37 knowledge, sarvaṁ karmākhilaṁ jñāne parisamāpyate. “As a fire kindled turns to ashes its fuel, so the fire of knowledge turns all works to ashes.” By this it is not at all meant that when knowledge is complete, there is cessation from works. What is meant is made clear by the Gita when it says that he who has destroyed all doubt by knowledge and has by Yoga given up all works and is in possession of the Self is not bound by his works,4·41 yoga-sannyasta-karmāṇam ātmavantaṁ na karmāṇi nibadhnanti, and that he whose self has become the self of all existences, acts and yet is not affected by his works, is not caught in them, receives5·7 from them no soul-ensnaring reaction, kurvann api na lipyate. Therefore, it says, the Yoga of works is better than the physical renunciation of works, because, while Sannyasa is difficult for embodied beings who must do works so long as they are in the body, Yoga of works is entirely sufficient and it rapidly and easily brings the soul to Brahman. That Yoga of works is, we have seen, the offering of all action to the Lord, which induces as its culmination an inner and not an outer, a spiritual, not a5·10 physical giving up of works into the Brahman, into the being of3·30 the Lord, brahmaṇi ādhāya karmāṇi, mayi sannyasya. When7·6 works are thus “reposed on the Brahman,” the personality of18·57 the instrumental doer ceases; though he acts, he does nothing; for he has given up not only the fruits of his works, but the works themselves and the doing of them to the Lord. The Divine then takes the burden of works from him; the Supreme becomes the doer and the act and the result.
Finally, we must have a faith which no intellectual doubt can be allowed to disturb, śraddhāvān labhate jñānam. “The ignorant4·40 who has not faith, the soul of doubt goeth to perdition; neither this world, nor the supreme world, nor any happiness is for the soul full of doubts.” In fact, it is true that without faith nothing decisive can be achieved either in this world or for possession of the world above, and that it is only by laying hold of some sure basis and positive support that man can attain any measure of terrestrial or celestial success and satisfaction and happiness; the merely sceptical mind loses itself in the void. But still in the lower knowledge doubt and scepticism have their temporary uses; in the higher they are stumbling-blocks: for there the whole secret is not the balancing of truth and error, but a constantly progressing realisation of revealed truth. In intellectual knowledge there is always a mixture of falsehood or incompleteness which has to be got rid of by subjecting the truth itself to sceptical inquiry; but in the higher knowledge falsehood cannot enter and that which intellect contributes by attaching itself to this or that opinion, cannot be got rid of by mere questioning, but will fall away of itself by persistence in realisation. Whatever incompleteness there is in the knowledge attained, it must be got rid of, not by questioning in its roots what has already been realised, but by proceeding to further and more complete realisation through a deeper, higher and wider living in the Spirit. And what is not yet realised must be prepared for by faith, not by sceptical questioning, because this truth is one which the intellect cannot give and which is indeed often quite opposed to the ideas in which the reasoning and logical mind gets entangled: it is not a truth which has to be proved, but a truth which has to be lived inwardly, a greater reality into which we have to grow. Finally, it is in itself a self-existent truth and would be self-evident if it were not for the sorceries of the ignorance in which we live; the doubts, the perplexities which prevent us from accepting and following it, arise from that ignorance, from the sense-bewildered, opinion-perplexed heart and mind, living as they do in a lower and phenomenal truth and therefore questioning the higher realities,4·41–42 ajñāna-sambhūtaṁ hṛtsthaṁ saṁśayam. They have to be cut away by the sword of knowledge, says the Gita, by the knowledge that realises, by resorting constantly to Yoga, that is, by living out the union with the Supreme whose truth being known all is known, yasmin vijñāte sarvaṁ vijñātam.
