Bhagavad Gita Chapter 4, Verse 41 (BG 4.41) — Meaning, Translation & Commentary

In this verse, the art of living as extensively described throughout this chapter is presented in the most beautiful and concise manner. By renunciation of action is meant the abandonment of attachment to the fruits of action. When we learn to perform our duties in the spirit of karma yoga while relinquishing our attachment to the results, and when through direct knowledge of the Self all our doubts concerning life's purpose are completely dissolved, then the ego is destroyed and we become firmly established in our pure nature as the Self. Such a Self-realized person, though engaged in action, remains unbound by it. It is only those actions performed with the pride of doership and motivated by selfish desire that generate vasanas and bind us in bondage. When actions are performed in the spirit of karma yoga, free from ego, bondage cannot occur. Consider the example of a dream: if one commits murder in a dream, one may experience dream-like consequences within the dream. But when the dreamer awakens, no one in the waking world can punish him, for with the awakening of the dreamer, the dream and the dreamer of that dream both cease to exist. The actions of the dream-dreamer cannot bind the awakened person. Similarly, actions performed with ego may bind the ego, but when the ego is destroyed through Self-realization, how can those actions bind the Self? The person whose ego has been destroyed is called here the Self-realized one. Since the fruit of this Self-knowledge is supreme, Sri Krishna instructs Arjuna thus: