Bhagavad Gita Chapter 9, Verse 28 (BG 9.28) — Meaning, Translation & Commentary

Though the spiritual goal is one, the paths to attain it are many. When these paths are studied superficially, they appear entirely contradictory to one another. Yet they all rest upon a single scientific foundation that justifies their utility and appropriateness. The Gita makes this fundamental basis explicit in many places, and merely alludes to it in others. Still, the careful and attentive student of the Gita can recognize it. In this section, we examine how a person, by living with the spirit of offering, can attain the highest human purpose—which is the certain fruit of meditation and sacrifice. It is a universally known truth that the doer of action is also the enjoyer of its fruits. Therefore, if we act with the sense of doership, we must also be bound to experience the results. Hence, the principle of Vedanta is that when actions are performed without ego, they generate neither auspicious nor inauspicious tendencies. Lord Sri Krishna says here: You shall be freed from the bondage of both auspicious and inauspicious actions. The reason is that in the absence of ego, new actions performed by the seeker do not increase vasanas, and simultaneously, the vasanas accumulated from the past gradually diminish. In brief, the seeker's mind becomes increasingly purified. In scriptural language, this is called chitta-shuddhi—purity of mind. As the mind becomes pure, its power of concentration increases. The next step in development is that as a result of this mental purity, the seeker's capacity for discrimination between self and non-self grows. Then he practices the life of sannyasa and yoga—terms whose detailed meaning has been explained earlier and should be understood in the sense given in the Gita. Sannyasa does not mean renouncing the material world; rather, in the language of the Gita, sannyasa means (a) the renunciation of all actions motivated by ego, and (b) the renunciation of attachment to the fruits of action. The person who lives a life of offering as an expression of devotion, with diligence and enthusiasm, naturally achieves both these renunciations. Finally, he offers all fruits to God. Thus, the seeker who has attained complete mental purity through discrimination while living the life of sannyasa finds yoga—the inquiry into the Self—to be effortless. This is because he maintains remembrance of the infinite Self even in his daily activities. Naturally, such a qualified practitioner discovers that the false identification of his ignorant state with limiting adjuncts, and the resulting sense of limitation and fear of death, are entirely dissolved. Direct experience of his true nature becomes spontaneously realized. United with sannyasa and yoga, you shall be liberated and attain Me. What is the nature of that Self whose realization the seeker shall attain? This is explained in the next verse.