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Adhyāyas / Karma-Sannyāsa Yogaḥ / verse 20

Mūla — the verse

Gita Press numbering
न प्रहृष्येत्प्रियं प्राप्य नोद्विजेत्प्राप्य चाप्रियम्। स्थिरबुद्धिरसम्मूढो ब्रह्मविद्ब्रह्मणि स्थितः
na prahṛiṣhyet priyaṁ prāpya nodvijet prāpya chāpriyam sthira-buddhir asammūḍho brahma-vid brahmaṇi sthitaḥ
Anuṣṭubh

Translation

Swami Gambhīrānanda · follows Śaṅkara-bhāṣya

A knower of Brahman, who is established in Brahman, should have their intellect steady and should not be deluded. They should not get delighted by getting what is desirable, nor become dejected by getting what is undesirable.

हिन्दी अनुवाद — Swami Tejomayānanda

जो स्थिरबुद्धि, संमोहरहित ब्रह्मवित् पुरुष ब्रह्म में स्थित है, वह प्रिय वस्तु को प्राप्त होकर हर्षित नहीं होता और अप्रिय को पाकर उद्विग्न नहीं होता।।

Pronunciation — Vaamshii

from Vaamshii
नप्र हृष्येत् प्रियम् प्राप्य
नोद्वि जेत् प्राप्य चाप्रियम्
स्थिर बुद्धिर सम्मूढः
ब्रह्म विद् ब्रह्मणिस् थितः
॥ २० ॥
Read each split group as one breath-unit; hyphens join pādas kept whole for the meter or a compound word. Symbols: # upadhmānīya (visarga before p/ph), % jihvāmūlīya (visarga before k/kh), ऽ avagraha (an elided a). Full method →

Word by word

padārtha
naneither
prahṛiṣhyetrejoice
priyamthe pleasant
prāpyaobtaining
nanor
udvijetbecome disturbed
prāpyaattaining
chaalso
apriyamthe unpleasant
sthira-buddhiḥsteady intellect
asammūḍhaḥfirmly situated
brahma-vithaving a firm understanding of divine knowledge
brahmaṇiestablished in God
sthitaḥsituated

Themes

from The Thematic Companion to the Bhagavad Gītā
SamatvaBrahman

Meaning — Questions & Solutions

from Q&A with KnA
5.20, 5.21Inward joy, to the exclusion of the outer.

The steady sage “neither rejoices on getting the pleasant nor grieves on getting the unpleasant”; “with the self unattached to outer contacts, he finds the joy that is in the Self.” This is not a grim shutting-out of the world but a discovery that makes the world's pleasures redundant. Once the inner spring is found, the outer taps lose their urgency; one no longer runs after external sensation, not because it is forbidden, but because a fuller sweetness is already at hand. “To the exclusion of the outer” means the outer is no longer needed, not that it is violently pushed away.

5.20, 5.24“Becoming Brahman,” the knower of Brahman, and Nirvāṇa.

“Resting in Brahman, of steady understanding, undeluded, the knower of Brahman abides in Brahman” (5.20); “whose joy is within, whose light is within — that yogi, having become Brahman, attains the peace of Brahman (brahma-nirvāṇa)” (5.24). Three things are said, and they are one. To “become Brahman” is not to turn into something one was not, but to cease mistaking oneself for the body-mind and to recognise the Self one always was. The “knower of Brahman is Brahman” because here, uniquely, the knower and the known are not two. And Nirvāṇa — literally the “blowing-out” of a flame — is the extinction not of the person but of the ego-fever; what is “put out” is the restless craving, and what remains is peace. The Buddhist and Vedāntic uses of the word are closer here than the schools' polemics admit.