Bhagavad Gita 18.16

Word meanings

tatra

there

evam sati

in spite of this

kartāram

the doer

ātmānam

the soul

kevalam

only

tu

but

yaḥ

who

paśyati

see

akṛta-buddhitvāt

with impure intellect

na

not

saḥ

they

paśyati

see

durmatiḥ

foolish

Translations

Commentary

Swami Sivananda

The Self is always actionless. He is unattached like ether. He is always the silent witness. He is the spectator of activity. The egoistic man of little understanding only thinks that he is the real agent, and so he is bound by actions. He takes birth again and again to reap the fruits of his actions. For him who considers the body as consciousness? God or the Self, it naturally follows that the Self is the agent or the doer. He who identifies himself with the body, who has taken the body as the pure Self, has cast a net over himself, and he leads a deluded life of utter ignorance.

He is bound by the fetters or bonds of Karma. He is ever shut up in the prisonhouse of this body. He who has not united himself with the Buddhi, who has got an impure or untrained understanding, who regards the Self as the actor or the agent is certainly a man of perverted intelligence. He is deluded. He is really a blind man. He sees not though he has eyes. He does not behold the essence of things. He has no idea of the supreme Principle (the Self) Which is Itself actionless?

Which ever stands as a silent witness of the activities of all minds and all organs of all beings? Which moves the minds, organs and the lifeforce and the bodies to action, just as the magnet makes the iron pieces move. He does not behold the truth about the Self and action. Durmati Evilminded person A man of perverted intellect or undeveloped reason. He thinks that he alone is the doer or agent. He does not understand anything. He has no knowledge of the, actionless, pure, selfluminous Self.

The ignorant man of untrained understanding identifies himself with the five causes and regards the pure actionless Self as the agent or doer of the actions which are really done by these five causes. What is the reason for this Why does he regard them so Because he is not endowed with a pure and subtle intellect his understanding (Buddhi) has not been trained in the practice of Vedanta he is not eipped with the four means of salvation his intellect has not been trained by the teachings of the preceptor or the spiritual teacher in the methods of logical reasoning.

He who considers that the pure actionless Self is the agent or the doer is certainly a man of untrained understanding. He has no knowledge of the actionless Self and action. Therefore, he is a man of perverted intelligence. His intellect works or moves in the wrong direction. His intellect moves in the sensual grooves or avenues. It runs like the vicious horse and leads to birth and death. The technie of Buddhi Yoga taught in the Gita enables one effectively to prevent this. He does not perceive or cognise the Truth though he has eyes.

Though he sees, he sees the external, gross, illusory, everchanging, perishable objects only. He does not behold the one immortal, unchanging, allblissful essence, which is the basis or substratum of everything. He is like the man with jaundiced eyes, who sees all objects tinged with yellow colur, or like the man suffering from diplopia who beholds many moons, or like the man who thinks that the moon moves when the clouds move, or like the man who, seated in a train, imagines that the trees are moving when it is the train that is really moving.

(Cf.V.15XIII.30)