Word meanings
- tapāmi
- radiate heat
- aham
- I
- aham
- I
- varṣam
- rain
- nigṛhṇāmi
- withhold
- utsṛjāmi
- send forth
- ca
- and
- amṛtam
- immortality
- ca
- and
- eva
- also
- mṛtyuḥ
- death
- ca
- and
- sat
- eternal spirit
- asat
- temporary matter
- ca
- and
- aham
- I
- arjuna
- Arjun
Translations
As the sun, I give heat; I withhold and send forth the rain; I am immortality and also death, existence and non-existence, O Arjuna.
I am the heat of the sun, I release and withhold the rain. I am death and immortality; I am being and non-being.
O Arjuna, I give heat, I withhold and pour down rain; I am verily the nectar, and also death, existence, and non-existence.
हे अर्जुन ! (संसारके हितके लिये) मैं ही सूर्यरूपसे तपता हूँ, जलको ग्रहण करता हूँ और फिर उस जलको वर्षारूपसे बरसा देता हूँ। (और तो क्या कहूँ) अमृत और मृत्यु तथा सत् और असत् भी मैं ही हूँ।Commentary
I radiate heat in the form of the sun. I send forth the rain in the form of Indra in the rainy season and I take it back during the rest of the year. Sat Existence, the manifested world (the effect). Asat Nonexistence, the unmanifested (the cause). Nonexistence does not mean nothingness. The subtle, unmanifested cause is spoken of as nonexitence. The Self or Brahman or the Eternal can never be altogether nonexistence. It always exists. It is Existence Absolute. If you say that the subtle unmanifested cause is nothing, it is impossible to conceive existence coming out of nothing.
The Chhandogya Upanishad asks? How can existence come out of nonexistence It is simply absurd to conceive that existence has arisen out of nonexistence (nothing). For a Vedantin ( student or follower of Vedanta) Brahman (the Absolute) is Sat (existence) because It always exists and because It is unchanging. This manifested world is Asat or unreal. For the worldlyminded people who have neither understanding nor knowledge of Brahman, who are endowed with gross and impure mind, who do not have a sharp and subtle intellect, and who ca perceive the gross forms only, this manifested world is the Sat and the subtle unmanifested Mula-Prakriti (the primordial Nature), the cause of this manifested world, is Asat.
For them Brahman also is Asat. The unmanifested refers to Mula-Prakriti and Para Brahman also because both are hidden. Every object has three states, viz., the gross (Sthula), the subtle (Sukshma) and the causal (Karana). Mahakarana (the great causeless cause) is Para Brahman. The gross and the subtle states are the effects of Karana. What you see outside is the physical body. This physical body is moved by the astral (the subtle) body made up of the mind, liferoce and the senses.
The causal body is the seedbody. From this seedbody have sprung the subtle and the gross bodies. Take the case of an orange. The outer skin is its physical body the inner pulp or essence is the subtle body the innermost causal body which gives rise to the pulp and the outer skin is the seed. This is only a gross illustration. The orange has got another kind of subtle and causal bodies. The worldlyminded man beholds the physical body only and takes this as the Truth. For him, the astral and the causal bodies are unreal.