Bhagavad Gītā Chapter 13, Verse 21: Krishna to Arjuna — Kṣetra-Kṣetrajña-Vibhāga-Yoga

Bhāṣyakāra purports

• Śaṅkaraadvaita

  Because the puruṣa (the experiencer) is prakṛti-stha, standing in prakṛti as avidyā (ignorance) transformed into body and instruments, that is, having taken prakṛti for the self, it apprehends the guṇa (qualities) born of prakṛti as 'I am happy, I am miserable, I am deluded, I am learned'. The chief cause of birth is guṇa-saṅga, the ātmabhāva (taking-as-self) in those qualities while they are being enjoyed, as the śruti says, 'as his desire, so his resolve' (Bṛhadāraṇyaka 4.4.5); births in sat-yoni (good wombs) are those of gods, in asat-yoni (low wombs) those of animals, and human births are both. So avidyā called 'standing in prakṛti' and kāma (desire) for the qualities are the cause of saṃsāra, stated so that they may be abandoned, and their remedy, jñāna (knowledge) and vairāgya (dispassion) with saṃnyāsa (renunciation), is well known in the Gītā.

  divergence: Śaṅkara (source 13.22) makes 'standing in prakṛti' a name for avidyā itself, the mistaking of prakṛti for the self, and reads guṇa-saṅga as ātmabhāva (self-identification), not as moral attachment to pleasant things. The verse is said to be taught for the sake of abandonment, pointing to jñāna and saṃnyāsa as the cure.

• Rāmānujaviśiṣṭādvaita

  The puruṣa, whose own nature is the bliss of experiencing itself alone, being prakṛti-stha, conjoined with prakṛti, experiences the pleasure and pain that are effects of the guṇa (sattva and the rest), which come to it only through that conjunction. The cause of this conjunction is this: lodged in particular wombs of god, human and the rest, themselves earlier transformations of prakṛti, it becomes attached to the pleasures and pains made of the guṇa of that womb, engages in puṇya and pāpa (meritorious and sinful acts) that produce them, is born in good and bad wombs to experience their fruit, acts again, is born again. So long as it does not cultivate amānitva (freedom from pride) and the other qualities that are the means of reaching the self, so long it wanders in saṃsāra, and that is what 'attachment to the guṇa is the cause of birth in good and evil wombs' means.

  divergence: Rāmānuja (source 13.21) reads prakṛti-stha as real saṃsarga (conjunction), not avidyā, and lays out an explicit karmic loop: womb, attachment, merit and sin, rebirth. The exit is not knowledge alone but the cultivation of the 13.7-11 virtues (amānitva etc.) as means of reaching the self, matching his reading of guṇa at 13.19.

• Madhvadvaita

  No Madhva commentary is supplied for this verse.

  divergence: ABSENT: the supplied text for source 13.22 reads 'Sri Madhvacharya did not comment on this sloka.' No rendering is fabricated; the Dvaita column is left empty for this verse. Jayatīrtha's Prameyadīpikā is also silent on this verse.

• Vallabhaśuddhādvaita

  Having stated their different work, the Lord says that the jīva (individual self) becomes an enjoyer only through contact with the field that is prakṛti's transformation, not otherwise: standing in prakṛti, in the field, he enjoys through the senses the guṇa, the transformations of sattva and the rest, unlike the antaryāmin (inner controller), who stays unattached, 'the other looks on without eating' (Muṇḍaka 3.1.1). As the Bhāgavata says, the puruṣa, thinking of prakṛti, ascribes to himself the agency of acts done by the guṇa, and from that come his saṃsṛti (wandering), bondage and dependence, though he is in truth no agent, the Lord, the witness, at peace. Therefore for this puruṣa, whose akṣara (imperishable) nature is concealed by contact with prakṛti, attachment to her guṇa is to be known as the cause of births in good and evil wombs.

  divergence: Vallabha (source 13.22) sharpens the verse by contrast with the second bird of Muṇḍaka 3.1.1: the jīva eats, the antaryāmin does not. Bondage is the concealment (tirohita) of the jīva's akṣara-nature, its portion of the Lord, through contact with prakṛti, supported by Bhāgavata 3.26.6-7 and 2.5.19; neither avidyā as in Śaṅkara nor a karmic loop as in Rāmānuja is the operative category.

• Śrīdharabhakti

  But how can the changeless, birthless puruṣa be an enjoyer? Because he is prakṛti-stha, standing in prakṛti's product, the body, by tādātmya (identification with it), he therefore enjoys the pleasure and the rest that it produces. And for his births in sat (good) wombs, of gods and the like, and asat (bad) wombs, of animals and the like, the cause is guṇa-saṅga, association with the guṇa, here meaning the senses that do good and bad deeds.

  divergence: Śrīdhara (source 13.22) poses the verse as answering an objection from 13.20 (how can the changeless enjoy?) and, uniquely here, takes guṇa in guṇa-saṅga as the senses (indriya) that perform good and bad acts, rather than as qualities or as desirable objects.

• Madhusūdanaadvaita-bhakti

  Prakṛti is māyā, and the puruṣa, having entered into identity with it only falsely (mithyā tādātmya), is prakṛti-stha and so apprehends the guṇa born of prakṛti; in sat-yoni (good wombs) such as the gods a pleasing sāttvika fruit is enjoyed, in asat-yoni such as animals a tāmasa unpleasing one, and in mixed wombs, humans beginning with the brāhmaṇa, a rājasa mixed fruit, because their merit and demerit are mixed. The cause there is guṇa-saṅga, the abhimāna (conceit) of identity with prakṛti made of sattva, rajas and tamas, so the unattached self has no saṃsāra of its own. Or guṇa-saṅga is desire for sound and the other objects, according to the śruti 'as his desire, so his resolve, so his act, so his attainment', but even on this reading the root cause is the conceit of identity with prakṛti.

  divergence: Madhusūdana (source 13.22) adds what Śaṅkara does not spell out: a three-way map of wombs to guṇa (gods sāttvika, animals tāmasa, humans rājasa and mixed), and two readings of guṇa-saṅga (identity-conceit or desire), both resolving into mithyā tādātmya with māyā.