Bhagavad Gītā Chapter 14, Verse 16: Krishna to Arjuna — Guṇatraya-Vibhāga-Yoga

Bhāṣyakāra purports

• Śaṅkaraadvaita

  Shankara reads this verse as a strict causal taxonomy: sattva-karma (virtuous action) yields a fruit that is sattvic and 'nirmala' (stainless) — luminous, unmixed with rajas or tamas. Rajasic action yields only 'duhkha' (pain), because the cause is inherently turbulent; cause and effect must be congruent ('karananurupyat'). Tamasic action yields 'ajnana' (non-knowledge), which Shankara glosses as equivalent to 'adharma' — both earlier verses and this one form a single descending arc. The implication is that only sattva-karma can serve as preparation for jnana; the practitioner must trace fruits back to their gunic source rather than rationalizing pleasant rajasic outcomes.

• Rāmānujaviśiṣṭādvaita

  Ramanuja situates the verse within a detailed death-moment ecology: at the time of death, when sattva predominates, a person born among 'atmavidah' (knowers of the self) who performs 'sukrta' (meritorious action) free from 'phalabhisandhi' (fruit-desire) and shaped as 'madaradhana' (service to Bhagavan) receives a yet-more-sattva-amplifying, 'nirmala' fruit. Rajasic death propels a cycle — birth in action-attached families, more rajasic karma, rebirth, further rajo-vrddhi — a self-reinforcing samsaric 'duhkha-praya' (mostly-suffering) chain. Tamasic death produces 'ajnana-parampara' (a lineage of ignorance). All three fruits are thus not isolated events but karmic trajectories across lives, intelligible only to those who know the tattva of each guna.

• Madhvadvaita

  Madhva focuses his commentary almost entirely on correcting a potential misreading of 'duhkha' for rajas: rajasic fruit is not sheer agony but 'alpasukha-duhkha' (pain-with-a-trace-of-pleasure), which is still fundamentally 'duhkha'. He cites the Sharkaraksha-shakha: 'rajo hi eva jayate matraya sukham; duhkham tasmattansukhino duhkhina ityacakshate' — rajas produces pleasure only in measure, so those touched by it are called both happy and unhappy. The precision matters polemically: if rajas yielded undiluted pain equal to tamas, tamas would not be the worst guna; the graded taxonomy (sattvic purity > rajasic mixed suffering > tamasic ignorance) must hold, and Madhva defends it with Vedic citation.

• Vallabhaśuddhādvaita

  Vallabha frames the verse around the non-dying moment ('amarana-samaye') — specifically the condition of not being at the death-moment, i.e., ordinary life-time action. Sattvic 'sukrta' (virtuous action) yields a fruit that is 'nirmala' — free from the odour ('gandha') of both duhkha and ajnana. Rajasic fruit is duhkha, tamasic fruit is ajnana; both perpetuate the cycle of birth-death-rebirth in which 'vivekabhava' (absence of discrimination) is itself reproduced. Vallabha adds a meta-comment: strictly speaking only rajasic karma relates to action per se (14.9), but here the verse accommodates alternate schools ('matantara-ritya') by giving all three gunas their own karma-fruit. Sattvic fruit is 'prakasha-bahula' (light-abundant) and 'sukha'; cited to Kapila-tradition.

• Śrīdharabhakti

  Sridhara Svami opens with the verse's structural purpose: to show how sattva, rajas, and tamas each, through their respective characteristic actions, become causes of variegated fruits. Sattvic 'sukrta' (good action) yields a sattvic, 'nirmala', 'prakasha-bahula' (luminous) fruit — he cites Kapila and others as the 'ahuh' (they say) authority. Rajasic karma is called 'prakrta' (worldly, base) in its fruit-mechanism, hence yields duhkha. Tamasic karma yields 'ajnana' or 'mudhata' (confusion). He closes by pointing forward to BG 18 where the full characterization of sattvic-rajasic-tamasic action ('niyatam sangarahitam' etc.) will be elaborated — maintaining cross-referential discipline characteristic of the bhakti-philological voice.

• Madhusūdanaadvaita-bhakti

  Madhusudana Sarasvati gives the verse as a 'samkshepa' (compression) of the guna-karma-fruit triad, explicitly labeling it as a precis before the full treatment in chapter 18. Sattvic 'dharma' (virtuous action) yields 'sattvena nirvritta' (sattva-produced) 'nirmala' fruit — 'rajas-tamo-mala-amisrita' (unmixed with the impurities of rajas and tamas), which is 'sukha'. Rajasic karma is 'papa-misra' (mixed with demerit), so its fruit is 'rajasam duhkham' — 'duhkha-bahula, alpa-sukha' (heavy with suffering, thin on pleasure). Tamasic karma, which is 'adharma', yields 'ajnana-avivekakprayam duhkham' (undiscriminating ignorance-pain). He then makes a grammatical-philosophical observation: 'rajas' and 'tamas' in the verse refer by 'karya-karana-abheda-upacara' (figure of effect-for-cause) to the actions produced by those gunas — just as 'go' (cow) stands for milk, and 'dhanya' (grain) for rice.