Bhagavad Gītā Chapter 2, Verse 49: Krishna to Arjuna — Sāṅkhya-Yoga
Action done for its reward falls far short of the wisdom-yoga, Arjuna. Take refuge in that discernment, for those who labor only for results are truly impoverished.
Bhāṣyakāra purports
- Śaṅkaraadvaita
Action performed for the sake of fruit stands infinitely removed — dūreṇa, by sheer distance — from buddhi-yoga (the yoga of equanimity-intellect), O Dhanañjaya, because karma done with fruit-desire is the very seed of birth and death. Therefore seek refuge — śaraṇam anviccha — in that buddhi which ripens ultimately into sāṃkhya-jñāna, the knowledge of the ātman as unconditioned reality. Those who remain fruit-goaded — phala-hetavaḥ — are kṛpaṇāḥ (wretched), exactly as the śruti declares: 'whoever departs this world without knowing that imperishable, he is a kṛpaṇa.'
- Rāmānujaviśiṣṭādvaita
That buddhi-yoga which consists in relinquishing the primary result and maintaining perfect equanimity (samatvam) in the attainment or non-attainment of subsidiary results — from karma joined to that buddhi-yoga, all other karma is by a great distance inferior (avaram). Karma wedded to that buddhi sweeps away the entire ocean of saṃsāric suffering and carries the devotee to mokṣa, the supreme puruṣārtha; karma severed from it leads only into unbounded misery. Therefore, while acting, take your dwelling — śaraṇam anviccha, make your very residence — within that buddhi itself; those who work with attachment to fruit (phala-saṅga) remain kṛpaṇāḥ, the pitiable ones still entrapped in worldly becoming.
- Madhvadvaita
Buddhi-yoga here is jñāna-lakṣaṇa — the upāya (means) characterised by direct knowledge of Hari as the independent supreme and the jīva as eternally subordinate; from that upāya, all karma is by a long measure (dūreṇa atīva) inferior. Therefore take refuge in buddhi — sthiti in jñāna, the unwavering recognition of Viṣṇu's absolute sovereignty. Those for whom fruit (phala) is the impelling cause of action — phala-hetavaḥ — have inverted the order of causality: the jīva's action is valid only as dependent worship, never as autonomous enterprise.
- Vallabhaśuddhādvaita
Action that is ayukta — disconnected from the vyavasāya-buddhi that sees Kṛṣṇa as the sole reality — is avaram, pulled downward; seek (anviccha, take hold of) refuge in that buddhi which is both the instrument and the very object of surrender. Those for whom phala is the driving nature — phala eva hetuḥ, prakṛti-kāraṇam — are kṛpaṇāḥ: even when the fruit arrives they remain thirsty (sa-tṛṣṇāḥ), because the joy of Kṛṣṇa's prasāda, his gratuitous gift-grace, is never tasted by one who treats action as a transaction.
- Śrīdharabhakti
Kāmya-karma — action motivated by desire for specific worldly results — is atiniṣkṛṣṭam, utterly degraded, in comparison with buddhi-yoga, which is karma-yoga performed through vyavasāyātmikā buddhi (the resolute, single-pointed intellect). Seek śaraṇam in buddhi — either as jñāna (the knowledge of the self) or as Īśvara himself who is the real protector (trātā) — and follow that karma-yoga as your practice. Those who are sakāmāḥ, moving toward fruit, are kṛpaṇāḥ, the wretched ones; the śruti's judgment applies: the one who departs without knowing the imperishable is the true pauper.
- Madhusūdanaadvaita-bhakti
Against the objection that purposeless action is irrational, Kṛṣṇa answers: niṣkāma-karma-yoga — action as the means for cultivating ātma-buddhi, the purified intellect oriented toward the Supreme — stands so far above phala-motivated karma that the distance is dūreṇa, immeasurable; even all karma taken together is avaram compared to paramātma-buddhi-yoga, the yoga of intellect fixed on the Paramātman. As misers (kṛpaṇāḥ) earn with great pain yet cannot enjoy real wealth through generosity, so the fruit-thirsty performer labors enormously to secure a trivial result while forfeiting the supreme bliss (paramānanda) which niṣkāma-karma alone can generate — such is the compounded tragedy of phala-hetutva.