🪷 Bhagavad-Gītā · 18.2

Shri Purohit Swami · Poetic English · 1935 · public domain · Cosmo Press tradition

18.2 Lord Shri Krishna replied: The sages say that renunciation means forgoing an action which springs from desire; and relinquishing means the surrender of its fruit.

Swami Sivananda · Direct prose · Divine Life Society

18.2 The Blessed Lord said The sages understand Sannyasa to be the renunciation of action with desire; the wise declare the abandonment of the fruits of all actions as Tyaga.

Swami Gambīrānanda · Word-key glosses · Advaita Ashrama · Śaṅkara-school

18.2 Some kavayah, learned ones; viduh, know; sannyasam, sannyasa, the meaning of the word sannyasa, the non-performance of what comes as a duty; to be the nyasam, giving up; karmanam, of actions; kamyanam, done with a desire for reward, e.g. Horse-sacrifice etc. Sarva-karma-phala-tyagah, abandonment of the results of all actions, means the giving up of the results accruing to oneself from all actions- the daily obligatory and the occasional (nitya and naimittika) that are performed. Vicaksanah, the adepts, the learned ones; prahuh, call, speak of that; as tyagam, tyaga, as the meaning of the word tyaga. Even if 'the giving up of actions for desired results' or 'the abandonment of results' be the intended meaning, in either case the one meaning of the words sannyasa and tyaga amounts only to tyaga (giving up); they do not imply distinct categories as do the words 'pot' and 'cloth'. Objection: Well, is it not that they say the daily obligatory (nitya) and the occasional (naimittika) rites and duties have no results at all? How is the giving up of their results spoken of-like the abandoning of a son of a barren woman?! Reply: This defect does not desire. It is the intention of the Lord that the nitya-karmas (daily obligatory duties) also have results; for the Lord will say, 'The threefold results of actions-the undesirable, the desirable and the mixed-accrue after death to those who do not resort to tyaga', and also, 'but never to those who resort to sannyasa (monks)' (12). Indeed, by showing that, it is only in the case of sannyasins (monks) alone that there is no connection with the results of actions, the Lord asserts in, '৷৷.accrue after death to those who do not resort to tyaga (renunciation)' (abid.), that the result of daily obligatory (nitya) duties accrue to those who are not sannyasins (monks).

Swami Ādidevānanda · Śrī-Vaiṣṇava perspective · Rāmānuja school

18.2 The Lord said Some scholars understand that Sannyasa is complete relinishment of desire-prompted acts. Some other wise men say that the meaning of the term Tyaga, according to the Sastras dealing with release, is relinishment of the fruits not only of all desiderative (Kamya), but also of obligatory and occasional, duties . Here, the problem is, whether the Tyaga taught in the Sastras concern desiderative acts themselves, or fruits of all acts. Sri Krsna has used the terms Sannyasa in one place and Tyaga elsewhere. From this it is understood that Sri Krsna uses the terms Tyaga and Sannyasa as synonyms. Likewise, the decisive teaching is about Tyaga alone in the statement: 'Hear My decision, O Arjuna, about Tyaga' (18.4). That the terms are synonymously used to denote the same sense, is conclusively established from such passages as: 'But the renunciation (Sannyasa) of obligatory work is not proper. Abandonment (Tyaga) of it through delusion is declared to be Tamasika' (18.7); and 'To those who have not renounced the fruits of actions, threefold are the conseences after death - undesirable, desriable and mixed. But to those who have renounced, none whatsoever' (18.12).

Dr. S. Sankaranarayan · Academic precision · modern scholarly

18.2. The Bhagavat said The seers understand the act of renouncing the desire-motivated actions as renunciation; the experts declare the relinishment of the fruits of all actions to be relinishment.