Bg. 2.48

BG 2.48
Srila Prabhupada

Devanagari

योगस्थः कुरु कर्माणि सङ्गं त्यक्त्वा धनञ्जय । सिद्ध्यसिद्ध्योः समो भूत्वा समत्वं योग उच्यते ॥ ४८ ॥

Verse text

yoga-sthaḥ kuru karmāṇi saṅgaṁ tyaktvā dhanaṣ-jaya siddhy-asiddhyoḥ samo bhūtvā samatvaṁ yoga ucyate

Synonyms

yoga-sthaḥ equipoised ; kuru perform ; karmāṇi your duties ; saṅgam attachment ; tyaktvā giving up ; dhanam-jaya O Arjuna ; siddhi-asiddhyoḥ in success and failure ; samaḥ equipoised ; bhūtvā becoming ; samatvam equanimity ; yogaḥ yoga ; ucyate is called.

Translation

Perform your duty equipoised, O Arjuna, abandoning all attachment to success or failure. Such equanimity is called yoga.

Translation (Visvanatha Cakravarti Thakura)

48. Being situated in this niṣkāma-karma-yoga, perform your duties, giving up attachment, and being equal to success and failure, O conqueror of wealth! Such equal mindedness is called yoga.

Translation (Baladeva Vidyabhusana)

48. Being situated in this yoga, perform your duties, giving up attachment, being equal in success and failure, O conqueror of wealth! Such equal mindedness is called yoga.

Purport

Kṛṣṇa tells Arjuna that he should act in yoga. And what is that yoga ? Yoga means to concentrate the mind upon the Supreme by controlling the ever-disturbing senses. And who is the Supreme? The Supreme is the Lord. And because He Himself is telling Arjuna to fight, Arjuna has nothing to do with the results of the fight. Gain or victory are Kṛṣṇa’s concern; Arjuna is simply advised to act according to the dictation of Kṛṣṇa. The following of Kṛṣṇa’s dictation is real yoga, and this is practiced in the process called Kṛṣṇa consciousness. By Kṛṣṇa consciousness only can one give up the sense of proprietorship. One has to become the servant of Kṛṣṇa, or the servant of the servant of Kṛṣṇa. That is the right way to discharge duty in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, which alone can help one to act in yoga. Arjuna is a kṣatriya, and as such he is participating in the varṇāśrama-dharma institution. It is said in the Viṣṇu Purāṇa that in the varṇāśrama-dharma, the whole aim is to satisfy Viṣṇu. No one should satisfy himself, as is the rule in the material world, but one should satisfy Kṛṣṇa. So unless one satisfies Kṛṣṇa, one cannot correctly observe the principles of varṇāśrama-dharma. Indirectly, Arjuna was advised to act as Kṛṣṇa told him.

Purport (Visvanatha Cakravarti Thakura)

With this verse, Kṛṣṇa starts teaching the method of niṣkāma-karma. Acting in this way, seeing victory and defeat as equal, O Arjuna, you should perform your duty of fighting. This performance of niṣkāma-karma-yoga transforms into jṣāna-yoga. Jṣāna-yoga should be understood from the previous and latter portions of the work.

Purport (Baladeva Vidyabhusana)

In this verse the Lord explains His previous statement. Giving up desires for results and thoughts of being the doer (saṅgam tyaktvā), being situated in yoga, perform such duties as fighting. By desiring results, you become entangled in māyā. By thinking yourself the doer, you steal the quality of independence which belongs to the Lord. By this identity as doer, you end up in opposition to the Lord’s māyā. Therefore you should give up these two conceptions. The Lord then explains the word yoga stha. Yoga means to be situated with equality both in attaining and not attaining results of action such as victory. Being without attachment or repulsion to the results, perform the action. Yoga in the phrase yoga sthah I take to mean “Being equal to all events (samatvam),” because it takes the form of intense concentration of mind.

Surrender Unto Me

When one is working or performing karma, and he is unattached to the fruits of his work, that is called Karma‑yoga. And when that detachment is perfected, which means detachment for oneself and offering the fruits to Krsna, then it will be called Bhakti‑yoga. Karma is turned into Yoga (Karma‑yoga) when detachment is there, and detachment comes from Jnana or knowledge. Krsna here is advocating the path of renunciation of the fruits of one's work, not the path of renunciation of work.