Bg. 3.8 · Bhagavad-gita As It Is

Devanagari

नियतं कुरु कर्म त्वं कर्म ज्यायो ह्यकर्मणः । शरीरयात्रापि च ते न प्रसिद्ध्येदकर्मणः ॥ ८ ॥

Verse text

niyataṁ kuru karma tvaṁ karma jyāyo hy akarmaṇaḥ śarīra-yātrāpi ca te na prasidhyed akarmaṇaḥ

Synonyms

niyatam — prescribed ; kuru — do ; karma — duties ; tvam — you ; karma — work ; jyāyaḥ — better ; hi — certainly ; akarmaṇaḥ — than no work ; śarīra — bodily ; yātrā — maintenance ; api — even ; ca — also ; te — your ; na — never ; prasidhyet — is effected ; akarmaṇaḥ — without work.

Translation

Perform your prescribed duty, for doing so is better than not working. One cannot even maintain one’s physical body without work.

Translation (Visvanatha Cakravarti Thakura)

8. Perform your daily scriptural duties. This is better than not acting. You cannot even maintain your body by non-action.

Translation (Baladeva Vidyabhusana)

8. Perform your daily scriptural duties without attachment. This is better than not acting. You cannot even maintain your body by non-action.

Purport

There are many pseudo meditators who misrepresent themselves as belonging to high parentage, and great professional men who falsely pose that they have sacrificed everything for the sake of advancement in spiritual life. Lord Kṛṣṇa did not want Arjuna to become a pretender. Rather, the Lord desired that Arjuna perform his prescribed duties as set forth for kṣatriyas. Arjuna was a householder and a military general, and therefore it was better for him to remain as such and perform his religious duties as prescribed for the householder kṣatriya. Such activities gradually cleanse the heart of a mundane man and free him from material contamination. So-called renunciation for the purpose of maintenance is never approved by the Lord, nor by any religious scripture. After all, one has to maintain one’s body and soul together by some work. Work should not be given up capriciously, without purification of materialistic propensities. Anyone who is in the material world is certainly possessed of the impure propensity for lording it over material nature, or, in other words, for sense gratification. Such polluted propensities have to be cleared. Without doing so, through prescribed duties, one should never attempt to become a so-called transcendentalist, renouncing work and living at the cost of others.

Purport (Visvanatha Cakravarti Thakura)

Therefore you should engage in daily obligatory activities such as sandhya-vandana (niyatam karma). This is better than renunciation of these actions (karma-sannyāsa). By renunciation of all actions you will not even be able to maintain your body.

Purport (Baladeva Vidyabhusana)

Therefore, since you have impure heart, you must necessarily (niyatam) perform prescribed activities for purification of the heart. This means “Perform these prescribed activities without desire.” Performing activities is better than renouncing all actions out of enthusiasm, because this will gradually lead to attainment of jṣāna, just as steps lead to the top of the stairs. This is because jṣāna will not arise in the contaminated heart of that person who prematurely renounces all actions out of enthusiasm only. Moreover by renouncing all actions, you cannot even maintain your material body (sarīra yātrā). Because he must maintain the body purified by sādhana as long as he lives, even the jṣānī performs actions such as begging for food. But that begging is not to done by you, a kṣatriya. Therefore you should earn wealth and taxes by your prescribed actions such as fighting and protecting the citizens, and accomplishing your bodily maintenance with that, you should search out your ātmā.