Chapter 13
Kṣetra-kṣetrajña (क्षेत्र-क्षेत्रज्ञ)
The field and the knower of the field. Knowledge, and what is to be known.
Summary
Chapter 13 is the field and the knower of the field. The body is the field. The one who knows it is the knower. Knowledge is a list of dispositions, and what is to be known is without beginning, neither said to be nor not to be in the ways an object is. Nature and the person, and the seeing that frees, close the chapter. This book numbers the verses as the note on the chapter page says.
नेपालीमा
अध्याय १३ क्षेत्र र क्षेत्रज्ञको विषय हो। शरीर क्षेत्र हो। त्यसलाई जान्ने क्षेत्रज्ञ हो। ज्ञान स्वभावको सूची हो, र जान्नुपर्ने अनादि हो, वस्तुझैँ छ वा छैन भनिँदैन। अध्यायको अन्त्य प्रकृति र पुरुष, अनि मुक्त गराउने दृष्टिले हुन्छ। यो पुस्तकले श्लोकको गणना अध्याय पृष्ठको टिप्पणीमा भनिएझैँ गर्छ।
This book numbers the question 13.1. The answer, इदं शरीरं idaṃ śarīram, is 13.2. In a book that leaves the question out, that answer stands as 13.1.
Note on verse numbering: In Śaṅkarācārya (शङ्कराचार्य)'s commentary, this opening question of Arjuna (अर्जुन) is omitted, and Kṛṣṇa (कृष्ण)'s response (verse 13.2 here) is counted as verse 13.1, giving Chapter 13 34 verses and the Gītā (गीता) 700 verses in total.
1–7 Arjuna (अर्जुन), श्रीभगवान् Śrī Bhagavān · The field
Summary
The field. This body is the field, and the one who knows it is the knower of the field. The great elements, the I sense, the intellect, the unmanifest, the senses, and the objects are listed as the field. The section draws the line between what is known and the knower. This book's numbering of chapter 13 is the one the chapter page explains.
नेपालीमा
क्षेत्र। यो शरीर क्षेत्र हो, र यसलाई जान्ने क्षेत्रज्ञ हो। महाभूत, अहङ्कार, बुद्धि, अव्यक्त, इन्द्रिय र विषय क्षेत्रका रूपमा गनिएका छन्। खण्डले जानिने र जान्ने बीच रेखा कोर्छ। यो पुस्तकले अध्याय १३ मा गरेको गणना अध्याय पृष्ठले बुझाउँछ।
13.1Arjuna (अर्जुन) said: I wish to know nature and the person, the field and the knower of the field, and knowledge and what is to be known, Keśava (केशव).13.2This body is called the field. The one who knows it is the knower of the field.13.3Know me also as the knower of the field in all fields, descendant of Bharata (भरत): knowledge of the field and of the knower of the field, that is knowledge, in my view.13.4Hear from me in brief that field, what it is and of what sort, what modifications it has and from what, and who he is and of what power.13.5It has been sung in many ways by the seers, separately by the various meters, and by the reasoned, settled statements of the Brahma-sūtra (ब्रह्म-सूत्र).13.6The great elements, the I-maker, the intellect, and the unmanifest, the ten senses and the one, and the five ranges of the senses.13.7Desire, hatred, pleasure, pain, the aggregate, awareness, and steadiness: this field, with its modifications, has been stated in brief.QuizFive questions on The field.
8–19 श्रीभगवान् Śrī Bhagavān · Knowledge, and what is to be known
Summary
Knowledge, and what is to be known. Humility, unpretentiousness, non harm, and the rest of that list are called knowledge. What is opposite is ignorance. What is to be known has no beginning, is neither said to be nor not to be as an object is, and stands outside and inside beings. The section separates a disposition called knowledge from the thing knowledge is about.
नेपालीमा
ज्ञान, र जान्नुपर्ने। नम्रता, ढोंग नगर्नु, अहिंसा र त्यो सूचीका अरू ज्ञान भनिन्छन्। उल्टो अज्ञान हो। जान्नुपर्ने अनादि हो, वस्तुझैँ छ वा छैन भनिँदैन, र प्राणीको बाहिर र भित्र उभिन्छ। खण्डले ज्ञान भनिने स्वभावलाई ज्ञानको विषयबाट छुट्याउँछ।
13.8Humility, absence of display, non-harm, patience, straightness, service of the teacher, purity, steadiness, and restraint of oneself.13.9Dispassion toward the objects of the senses, and absence of I-making, and seeing the fault in the pain of birth, death, old age, and disease.13.10Non-attachment and absence of clinging toward son, wife, home, and the rest, and constant evenness of mind when the wanted and the unwanted arise.13.11And unswerving devotion to me with a yoga that has no other object, resort to a solitary place, and no delight in a crowd.13.12Constancy in knowledge of the self, and seeing the aim of the knowledge of reality: this is declared to be knowledge, and what is otherwise than this is ignorance.13.13I shall declare that which is to be known, knowing which one reaches the deathless: beginningless Brahman (ब्रह्म), with me as its highest, called neither being nor non-being.13.14That has hands and feet everywhere, eyes and heads and mouths everywhere, and hearing everywhere, and having covered all it stands in the world.13.15It shines as the qualities of all the senses and is free of all the senses, unattached and bearing all, free of the guṇas (गुण) and the experiencer of the guṇas (गुण).13.16It is outside and inside beings, the unmoving and the moving; because it is subtle, that is not to be discerned; it stands far, and it is near.13.17And it stands undivided in beings, as if divided; that which is to be known is the supporter of beings, apt to swallow and apt to bring forth.13.18That is the light even of lights, and it is called beyond darkness: knowledge, what is to be known, and what is reached by knowledge, settled in the heart of all.13.19Thus the field, knowledge, and what is to be known have been stated in brief; my devotee, having discerned this, comes to my state.QuizFive questions on Knowledge, and what is to be known.
20–35 श्रीभगवान् Śrī Bhagavān · Nature, person, and seeing
Summary
Nature, person, and seeing. Nature and the person are both beginningless. The strands and the changes come from nature. Nature is the cause of doing. The person is the cause of experiencing pleasure and pain. The one who sees that actions are done entirely by nature, and that the self does not act, sees. The section is the seeing that ends the chapter.
नेपालीमा
प्रकृति, पुरुष र दृष्टि। प्रकृति र पुरुष दुवै अनादि हुन्। गुण र विकार प्रकृतिबाट आउँछन्। गर्नुको कारण प्रकृति हो। सुख र दुःख भोग्नुको कारण पुरुष हो। कर्म सबै प्रकृतिले गर्छ र आत्माले गर्दैन भन्ने देख्नेले देख्छ। खण्ड अध्याय सकाउने दृष्टि हो।
13.20Know that nature and the person are both beginningless, and know that the modifications and the guṇas (गुण) are born of nature.13.21Nature is called the cause in the doership of effect and instrument; the person is called the cause in the experiencing of pleasure and pain.13.22The person, standing in nature, experiences the guṇas (गुण) born of nature, and his clinging to the guṇas (गुण) is the cause in births in good and bad wombs.13.23The higher person in this body is also called the overseer, the consenter, the supporter, the experiencer, the great lord, and the supreme self.13.24Who knows the person thus, and nature together with the guṇas (गुण), he is not born again, even though he lives in every way.13.25Some see the self in the self by the self, through meditation; others by the yoga of reckoning; and others by the yoga of action.13.26Others, not knowing it thus, worship having heard it from others; they too, devoted to what they have heard, cross beyond death.13.27Whatever being comes to be, unmoving or moving, know it as coming from the joining of the field and the knower of the field, bull of the Bharatas (भरत).13.28Who sees the supreme lord standing the same in all beings, he sees.13.29For, seeing the lord established the same everywhere, he does not wound the self by the self, and from that he goes to the supreme goal.13.30Who sees actions being done in every way by nature alone, and so sees the self as the non-doer, he sees.13.31When he sees the separate state of beings standing in one, and the spreading from that alone, then he reaches Brahman (ब्रह्म).13.32Because it is beginningless and free of the guṇas (गुण), this supreme self is imperishable; even standing in the body, son of Kuntī (कुन्ती), it does not act and it is not stained.13.33Just as the sky, gone everywhere, is not stained, because it is subtle, so the self, standing everywhere in the body, is not stained.13.34Just as one sun illumines this entire world, so the knower of the field illumines the entire field, descendant of Bharata (भरत).13.35Those who know thus, with the eye of knowledge, the difference of the field and the knower of the field, and the release from the nature of beings, they go to the supreme.QuizFive questions on Nature, person, and seeing.