Vyasa · a new plain-English translation from the Sanskrit
4.1 The Blessed Lord said: I taught this imperishable yoga to Vivasvan; Vivasvan told it to Manu; Manu spoke it to Ikshvaku.
4.2 Received thus in succession, the royal sages knew it, until over great stretches of time, O scorcher of foes, this yoga was lost in the world.
4.3 That same ancient yoga I have taught to you today, for you are my devotee and my friend; this is the highest secret.
4.4 Arjuna said: Your birth was later, the birth of Vivasvan was earlier. How am I to understand that you taught it in the beginning?
4.5 The Blessed Lord said: Many births of mine have passed, and yours too, Arjuna. I know them all; you do not know them, scorcher of foes.
4.6 Though I am unborn and my self is imperishable, though I am the lord of beings, I come into being by my own creative power, taking hold of my own nature.
4.7 Whenever righteousness (dharma) declines, Bharata, and unrighteousness rises up, then I bring myself into being.
4.8 For the protection of the good, for the destruction of evildoers, and for the establishment of dharma, I come into being age after age.
4.9 Whoever truly knows in this way my divine birth and action does not, on leaving the body, take birth again; he comes to me, Arjuna.
4.10 Freed from passion, fear, and anger, absorbed in me, taking refuge in me, many, purified by the austerity of knowledge, have come to my state of being.
4.11 In whatever way people approach me, I meet them in that same way; in every respect, Partha, people follow my path.
4.12 Those desiring the success of their actions here sacrifice to the gods, for success born of action comes swiftly in the human world.
4.13 The fourfold order was created by me, divided according to quality and action. Though I am its maker, know me to be the non-doer, the imperishable one.
4.14 Actions do not stain me, nor do I long for the fruit of action. He who understands me thus is not bound by actions.
4.15 Knowing this, the ancient seekers of liberation still performed action; therefore you too should perform action, as the ancients did before you.
4.16 "What is action, what is inaction?" — even the wise are confused about this. I will explain to you what action is, knowing which you will be freed from misfortune.
4.17 One must understand action, and one must understand wrong action, and one must understand inaction as well; the way of action is deep and hard to fathom.
4.18 Whoever sees inaction in action and action in inaction is wise among men; he is disciplined, having accomplished all action.
4.19 The wise call him a man of understanding whose every undertaking is free of desire and calculation, whose actions are burned up in the fire of knowledge.
4.20 Abandoning attachment to the fruit of action, always content, dependent on nothing, he does nothing at all even while fully engaged in action.
4.21 Free of hope, his mind and self restrained, having given up all possessions, performing action with the body alone, he incurs no fault.
4.22 Content with whatever comes unbidden, beyond the pairs of opposites, free of envy, equal in success and failure, he is not bound even when he acts.
4.23 For one who is free of attachment, liberated, his mind fixed in knowledge, performing action as sacrifice, the entire action dissolves away.
4.24 Brahman is the offering, brahman is the oblation poured by brahman into the fire of brahman; brahman alone is to be reached by one absorbed in action that is brahman.
4.25 Some yogis offer sacrifice to the gods alone; others offer sacrifice by sacrifice itself into the fire of brahman.
4.26 Some offer hearing and the other senses into the fires of restraint; others offer sound and the other objects of sense into the fires of the senses.
4.27 Others offer all the actions of the senses and the actions of the life-breath into the fire of the yoga of self-restraint, kindled by knowledge.
4.28 Some offer sacrifice with wealth, some with austerity, some through yoga; others, disciplined ascetics of strict vows, offer sacrifice through study and knowledge.
4.29 Some offer the outgoing breath into the incoming, and others the incoming into the outgoing, restraining the paths of both breaths, intent upon control of the breath.
4.30 Others, restricting their food, offer their very life-breaths into the life-breaths. All these are knowers of sacrifice, their impurities consumed by sacrifice.
4.31 Those who eat the nectar left over from sacrifice go to the eternal brahman. This world is not for the one who offers no sacrifice — how then any other world, best of the Kurus?
4.32 Thus many kinds of sacrifice are spread out before brahman. Know that all of them arise from action; knowing this, you will be freed.
4.33 Better than sacrifice made of material things is the sacrifice of knowledge, scorcher of foes. All action without exception, Partha, finds its consummation in knowledge.
4.34 Learn this by prostrating yourself, by questioning, by service. Those who have knowledge, who have seen the truth, will instruct you in that knowledge.
4.35 Knowing this, you will not fall into confusion again, Pandava; by this knowledge you will see all beings without exception in yourself, and then in me.
4.36 Even if you were the worst wrongdoer among all wrongdoers, you would cross over all wrongdoing by the raft of knowledge alone.
4.37 As a kindled fire reduces its fuel to ashes, Arjuna, so does the fire of knowledge reduce all actions to ashes.
4.38 There is nothing in this world as purifying as knowledge. One who is himself perfected by yoga finds this within himself in time.
4.39 The one with faith obtains knowledge, devoted to it, his senses restrained; having obtained knowledge, he swiftly attains supreme peace.
4.40 But the one without knowledge, without faith, whose self is full of doubt, is destroyed. Neither this world nor the world beyond, nor happiness, exists for the doubting self.
4.41 Actions do not bind the one who has renounced action through yoga, whose doubt is cut away by knowledge, who possesses himself, winner of wealth.
4.42 Therefore, having cut away with the sword of knowledge this doubt born of ignorance that dwells in the heart, take up yoga and rise, Bharata.