Vyasa · a new plain-English translation from the Sanskrit
7.1 The Blessed Lord said: With mind fixed on me, Partha, practicing yoga and taking refuge in me, hear how you will know me fully, without doubt, in my entirety.
7.2 I will declare to you completely this knowledge together with realization, knowing which nothing further remains here to be known.
7.3 Among thousands of people, scarcely one strives for perfection; and among those who strive and attain perfection, scarcely one knows me in truth.
7.4 Earth, water, fire, air, space, mind, intellect, and ego — this is my nature divided eightfold.
7.5 This is the lower nature; know my other nature to be higher than this, O mighty-armed one — the living being by which this world is sustained.
7.6 Understand that all beings have their source in these two natures; I am the origin and also the dissolution of the whole world.
7.7 There is nothing higher than me, Dhananjaya. All this is strung on me like clusters of jewels on a thread.
7.8 I am the taste in water, Kaunteya; I am the light in the moon and the sun; I am the sacred syllable Om in all the Vedas, the sound in space, the manhood in men.
7.9 I am the pure fragrance in the earth and the brilliance in fire; I am the life in all beings, and the austerity in those who practice austerity.
7.10 Know me, Partha, to be the eternal seed of all beings; I am the intellect of the intelligent, the splendor of the splendid.
7.11 I am the strength of the strong, free from desire and passion; I am desire in beings that is not opposed to dharma, O bull among the Bharatas.
7.12 Whatever states of being arise, whether sattvic, rajasic, or tamasic, know that they come from me alone; yet I am not in them — they are in me.
7.13 Deluded by these three states composed of the gunas, the whole world fails to recognize me, who am beyond them and imperishable.
7.14 This divine illusion of mine, composed of the gunas, is difficult to cross beyond; but those who take refuge in me alone cross over this illusion.
7.15 Evildoers, deluded and base among men, do not take refuge in me; their knowledge is carried away by illusion, and they cling to a demonic nature.
7.16 Four kinds of virtuous people worship me, Arjuna: the distressed, the seeker of knowledge, the seeker of wealth, and the man of knowledge, O bull among the Bharatas.
7.17 Among these, the man of knowledge, ever disciplined and devoted to one alone, is the best; for I am exceedingly dear to the man of knowledge, and he is dear to me.
7.18 All of these are noble, but the man of knowledge I consider to be my very self; for he, disciplined in mind, is established in me alone as the highest goal.
7.19 At the end of many births, the man of knowledge takes refuge in me, knowing that Vasudeva is all that is; such a great soul is very hard to find.
7.20 Those whose knowledge has been carried away by this or that desire take refuge in other deities, following this or that rule, constrained by their own nature.
7.21 Whatever form a devotee wishes to worship with faith, I make his faith in that form unwavering.
7.22 Endowed with that faith, he seeks to worship it, and from it he obtains the objects of his desire, which are in truth granted by me alone.
7.23 But the fruit gained by those of little understanding is finite; those who worship the gods go to the gods, but my devotees come to me.
7.24 The unwise think of me, the unmanifest, as having come into manifest form, not knowing my higher state, imperishable and unsurpassed.
7.25 I am not revealed to all, veiled as I am by my creative power (yoga-maya); this deluded world does not recognize me as unborn and imperishable.
7.26 I know, Arjuna, the beings that are past, present, and yet to come; but no one knows me.
7.27 By the delusion of the pairs of opposites arising from desire and aversion, all beings fall into confusion at birth, O scorcher of the foe.
7.28 But those people of virtuous deeds whose sin has come to an end, freed from the delusion of opposites, worship me with firm resolve.
7.29 Those who strive, taking refuge in me, for release from old age and death, know brahman entirely, and the self, and all action.
7.30 Those who know me together with the material realm, the divine realm, and the realm of sacrifice, with minds disciplined, know me even at the time of departure.