Sanskrit
भूय एव महाबाहो शृणु मे परमं वचः । यत्तेऽहं प्रीयमाणाय वक्ष्यामि हितकाम्यया ॥ १ ॥
bhūya eva mahābāho śṛṇu me paramaṃ vacaḥ yat te'haṃ prīyamāṇāya vakṣyāmi hitakāmyayā
Translation
Again, O mighty-armed, hear thou My supreme word, that, desiring thy welfare, I will declare to thee who art beloved.
Annie Besant · The Bhagavad-Gita, translated by Annie Besant (4th ed., 1922) — Wikisource · Public Domain
Explanation
Krishna resumes the discourse with an explicit “again” (bhūya eva), signalling this is a second beginning rather than a continuation of the same argument-thread as Chapter 9. The address “mighty-armed” and the stated motive — Arjuna’s welfare, because he is beloved — sets an intimate, devotional register that carries through the whole chapter, distinct from the more argumentative tone of Chapters 2-6. Prīyamāṇāya… hita-kāmyayā — “to you who love this, out of a wish for your good” — states the motive plainly: this chapter is spoken as a gift to a devotee, not as an argument to be won.
Study deeper
Word by word
- bhūya eva mahābāhoभूय एव महाबाहो
- once more, O mighty-armed (bhūyaḥ + eva + mahā-bāho)
- śṛṇu me paramaṃ vacaḥशृणु मे परमं वचः
- hear My supreme word (śṛṇu + me + paramam + vacaḥ)
- yat te'haṃ prīyamāṇāyaयत् तेऽहं प्रीयमाणाय
- which, to you who delight [in it] (yat + te + aham + prīyamāṇāya)
- vakṣyāmi hitakāmyayāवक्ष्यामि हितकांयया
- I shall speak, wishing your good (vakṣyāmi + hita-kāmyayā)
Commentary
Site Commentary
Bhūya eva — “again” — is doing structural work most translations flatten into a mere transition word: Krishna signals that what follows should not be read as more of the same argument-thread running since Chapter 2, but as something new. Naming a shift before making it changes how the next thirty verses are heard — as intimacy rather than instruction — before a single word of that intimacy has been spoken.
Original commentary written for this site · © Amit Singh — original commentary
Apply this verse
Lessons
Personal
- When you shift the substance of what you're offering someone — advice, a project's direction — say so explicitly before continuing, the way Krishna names "again" before resuming. Naming a shift up front stops people from mapping what follows onto the wrong earlier thread.
Professional
- When restarting a stalled discussion or project phase, state plainly that you're resetting the frame before diving into new content — don't assume your team will infer the shift. An explicit reset, named out loud, prevents new work being read against the wrong prior context.
Family & Social
- When you resume a hard conversation after a pause, tell the other person you're starting fresh rather than assuming they'll sense the shift themselves. Naming the restart, the way Krishna does before continuing his teaching, keeps old assumptions from bleeding into the new conversation.
Ask yourself
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