Sanskrit
सखेति मत्वा प्रसभं यदुक्तम् हे कृष्ण हे यादव हे सखेति । अजानता महिमानं तवेदम् मया प्रमादात्प्रणयेन वापि ॥
sakheti matvā prasabhaṃ yad uktam he kṛṣṇa he yādava he sakheti ajānatā mahimānaṃ tavedaṃ mayā pramādāt praṇayena vāpi
Translation
If, thinking Thee but friend, importunate, O Krishna! or O Yâdava! O friend! I cried, unknowing of Thy majesty, And careless in the fondness of my love;
Annie Besant · The Bhagavad-Gita, translated by Annie Besant (4th ed., 1922) — Wikisource · Public Domain
Explanation
The hymn’s register drops without warning from cosmic titles to embarrassed memory: Arjuna quotes his own past words back to Krishna — “he kṛṣṇa, he yādava, he sakhā,” hey Krishna, hey Yadava, hey friend — the exact casual vocative he must have used a hundred times before this chapter. Everything the hymn has just spent five verses establishing (first cause, beyond being and non-being, greater than Brahmā) is now measured against those words, and the gap between them is the entire content of what follows: not fear this time, but retroactive mortification at having addressed the infinite as “friend” without knowing what he was actually talking to. The register drops from cosmic titles to embarrassed memory: Arjuna quotes his own casual vocatives back — he kṛṣṇa, he yādava, he sakhā. Not fear this time, but retroactive mortification at having addressed the infinite as “friend.””
Study deeper
Word by word
- sakheti matvā prasabhaṃ yad uktamसखेति मत्वा प्रसभं यद् उक्तं
- whatever was said rashly, thinking [you] a friend (sakhā + iti + matvā + prasabham + yat + uktam)
- he kṛṣṇa he yādava he sakhetiहे कृष्ण हे यादव हे सखेति
- 'Hey Krishna, hey Yādava, hey friend' (he + kṛṣṇa + he + yādava + he + sakhā + iti)
- ajānatā mahimānaṃ tavedaṃअजानता महिमानं तवेदं
- not knowing this greatness of yours (ajānatā + mahimānam + tava + idam)
- mayā pramādāt praṇayena vāpiमया प्रमादात् प्रणयेन वापि
- by me, through carelessness or through affection (mayā + pramādāt + praṇayena + vā + api)
Commentary
Site Commentary
Arjuna doesn’t summarize his past familiarity, he quotes it verbatim — “he kṛṣṇa, he yādava, he sakhā” — and verbatim quotation is a harder form of self-accounting than paraphrase would be. A summary lets you round the edges off an old embarrassment; repeating your own exact words back doesn’t allow that softening.
Original commentary written for this site · © Amit Singh — original commentary
Concepts
Apply this verse
Lessons
Personal
- When you're working through something you regret having said, try recalling and repeating your exact words rather than summarizing what you 'basically' said — verbatim recall is more honest than paraphrase, which almost always rounds the edges off in your own favor.
Professional
- When apologizing for a specific comment or decision at work, quote your own words back precisely rather than characterizing them generally — precise self-quotation signals you've actually reckoned with what was said, not just with a softened memory of it.
Family & Social
- If you're apologizing to someone close to you, repeating your actual words back to them, rather than a generalized version of what you said, shows you've sat with the specific harm rather than a version already smoothed over in memory.
Ask yourself
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