Sanskrit
इति क्षेत्रं तथा ज्ञानं ज्ञेयं चोक्तं समासतः । मद्भक्त एतद्विज्ञाय मद्भावायोपपद्यते ॥
iti kṣetraṃ tathā jñānaṃ jñeyaṃ coktaṃ samāsataḥ madbhakta etad vijñāya madbhāvāyopapadyate
Translation
Thus the Field, Wisdom and the Object of Wisdom, have been briefly told. My devotee, thus knowing, enters into My Being.
Annie Besant · The Bhagavad-Gita, translated by Annie Besant (4th ed., 1922) — Wikisource · Public Domain
Explanation
This verse closes the chapter’s opening section with the same three terms Arjuna asked about in verse 1 — kshetra, jnana, jneya — now stated to have been covered “briefly.” “My devotee, thus knowing, enters into My Being” quietly folds bhakti back in as the payoff of the entire analytical exercise, echoing verse 11’s inclusion of devotion inside the definition of jnana: the knowledge isn’t presented as an end in itself but as what makes union with Krishna possible. “My devotee, knowing this, enters into My Being” folds bhakti back in as the payoff of the analytical exercise, echoing BG 13.11: the knowledge is not an end in itself but what makes union with Krishna possible.
Study deeper
Word by word
- iti kṣetraṃ tathā jñānaṃइति क्षेत्रं तथा ज्ञानं
- thus the field, and knowledge (iti + kṣetram + tathā + jñānam)
- jñeyaṃ coktaṃ samāsataḥज्ञेयं चोक्तं समासतः
- and its object have been told in brief (jñeyam + ca + uktam + samāsataḥ)
- madbhakta etad vijñāyaमद्भक्त एतद् विज्ञाय
- My devotee, knowing this (mat-bhaktaḥ + etat + vijñāya)
- madbhāvāyopapadyateमद्भावायोपपद्यते
- becomes fit for My being (mat-bhāvāya + upapadyate)
Commentary
Site Commentary
Krishna calls eighteen verses of dense analysis “briefly told” (samasatah), which is worth sitting with — what reads to us as exhaustive is, by the text’s own accounting, the short version. The verse’s real weight falls on its second half, though: the section closes not on a claim about the knowledge itself but on what a person who holds it becomes eligible for, treating everything that came before as instrumental rather than an end in itself.
Original commentary written for this site · © Amit Singh — original commentary
Concepts
Apply this verse
Lessons
Personal
- When you compress months of learning into 'briefly, here's what I found,' remember the compression is doing real work, not skipping it — and that the point of gathering the knowledge was never the knowledge itself, but what you become able to do once you hold it.
Professional
- When you hand a team a two-line summary of a long investigation, don't apologize for it being 'brief' — a compressed version delivered well can carry as much weight as the eighteen-verse version behind it, as long as it's the compression, not a shortcut around doing the work.
Family & Social
- Don't mistake 'I've told you the whole story' for the actual goal of that conversation — with someone close to you, knowledge exchanged is only worth what it lets you become to each other afterward, not the information itself.
Ask yourself
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