Sanskrit
बुद्धेर्भेदं धृतेश्चैव गुणतस्त्रिविधं शृणु । प्रोच्यमानमशेषेण पृथक्त्वेन धनञ्जय ॥ २९ ॥
buddher bhedaṃ dhṛteścaiva guṇatas trividhaṃ śṛṇu procyamānam aśeṣeṇa pṛthaktvena dhanañjaya
Translation
The division of Reason and of firmness also, threefold according to the qualities, hear thou related, unreservedly and severally, O Dhananjaya.
Annie Besant · The Bhagavad-Gita, translated by Annie Besant (4th ed., 1922) — Wikisource · Public Domain
Explanation
Having covered knowledge, action, and actor, Krishna signals two more triads still to come — intellect (buddhi) and resolve (dhriti) — each also threefold by guna. The chapter’s architecture is now fully visible: six concepts (tyaga, knowledge, action, actor, intellect, resolve) run through the same three-part sieve, with happiness held in reserve as a seventh for verses 36 through 39. Next: the buddhi, the discerning intellect, sorted by guṇa — the faculty BG 2.41 made the whole hinge of yoga, now examined for its failure modes.
Study deeper
Word by word
- buddher bhedaṃ dhṛteścaivaबुद्धेः भेदं धृतेश्चैव
- the division of intellect and of firmness (buddheḥ + bhedam + dhṛteḥ + ca + eva)
- guṇatas trividhaṃ śṛṇuगुणतस् त्रिविधं शृणु
- hear as threefold, by guṇa (guṇataḥ + trividham + śṛṇu)
- procyamānam aśeṣeṇaप्रोच्यमानं अशेषेण
- declared completely (procyamānam + aśeṣeṇa)
- pṛthaktvena dhanañjayaपृथक्त्वेन धनञ्जय
- one by one, O Dhanañjaya (pṛthaktvena + dhanañjaya)
Commentary
Site Commentary
Krishna addresses Arjuna here as Dhananjaya, winner of wealth, a name earned through an act of decisive resolve, not birth. Using it in the same breath as introducing the threefold division of dhriti is not incidental: the epithet embeds the very quality the coming verses are about to sort into sattvic, rajasic, and tamasic, before Arjuna has been told what any of them mean.
Original commentary written for this site · © Amit Singh — original commentary
Apply this verse
Lessons
Personal
- When you're about to study a distinction you don't yet fully grasp, discipline, focus, resolve, look first for where you're already a living example of the good version of it; that example is a truer anchor than the abstract definition you're about to read.
Professional
- Before rolling a new competency framework out to a team, find the person already embodying the top tier of it and use them as the concrete anchor — an abstract rubric lands faster next to a name everyone already respects.
Family & Social
- Before asking a family member to work on a quality they're missing, patience, follow-through, remind them, and yourself, of a specific time they already showed it; the anchor makes the standard feel earnable, not foreign.
Ask yourself
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