Sanskrit
अथ चेत्त्वमिमं धर्म्यं सङ्ग्रामं न करिष्यसि । ततः स्वधर्मं कीर्तिं च हित्वा पापमवाप्स्यसि ॥
atha cet tvam imaṃ dharmyaṃ saṃgrāmaṃ na kariṣyasi tataḥ svadharmaṃ kīrtiṃ ca hitvā pāpam avāpsyasi
Translation
But if thou wilt not carry on this righteous warfare, then casting away thine own duty and thine honour, thou wilt incur sin.
Annie Besant · The Bhagavad-Gita, translated by Annie Besant (4th ed., 1922) — Wikisource · Public Domain
Explanation
The other side of verse 31’s claim, stated as a direct conditional: refusing this fight isn’t a neutral withdrawal, it’s an abandonment of svadharma with a real cost — sin, not just missed opportunity. Krishna is narrowing Arjuna’s options rather than presenting inaction as a safe default. The structure is “if not X, then loss of Y and Z, and P” — duty, reputation, and positive fault. Chapter 3 will generalise the underlying claim at BG 3.5: abstention is not actually one of the choices on offer.
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Word by word
- atha cet tvamअथ चेत् त्वं
- but if you (atha + cet + tvam)
- imaṃ dharmyaṃ saṃgrāmaṃइमं धर्ंयं संग्रामं
- this righteous battle (imam + dharmyam + saṃgrāmam)
- na kariṣyasiन करिष्यसि
- will not do (na + kariṣyasi)
- tataḥततः
- then
- svadharmaṃ kīrtiṃ caस्वधर्मं कीर्तिं च
- your own duty and your renown (svadharmam + kīrtim + ca)
- hitvāहित्वा
- having abandoned
- pāpam avāpsyasiपापं अवाप्स्यसि
- you will incur sin (pāpam + avāpsyasi)
Commentary
Site Commentary
Duty and honor are named in the same breath here, as if they were two separate costs — but for a kshatriya in Arjuna’s position they’re really one cost described twice. The verse isn’t warning about two different failures; it’s pointing out that a single act of withdrawal registers on both axes at once, which is precisely why it can’t be treated as a private, victimless decision.
Original commentary written for this site · © Amit Singh — original commentary
Concepts
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Lessons
Personal
- When weighing whether to walk away from a hard commitment, check whether the cost you're minimizing and the cost you're not naming are actually the same cost wearing two names — what looks like two separate downsides is sometimes one you're underweighting by splitting it in half.
Professional
- When you consider skipping a responsibility visibly tied to your role, recognize that the reputational cost and the role-failure cost are often the same event seen from two angles — don't let naming them separately make either one feel smaller than it is.
Family & Social
- When you're tempted to quietly step back from a family responsibility, notice that the practical failure and the trust it damages are usually one event, not two — treating them as separate can make the decision feel lighter than it actually is.
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