Sanskrit
यदि ह्यहं न वर्तेयं जातु कर्मण्यतन्द्रितः । मम वर्त्मानुवर्तन्ते मनुष्याः पार्थ सर्वशः ॥
yadi hy ahaṃ na varteyaṃ jātu karmaṇy atandritaḥ mama vartmānuvartante manuṣyāḥ pārtha sarvaśaḥ
Translation
For if I mingled not ever in action unwearied, men all around would follow My path, O son of Prithâ.
Annie Besant · The Bhagavad-Gita, translated by Annie Besant (4th ed., 1922) — Wikisource · Public Domain
Explanation
The counterfactual continues, spelling out the stakes of verse 21’s imitation principle applied at cosmic scale: if Krishna disengaged from action, humanity would follow his path into disengagement. Verse 24 pushes this to its most severe conclusion. Atandrita — “unwearied, never slack” — is quietly important: the model isn’t just that Krishna acts, but that he acts without flagging, which is the standard the imitators would inherit either way. A tireless example sustains the wheel of BG 3.16; a slackening one unwinds it.
Study deeper
Word by word
- yadi hy ahaṃ na varteyaṃयदि ह्य् अहं न वर्तेयं
- for if I did not engage (yadi + hi + aham + na + varteyam)
- jātu karmaṇy atandritaḥजातु कर्मण्य् अतन्द्रितः
- ever, unwearied, in action (jātu + karmaṇi + atandritaḥ)
- mama vartmānuvartanteमम वर्त्मानुवर्तन्ते
- follow my path (mama + vartma-anuvartante)
- manuṣyāḥ pārtha sarvaśaḥमनुष्याः पार्थ सर्वशः
- men, O Pārtha, in every way (manuṣyāḥ + pārtha + sarvaśaḥ)
Commentary
Site Commentary
Krishna doesn’t argue his own effort matters because the universe needs the physical outcome of his actions — he argues it matters because of what would happen to everyone watching him. That’s a strange kind of accountability: the stakes of relaxing aren’t private to the person who relaxes, they scale with how many people are calibrating their own effort against yours. The more anyone is watched, the less “just this once” actually costs only them.
Original commentary written for this site · © Amit Singh — original commentary
Concepts
Apply this verse
Lessons
Personal
- When you're tempted to let effort slide 'just this once,' remember the cost isn't only yours to bear if people around you take their cue from what you actually do rather than what you say — invisible slack has a way of becoming visible license.
Professional
- As a senior engineer or lead, an unwritten habit — skipping a review, cutting a corner under deadline — gets copied by people who never saw the context that made it excusable; your team calibrates against your actual behavior, not your stated standard.
Family & Social
- If you tell your kids to work hard while quietly cutting corners yourself, don't expect the words to win — they read your daily behavior as the real instruction, the way this verse assumes people follow conduct over doctrine.
Ask yourself
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