Sanskrit
उत्सीदेयुरिमे लोका न कुर्यां कर्म चेदहम् । सङ्करस्य च कर्ता स्यामुपहन्यामिमाः प्रजाः ॥
utsīdeyur ime lokā na kuryāṃ karma ced aham saṅkarasya ca kartā syām upahanyām imāḥ prajāḥ
Translation
These worlds would fall into ruin, if I did not perform action; I should be the author of confusion of castes, and should destroy these creatures.
Annie Besant · The Bhagavad-Gita, translated by Annie Besant (4th ed., 1922) — Wikisource · Public Domain
Explanation
The counterfactual’s conclusion invokes sankara, “confusion of castes” — the same varna-sankara anxiety that drove Arjuna’s own argument against fighting back in 1.41-43. Worth being direct about this: the verse takes for granted a caste-order social theory as something whose collapse would be catastrophic, a dated assumption of its context rather than a claim this reading treats as still binding. What’s structurally interesting is that both sides of the chapter 1-3 argument — Arjuna’s case for not fighting, and Krishna’s case here for why he himself acts — independently reach for the same caste-preservation logic as a worst-case scenario. Read past the period detail, the durable claim is that a society coheres by its exemplars continuing to do their work, and comes apart when they don’t — the ethical, not sociological, core of lokasaṅgraha.
Study deeper
Word by word
- utsīdeyur ime lokāउत्सीदेयुः इमे लोका
- these worlds would fall to ruin (utsīdeyuḥ + ime + lokāḥ)
- na kuryāṃ karma ced ahamन कुर्यां कर्म चेद् अहं
- if I did not perform action (na + kuryām + karma + cet + aham)
- saṅkarasya ca kartā syāmसङ्करस्य च कर्ता स्यां
- I would be the author of confusion (saṅkarasya + ca + kartā + syām)
- upahanyām imāḥ prajāḥउपहन्यां इमाः प्रजाः
- and would destroy these creatures (upahanyām + imāḥ + prajāḥ)
Commentary
Site Commentary
Notice the move isn’t a new argument, it’s redirection: Krishna doesn’t ask Arjuna to drop the concern for social collapse that shaped his refusal to fight back in chapter 1, he takes that exact concern and re-aims it at inaction instead. Real persuasion often works this way — not by replacing what someone already values, but by showing where their own values point somewhere they hadn’t looked.
Original commentary written for this site · © Amit Singh — original commentary
Apply this verse
Lessons
Personal
- When you're stuck between two choices, check whether the value making you hesitate on one side might actually argue against the other side too — the same worry that stops you can sometimes be the reason to act, not stay still.
Professional
- When pushing back on a colleague's decision, look for the value they already hold that argues against their own conclusion — reusing their own reasoning against a different target tends to land better than introducing a competing value from outside.
Family & Social
- If someone you love resists a change out of fear of what it might break, look for whether that same fear actually argues for the change rather than against it — you don't need a new argument, just a redirection of the one they already hold.
Ask yourself
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