Sanskrit
ज्ञानेन तु तदज्ञानं येषां नाशितमात्मनः । तेषामादित्यवज्ज्ञानं प्रकाशयति तत्परम् ॥
jñānena tu tad ajñānaṃ yeṣāṃ nāśitam ātmanaḥ teṣām ādityavaj jñānaṃ prakāśayati tat param
Translation
Verily, in whom unwisdom is destroyed by the wisdom of the Self, in them wisdom, shining as the sun, reveals the Supreme.
Annie Besant · The Bhagavad-Gita, translated by Annie Besant (4th ed., 1922) — Wikisource · Public Domain
Explanation
The sun simile arrives on schedule: once ignorance is destroyed by the wisdom belonging to the Self, that wisdom illuminates the Supreme the way sunlight reveals what was always there, unbuilt and unadded, simply uncovered. Jñāna is not information gathered but a covering removed, consistent with the previous verse’s āvṛta — the metaphysics running through this stretch of the chapter is consistently subtractive rather than additive. This pair of verses is easy to skim past as generic praise of “wisdom,” but the specific covering-and-uncovering model they propose is a genuine philosophical position, not decoration. Ādityavat — “like the sun” — completes the cloud image of BG 5.15: the light was never gone, only blocked. Jñāna removes the block; Brahman is what then stands revealed.
Study deeper
Word by word
- jñānena tu tad ajñānaṃज्ञानेन तु तद् अज्ञानं
- but by knowledge, that ignorance (jñānena + tu + tat + ajñānam)
- yeṣāṃ nāśitam ātmanaḥयेषां नाशितं आत्मनः
- of those whose [ignorance] of the Self is destroyed (yeṣām + nāśitam + ātmanaḥ)
- teṣām ādityavaj jñānaṃतेषां आदित्यवज् ज्ञानं
- for them, knowledge, like the sun (teṣām + āditya-vat + jñānam)
- prakāśayati tat paramप्रकाशयति तत् परं
- reveals the Supreme (prakāśayati + tat + param)
Commentary
Site Commentary
There’s a shift worth catching between this verse and the effortful language of verses 8-9, where the practitioner has to actively “hold” an understanding against a more natural pull. Here, once ignorance is actually destroyed rather than merely resisted, the sun simile implies no more holding is needed — light doesn’t have to try to reveal what’s in front of it once nothing blocks it. The chapter seems to be describing two different phases of the same path: effortful maintenance while the obstruction still exists, and effortless clarity once it’s actually gone.
Original commentary written for this site · © Amit Singh — original commentary
Concepts
Apply this verse
Lessons
Personal
- If a habit or understanding you're building still takes conscious effort to maintain, that's not a sign you're doing it wrong — it means the underlying obstruction hasn't fully cleared yet; effortlessness is a later phase, not the starting requirement.
Professional
- When a new team practice — writing postmortems, reviewing code kindly — still feels like it requires active enforcement, don't mistake that for failure; enforced discipline is the phase before it becomes the team's default grain, not evidence the practice isn't working.
Family & Social
- If treating someone close to you with patience still takes visible effort, don't read that as proof you don't really feel it — effortful patience now can be the phase before it becomes your actual default response, not a sign of insincerity.
Ask yourself
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