Sanskrit
कामक्रोधवियुक्तानां यतीनां यतचेतसाम् । अभितो ब्रह्मनिर्वाणं वर्तते विदितात्मनाम् ॥
kāmakrodhaviyuktānāṃ yatīnāṃ yatacetasām abhito brahmanirvāṇaṃ vartate viditātmanām
Translation
The Peace of the Eternal lies near to those who know themselves, who are disjoined from desire and passion, subdued in nature, of subdued thoughts.
Annie Besant · The Bhagavad-Gita, translated by Annie Besant (4th ed., 1922) — Wikisource · Public Domain
Explanation
Abhitaḥ, “on all sides” or “near at hand,” is the notable word choice here — this peace isn’t described as a distant achievement requiring extraordinary conditions but as something already surrounding those who meet three ordinary-sounding criteria: freed from desire and anger, of controlled mind, and self-knowing. The verse functions as a summary restatement of the previous verse’s territory, but the shift from “obtain” to “is near” quietly changes the emotional register — less an achievement to strive toward, more a proximity to notice. Abhitaḥ — “all around” — locates brahma-nirvāṇa as ambient rather than remote: for the person freed of kāma and anger it is already the medium they move in, not a shore to be reached.
Study deeper
Word by word
- kāmakrodhaviyuktānāṃकामक्रोधवियुक्तानां
- for those freed from desire and anger (kāma-krodha-viyuktānām)
- yatīnāṃ yatacetasāmयतीनां यतचेतसां
- the striving, of controlled mind (yatīnām + yata-cetasām)
- abhito brahmanirvāṇaṃअभितो ब्रह्मनिर्वाणं
- on all sides, the peace of Brahman (abhitaḥ + brahma-nirvāṇam)
- vartate viditātmanāmवर्तते विदितात्मनां
- exists — for the knowers of the Self (vartate + vidita-ātmanām)
Commentary
Site Commentary
This is at least the third slightly different triad the chapter has offered for roughly the same inner state — body, mind, intellect, and senses in verse 11, and here desire-and-anger, mind, and self-knowledge. The variation isn’t sloppiness; it suggests the text is circling one disposition from different descriptive angles rather than pinning it to a single fixed checklist — a useful reminder that steadiness doesn’t have one canonical inventory of components.
Original commentary written for this site · © Amit Singh — original commentary
Concepts
Apply this verse
Lessons
Personal
- Don't get attached to one specific checklist for what being disciplined or being at peace requires — different frameworks name overlapping but not identical components, and chasing an exact list can distract from the actual disposition all of them are pointing at.
Professional
- When different mentors describe senior engineering judgment with slightly different lists of traits, don't treat the variation as contradiction — they're circling the same underlying capability from different angles, and no single checklist owns the definitive inventory.
Family & Social
- If you and a partner define a good parent with slightly different lists of qualities, that's not necessarily disagreement — you may both be circling the same underlying disposition from different angles, worth checking before assuming you actually disagree.
Ask yourself
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