3.22

This is the first point in the whole discourse where Krishna offers himself, not scripture, myth, or precedent, as the evidence for a claim — a shift from citing authority to demonstrating it directly. Having nothing left to gain and still choosing to act, he becomes his own proof of the principle rather than merely stating it.

The verb Krishna uses for his own relationship to action, varte — “I engage, I turn, I am occupied” — is not the language of a remote cause pulling levers from outside the system; it’s participatory, the same root used elsewhere for simply existing or turning in the world. That word choice quietly forecloses a deist reading of everything Krishna has said about divine oversight up to this point: the picture isn’t a governor issuing orders from a distance, it’s an actor immersed in the same field of action he’s describing. Whatever authority is being claimed here, it isn’t the authority of someone standing outside the game.