Shloka 13

अक्षरब्रह्मयोग (Akṣara-Brahma-Yoga) — Knowledge of the Imperishable, Prakṛti, and Devotion

Devanagari script

सर्वकर्माणि मनसा संन्यस्यास्ते सुखं वशी । नदद्वारे पुरे देही नैव कुर्वनू न कारयन्‌,अन्त:ःकरण जिसके वशमें है, ऐसा सांख्ययोगका आचरण करनेवाला पुरुष न करता हुआ और न करवाता हुआ ही नदद्वारोंवाले शरीररूप घरमें सब कर्मोंको मनसे त्यागकर्रः आनन्दपूर्वक सच्चिदानन्दघन परमात्माके स्वरूपमें स्थित रहता है

Transliteration

sarvakarmāṇi manasā saṁnyasyāste sukhaṁ vaśī | navadvāre pure dehī naiva kurvan na kārayan ||

Translation

Arjuna said: Having mentally renounced all actions, the self-controlled embodied being rests in ease within the ‘city of nine gates’ (the body), neither acting nor causing others to act. The ethical thrust is inner mastery: freedom from doership and coercion, while abiding in the Self beyond compulsive agency.

Word by Word

• {'sarva-karmāṇi': 'all actions, all deeds', 'manasā': 'by the mind

• mentally', 'saṁnyasya': 'having renounced

• having laid aside (as non-binding)', 'āste': 'sits

• abides', 'sukham': 'in ease

• happily', 'vaśī': 'self-controlled

• master of oneself', 'nava-dvāre': 'with nine gates (nine bodily openings)', 'pure': 'in the city (metaphor for the body as a city)', 'dehī': 'the embodied self

• the one who dwells in the body', 'na eva': 'not at all

• in no way', 'kurvan': 'doing

• acting', 'na kārayan': 'nor causing (others) to do

Speaker

अर्जुन उवाच

Characters & Entities

• Arjuna
• dehī (embodied self)
• nava-dvāra-pura (the body as the city of nine gates)

Educational Q&A

What is the core teaching?

The verse teaches inner renunciation and non-doership: the wise, self-controlled embodied being mentally lays aside ownership of all actions and abides peacefully in the body, without the ego-sense of ‘I do’ or ‘I make others do’. Ethical agency is purified by removing compulsion, domination, and attachment to results.

What is happening in the narrative?

In the Bhīṣma Parva’s philosophical instruction context, Arjuna voices a teaching about the state of the realized person: even while dwelling in the body (the ‘city of nine gates’), such a person remains inwardly established in the Self, free from the sense of acting or instigating action.