Bhagavad Gītā Chapter 1, Verse 44: Arjuna to Krishna — Arjuna-Viṣāda-Yoga

Bhāṣyakāra purports

• Śaṅkaraadvaita

  For men in whom kula-dharma (family obligation) has been destroyed, O Janārdana, a fixed sojourn in naraka (hell) is the result — this is what we have received by oral transmission. [Rendered from mūla alone; no Śaṅkara bhāṣya available for this verse. The Advaita reading would treat naraka as a metaphor for the self-perpetuating cycle of adharma rather than a literal place, but that reading cannot be anchored here without fabrication.]

• Rāmānujaviśiṣṭādvaita

  Arjuna, that great-souled one (mahāmanāḥ), supremely compassionate and deeply dharmic, observing those about to be slain with bonds of affection and extreme grief, declares he will not fight — and in that very declaration reveals the dharma-fear that underlies verse 1.44: when kula-dharma (family duty) is uprooted, naraka (hellish consequence) follows as certainly as fruit follows flower. Rāmānuja's prose shows the collapse is not intellectual but visceral — svinna-sarva-gātra (all limbs sweating), the body itself testifying to the weight of dharmic disruption. The verse is Arjuna's heard wisdom (anūśuśruma — 'so we have heard') justifying his paralysis before Bhagavān.

• Madhvadvaita

  For those men in whom kula-dharma has been destroyed, O Janārdana, dwelling in naraka (hell) is certain — thus it has been heard. [Rendered from mūla alone; no Madhva bhāṣya available. The Dvaita reading would emphasize that jīvas eternally dependent on Hari who abandon their dharmic station fall into tamas, but this cannot be textually anchored here without fabrication.]

• Vallabhaśuddhādvaita

  Men whose kula-dharmas (family observances) have collapsed, O Janārdana, are destined for naraka (hell) — this is the śruti-vākya (received teaching) Arjuna invokes. [Rendered from mūla alone; no Vallabha bhāṣya available. The Puṣṭi-mārga reading would ask whether even naraka is Kṛṣṇa's līlā-space, but that reading cannot be anchored without fabrication.]

• Śrīdharabhakti

  For humanity in whom kula-dharma (ancestral duty) has been destroyed, O Janārdana, a fixed residence in naraka is the consequence — this is what we have traditionally heard (anūśuśruma). [Rendered from mūla alone; Śrīdhara payload empty. The bhakti-philological reading would note that anūśuśruma — the first-person plural 'we have heard' — locates this claim in śruti-smṛti inheritance, not in Arjuna's personal reasoning, and thus it carries communal dharmic authority rather than private fear.]

• Madhusūdanaadvaita-bhakti

  Madhusūdana observes that Arjuna, grieving over his own rashness (aviмṛśya-kāritā — acting without deliberation), recognizes the war-resolve aimed at slaying kinsmen as supremely sinful (pāpiṣṭhatara). Verse 1.44 is the śāstra-citation that locks this reasoning: utsanna-kula-dharmāṇām — for those whose kula-dharmas have been destroyed — naraka-vāsa (hell-dwelling) is niyata (certain), and this Arjuna has received by transmission (anūśuśruma). Madhusūdana's point is that Arjuna is not merely emotional but is constructing a śāstric argument, however misdirected — the very argument Kṛṣṇa will dismantle from 2.11 onward.