Bhagavad Gītā Chapter 13, Verse 7: Krishna to Arjuna — Kṣetra-Kṣetrajña-Vibhāga-Yoga

Bhāṣyakāra purports

• Śaṅkaraadvaita

  These eight qualities — freedom from pride (amanitvam), freedom from pretence (adambhitvam), non-injury (ahimsa), forbearance (ksanti), uprightness (arjavam), attendance on the teacher (acaryopasanam), purity (saucam), steadiness (sthairyam), and self-restraint (atma-vigraha) — are designated jnana by the Lord because they constitute the indispensable equipment (sadhana) that makes a seeker fit (adhikrta) to realize the knowable (jneya). Sankara is explicit: the aspirant who possesses this group is a samnyasi established in jnana-nistha. These virtues are not ends in themselves but the clearing of the field (ksetra) so that the witnessing awareness that is the kshetrajna may stand forth unobstructed.

  divergence: Advaita reads these qualities purely as preparation for nirvikalpa-jnana; they cease to be 'virtues' and become epistemological clearing operations.

• Rāmānujaviśiṣṭādvaita

  Each quality is precisely defined as a relational virtue oriented toward Bhagavan and his devotees: amanitvam is the absence of contempt even toward one's superiors; acaryopasanam is full surrender to the teacher who grants atma-jnana through pranipata, pariprasna, and seva; saucam is the scriptural fitness of mind, speech, and body for atma-jnana and its means; sthairyam is unshakeable certainty regarding the truths taught in adhyatma-sastra. These are the interior disciplines of bhakti-yoga preparation, not mere ethical polish.

  divergence: Visistadvaita makes every virtue explicitly relational and devotional — they orient the jiva toward the acarya and ultimately toward Isvara, not toward cognitive absorption.

• Madhvadvaita

  *Amānitvam* (absence of pride), *adambhitvam* (absence of ostentation), *ahiṃsā* (non-injury), *kṣānti* (forbearance), *ārjavam* (straightforwardness), *ācāryopāsanam* (attendance upon the teacher), *śaucam* (purity), *sthairyam* (steadiness), *ātma-vinigrahaḥ* (self-restraint) — Madhva reads this list as enumerating modifications (*vikārāḥ*) that belong to the *kṣetra* (the field), not to the *kṣetrajña* (the field-knower). As Jayatīrtha notes, the verse continues the enumeration begun with *mahābhūtāni*: *icchādayo vikārāḥ* — desire and the rest are transformations of the field. *Amānitvam* and its companions are thus qualities that arise within the *paratantra* *jīva* (the eternally dependent individual self) precisely as field-phenomena, not as autonomous self-generated attainments. Each quality registers the *jīva*'s proper orientation toward *Hari* — absence of pride before the *svatantra* (self-sufficient) Lord, absence of false display, steady restraint — while remaining ontologically distinct from the knower who witnesses them. The *pañca-bheda* (the five-fold real distinction) is presupposed throughout: the qualities listed belong to the field; the Lord who is their ultimate ground stands wholly apart.

  divergence: Madhva's bhāṣya on 13.7 is compressed to *icchādayo vikārāḥ*; Jayatīrtha's *Nyāya-sudhā* supplies the framing that connects this verse to the prior kṣetra-enumeration. The rendering follows that combined testimony directly.

• Vallabhaśuddhādvaita

  These qualities arise not as personal achievements but as prasada-flows from Krsna's own svabhava descending into the bhakta who has fully surrendered. Amanitvam is not an act of will but the natural dissolution of the ego-knot when Krsna's grace (pusthi) floods the antahkarana; acaryopasanam is the loving attendance on the one through whom Krsna's rasa reaches the world. Sthairyam is the steadiness of one absorbed in the Lord's lila, who no longer oscillates because there is nowhere else to go.

  divergence: Vallabha's direct 13.7 prose targets the preceding ksetra-verse; the prasada-frame is his documented hermeneutic applied here. Mark as INFERRED for the quality-list application.

• Śrīdharabhakti

  Absence of pride (*amānitvam*), absence of ostentation (*adambhitvam*), non-injury (*ahiṃsā*), patience (*kṣānti*), straightforwardness (*ārjavam*), attendance on one's teacher (*ācāryopāsanaṃ*), purity (*śaucaṃ*), steadiness (*sthairyam*), and self-restraint (*ātma-vinigrahaḥ*): Śrīdhara reads these nine as the inner qualifications (*adhikāra*) that open a student to the knowledge of *kṣetra* and *kṣetrajña* (*kṣetra-kṣetrajña-viveka*). *Amānitvam* and *adambhitvam* together dissolve the twin obstacles of self-inflation and performative display that close the heart to *guru*-instruction. *Ahiṃsā* and *kṣānti* steady the relational ground within which the teacher's word can take root. *Ārjavam* binds outer conduct to inner intention, so no gap opens between what is professed and what is practiced. *Ācāryopāsanaṃ* is the axis: devotion to the teacher (*guru-bhakti*) channels all the other qualities toward their telos, the direct reception of liberating knowledge. *Śaucaṃ*, *sthairyam*, and *ātma-vinigrahaḥ* together purify, stabilize, and master the body-mind complex that Śrīdhara, following the verse's own logic, identifies as *kṣetra* — the field — rather than the knowing self. One who cultivates these qualities is fit to hear, hold, and realize the *viveka* that the remainder of the chapter will unfold.

  divergence: Śrīdhara's bhāṣya on the immediately adjacent verses (13.5–6) focuses on *kṣetra*-enumeration and the Chāndogya-derived list of mental modifications (kāma, saṅkalpa, vicikitsā, etc.) as *kṣetra*-dharmas. The present reading extends that orientation to 13.7: the nine qualities listed here belong to the *adhikārin*, the qualified aspirant, who must first distinguish himself from the *kṣetra* he is about to analyze.

• Madhusūdanaadvaita-bhakti

  Madhusudhana holds both registers simultaneously: these qualities are jnana-sadhanas in the Sankara sense (clearing the vikara-field so the nirvikarana witness shines) AND they are the natural overflow of the bhakta's love for Krsna. Amanitvam is simultaneously the philosopher's non-grasping and the lover's forgetting of self in the beloved; sthairyam is both the Advaitic 'unshakeability regarding adhyatma-sastra truths' (Ramanuja's phrasing) and the bhakta's one-pointed fixity on Krsna's form. The list therefore works in both directions: it leads the jnani to absorption and confirms the bhakta's arrival.

  divergence: Madhusudhana's direct commentary on the 13.7 quality-list is inferred from his bhashya frame; the supplied prose covers 13.5-6. Mark as PARTIALLY INFERRED.