Bhagavad Gītā Chapter 15, Verse 10: Krishna to Arjuna — Puruṣottama-Yoga

Bhāṣyakāra purports

• Śaṅkaraadvaita

  The self (ātman) — departing a prior body, residing within a present one, or experiencing sense-objects along with the qualities (guṇas) of pleasure, pain, and delusion — remains in plain sight, yet the deluded (vimūḍha), whose minds are drawn entirely toward seen and unseen enjoyments, do not perceive it at all. The Lord's compassionate lament ('aho kaṣṭam') signals that ignorance here is not metaphysical distance but a failure of discrimination (viveka). Only those whose eye is knowledge (jñāna-cakṣus), whose vision is purified by valid means of knowing (pramāṇa-janita-jñāna), truly see it.

• Rāmānujaviśiṣṭādvaita

  The jīva (individual self), though inseparably associated with a body-form constituted of the transformations of sattva and the other qualities (guṇas) — departing one such body-configuration, abiding in another, or enjoying the sense-objects arising from that configuration — is categorically distinct in form (vivikte-ākāra) from any such body-form; the deluded, who identify the self with the body (piṇḍātmābhimāninah), fail to see this distinction. Those possessed of the knowledge that discriminates self from body (piṇḍātma-viveka-viṣaya-jñāna), however, perceive the jīva in all conditions as invariably distinct from its material envelope, which is itself the body of Bhagavān.

• Madhvadvaita

  *Tarhī kim iti na dṛśyate* (then why is it not seen?) — this is precisely what the verse answers, beginning with *utkrāmantam* (departing). The objection is weak (*mandāśaṅkā*): if there were no inner controller (*niyāmaka*) beyond the *jīva* in the body, that absence would be the reason for non-perception. But the verse states no such absence. Rather, *vimūḍhā* (the thoroughly deluded) fail to perceive the *jīva* — *guṇānvita* (bound with the three *guṇa*s) — as it departs (*utkrāmantam*), abides (*sthitam*), or enjoys (*bhuñjānam*), precisely because they do not know Hari as *niyāmaka*. *Vimūḍhatva* (the condition of delusion) is the cause of *anupalambha* (non-apprehension); the Lord's absence is not. Only *jñāna-cakṣuṣaḥ* — those whose eye is *jñāna*, opened by Hari's *anugraha* — *paśyanti*, behold the *paratantra* *jīva* in its actual dependent motion.

• Vallabhaśuddhādvaita

  The jīva, wrapped in the body-configuration of the three qualities, passing from one body to another, or enjoying sense-objects, remains invisible to the deluded who take the body to be the self (piṇḍātmābhimāninah) — this is the condition of those outside Kṛṣṇa's prasāda. Vallabha's reading of vivikta-ākāra (the distinct form of the self) points toward the jīva's essential character as a spark of Kṛṣṇa's own ānanda-svarūpa, concealed only by adherence to quality-laden prakṛti; the knowledge-eye (jñāna-cakṣus) that sees through all conditions is itself prasāda-granted vision. To see the jīva as distinct in every state is already to participate in Kṛṣṇa's own delight in his own creation.

• Śrīdharabhakti

  Śrīdhara Svāmī reads the verse as a plain diagnostic: the jīva, equipped with the sense-faculties (indriyādiyukta), is called 'guṇānvita' precisely because it is associated with the instruments of enjoyment — departing from one body, dwelling in another, or tasting sense-objects through these instruments. The undiscriminating (vimūḍha) neither look (na ālokayanti) nor perceive; those for whom knowledge itself is the eye (jñānam eva cakṣuḥ) — the discerning (vivekina) — do see. The verse's force is devotional insofar as jñāna here is not abstract philosophy but the bhakta's clarity of inner sight cultivated through steady practice.

• Madhusūdanaadvaita-bhakti

  Madhusūdana follows Śaṅkara closely — the self, visible (darśana-yogya) in all states yet invisible to those whose minds are dragged by the vāsanās of seen and unseen enjoyment (dṛṣṭādṛṣṭa-viṣaya-bhoga-vāsanā-kṛṣṭa-cetas), is perceived only by those with the knowledge-eye (jñāna-cakṣus) born of valid cognition (pramāṇa-janita). His distinctive synthesis appears in his retention of the Lord's compassionate cry ('aho kaṣṭam') as the emotional register of the verse: the Kṛṣṇa who laments the blindness of the deluded is simultaneously the jñānin's sole object of vision — Advaita insight and bhakti warmth converge at the moment the jñāna-cakṣus opens.