Bhagavad Gītā Chapter 17, Verse 13: Krishna to Arjuna — Śraddhātraya-Vibhāga-Yoga

Bhāṣyakāra purports

• Śaṅkaraadvaita

  A yajña (sacrifice) is declared tamasic (tamas-driven) when it is vidhi-hina (devoid of scriptural injunction) — that is, performed contrary to what the texts prescribe. Equally disqualifying: no anna is distributed to brahmanas (asrishta-anna), the mantras are defective in svara (accent) or varna (phoneme), the prescribed dakshina (honorarium) is withheld, and shraddha (reverential intent) is wholly absent. Shankara's gloss is terse and enumerative: each defect is a category of negation, and their conjunction produces rite that generates tamas rather than antahkarana-shuddhi (purification of the inner instrument) needed as prerequisite for jnana.

  divergence: Shankara lists: vidhi-hinam = ‘viparita of what the text commands'; asrishta-annam = ‘anna not given to brahmanas'; mantra-hinam = ‘defective in svara, varna, or the mantra itself'; adakshinam = ‘without the stipulated honorarium'; shraddha-virahitam = tamo-nirvritta (produced by tamas).

• Rāmānujaviśiṣṭādvaita

  Ramanuja specifies that vidhi-hina means lacking the directive of qualified brahmanas who know proper conduct (sadachara-yukta, vidhi-vid brahmanas) — concretely, the rite performed without those knowers saying ‘yajasva' (you should sacrifice). Asrishta-anna for him is achudita-dravya, material not enjoined by the canon. The remaining defects — mantra-hina, adakshina, and shraddha-virahita — compound the disqualification. In Ramanuja's frame, a rite stripped of Bhagavan's sanction through proper brahmana mediation fails as kainkarya (service) and cannot serve as upaya (means) toward bhakti-yoga.

  divergence: Ramanuja: ‘vidhi-hinam = brahmana-ukta-vidhi-hinam... yajasya iti ukti-hinam; asrishta-annam = achudita-dravyam' — the emphasis is on brahmana-mediated sanction, not mere textual compliance.

• Madhvadvaita

  Reconstructed from the dvaita school's doctrine, not translated from Madhva's commentary at this verse.

  Vidhi-hīnam (devoid of Vedic injunction), asṛṣṭānnam (without distribution of food), mantra-hīnam (lacking proper mantra-recitation), adakṣiṇam (without sacrificial honorarium), and śraddhā-virahitam (bereft of śraddhā, faith) — a sacrifice carrying all five deficiencies is declared tāmasa. From the dvaita reading, each of these five elements is not merely formal but ontologically required: the paratantra jīva has no independent capacity to generate valid worship; prescribed vidhi, mantra, dakṣiṇā, anna-distribution, and śraddhā together constitute the structure through which bhakti as ontological subordination actually reaches svatantra Hari. Strip any one, and the rite falls outside Viṣṇu-sevā altogether. Strip all five, and the act is not a degraded sacrifice — it is no sacrifice at all, a tāmasa counterfeit that reinforces bheda-blindness rather than realizing the pañca-bheda (the five-fold real distinction: Lord–jīva, Lord–matter, jīva–jīva, jīva–matter, matter–matter) in its proper devotional order. Taratamya (graded ontological hierarchy) demands that offerings ascend through exact prescription; a tāmasa rite, performed without these qualifications, cannot occupy any position in that ascent.

  divergence: No bhāṣya from Madhva or Jayatīrtha is extant on this verse. The reading is voiced directly from dvaita siddhānta applied to the mūla's five named deficiencies.

• Vallabhaśuddhādvaita

  Reconstructed from the śuddhādvaita school's doctrine, not translated from Vallabha's commentary at this verse.

  Vidhi-hīna (devoid of injunctive order), asṛṣṭānna (with no food distributed), mantra-hīna (stripped of sacred utterance), adakṣiṇam (without honorific gift), and śraddhā-virahita (emptied of faith) — such a yajña (sacrifice) is declared tāmasa (of the nature of tamas). In śuddhādvaita, Brahman alone is real and the world is Brahman's own self-manifestation (svābhāvika expression), not a māyā-conjured shadow. Sacrifice therefore belongs to this real world as a genuine act of sevā (loving service) before Śrī Kṛṣṇa. A rite meeting none of these five conditions is not merely procedurally deficient; it is wholly severed from the current of puṣṭi (Kṛṣṇa's sustaining grace). Puṣṭi-mārga (the path of grace) holds that Kṛṣṇa's descent of grace requires a vessel — an act offered with śraddhā (faith-filled earnestness), proper vidhi (injunctive form), mantra, dakṣiṇā, and shared anna (food). When all five are absent, the act carries no brahma-sambandha (binding relation to Brahman); the one who performs it is, in effect, acting for himself alone, which is the mark of tamas. The rasa (devotional-aesthetic flavor) that transforms rite into prasāda-occasion requires at minimum the śraddhā that opens the jīva to puṣṭi; without it, Kṛṣṇa's grace finds no opening, and what remains is mechanical motion devoid of prema (love).

  divergence: No bhāṣya from Vallabhācārya on this verse is transmitted. The reading is voiced directly from śuddhādvaita siddhānta — the real-world-as-Brahman-manifestation doctrine, puṣṭi-mārga, brahma-sambandha, and sevā — applied to the five defects named in the mūla.

• Śrīdharabhakti

  Sridhara introduces the verse explicitly as ‘he now describes tamasic sacrifice' and glosses vidhi-hina as shastra-ukta-vidhi-shunya (wholly empty of the procedure the shastra has articulated). Asrishta-anna: the food ingredient not given forth, not prepared for brahmanas and the like. The wise (shishtas) declare such a rite — mantra-defective, honorarium-lacking, faith-empty — to be tamasic. His voice is balanced and pedagogical: the five defects form a complete checklist of what the tradition's practitioners would recognize as disqualifying a public rite.

  divergence: Sridhara: ‘vidhi-hinam = shastra-ukta-vidhi-shunyam; asrishta-annam = brahmanadi-bhyah na srishtam na nishpaditam annam yasmin tam; ... shishtas tamasam parichakshate.’

• Madhusūdanaadvaita-bhakti

  Madhusudana accepts Shankara's enumeration but extends it analytically: each of the five defects (vidhi-hina, anna-dana-hina, svara-varna-mantra-hina, dakshina-hina, shraddha-rahita) constitutes a distinct tamasic species — five mono-defect variants, one penta-defect form, and multiple combinatorial forms. He adds a pointed contrast: in a rajasic rite, even without antahkarana-shuddhi, apurva (unseen karmic result) accrues because the procedure is correctly executed; in the tamasic rite, incorrect execution produces no apurva whatsoever — making it worse than the rajasic in metaphysical yield. The synthesizing voice surfaces in his noting that the shraddha-defect often arises from rtvij-dvesha (animosity toward the officiants), pointing toward the bhakti-register of interior disposition.

  divergence: Madhusudana: ‘vidhi-hinatvad-eka-eka-visheshanah pancha-vidhah... sarva-visheshana-samuccayena chaikavido iti shat... tamase tv ayatha-shastra-anushthanan na kimapi apurvam asti iti atishayah; rtvij-dvesha-adina shraddha-rahitam.’