Bhagavad Gītā Chapter 18, Verse 12: Krishna to Arjuna — Mokṣa-Sannyāsa-Yoga

Bhāṣyakāra purports

• Śaṅkaraadvaita

  The three-fold fruit of action — the undesired (hell and animal births), the desired (divine states), and the mixed (human existence) — arises after death for those who have not relinquished, whose avidya (ignorance) projects action, agent, and result onto the atman (Self) as if real. But for the true sannyasi (renunciant) — the paramahansa, grounded solely in kevala-jnana (pure non-dual knowledge) — no such fruit arises anywhere, ever. This is because right vision (samyag-darsana) uproots the very seed of samsara: when action-agency-result are seen as superimposed by avidya, nothing remains to bear fruit.

• Rāmānujaviśiṣṭādvaita

  The three-fold fruit — hell, heaven, and their mixture (children, cattle, food) — accrues after action to those who have not relinquished kartritva (sense of personal doership), mamata (possessiveness), and phala-abhisandhi (fruit-desire). The true sannyasi, who has surrendered all three, never incurs any fruit that obstructs moksha (liberation). The key: nityakarmas (obligatory rites) like the Agnihotra, when performed with their fruits re-directed to Bhagavan as kainkarya (loving service), are freed from the liberation-opposing fruit — as the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad confirms, 'By sacrifice, gift, and austerity they desire to know him.'

• Madhvadvaita

  Madhva glosses this verse as *tyāgaṃ stauti* — a praise of renunciation — marking the verse's function with *aniṣṭam iti* as the opening signal. The three-fold fruit of action — *aniṣṭam* (the unwanted), *iṣṭam* (the wanted), and *miśram* (the mixed) — accrues *pretya* (after death) to *atyāginām* (those who do not renounce), never to the *saṃnyāsin*. Jayatīrtha presses the question: if *karmafalābhāva* (the absence of karmic fruit) is simply *saṃsāranivṛtti* (cessation of rebirth), how is that spoken of as the *tyāgaphala* (fruit of renunciation)? He resolves this by cross-reference: *upapaditam etat tyāgāc chāntiḥ* [12.12] — it has already been established there. The *jīva* (the individual self), eternally *paratantra* (dependent) on Hari, generates bondage through any act not surrendered to the *svatantra* (independently real, self-sufficient) Lord; the *saṃnyāsin* who has relinquished the fruit and the conceit of independent agency is untouched by this three-fold result, *kvacit* — in no circumstance whatsoever.

• Vallabhaśuddhādvaita

  Vallabha addresses the prima facie objection: if scriptures enjoin sacrifices with stated fruits (like prajapati-yajna for householders), must those fruits not necessarily follow even for the unintentional performer, as seeds once sown sprout regardless? He resolves this by distinguishing the mode of performance: for those who have surrendered kartritva and phala-kama (fruit-desire), even obligatory rites performed with desire-tainted water do not sprout liberation-opposing fruits. Action offered as Bhagavad-arpita (dedicated to the Lord) belongs to Bhagavan's lila (divine play), and so the sannyasi — here the one who has abandoned kartritva and dedicated all to Krishna — incurs no binding fruit whatsoever.

• Śrīdharabhakti

  Sridhara gives the verse its most economical devotional reading: the undesired fruit is hell-existence (narakatva), the desired is divine-existence (devatva), and the mixed is human-existence (manusyatva) — corresponding to demerit, merit, and their combination. All three accrue only to the sakama (desire-motivated) performer. The term 'sannyasi' here, Sridhara notes, deliberately includes karma-phala-tyagis (renouncers of fruit) by extension — as the Gita itself uses 'sannyasi' for one who acts without clinging to fruit (6.1). Since such persons are sattvika (pure) and offer results to Ishvara (the Lord), neither the inauspicious nor the auspicious fruit binds them.

• Madhusūdanaadvaita-bhakti

  Madhusudana opens with a sharp dialectical challenge: if both the nominal renunciant (karma-phala-tyagi) and the true renunciant (sarva-karma-sannyasi with Paramatma-jnana) have given up fruit-desire, what is their actual difference in fruit that justifies calling one 'secondary' and the other 'primary'? He answers: the nominal sannyasi, dying before vividishiparanta (reaching full desire-to-know), still bears a residual body through prior karma — the three-fold fruit of rebirth is not blocked because avidya remains. The true sannyasi, with direct Paramatma-sakshatkara (Self-realization), burns away avidya and all its karmic offspring simultaneously, as the Mundaka Upanishad confirms: 'The knot of the heart is broken, all doubts are cut, and his karmas dissolve when the Supreme is seen.' No further embodiment — only videha-kaivalya (bodiless liberation).