Bhagavad Gītā Chapter 18, Verse 15: Krishna to Arjuna — Mokṣa-Sannyāsa-Yoga

Bhāṣyakāra purports

• Śaṅkaraadvaita

  Whatever action a person sets in motion through body, speech, or mind — whether sanctioned by scripture (nyayya) or contrary to it — every such act, down to the blinking of an eye, is the effect of prior dharma and adharma. Sankara insists: the five causes listed are not competitors to bodily-vocal-mental instrumentality but its analytic decomposition, since all action collapses into these three channels even when subtle. The fivefold causation is therefore internally consistent and raises no contradiction.

  divergence: Shankara: 'vidhipratisedhalaksanam sarvam karma shariradityapradhanam tadangataya darshanashravanadi ca jivanalaksanam tridhava rashikrtam' — all prescriptive and prohibitive action is principally bodily-vocal-mental; even perception and life-functions are subsumed into those three channels.

• Rāmānujaviśiṣṭādvaita

  Every deed performed through body, speech, or mind — prescribed or forbidden — has five causes, of which the fifth, called daiva (the divine), is Paramatman (the supreme self) dwelling as inner-ruler (antaryamin). Ramanuja cites BG 15.15 and 18.61: Ishvara stands in the heart of all beings, granting or withholding his sanction, so jiva's agency is real but radically dependent. Scripture remains operative because jiva's own effort is the necessary precondition for divine permission — just as moving a large stone requires many persons each of whom is nonetheless a real cause.

  divergence: Ramanuja: 'daivam ca eva atra pancamam atra karma hetukalaape daivam pancamam Paramatma antaryami karmanishpattau pradhanah hetuh' — the fifth cause in the causal cluster is Paramatman as inner-ruler, the primary efficient cause of action-completion.

• Madhvadvaita

  The five causes are: the body-complex as adhishthana (locus), Vishnu himself as the true karta (agent) — for jiva is fundamentally non-agent — the sense-instruments as karana, the various chesta (movements) including prior-life impressions, and daiva understood as adrsta (unseen past karma). Madhva is unambiguous: the real agent is Vishnu alone; jiva's apparent agency is entirely borrowed and derivative. The Ayasya-shruti is cited as scriptural warrant.

  divergence: Madhva: 'karta Vishnuh sa hi sarvakarta iti uktam jivasyaca akartrtve pramanam uktam' — Vishnu is the agent, as has been declared; the non-agency of jiva has been established by proof-texts.

• Vallabhaśuddhādvaita

  Vallabha endorses the antaryamin reading for the fifth cause but roots it in Krishna's svarupa (essential nature) as the universal interior — 'hrdi sarvasya dhishthitam' (13.18). All five causes are ultimately Krishna's lila-prasada (play-grace): the body he gave, the instruments he empowers, the breath-movements (pranadi) he sustains, and his own inner presence as the completing cause. Jiva's kartrtva is real as tad-amsha (a portion of his lordship), not as independent agency.

  divergence: Vallabha: 'vastutah pancasankhyapuranam uttamam antaryamijrupam karmamatranishpattau pradhanam hetuh' — the fifth, completing the count of five, is the antaryamin-form of Krishna, the primary cause in all action-completion.

• Śrīdharabhakti

  Sridhara gives a clean, philological reading: the five causes already stated apply to all three kinds of action — bodily, verbal, and mental — whether the act is dharmic (nyayya) or its opposite. His commentary is notably terse here, collecting the previous verse's analysis and applying it without additional metaphysical elaboration.

  divergence: Sridhara: 'shariradibhir yadyat karma dharmyam va adharmyam va karoti naras tasya sarvasya karmana ete pancha hetavah' — whatever bodily-verbal-mental action a person performs, righteous or unrighteous, these five are its causes.

• Madhusūdanaadvaita-bhakti

  Madhusudana follows Sankara's structural reading closely — all action collapses into the three instruments (sharira, vak, manas), and the Nyaya-sutra's 'pravrttir vagbuddhisharirarambhah' is cited to show that 'mind' stands in for intellect as the leading instrument. Even ordinary life-functions like blinking fall under the nyayya/viparita binary via their prior-karma basis. The five causes are causes of all karma without remainder.

  divergence: Madhusudana: 'shariram vaca manasa va yat karma prarabhate nirvartayati naro manushyadhikaratvacchhastrasya... pancha ete yathoktah adhisthanadayas tasya sarvasyaiva karmano hetavah karanani' — citing Nyaya, he confirms: for the human adhikari, all action whatever has these five causes.