Bhagavad Gītā Chapter 18, Verse 67: Krishna to Arjuna — Mokṣa-Sannyāsa-Yoga

Bhāṣyakāra purports

• Śaṅkaraadvaita

  This teaching (shastra) — which I have spoken for your liberation from samsara — must never be given to one without tapas (austerity), for such a person lacks the inner purification that makes the teaching operable. Even one endowed with tapas but lacking bhakti toward guru and Ishvara, or one who serves but does not hear with the disposition of a shishya, is unfit. He who envies me — projecting faults onto my Ishvaratva out of ignorance, treating me as an ordinary manushya — is the most disqualified of all; the teaching given to such a one is not merely wasted but potentially harmful. Shankara's rule: the teaching flows only to one who unites shushrusha (attentive service), bhakti, tapas, and freedom from asuya (envy) toward Bhagavan — and where tapas and medha (intellect) are alternatives to each other, bhakti and shushrusha are never optional.

• Rāmānujaviśiṣṭādvaita

  This supreme secret teaching (parama guhyam shastra) that I have declared to you is not to be spoken to one who has not performed tapas, nor — under any circumstance — to one who lacks bhakti toward both the speaker and Bhagavan himself. Even a devotee who is filled with bhakti is unfit if he lacks shushrusha (the disposition of humble service-hearing). Most emphatically, it must never be given to one who exposes fault in my svarupa, my aishvarya, or my guna — Ramanuja's shift in grammatical case (asamana-vibhakti) for this final qualifier signals that such a person is to be avoided utterly, not merely passed over. The teaching is a kainkarya-gift: it flows only where there is readiness to receive it as grace.

• Madhvadvaita

  *Idaṃ* — this teaching of *Bhagavān*'s absolute *svatantra* (self-sufficient, independently real) lordship — is never to be spoken (*na vācyam*) to the *atapaska*, one who has not taken up the discipline of *tapas* (austerity) that purifies the *jīva* (individual self) for reception of *tattva*-knowledge; nor to the *abhakta*, one who withholds the ontological subordination of *bhakti* (devotion) that alone constitutes the *jīva*'s proper relation to Hari; nor to one who is *aśuśrūṣu*, who refuses the obedient hearing through which *paratantra* existence is acknowledged; nor to the one who bears *abhyasūyā* (envy, spite) toward *māṃ*, toward the *Bhagavān* himself. Each disqualification names a specific failure to recognize the *pañca-bheda* (the five-fold real distinction — Lord from *jīva*, Lord from matter, *jīva* from *jīva*, *jīva* from matter, matter from matter) that structures all existence. The envious one does not merely misunderstand; he actively resists the *bheda* between his own *paratantra* status and Hari's *svatantra* supremacy — making him not merely unfit but opposed in the very orientation of his will. *Adhikāra* (qualification for instruction) is thus grounded in ontology: the *jīva* who has not accepted his own dependence cannot receive the knowledge of what Hari independently is.

• Vallabhaśuddhādvaita

  Vallabha is characteristically terse: having taught the gita-jnana — the entire secret of his own svarupa and lila — Bhagavan now regulates its sampradaya-pravartana (transmission). The teaching is not to be given to the atapaska. The logic of Pushti-marga goes further than restraint: the gita-jnanam is Krishna's prasada; it flows only where there is the vessel of tapas, bhakti, and shushrusha prepared by Krishna's own grace (pushti). To give it to the unprepared is to mistake the teaching for information; it is in fact a living gift that only becomes active in a prepared vessel.

• Śrīdharabhakti

  Sridhara clarifies each qualification with practical precision: atapaska means one deficient in svadharma-anushthana (practice of one's own duty) — not merely ascetic austerity but ethical seriousness in one's station; abhakta means one empty of bhakti toward both guru and Ishvara simultaneously; ashushrushu is one who does not perform paricharyam (attending service) even while possessing other qualities. The one who 'nindati' (calumnies) me — treating the Parameshvara through a manushya-drishti (human lens), projecting faults — is the fourth and final disqualification. Sridhara's reading: each qualifier removes a different class of student; a qualified recipient must clear all four.

• Madhusūdanaadvaita-bhakti

  Madhusudana reads this verse as the shastra-sampradaya-vidhi — the formal rule of transmission for all shastra-artha-rahasya. He follows Shankara's structural analysis but emphasizes bhagavad-anurakti (deep affection for Krishna) as the living heart of qualification: shushrusha, guru-bhakti, and bhagavad-anurakti form an inseparable triad. The four 'na' (negations) are deliberate — each removes one class of aspirant regardless of other merits, because even one missing quality makes the teaching inert. Critically, Madhusudana notes that medha and tapas are pakshika (alternative to each other) but bhagavad-anurakti, guru-bhakti, and shushrusha are niyama (invariably required) — this is the bhashyakrit's ruling that he explicitly preserves.