Bhagavad Gītā Chapter 18, Verse 6: Krishna to Arjuna — Mokṣa-Sannyāsa-Yoga

Bhāṣyakāra purports

• Śaṅkaraadvaita

  These acts of yajna (sacrifice), dana (giving), and tapas (austerity) are purifying precisely because they can be performed without sanga (attachment) and without craving for phala (fruit). Sankara reads the api ('even these') not as comparison to other rites but as pointing directly at the mumuksu (liberation-seeker): even these can bind if done with desire, so they must be done without kartrtva-abhinivesa (insistence on being the doer). His settled, supreme view is that niṣkama-karma here is the path for one still under adhikara (qualified duty), not a recommendation of kamya-karma alongside nityakarma.

• Rāmānujaviśiṣṭādvaita

  Ramanuja reads yajna, dana, tapas as madAradhana-rupani (forms of worship of the Lord), not merely purificatory acts with a secondary devotional flavour. Sanga here is mamata (possessiveness) toward the act itself, and its abandonment allows the mumuksu to perform these rites ahar-ahar (day after day) continuously right up to the moment of liberation, in the same spirit as upasana (meditative worship). This is Bhagavan's own settled, supreme matam: kainkarya executed without self-claim or fruit-hunger.

• Madhvadvaita

  *Etānyapi tu karmāṇi saṅgaṃ tyaktvā phalāni ca | kartavyānīti me pārtha niścitaṃ matamuttamam* — even these acts of yajña, dāna, and tapas are to be performed without *saṅga* (attachment to agency) and without *phala-āsakti* (clinging to result): this is Kṛṣṇa's *uttama mata* (highest declared position). The *jīva* (the individual self) is *paratantra* (eternally dependent); its agency is always derivative, subordinate to the *svatantra* (self-sufficient, independently real) sovereignty of Hari. *Saṅga* is not merely a psychological flaw but an ontological error: it misattributes the authorship of action to the *jīva* as if it were *svatantra*, violating the *bheda* (real distinction) between Lord and bound self. To relinquish *saṅga* is to restore that *bheda* to its proper recognition. The acts themselves remain *kartavya* (obligatory) because Hari's will sustains them and their fruit belongs entirely to Him. Renunciation is never renunciation of the acts but of the twin errors of independent agency and proprietary claim over result. *Bhakti* (devotion) as ontological subordination is thus not opposed to *karma* but is its innermost form: action performed in full acknowledgment of the *jīva*'s dependence on Hari is itself devotional *sevā*. Kṛṣṇa's verdict — *niścitaṃ matamuttamam*, the settled supreme opinion — closes any space for either quietist abandonment or self-assertive action; both deviate from the *paratantra* truth of the *jīva*'s constitution.

• Vallabhaśuddhādvaita

  Even where *kartavyatva* (the bindingness of action) has been established among the *brahma-vādins* — *evaṃ brahma-vādinām kartavyatve prāpte'pi tu* — the teaching presses further: *saṅgam*, that is, *sva-kartṛtva-abhiniveśa* (insistence on one's own agency), and *guṇamaya-rocanārthāni phalāni* (fruits whose appeal is woven from the three guṇas), both must be relinquished. Action persisting after that relinquishment — *tyaktvā kartavyānīti* — is what Krishna names his *niścitaṃ matam*: the *vicakṣaṇābhimata* (considered, discerning) conclusion. And it is *uttamam*, highest across all views — *uttamaṃ caitatsa rvamate ṣvityāha uttamamiti* — Kṛṣṇa's certified, supreme *matam* standing above every competing position.

• Śrīdharabhakti

  Sridhara asks: in what manner must these purifying acts be done? The answer is twofold: abandon sanga as kartrtva-abhinivesa (the sense 'I am doer'), and abandon phala-apeksa (expectation of fruit). What remains is kevalam Isvara-aradhana (pure worship of the Lord alone). Sridhara's voice is concise and devotionally warm: the act itself becomes the puja when the self-claim and reward-hunger are removed. That is why this matanam is uuttamam — best — because it neither rejects the rite nor lets the ego colonize it.

• Madhusūdanaadvaita-bhakti

  Madhusudana opens by closing a logical gap: could not even kamya-karma (desire-driven rites) purify, making fruit-abandonment unnecessary? He cites the vartika-krt (Vacaspati Misra's metrical commentary): kamya-rites do purify, but only for bhoga-siddhi (enjoyment of their fruit), not for jnana-yogyata (fitness for knowledge). The purification that counts for mumuksu is antahkarana-suddhi (inner-instrument purification) toward jnana, and that comes only when sanga — 'aham evam karomi' (I alone do this) — and phala-abhinivesa are both dropped. Madhusudana then respectfully attributes the underlying view to Bhagavat-pujya-padah (Sankara) while inflecting it devotionally: the liberated doing is itself an act of offering to Bhagavan.