Bhagavad Gītā Chapter 18, Verse 9: Krishna to Arjuna — Mokṣa-Sannyāsa-Yoga

Bhāṣyakāra purports

• Śaṅkaraadvaita

  Prescribed action (niyatam karma) performed solely because it must be done — 'karyam iti eva' — and not from any craving for its fruit, constitutes sattvic renunciation. Shankara presses further: even the subtle imagination that obligatory action purifies the self (atma-samskara) or removes sin (pratyavaya-parihara) is a fruit-expectation, and that too must be abandoned. The uncontaminated inner organ (antahkarana), gradually purified through such fruit-free performance, becomes fit for the self-knowledge (atma-jnana) that alone liberates.

• Rāmānujaviśiṣṭādvaita

  Obligatory and occasional acts (nitya-naimittika-mahayajna) prescribed for one's varna and ashrama are to be performed as Bhagavan's own aradhana (worship-service), self-justifying in that very character — 'svayam-prayojanam' — without any possessive attachment to the action (karma-mamatam) or desire for its separate fruit. Ramanuja grounds 'sattvic' in epistemic precision: sattva generates knowledge of things as they truly are ('yathavasthu-vastu-jnanam'), so this renunciation is sattvic because it rests on correct scriptural understanding of what action actually is. The karma thereby becomes kainkarya, service-for-the-Lord's-sake, the foundation of bhakti-yoga.

• Madhvadvaita

  *Niyataṃ karma* (prescribed, obligatory action) performed solely because it is *kāryam* — what must be done — with *saṅga* (attachment to the action itself) and *phala* (fruit) both relinquished: such *tyāga* (renunciation) is *sāttvika*. For the *paratantra* *jīva* (the eternally dependent individual self), this verse names the only mode of action consonant with the *pañca-bheda* (the five-fold real distinction) that obtains inviolably between Lord and *jīva*. Because the *jīva* possesses neither independent agency nor a claim on results — both belonging solely to *svatantra* Hari (the independently real, self-sufficient Lord) — every *niyata-karma* is rightly understood as *Hari-sevā* (service of Hari). Relinquishing *saṅga* is thus not a psychological adjustment but an ontological acknowledgment: the *jīva* never owned the action. Relinquishing *phala* follows necessarily, since fruit accrues only to one whose sovereignty underwrites the deed. The *sāttvika* character of this *tyāga* reflects *taratamya* (graded ontological hierarchy): action performed in clear recognition of the Lord's total sovereignty and the *jīva*'s utter dependence stands at the highest grade of renunciation. *Bhakti* as ontological subordination is the living form of this *tyāga* — not dissolution into Hari, but real, differentiated surrender that preserves the *bheda* even in the act of offering.

• Vallabhaśuddhādvaita

  Action prescribed by varna and ashrama is to be done because it is Bhagavan's command (bhagavad-ajna) and is, in its very form, his aradhana — therefore 'karyam' means obligatory by the Lord's own decree, not merely by social code. Attachment and fruit are abandoned not as an ascetic discipline but because the action already belongs entirely to him. Vallabha's commentary adds a crucial step upward: even this sattvic tyaga is surpassed by the pushtipurushottama-sharana (taking refuge in the supreme Lord of Pushti), where all is surrendered and the practitioner acts as an instrument of the Lord's own will — 'tad-ajna-paripalana-rupah'.

• Śrīdharabhakti

  Obligatory prescribed action (niyatam = avashya-kartavyataya vihitam karma) performed with the firm understanding 'this is to be done' — with attachment and fruit both relinquished — is sattvic renunciation. Sridhara's reading is deliberately spare: the sattvic quality resides in the combination of the understanding ('karyam iti buddhva') with the double relinquishment of sanga and phala, and nothing more needs to be added. The verse describes the practitioner who fulfills duty without the clinging of ego or the hunger of expectation.

• Madhusūdanaadvaita-bhakti

  Tamasic and rajasic renunciation — abandoning action itself — have been condemned; the sattvic alternative is to perform prescribed action until antahkarana-shuddhi (purification of the inner organ) is complete, having relinquished both kartrtva-abhinivesha (the insistence on being the doer) and any fruit-intention. Madhusudana makes a precise logical distinction: tamas and rajas are 'visheshya-abhava' — the absence of the action itself — whereas sattvic tyaga is 'visheshana-abhava' — the absence only of the qualifier (fruit-intention) while the action continues. Even the fruit imagined by the ignorant — self-purification or prevention of sin (pratyavaya-parihara) — must be abandoned, as Apastamba and the shruti passages Madhusudana cites demonstrate that such ancillary fruits arise by themselves, like shade from a mango planted for fruit.