Bhagavad Gītā Chapter 2, Verse 40: Krishna to Arjuna — Sāṅkhya-Yoga

Bhāṣyakāra purports

• Śaṅkaraadvaita

  In the mokṣa-mārga (path of liberation), the karma-yoga that Kṛṣṇa now commends is unlike agriculture and other worldly endeavors where an interrupted beginning (abhikrama, undertaking) is simply wasted — here, no abhikrama-nāśa (loss of the undertaking) occurs, because the purification accomplished so far is not undone by incompletion. Nor does any pratyavāya (counter-demerit arising from partial performance, as from ritual defect) arise — for this yoga is directed toward Īśvara and therefore does not admit the vaiśeṣika defects of contractual ritual. Even the smallest portion of this yoga-dharma (the discipline of desireless action) protects the practitioner from mahato bhaya (great fear), here glossed as the saṃsāra-bhaya (the fear intrinsic to conditioned existence) characterized by janma-maraṇa-ādi (birth, death, and the train of suffering that attends them).

  divergence: Śaṅkara explicitly contrasts karma-yoga with kṛṣi-ādi (agriculture and other sakāma worldly activities) to establish that the verse's two guarantees — no loss, no counter-demerit — belong specifically to niṣkāma-karma-yoga and not to ritual action in general. The anchor concept is the verse's role as a praise (stuti) of yoga-mārga that explains why Arjuna should hear the coming teaching.

• Rāmānujaviśiṣṭādvaita

  In karma-yoga understood as kainkarya (service oriented toward Bhagavān), even an ārambha (beginning) that is interrupted — vicchinno ‘pi (even if severed mid-course) before completion — incurs no niṣphalatva (fruitlessness), because the fruit of karma-yoga is śuddhi (purification of the antaḥkaraṇa), and any measure of purification accomplished cannot be reversed. The assurance that even svalpāṃśa (a small portion) of this sva-dharma (one's own dharma) protects from saṃsāra-bhaya (fear of conditioned existence) will be fully expounded at Gītā 6.40 — naiva iha nāmutra vināśas tasya vidyate (“no destruction of him exists either here or hereafter”) — meaning Kṛṣṇa is anticipating here what he will confirm later. Worldly and Vedic sādhanas (means), by contrast, when interrupted, neither bear fruit nor spare the practitioner pratyavāya (counter-demerit): their contractual character means partial performance incurs guilt.

  divergence: Rāmānuja uniquely cross-references Gītā 6.40 within the bhāṣya as a prospective confirmation of 2.40’s guarantees — the verse is not a standalone assurance but an announcement of a theme Kṛṣṇa will return to after establishing the full architecture of karma-yoga as bhakti-preparation.

• Madhvadvaita

  Reconstructed from the dvaita school's doctrine, not translated from Madhva's commentary at this verse.

  Nehābhikrama-nāśo ‘sti pratyavāyo na vidyate — no loss of effort arises here, no adverse return accrues. Svalpam apy asya dharmasya trāyate mahato bhayāt — even a small measure of this dharma (the path of bhakti-infused action toward Hari) delivers one from great fear. The two guarantees rest on pañca-bheda (the five-fold real distinction) and the absolute svatantra (independently real, self-sufficient) nature of Hari. Because the jīva (the individual self) is paratantra (eternally dependent) and Hari is omniscient, every genuine step taken toward him is received, retained, and accounted within his anugraha (grace) — it cannot evaporate as a mundane act might. The abhikrama (initial effort) is not a mere karmic deposit liable to destruction; it is an act directed at svatantra Hari, who holds it. Pratyavāya (adverse karmic return), the danger that interrupts ordinary rites, has no purchase here: what is offered to an all-knowing Lord cannot recoil against the offerer. The svalpam api (even a little) clause is decisive within taratamya (graded ontological hierarchy): Hari's anugraha is disproportionately responsive because the disproportion is Hari's own sovereign nature, not a property of the act. The mahato bhayāt (from great fear) from which one is delivered is saṃsāra-bondage, the supreme danger for a paratantra jīva whose only secure refuge is Hari's bhakti-path.

  divergence: No Madhva or Jayatīrtha bhāṣya exists for this verse; the reading derives directly from dvaita siddhānta applied to the mūla. The central dvaita move is to ground the verse's twin guarantees — no loss of effort, no adverse return — in Hari's svatantra omniscience and his disproportionate anugraha, rather than treating them as abstract properties of karma-yoga.

• Vallabhaśuddhādvaita

  Sugamatā (ease of entry) into yoga for all — that is what nehābhikrama-nāśo ‘sti declares. Iha yoga-buddhau dharmasya yo ‘bhikramaḥ prārambhas tasya nāśo nāsti — within yoga-buddhi, whatever abhikrama (first step, beginning) one makes into dharma, that beginning is not destroyed. The Bhāgavata confirms: na hy aṅgopakrame dhvaṃso sva-dharmasya uddhavāṇv api | mayā vyavasitaḥ (11.29.20) — not even the smallest beginning of one's own dharma is destroyed, thus have I ordained. Hence svalpam apy asya dharmasya abhikramo mahato bhayāt trāyate — even the slightest abhikrama into this dharma rescues from great fear. In Sāṅkhya, once the end is attained, siddhe dharma-karmaṇāṃ tyāgaḥ — dharma and karma are relinquished; here it is not so (atra tu na tathā). As is said: yama-ādayas tu kartavyāḥ siddhe yoge kṛtārthatā — the disciplines are to be performed throughout; fulfillment comes only when yoga is perfected. Kṛṣṇa's own prasāda preserves even the tiniest offering on the puṣṭi-mārga, and no step taken toward Him is undone.

  divergence: Vallabha alone anchors the verse's guarantee in an explicit Bhāgavata citation — na hy aṅgopakrame dhvaṃso (BhP 11.29.20) — rather than resting on the Gītā's internal logic. The contrast with Sāṅkhya (siddhe dharma-karmaṇāṃ tyāgaḥ vs. atra tu na tathā) is Vallabha's own doctrinal move: the puṣṭi-mārga keeps the disciplines active throughout, sustained by Kṛṣṇa's grace, whereas Sāṅkhya dissolves them upon attainment.

• Śrīdharabhakti

  Śrīdhara frames the verse as a direct answer to a purvapakṣa (prior objection): karma-yoga might seem unreliable, like agriculture, where vighnabāhulya (accumulated obstacles) can prevent the harvest and mantra-aṅga-vaiguṇya (deficiency in a ritual limb or auxiliary) can generate pratyavāya (counter-demerit) — so how can karma-yoga reliably dissolve karma-bandha (the bondage of action)? The answer is that because niṣkāma-karma-yoga is performed Īśvara-uddeśena (with the Lord as its sole aim), neither vighna (obstacle) nor aṅga-vaiguṇya (ritual deficiency) can arise — the entire structure of contractual contingency is removed by the orientation of intent. Even the upakrama-mātra (the mere beginning, the bare undertaking) of this dharma, if performed, protects from mahato bhaya (great fear, i.e., saṃsāra): unlike kāmya-karma (desire-driven ritual action), where some defect in even a single aṅga (limb) can nullify the whole, this yoga's partial performance still protects.

  divergence: Śrīdhara is the only commentator who stages the verse explicitly as a purvapakṣa-uttara (objection-and-reply) sequence, treating the agricultural analogy as a genuine challenge rather than merely a contrast. His resolution — that Īśvara-uddeśenā (Lord-directedness) eliminates the very conditions under which pratyavāya arises — is the sharpest formal argument in the panel.

• Madhusūdanaadvaita-bhakti

  Madhusūdana's extraordinarily detailed bhāṣya on 2.40 builds on the pūrvapakṣa from 2.39: since Vedic statements like tad yathā iha karma-jito lokaḥ kṣīyata evam evāmutra puṇya-jito lokaḥ kṣīyate (“just as a world won by earthly action perishes, so too does a world won by merit perish”) establish that even accumulated puṇya-phala (meritorious fruit) is subject to kṣaya (decay), how can karma-yoga reliably produce liberation? His answer is that abhikrama-nāśa (loss of progress) does not occur in niṣkāma-karma-yoga because its phala (fruit) is śuddhi (purification of the antaḥkaraṇa), which is loka-śabdāvācya-bhogyatva-abhāva (not a consumable experiential world and therefore not subject to the exhaustion logic of puṇya-loka). The śuddhi-rūpa-phala (fruit in the form of purification) is not a finite heavenly enjoyment that depletes — it is a structural change in the instrument of cognition that persists and accumulates. Similarly, pratyavāya (counter-demerit from incomplete performance) does not arise because niṣkāma-karma-yoga operates in the mode of nityānām upātta-durita-kṣaya (the nityakarmas as vehicles for destroying accumulated sin through Bhagavat-ārādhana), where the full saṃhāra-niyama (requirement to complete all auxiliary rites) does not apply — even partial performance with bhagavad-arpaṇa (dedication to Bhagavān) achieves its purificatory end.

  divergence: Madhusūdana is unique in grounding the verse's guarantees in a detailed epistemology of the śuddhi-phala: the reason karma-yoga's progress cannot be lost is not merely structural (unlike agriculture) but logical — the fruit is not a perishable world-experience but an irreversible refinement of the cognitive instrument. This makes 2.40 an argument about what kind of fruit niṣkāma-karma-yoga produces, not merely an assurance about the path's reliability.