Bhagavad Gītā Chapter 2, Verse 41: Krishna to Arjuna — Sāṅkhya-Yoga

Bhāṣyakāra purports

• Śaṅkaraadvaita

  In this path of the highest good (śreyas), O Kuru's joy, there is one and only one buddhi (discernment) — the vyavasāyātmikā (resolute, of the nature of certainty) — and it is precisely that single discernment born of right pramāṇa (valid means of knowledge) which refutes and overrides every contrary branch-proliferation of the mind. The discernments of the avyavasāyin (the irresolute, the one lacking discriminative certainty) are by contrast bahushākhā (many-branched) and anantā (endless), and it is through the unchecked spread of those branches that saṃsāra (the cycle of conditioned existence) is perpetually sustained and widened; when viveka-buddhi (the discernment born of discriminative knowledge) arises and the endless differentiated cognitions subside, saṃsāra too subsides. The one is the fire that destroys the many; the many are the kindling that feeds rebirth.

  divergence: Śaṅkara grounds the uniqueness of vyavasāyātmikā buddhi entirely in its pramāṇa-origin: it is not resolute by will but by epistemological warrant. The many branches are not merely distractions — they are causally constitutive of saṃsāra; their cessation is saṃsāra's cessation. The operative logic is that of sublation (bādha): the one valid cognition cancels the invalid many. No devotional frame is introduced; the śreya-mārga here is the jñāna trajectory, and karma is relevant only as preparation for that cessation.

• Rāmānujaviśiṣṭādvaita

  Among all actions enjoined by śāstra (scripture), O Kuru's delight, the buddhi of the mumukṣu (the liberation-seeking practitioner) is one — unified because it is vyavasāyātmikā, that is, grounded in the prior certainty of the ātman's true nature (ātmayāthātmya-niścaya-pūrvikā) — for when all nitya (regular) and naimittika (occasional) and even appropriate kāmya (desire-motivated) actions are performed with mokṣa alone as their single fruit, they constitute one śāstrārtha (scriptural purpose). The buddhi of the avyavasāyin — one motivated by svarga (heaven), sons, cattle, and food — is by contrast both bahushākhā and anantā: endless because the desires themselves are endless, and many-branched because even a single rite enjoined for one fruit ramifies into innumerable sub-fruits (āvāntara-phala). The teaching, then, is that even kāmya rites proper to one's own varṇa (social station) and āśrama (life stage) must be integrated into the stream of nitya-naimittika action and directed wholly toward mokṣa.

  divergence: Rāmānuja's key move, absent in Śaṅkara, is the structural unity argument: multiple diverse rites collapse into one buddhi because they share one telos — mokṣa as Bhagavān's grace. The epistemological criterion (pramāṇa) is displaced by a teleological one (ekaphalata, single-fruit). The ātmayāthātmya-niścaya is not Śaṅkara's sublating cognition but a positive affirmation of the jīva's real nature as distinct-yet-dependent (śeṣa) on Brahman. Even kāmya actions are rehabilitated if re-oriented, which Śaṅkara would not permit.

• Madhvadvaita

  When the question arises — since there are many schools (mata-bheda) and their reasonings, how can one establish oneself in a single commitment? — the verse answers precisely: the vyavasāyātmikā buddhi is one because the views that have been correctly determined through sound yukti (reasoning, argument) converge in agreement. The multiplicity of discernments among the avyavasāyin arises from the fragmentation of intellect not submitted to Hari's superior ordering; the ekā (single) buddhi of the yogin is not a personal resolve but the cognition that reflects Hari's own unambiguous reality.

  divergence: Madhva's commentary is characteristically economical and polemical: the singleness of buddhi is not achieved by the practitioner but discovered — it is the unity that sound reasoning (samyag-yukti) reveals in the tradition's truly valid positions. This implicitly frames rival schools as products of avyavasāya (irresolution). The jīva's eternal distinction from Brahman is the unstated axiom: buddhi cannot collapse into non-dual identity; it must remain oriented toward Hari as an irreducibly external reality.

• Vallabhaśuddhādvaita

  In this yoga — whether as niṣkāma-karma (desireless action) or as action performed for Bhagavān — the buddhi is one, of the form of resolute determination (niścaya-rūpā), because it is directed to a single object: the certainty that some action must be done without desire for fruit or for the sake of Bhagavān alone. In the path of Sāṅkhya, by contrast, the vṛtti (mental modification) is without the triads of knower-known-knowing; but here in yoga the buddhi is singular in its one-pointedness. The buddhi of those engrossed in kāmya-karma (desire-propelled action) is bahushākhā and anantā — as will be shown in the passages on the āsura-sampat (demoniac endowment) where the deluded say: 'I shall sacrifice, I shall give, I shall rejoice.' The pull of Kṛṣṇa's grace (prasāda) is the only force sufficient to draw the mind from that proliferation into singular devotion.

  divergence: Vallabha introduces the Puṣṭi-mārga's signature distinction: action directed toward Bhagavān as līlā-participation (not mere duty) is the positive content of the one buddhi, while Sāṅkhya's traceless-vṛtti is acknowledged but subordinated. The demoniac proliferation quoted from BG 16.15 grounds the contrast in concrete scripture rather than epistemological argument, giving the verse an urgency no other school generates here.

• Śrīdharabhakti

  In this karma-yoga whose defining mark is worship of Īśvara (the Lord), the resolute buddhi is one — of the form of the certainty 'I shall certainly cross over by bhakti to Parameśvara (the Supreme Lord) alone' — because single-pointed, it is a single discernment. The rites of the avyavasāyin — those who face many directions and are filled with desires (kāmin) — are both endless (because desires are endless) and many-branched (because within any single enjoined act such as the new- and full-moon rites, the pursuit of sub-results like long life and offspring creates further proliferation). But nityā-naimittika-karma (regular and occasional ritual action) performed for Īśvara-ārādhana (worship of the Lord) does not perish even if some limb is defective, for the defect is removed by the dedication itself — which is not true of kāmya action, where each result demands its own exact performance.

  divergence: Śrīdhara's distinctive contribution is the liturgical consequence: Īśvara-directed action is structurally resilient (a defective rite still reaches the Lord) while kāmya action is structurally fragile (svarga-kāma's rite must be exact to yield svarga). The bhakti orientation is not merely motivational but ontological — it changes the very conditions of efficacy. This pragmatic argument for bhakti-yoga has no parallel in the other schools' readings of this verse.

• Madhusūdanaadvaita-bhakti

  To demonstrate the unity of the instruction introduced by the phrase 'tametam' (that this), Madhusūdana shows that the single vyavasāyātmikā buddhi — the buddhi that is of the nature of certainty about ātma-tattva (the truth of the Self) — is the one goal of all four āśramas, since each of their prescribed means is taught in the third case (instrumental) without mutual dependence, indicating independent efficacy converging on one end. The Sāṅkhya-buddhi and the Yoga-buddhi are therefore not two discernments but one, because they share one fruit; this one buddhi, born of flawless Vedic sentences, sublates all contrary discernments. Yet the devotional reading is not dismissed: those who say the vyavasāyātmikā buddhi is the certainty 'I shall cross saṃsāra through worship of Parameśvara alone' are also heard, and both readings are sustained because — as the jñāna-kāṇḍa confirms — 'even a little of this dharma protects from great fear,' a verse whose meaning is fully coherent on either construal.

  divergence: Madhusūdana's synthesis is grammatically grounded: the unity of buddhi is proven via the Pāṇinian third-case (instrumental) argument — independent means sharing one fruit prove one śāstrārtha. He then holds the jñāna-reading (Śaṅkara's) and the bhakti-reading (Śrīdhara's) simultaneously, citing BG 2.40 as the axiom that makes both valid. This is the only school where two hermeneutic registers are formally acknowledged as co-legitimate, neither absorbed nor refuted.