Bhagavad Gītā Chapter 2, Verse 45: Krishna to Arjuna — Sāṅkhya-Yoga

Bhāṣyakāra purports

• Śaṅkaraadvaita

  The Vedas illuminate (prakāśayanti) only the domain of saṃsāra — which is itself nothing but the play of the three guṇas — and so every injunction they contain is shaped for the guṇa-bound mind seeking a result. You, Arjuna, must transcend that entire orbit: become free of desire (niṣkāma), bear the pairs of pleasure and pain without recoil (nirvandva), abide perpetually in sattva as a platform for viveka, and relinquish the anxious grasping called yoga-kṣema. The one who is thus ātmavān — vigilant, un-distracted — alone is fit for the path that ends saṃsāra rather than extending it.

• Rāmānujaviśiṣṭādvaita

  The Vedas, out of parental tenderness (vātsalya) for every soul at every guṇa-level, prescribe the means appropriate to each — svarga for the tamas-rajo-predominant, liberation for the sattva-predominant — lest souls, denied any foothold, fall into kāma-driven ruin. You are already sattva-predominant, Arjuna: do not slide back into the mixed-guṇa condition, but let sattva grow until rajo-tamas are entirely subdued. Abandon pursuit of things outside your own ātma-svarūpa (yoga-kṣema), and turn instead toward that svarūpa — for Bhagavān himself will then sustain you, as He declared: 'I carry what they lack and protect what they hold' (BG 9.22).

• Madhvadvaita

  The apparent content of the Vedas — svarga, ritual fruits, guṇa-indexed rewards — is parokṣa-vāda, indirect speech whose surface meaning is a concession to limited vision, not the Veda's actual purport (tātparya). The Veda's real testimony, from Ṛg to Atharva, is that Viṣṇu alone pervades every pāda: 'sarvatra Viṣṇur gīyate.' Do not mistake the prātītika artha (the phenomenally apparent meaning) for truth; Hari is the sole referent of all Vedic injunction, and action performed as dependent worship (upāsanā) of Hari is the only action not bound by guṇa-result.

• Vallabhaśuddhādvaita

  Bhagavān here reveals the Veda's own hidden tātparya: the tri-kāṇḍa of the Vedas addresses guṇa-bound souls in their guṇa-conditioned capacity — but the real imperative (gūḍhābhiprāya) is to take refuge in the nirguṇa tattva that stands behind the three guṇas, which is Kṛṣṇa himself. The word nistraiguṇya is a coded invitation: 'Take shelter in Me, who am free of guṇa.' And ātmavān discloses the mystery of BG 9.22 — for the devotee whose mind is entirely Bhagavān's, yoga-kṣema itself is Bhagavān's burden to carry; the bhakta's only business is to remain wholly His.

• Śrīdharabhakti

  The Vedas do not contradict themselves by promising svarga-results while Kṛṣṇa dismisses those results: the Vedas address the sākāma adhikārins (desire-possessing practitioners) who are their actual audience, and for them, guṇa-bound ritual is the appropriate medicine. You, however, must become niṣkāma — the fourfold discipline is the path: endure the dvandva-pairs (pleasure-pain, heat-cold) without flight, stand firm in nityasattva which is dhairya (steady courage) made permanent, relinquish the yoga-kṣema anxiety that dissipates concentration, and remain apramatta (unwasteful of attention). Without these four, transcendence of traiguṇya is simply impossible.

• Madhusūdanaadvaita-bhakti

  The decisive insight is that Vedic fruit tracks desire, not action: the same dārśa-pūrṇamāsa rite yields nothing to the desireless performer, because fruit is bonded to the kāmanā that motivates the act — remove kāmanā, remove saṃsāra's hook entirely. Nityasattva is not mere guṇic sattva but its steady, unflickering form — dhairya itself — which alone makes dvandva-toleration possible when rajo-tamas are overwhelmed. And ātmavān names the one for whom Paramātmā is the very agent of yoga-kṣema: knowing that the indwelling God will carry every bodily need, the sādhaka becomes niścinta (worry-free), pouring all remaining attention into Kṛṣṇa — and this is where jñāna and bhakti cease to differ.