Bhagavad Gītā Chapter 3, Verse 12: Krishna to Arjuna — Karma-Yoga

Bhāṣyakāra purports

• Śaṅkaraadvaita

  The devas (gods), nourished by yajna (sacrifice), bestow desired enjoyments — cattle, progeny, grain — upon you; this is Shankara's plain reading: the householder's world runs on reciprocal debt. But the deeper cut is ethical: one who consumes these gifts without returning oblations feeds only body and senses, and so commits theft (stena — 'thief') against the cosmic order. For Shankara, this injunction keeps the unenlightened actor in righteous motion, clearing the field for the eventual renunciation of karma altogether in jnana.

  divergence: Shankara — 'svadehendriyaneva tarpayati stena eva taskara eva sah devadi-sva-apahari' (he who feeds only his own body and senses is exactly a thief, a plunderer of what belongs to the devas). Bhashya present; anchor strong.

• Rāmānujaviśiṣṭādvaita

  The devas are not independent powers; they are modes (prakara — 'form/mode') of Bhagavan himself, and when they give rain, grain, and progeny, that gift flows from the Lord's own grace mediated through worship. To receive this flow and withhold the returning yajna-offering is not merely ingratitude — it is self-appropriation of what is essentially the Lord's own property, and Ramanuja's bhashya warns this brings not just disqualification from liberation (paramapurushartha — 'supreme human goal') but descent into hell (niraya-gamitva — 'hell-going'). Service to the devas is therefore kainkarya (devoted service) to Vishnu himself.

  divergence: Ramanuja — 'cauryam hi nama anyadiye tat-prayojanaya eva pariklrpte vastuni svakiyata-buddhim krtva tena svatma-poshanam' (theft is precisely treating as one's own what belongs to another, appointed for that other's purpose, and using it to feed oneself). Bhashya present; anchor strong.

• Madhvadvaita

  *Yajña-bhāvitāḥ* (nourished by sacrifice) *devā* grant *iṣṭān bhogān* (desired enjoyments) to the sacrificer; one who consumes what they have given — *tair dattān* — without returning the oblation — *apradāya ebhyaḥ* — is *stena eva*, a thief and nothing else. In Dvaita's order, the *devā* are *paratantra* (eternally dependent) instruments of *svatantra* Hari; their bestowal of *bhogān* is Hari's own dispensation flowing through a graded hierarchy — *taratamya* (the graded ontological hierarchy of dependent beings). The *jīva* who receives that flow and hoards it breaks the cosmic circuit of *bheda* (real distinction): it mistakes a dependent gift for a self-generated acquisition, which is the precise structure of *stena*-hood. Theft here is not a juridical label but an ontological one — the *jīva* falsely enacts *svatantra*, the very attribute that belongs to Hari alone. Proper *yajña* is thus *bhakti* enacted as ontological subordination: offering back to Hari through His *deva*-intermediaries what was never the *jīva*'s own. To withhold is to assert an independence that *pañca-bheda* (the five-fold real distinction — Lord–*jīva*, Lord–matter, *jīva*–*jīva*, *jīva*–matter, matter–matter) makes metaphysically impossible. The thief does not merely break a ritual rule; he positions himself against the very constitution of his being.

  divergence: Madhva and Jayatīrtha are silent on this verse. The reading voices Dvaita *siddhānta* — *paratantra jīva*, *taratamya*, *pañca-bheda* — applied directly to the mūla's *stena* indictment.

• Vallabhaśuddhādvaita

  Vallabha grounds the verse in shruti-debt (rina — 'debt'): every brahmin is born threefold indebted — to rshis through brahmacharya, to the devas through yajna, to the pitrs (ancestors) through progeny. The rain and grain the devas provide via yajna is repayment of a prior obligation; to eat without returning the oblation is to re-incur a debt already cleared and so to commit fresh theft. In Pushtimarga this has a further valence: all enjoyment (bhoga — 'enjoyment, experience') is Krishna's prasada (grace-gift); consuming it without offering (nivedana — 'presentation to the Lord') treats the Lord's own gift as self-acquired property.

  divergence: Vallabha — 'jāyamāno vai brahmanah tribhir rnavanjayas' (shruti cited: one born is immediately indebted threefold); and 'tadanivedane dosa uktah' (the fault of non-offering is stated). Bhashya present; anchor present though compact.

• Śrīdharabhakti

  Sridhara's reading is the most pedagogically transparent: the devas, made prosperous by yajna, rain down grain and sustenance; eating that grain without the panca-yajna (five daily sacrifices) obligated in return is theft, full stop. His purpose is to clarify why non-performance of karma is a moral and cosmic wrong, not merely a ritual lapse. The verse closes the argument opened in 3.10-11 that creation itself runs on the yajna-cycle, and personal enjoyment outside that cycle is parasitic.

  divergence: Sridhara — 'devair dattannanadin ebhyo devebhyah pancayajnadibhir adattva yo bhunkte sa tu cora eva jneyah' (one who eats the food given by the devas without returning through the five sacrifices is to be known as a thief). Bhashya present; anchor strong.

• Madhusūdanaadvaita-bhakti

  Madhusudana extends the verse's scope: yajna yields not only transcendent (paratrika — 'relating to the next world') fruit but immediate worldly goods — cattle, grain, gold. Identifying the devas as 'rina-vat' (creditor-positioned) toward humans who have previously sustained them, he insists the person who eats without oblation is a thief of divine property (deva-sva-apahari — 'plunderer of what belongs to the devas') and remains burdened by deva-rina (debt to the gods). For Madhusudana, this verse motivates niskriya (actionless) seekers to remain in karma until the inner purity required for jnana-bhakti is achieved.

  divergence: Madhusudana — 'tair devaih dattan bhoganebhyo devebhyo apradaya yajneshu devuddeshena ahutir asampadya yo bhunkte dehendriyanyeva tarpayati stena eva taskara eva sah deva-sva-apahari devarnanapakaranat' (having failed to offer oblations to the devas in yajna, one who merely satiates body and senses is a thief, a plunderer, because he has not discharged the deva-debt). Bhashya present; anchor strong.