Bhagavad Gītā Chapter 3, Verse 31: Krishna to Arjuna — Karma-Yoga

Bhāṣyakāra purports

• Śaṅkaraadvaita

  Those who constantly follow this teaching of mine — the lordless performance of duty — with faith (śraddhā) in Vāsudeva as supreme teacher and without finding fault (asūyā) in him, are freed even from karmas classified as dharma and adharma. Śaṅkara insists the liberation is not from karma itself as activity but from the karmas as binding agents: the bhāṣya specifies 'dharmādharmākhyaiḥ karmabhiḥ,' underscoring that niṣkāma action dissolves binding, not action as such. This verse functions as upasaṃhāra (summary closure) for the prior argument: the jñāna-mārga practitioner is the implicit horizon, and karma-yoga is validated only as its proximate preparation.

• Rāmānujaviśiṣṭādvaita

  Rāmānuja reads three concentric groups in the single verse: those who practice the teaching, those who do not practice but hold śraddhā, and those who neither practice nor hold śraddhā yet refrain from censure — all three classes are progressively freed from anādikāla-prārabdha karmas (beginningless accumulated actions). The 'api' particle in 'te'pi' marks differentiation: even the mere non-censurer, purified by non-opposition, will in due course take up practice and attain liberation. Kainkarya (service-disposition) to Bhagavān is the structural mechanism; śraddhā and anasūyā are its minimum thresholds.

• Madhvadvaita

  Even those who have withdrawn from karmic activity (nivṛttakarmin) are freed — but through jñāna as the intermediate means, not as a separate path, and the real target is aparokṣa-jñāna (direct, non-inferential perception of Hari). Madhva's bhāṣya cites Nārāyaṇāṣṭākṣara-kalpa to establish that all sādhanā, whether nivṛtti or pravṛtti, must be subordinated to aparokṣa-dṛṣṭi of Īśa; once that direct vision is attained, no intermediary remains. The verse thus rules out any co-ordinated combination (samuccaya) of karma and jñāna: karma serves, jñāna liberates, and jīva's eternal dependence on Hari is preserved throughout.

• Vallabhaśuddhādvaita

  Vallabha's gloss is deliberately spare: following Kṛṣṇa's teaching with faith and non-censure, one is freed through karma itself — 'karmaiva kṛtvā karmato vā muktiṃ prāpnuvanti.' The brevity is doctrinal: in Puṣṭi-mārga, action is not an obstacle to be transcended but the very medium of Kṛṣṇa's prasāda (grace-gift), so the liberation described here is not escape from action but the transformation of action into līlā-participation. Śraddhā is not mere intellectual assent but the disposition that recognizes every act as Kṛṣṇa's own movement through the devotee.

• Śrīdharabhakti

  Śrīdhara Svāmī occupies the middle register: faith in the Lord's word, absence of the fault-finding that would call karma cruel ('duḥkhātmake karmaṇi pravartayatīti doṣadṛṣṭim akurvantaḥ'), and gradual practice yield the same liberation as that of the jñānin — 'samyagjñānivat karmabhir mucyante.' The bhāṣya neither collapses karma into jñāna nor elevates it above bhakti; the practitioner advances 'śanaiḥ' (gradually), and liberation through karma is accorded dignity by the particle 'api' (even so, they are freed). Devotional affection for the teaching functions as the affective ground beneath formal practice.

• Madhusūdanaadvaita-bhakti

  Madhusūdana synthesizes both registers: action performed without fruit-desire (phalaābhisandhirāhitya) and offered to Bhagavān (bhagavadarpanabuddhi) purifies sattva, which in turn produces jñāna, which liberates — 'sattvaśuddhijñānaprāptidvāreṇa samyagjñānivat mucyante.' Asūyā is glossed as the specific complaint that Kṛṣṇa is cruel for directing one into painful karma; absence of this fault in 'sarvahṛdi Vāsudeva' is what enables the purification cycle. The verse is therefore not merely an incentive clause but a complete soteriology in miniature: karma → śraddhā+anasūyā → sattvaśuddhi → jñāna → mukti.