Bhagavad Gītā Chapter 4, Verse 14: Krishna to Arjuna — Jñāna-Karma-Sannyāsa-Yoga

Bhāṣyakāra purports

• Śaṅkaraadvaita

  Actions do not stain Me because the sense of being a doer — the ego-root that makes karma adhere — is wholly absent. One who knows Me as the inner Self (ātman), free from the claim 'I act' and free from craving for any fruit, is likewise unbound: his actions no longer seed a body or a rebirth.

  divergence: Śaṅkara: 'na māṃ tāni karmāṇi limpanti dehādy-ārambhakatvena ahaṃkārābhāvāt' — absence of ego (ahaṃkāra-abhāva) is the stated reason; knowing Me as ātman replicates that absence in the knower.

• Rāmānujaviśiṣṭādvaita

  The variegated creation — gods, humans, all beings — arises from the stored karmas of the souls themselves; I am the instrumental cause (nimitta-mātra), not the efficient cause of their differentiation. Knowing Me thus as the sovereign ground who neither accumulates karmas nor desires fruits, the devotee is freed from the binding past karmas that fuel saṃsāra.

  divergence: Rāmānuja cites Viṣṇu-Purāṇa 1.4.51–52: 'nimittamātram evāyaṃ sṛjyānāṃ sarga-karmaṇi' — Bhagavān is merely the occasion; the souls' own prior karma-śakti is the principal cause of diversity.

• Madhvadvaita

  Viṣṇu's actions are entirely His own sovereign will (icchā-mātra); He may desire outcomes without the compulsive attachment (abhiniviśa) that characterizes bound souls. The śruti confirms: 'knowing Him thus in mind and heart, the wise one no longer approaches death.' Liberation is real and sequential — each soul freed in its own time, none collapsed into identity with Hari.

  divergence: Madhva: 'icchāmātraṃ tv asti na tu tatrābhiniviśaḥ' — Viṣṇu has volition but zero compulsion; his own cited verse ('ākāṅkṣann api devo 'sau necchate lokavat paraḥ') distinguishes divine desire from worldly craving.

• Vallabhaśuddhādvaita

  This very verse is Kṛṣṇa's disclosure of His own singular character (vilakṣaṇatva): He who is untouched by karma and unstained by desire for its fruit. The devotee who truly knows Him in this way becomes a sharer in that character (mad-dharmā) — not by effort but by the grace-current (puṣṭi) of knowing.

  divergence: Vallabha: 'idaṃ mama jīvato vilakṣaṇatvam iti māṃ yo 'bhijānāti so 'pi mad-dharmā bhavati' — recognition of the Lord's distinctiveness actively transforms the knower into a bearer of that same quality.

• Śrīdharabhakti

  Even over the entire creation — the universe itself — I have no clinging (āsakti); I am free of the sense of being an agent (nirahaṃkāratva) and free of craving for fruit (niḥspṛhatva). One who knows Me in this way loosens his own ahaṃkāra and spṛhā, and thereby escapes the binding power of action.

  divergence: Śrīdhara: 'nirlepatve kāraṇaṃ nirahaṃkāratva-niḥspṛhatv-ādikaṃ jānatas tasyāpy ahaṃkārādi-śaithilyāt' — the causal chain is explicit: knowing the Lord's non-binding conditions produces a loosening (śaithilya) of the devotee's own ego-complex.

• Madhusūdanaadvaita-bhakti

  All actions of universal creation rest on Me who am without ego-claim (nirahaṃkāra) and without ownership of any fruit; I am the ātman for whom these actions cannot produce a body or a chain of birth. One who knows Me as that non-doer, non-enjoyer ātman is released — Advaitic insight and Kṛṣṇa-recognition are a single act of liberating knowledge.

  divergence: Madhusūdana: 'kartṛtvābhimāna-phala-spṛhābhyāṃ hi karmāṇi limpanti tad-abhāvān na māṃ karmāṇi limpanti … akartṛ-ātma-jñānena mucyata ity arthaḥ' — the two causes of binding (ego-claim + fruit-craving) are both absent; knowing Me as akartṛ-ātman is the liberating cognition.