Bhagavad Gītā Chapter 6, Verse 9: Krishna to Arjuna — Dhyāna-Yoga

Bhāṣyakāra purports

• Śaṅkaraadvaita

  The one who holds equal understanding (sama-buddhi) toward friend (suhṛt), ally (mitra), foe (ari), neutral (udāsīna), mediator (madhyastha), the hateful (dveṣya), kinsman (bandhu), the virtuous (sādhu), and the sinful (pāpa) — that person is distinguished (viśiṣyate) among all who are established in yoga. Śaṅkara reads sama-buddhi not as emotional warmth toward all, but as the mind's disengagement from the project of reckoning: the ātman has no stake in whether another is benefactor or enemy, because the ego-ledger that tracks such distinctions has dissolved. The term viśiṣyate admits the variant vi-mucyate — 'is liberated' — signalling that equal-sightedness is not merely social virtue but the fruit of jñāna; the yogārūḍha who achieves it is the best (uttama) among all yogins.

  divergence: Śaṅkara: 'kim-karma ity-avyāpṛta-buddhiḥ' — whose mind is uninvolved in the accounting of actions; viśiṣyate / vimucyate variant noted; sarvebhyo yogārūḍhānām ayam uttamaḥ

• Rāmānujaviśiṣṭādvaita

  Rāmānuja catalogues six relational modes — the benefactor by nature (suhṛt), the affectionate helper (mitra), the incidental enemy (ari), the fully disinterested bystander (udāsīna), the congenital neutral (madhyastha), the congenital ill-wisher (dveṣya), and the birth-kin (bandhu) — and observes that for the yogī whose sole purpose is ātma-prāpti, none of these relationships supply either motive or obstacle. The yogī's equal regard (sama-buddhi) dissolves not because persons are unreal, but because the yogī has recognised that self-realisation has no allies and no enemies among finite beings. Such a person is distinguished (viśiṣyate) as fit (arha) for sustained yoga-practice — sama-buddhi is prerequisite disposition, not final liberation.

  divergence: Rāmānuja: 'ātmaikaprayo­janatayā suhṛnmitrādibhiḥ prayojanābhāvād virodhābhāvāc ca teṣu samabuddhiḥ yogābhyāsārhattve viśiṣyate'

• Madhvadvaita

  Madhva grounds equal regard in an ontological fact: all jīvas are by their intrinsic nature (svataḥ) pure consciousness (cid-rūpa), entirely free of defect; whatever appears as saintliness or sinfulness in a person is the work of the inner instrument (antaḥkaraṇa) and is ultimately ordained by Īśvara, not self-generated. The yogī who sees this — that no jīva originates its own virtue or vice, that all differentiation is Bhagavān's dispensation — holds genuinely equal vision without collapsing the real distinctions that govern worship: Madhva insists that equal vision (sama-dṛṣṭi) does not mean equal worship (pūjā-sāmya), and cites the Brahma-vaivarta-purāṇa that offering equivalent honour to unequals, or unequal honour to equals, causes even a god to fall.

  divergence: Madhva: 'svataḥ sarvepy cid-rūpāḥ sarvadoṣa-vivarjitāḥ / jīvās teṣāṃ tu ye doṣās ta upādhi-kṛtā matāḥ' — defects belong to the upādhi, not the jīva; pūjā-sāmya vs. sama-dṛṣṭi distinction from Brahma-vaivarta citation

• Vallabhaśuddhādvaita

  Vallabha comments on verses 6.8–6.9 together: the yogārūḍha is 'filled (tṛpta) with knowledge (jñāna) and direct experience (vijñāna),' and it is precisely this saturation that produces steadiness amid all relational difference. Because the yogī's ātman rests in Kṛṣṇa — kūṭa-stha, immovable as an anvil — the entire field of suhṛt and ari, sādhu and pāpa, appears as Kṛṣṇa's own līlā-range, neither threatening nor seducing the self. Vallabha's bhāṣya is compressed (shared with 6.8) and does not enumerate the six categories individually; the doctrinal point is that sama-buddhi is the overflow of devotional fullness (tṛpti), not an achieved detachment.

  divergence: Vallabha (joint commentary on 6.8–6.9): 'jñāna-vijñānā­bhyāṃ tṛpta ātmā yasya kūṭe sthitopy ukta ity ucyate sa yogī suhṛdādiṣu tad-vipariiteṣu ca samabuddhir adhikataro bhavatīti viśiṣyate' — NOTE: Vallabha gives no individual etymological analysis of the six categories

• Śrīdharabhakti

  Śrīdhara Svāmī gives clean etymological distinctions: suhṛt — the natural well-wisher (svabhāvenaiva hitāśaṃsī); mitra — helper moved by affection (sneha-vaśena); ari — the killer; udāsīna — indifferent to both sides in a quarrel; madhyastha — wishing good to both sides; dveṣya — the object of one's own aversion; bandhu — the related one; sādhu — the virtuous; pāpa — the vicious. The devotionally-inflected gloss turns on the phrase rāga-dveṣa-ādi-śūnyā buddhi — a mind empty of attachment and aversion toward all these. This is the mark of true excellence (viśiṣṭaḥ): not equanimity as indifference, but the absence of the interior distortion that makes some persons feel like threats and others like props.

  divergence: Śrīdhara: 'samā rāgadveṣādiśūnyā buddhir yasya sa tu viśiṣṭaḥ' — the six categories enumerated with distinct etymologies

• Madhusūdanaadvaita-bhakti

  *Suhṛt* (the well-wisher) is *prati-upakāram anapekṣya* (without expecting a return benefit) and *pūrva-snehaṃ sambandhaṃ ca vinā* (even without prior affection or kinship), one who benefits another. *Mitra* is *snehena upakārakaḥ* — the helper moved by affection. *Ariḥ* is *svakṛtāpakāram anapekṣya svabhāva-krauryeṇa apakartā* — the one who harms by innate cruelty, without regard for harm first done to him. *Udāsīna* remains indifferent to both parties in a dispute; *madhyastha* wishes well to both disputants. *Dveṣya*, by contrast, is *svakṛtāpakāram apekṣya apakartā* — the harmer who acts in proportion to harm received, a morally charged distinction that separates him from the *ari*. *Bandhu* benefits through kinship alone. Among all these — among the virtuous, *śāstravidhita-kāriṣu* (those who act as scripture enjoins), and even among the sinful, *śāstra-pratiṣiddha-kāriṣu* (those who do what scripture forbids), and by the *ca* among all others besides — the one who is *sama-buddhiḥ* is *kiṃ karma ity avyāpṛta-buddhiḥ*, whose mind is uninvolved in the question 'what is this action?', and who is *sarvatra rāga-dveṣa-śūnyaḥ* — empty of attraction and aversion everywhere. Such a one *viśiṣyate sarvataḥ utkṛṣṭo bhavati*: excels, is preeminent in every direction. The alternate reading *vimucyate* — 'is liberated' — carries the same force. This *sama-buddhi* is the crown of the yoga path Kṛṣṇa has been unfolding, and for Madhusūdana it is inseparable from *rāga-dveṣa-śūnyatā* as the inner ground of *bhakti*.

  divergence: Madhusūdana: 'rāgadveṣaśūnyo viśiṣyate sarvata utkṛṣṭo bhavati / vimucyate iti vā pāṭhaḥ'; the ari/dveṣya distinction — *svakṛtāpakāram anapekṣya svabhāva-krauryeṇa* vs *svakṛtāpakāram apekṣya apakartā* — is Madhusūdana's own fine-grained parsing, absent in Śaṅkara and Śrīdhara.