Bhagavad Gītā Chapter 8, Verse 23: Krishna to Arjuna — Akṣara-Brahma-Yoga
I will tell you, Arjuna, the times of departure by which yogins go forth to non-return, and those by which they return.
Bhāṣyakāra purports
- Śaṅkaraadvaita
Kṛṣṇa addresses Arjuna as 'bharatarṣabha' (bull of the Bharatas) to announce a teaching on kāla (time/path) that governs whether the departing yogin attains anāvṛtti (non-return) or āvṛtti (return). Śaṅkara reads 'yoginaḥ' as covering both jñāna-yogins and karma-yogins — the latter designated 'yogin' by loose extension from 'karmayogena yoginām' (BG 3.3). The bright path leads to liberation-without-return; the dark path leads back — but the jñānin who has realized the ātman is untouched by either path, since path-travel itself belongs to the realm of upādhi (limiting adjunct), not to the self.
- Rāmānujaviśiṣṭādvaita
Rāmānuja insists that kāla here is not clock-time but is a shorthand (upalakaṣaṇa) for the presiding deities of time — the succession of divinities from Agni through the months and the year — that actually constitute the two mārgas (paths). The yogin who departs by the bright mārga is the bhakta whose pūjā (worship) was offered as kainkarya (service to Nārāyaṇa) and hence is carried irreversibly upward; the puṇyakarmī (meritorious actor) who departs by the dark mārga enjoys his earned realms and returns. The verse is an act of Bhagavān's grace (prasāda): He names Himself the knower of both paths so that the devotee may choose deliberately.
- Madhvadvaita
Madhva reads 'kāla' as an upalakṣaṇa (indicator) for the entire array of path-deities beginning with Agni — the deity of kāla is just the first of a sequence to be specified in the following verses. The jīva (individual soul), eternally distinct from Hari, does not earn liberation by its own power; those jīvas whom Hari has marked for mukti travel the bright path and are received into His presence, while those marked for samsāra travel the dark. Kṛṣṇa's declaration 'vakṣyāmi' (I will tell) underscores that this knowledge comes only from the Lord — the jīva cannot reason its way to this path-topology independently.
- Vallabhaśuddhādvaita
Vallabha reads the verse as Kṛṣṇa's gracious answer to the devotee's natural question: by which mārga do those who know Bhagavān's mahimā (greatness) pass without return, and by which do others return? Kāla here signifies the mārga defined by the time-presiding deities — Agni and Jyotis are associated through their relation to the kāla-abhimānin deities of evening and dawn, citing the mantra 'agniś ca māmanyuś ca' for night and 'sūryaś ca māmanyuś ca' for day. The bhakta who is a mahimā-jñānin (knower of Kṛṣṇa's greatness) departs by the bright mārga into anāvṛtti; the arthārthī (one seeking worldly ends) departs by the dark mārga back into samsāra. This is not cosmic mechanics but Kṛṣṇa's līlā-prasāda (grace expressed as divine play).
- Śrīdharabhakti
Śrīdhara opens by recalling the context: the paramareśvara-upāsaka (worshipper of the supreme Lord) was said to reach Brahman's abode and not return; others do return. This verse addresses the expectant question: by which kāla-distinguished mārga does the yogin pass to anāvṛtti, and by which to āvṛtti? Kāla here designates the path characterized by the time-presiding deities (kālābhimāni-devatā-upalaṣkita mārga), as the Chāndogya nyāya of 'raśmy-anusārī' already implies: the deities from Agni through uttarāyaṇa define the bright path. The word kāla is used as upalakṣaṇa (secondary marker) — technically Agni and Jyotis are not kālābhimāninī, but because the majority of the path-deities are kāla-presiders, the association is acceptable, just as 'āmravana' names a forest by its dominant tree.
- Madhusūdanaadvaita-bhakti
Madhusūdana synthesizes: the saguna-brahma-upāsaka (worshipper of qualified Brahman) who has not yet attained samyag-darśana (integral vision) needs a path and so the devayāna-mārga (bright path) is taught; the pitṛyāna (dark path) is described for the purpose of glorifying the devayāna by contrast — niyamena āvṛtti-phala (necessarily leading to return). On the devayāna, some upāsakas who reach only up to Taḍit-loka and are led as far as Hiraṇyagarbha do eventually return after exhausting their merit; but the dahara-upāsakas (meditators on the dahara-ākāśa) attain krama-mukti (gradual liberation) and do not return. Hence kāla is used as upalakṣaṇa for the kālābhimāni-devatā-defined path, and since both paths have such deities in abundance, the upalakṣaṇa is not strained.