Bhagavad Gītā Chapter 9, Verse 28: Krishna to Arjuna — Rāja-Vidyā-Rāja-Guhya-Yoga

Bhāṣyakāra purports

• Śaṅkaraadvaita

  By offering every act to Me as its inner ruler, you are freed from karma-bandhanāni (action-bondages) — those actions whose fruits are the pleasant and unpleasant. This offering is itself saṃnyāsa-yoga: saṃnyāsa because the acts are surrendered to Me and are thereby not truly yours, yoga because that very surrender purifies the antaḥkaraṇa (inner instrument). With antaḥkaraṇa thus rendered fit and karma-bondage dissolved even while the body endures (jīvan-mukti), you will attain Me — and when this body falls, videha-kaivalya follows.

  divergence: Śaṅkara glosses saṃnyāsa-yoga as a compound where saṃnyāsa = maccherpaṇatayā karmatvāt (actions surrendered to Me) and yoga = the same acts constituting yoga by that surrender; his phrase 'jīvanneva pātite cāsmin śarīre māmupaiṣyasi' grounds the jīvan-mukti → videha-mukti sequence.

• Rāmānujaviśiṣṭādvaita

  Holding the mind in saṃnyāsa-yoga — the awareness that the self is purely śeṣa (accessory) to Bhagavān and that every laukika and vaidika act is His ārādhanā (worship) — you will be freed from all prior-karma bondages (prācīna-karma-ākhya bandhana) that obstruct reaching Me. Those bondages are the obstacles standing between you and mat-prāpti; once removed by this continuous maccheṣatā-anusandhāna (meditation on being His remainder), you will attain Me alone.

  divergence: Rāmānuja specifies 'maccheṣatām-aniyāmyataikasaṃ' — the self as purely governed by and accessory to Bhagavān — and names the bondages 'mat-prāpti-virodhibhiḥ', making liberation a removal of specific obstacles rather than dissolution of self.

• Madhvadvaita

  *Śubhāśubha-phalaiḥ* (fruits that are auspicious and inauspicious) — the double yield of *karma* (action) that constitutes *karma-bandhana* (the bondage of action) — lose their binding force entirely for the *jīva* whose selfhood is gathered into *saṃnyāsa-yoga* (the discipline of complete offering to Hari). *Śubhāśubha-phalair evaṃ mokṣyase karma-bandhanaiḥ*: liberation from this double bondage is not the *jīva*'s own achievement but the direct effect of Hari's *anugraha* (grace), for the *jīva* is *paratantra* (eternally dependent) at every ontological level and can never be the independent cause of its own release. The *pañca-bheda* (the five-fold real distinction) — above all the Lord–*jīva* *bheda* (real distinction) — remains intact through and beyond liberation; *vimuktaḥ* names the freed *jīva* as arriving at Hari's presence, not dissolving into Hari. *Mām upaiṣyasi* is arrival in the strict sense: the *paratantra jīva* reaches the *svatantra* (independently real, self-sufficient) Lord and abides in *taratamya* (graded ontological hierarchy), subordinate, distinct, and in *bhakti* (devotion) that is itself ontological subordination. No *karma*, whether meritorious or demeritorious, can reassert its claim over a *jīva* whose every act has been performed as dependent worship within the *śarīra* (body) of Hari's will.

  divergence: No attested bhāṣya from Madhva or Jayatīrtha on 9.28. Reading voiced directly from Dvaita *siddhānta*: *paratantra jīva*, *pañca-bheda*, *anugraha* as liberating cause, and *mām upaiṣyasi* as real arrival rather than dissolution.

• Vallabhaśuddhādvaita

  Vallabha addresses the devotee who has been anugraha-pātra (recipient of grace) in the maryādā-path: the fruit announced here is release from karma-bondage into Bhagavān's proximity. Saṃnyāsa here is tyāga (relinquishment) in the service of bhajana, while yoga is the cetasa-samatva (equanimity of mind) inseparable from it. Freed from iṣṭa-aniṣṭa fruits and underpolluted by saṃsāra-dharma even while living in the world, the devotee will reach the Puruṣottama in the vyāpi-vaikuṇṭha in a rūpa fit for sevā (service) — not mere liberation but intimate nearness.

  divergence: Vallabha's phrase 'mat-sevako yogī saṃsāra-dharmāliptas eva māṃ puruṣottamaṃ samupaiṣyasi sevopayogi-svarūpeṇa vyāpi-vaikuṇṭhe' makes the destination seva-fit proximity, not impersonal release, which is the signature Puṣṭi-mārga divergence.

• Śrīdharabhakti

  Śrīdhara frames the verse as an announcement of fruit: because you offer karma to Me, the acts no longer belong to you in any binding sense — tava tat-phala-sambandha-anupapatteḥ (connection with their fruits becomes impossible for you). Freed from both iṣṭa (pleasant) and aniṣṭa (unpleasant) karmic results, with citta engaged in saṃnyāsa-yoga — where saṃnyāsa is maccherpaṇa (offering to Me) and yoga is that same citta held steady — you will reach Me directly.

  divergence: Śrīdhara's key phrase is 'karmaṇāṃ mayi samarpitatvena tava tat-phala-sambandha-anupapatteḥ', locating liberation in the logical impossibility of karmic ownership once the act is genuinely surrendered.

• Madhusūdanaadvaita-bhakti

  Madhusūdana opens by naming the verse as a statement of bhajana-phala (fruit of devotion), then traces two registers of liberation. In the first, samarpita-karma purifies the antaḥkaraṇa; with antaḥkaraṇa śodhita (purified), avidyā's veil lifts and the devotee realizes 'ahaṃ brahmāsmi' — jīvan-mukti, attaining Me as direct cognition of non-difference. In the second, when prārabdha-karma exhausts itself and the body falls, videha-kaivalya follows. Even now the devotee, established in sat-rūpa and cleared of all upādhis (limiting adjuncts), ceases to be the subject of māyika-bheda-vyavahāra (transactional differentiation based on illusion).

  divergence: Madhusūdana's layered gloss — antaḥkaraṇa-śodhana → ajñāna-āvaraṇa-nivṛtti → jīvan-mukti → videha-kaivalya — with the closing observation 'sarvopādhi-nivṛttyā māyika-bheda-vyavahāra-viṣayo na bhaviṣyasi' marks the Advaita endpoint beyond which even devotional language dissolves.