Chapter 2 · Verse 16 · Sankhya Yoga
Bhagavad Gita 2.16
Sanskrit
नासतो विद्यते भावो नाभावो विद्यते सतः। उभयोरपि दृष्टोऽन्तस्त्वनयोस्तत्त्वदर्शिभिः।।2.16।।
Transliteration
nāsato vidyate bhāvo nābhāvo vidyate sataḥ ubhayorapi dṛiṣhṭo ’nta stvanayos tattva-darśhibhiḥ
In plain words
What you're holding onto as real—the loss, the rejection, the diagnosis, the debt, the failure—has a shelf life. Krishna says: the eternal part of you cannot be touched by any of it. Your body ages and falls away, your circumstances shift like weather, your mistakes and griefs are real but not final. The only thing that endures is the consciousness aware of all of it. When you stop fighting to keep temporary things permanent, you find what never leaves.
हिंदी अर्थ
असत् (अनित्य) का कोई अस्तित्व नहीं है और सत् (नित्य) का अभाव नहीं हो सकता। तत्वदर्शी लोगों ने इन दोनों का सार समझा है।
Word by Word
Krishna here unveils the ultimate truth that shatters our confusion about reality itself: the temporary has no true existence, the eternal cannot cease to be. This is not philosophy for its own sake—it is the ground floor of liberation, the foundation upon which every spiritual aspiration rests.
The seers of truth have gazed into both the manifest and unmanifest and returned with this singular wisdom: only the Self endures. When you recognize that your body, your fears, your losses are all temporary ripples on an eternal ocean, the grip of anxiety loosens, and you begin to live from your deathless nature.
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Bhagavad Gita 2.16 — BG 2.16
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