Krishna
तमस्त्वज्ञानजं विद्धि मोहनं सर्वदेहिनाम् । प्रमादालस्यनिद्राभिस्तन्निबध्नाति भारत ॥
tamastvajñānajaṃ viddhi mohanaṃ sarvadehinām | pramādālasyanidrābhistannibadhnāti bhārata ||
But know that tamas is born of ignorance, and it deludes all embodied beings. It binds them, O descendant of Bharata, through negligence, laziness and sleep.
Explanation Krishna is describing the three qualities (guṇa) of nature that bind the soul. After sattva and rajas, he turns to tamas, the quality of darkness and inertia, which arises from ignorance (ajñāna) and clouds the mind. It ties a person down through negligence (pramāda), laziness (ālasya) and excess sleep (nidrā).
Previous verse 14.7 Chapter 14 · The three qualities Next verse 14.9
About the Bhagavad Gita
The Bhagavad Gita, in Sanskrit श्रीमद्भगवद्गीता (Śrīmad Bhagavad Gītā ), “the song of the Lord”, is a dialogue of 18 chapters and 700 verses from the Bhishma Parva of the Mahabharata. On the battlefield of Kurukshetra, as the war is about to begin, the warrior Arjuna loses heart at the thought of fighting his own kin, and his charioteer Krishna answers him: on duty, on acting without attachment to the results, on knowledge, meditation and devotion. Sanjaya recounts the conversation to the blind king Dhritarashtra. The name is also written Bhagwad Gita, Bhagvad Gita, Bhagavat Gita or Bhagavad Geeta; with the honorific, Shrimad Bhagavad Gita, Srimad Bhagavad Gita or Shrimad Bhagwat Geeta; and often simply the Gita or Geeta.
Every verse is here in the original Sanskrit, with a Roman (IAST) transliteration, a plain-language translation and a short explanation, in English, Hindi, Arabic, Spanish, French and Tamil. The translations were made from the Sanskrit for this site and reviewed; they follow no published translation. Reading is free, with no account or advertising, and your progress stays in your browser. The verses are numbered 1.1 to 18.78, 701 in all, counting the question that opens chapter 13.
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