Chapter 10 · Verse 19·Spoken by Krishna
हन्त ते कथयिष्यामि दिव्या ह्यात्मविभूतयः। प्राधान्यतः कुरुश्रेष्ठ नास्त्यन्तो विस्तरस्य मे
hanta te kathayiṣhyāmi divyā hyātma-vibhūtayaḥ prādhānyataḥ kuru-śhreṣhṭha nāstyanto vistarasya me
Krishna said: Yes, I shall describe to you my divine glories, the most prominent ones. There is no end to my extent.
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Sanskrit recitation by Swami Brahmānanda
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Convergence
his verse is Krishna agreeing to Arjuna's request and beginning to speak. Arjuna had just asked to hear of Krishna's glories, his 'vibhutis' (the divine powers and excellences by which God shows himself in the world). Krishna opens with the word 'hanta', a small word of assent, as if to say 'very well, yes, I will'. Several commentators stress that he is reassuring Arjuna here: in effect, 'what you have prayed for, that I shall do, do not be agitated', and then he turns at once to actually doing it. So the line is both a granting of the request and the doorway into the long roll of glories that follows.
Braided from 14 commentators
Śaṅkarācārya · Śrī Ānandagiri · Madhusūdana Sarasvatī · Dhanapati Sūri · Śrī Nīlakaṇṭha · Rāmānujācārya · Vedānta Deśika · Vallabhācārya · Śrī Puruṣottama · Śrīdhara Svāmī · Śrīla Viśvanātha · Śrīla Baladeva · Sant Jñāneśvar · Swami Ramsukhdas
What Krishna promises to tell are his 'divya atma-vibhutayah', his divine self-glories. 'Divya' means divine, exalted, uncommon, the very opposite of ordinary. Commentators underline this by contrast: these are not lowly things like straw, grass, or bricks, but glories that are renowned even in other scriptures for their excellence. 'Atma-vibhuti' means the glory is the Self's own, Krishna's own; the splendor we see anywhere is really his. The point is that the listing about to come is not a survey of impressive objects in the world for their own sake, but a showing of God through the finest things in which his power becomes visible.
Braided from 9 commentators
Śaṅkarācārya · Madhusūdana Sarasvatī · Śrī Nīlakaṇṭha · Vallabhācārya · Śrīla Viśvanātha · Śrīla Baladeva · Sant Jñāneśvar · Swami Sivananda · Swami Ramsukhdas
Krishna says he will tell them 'pradhanyatah', only by the chief ones. He will name the foremost, most leading glories and not attempt every one. The commentators take this as the deliberate method of the discourse: a selection by eminence, picking out what stands at the head in each class. This is why the famous list that follows reads as 'of X, I am the chief one'. The selection is not arbitrary; it gives the seeker the most striking, highest instances on which to fix attention.
Braided from 12 commentators
Śaṅkarācārya · Śrī Ānandagiri · Madhusūdana Sarasvatī · Dhanapati Sūri · Rāmānujācārya · Vedānta Deśika · Vallabhācārya · Śrī Puruṣottama · Śrīdhara Svāmī · Śrīla Viśvanātha · Śrīla Baladeva · Swami Sivananda
The reason for naming only the chief ones is given in the second line, 'na asty anto vistarasya me': there is no end to the extent of my glories. The list must be partial because the reality it points to is endless. Shankara puts it vividly: to tell them without remainder would be impossible even in a hundred years. The endlessness is not a limit on Krishna's knowledge or generosity but a feature of the truth itself. Vedantadeshika draws the practical lesson for the listener: hearing this, the seeker is reminded that the listing is indicative, not exhaustive, so that even after the whole roll has been heard, infinitely more remains.
Braided from 14 commentators
Śaṅkarācārya · Śrī Ānandagiri · Madhusūdana Sarasvatī · Dhanapati Sūri · Rāmānujācārya · Vedānta Deśika · Vallabhācārya · Śrī Puruṣottama · Śrīdhara Svāmī · Śrīla Viśvanātha · Śrīla Baladeva · Sant Jñāneśvar · Swami Sivananda · Swami Ramsukhdas
Krishna addresses Arjuna as 'kuru-shreshtha', best of the Kurus, and many read this as more than a polite form. It marks Arjuna as the fit recipient, the one worthy to hear and to hold such teaching. Some add that he is being chosen for his sake, as one born in the line of devotees and ready for this knowledge. The address quietly says the glories are being unfolded to a qualified, beloved listener.
Dhanapati Sūri · Rāmānujācārya · Vedānta Deśika · Śrī Puruṣottama · Sant Jñāneśvar
Divergence
Advaita Vedānta
These commentators read 'hanta' soberly, as a particle of assent or consent that grants Arjuna's request and reassures him, and they bound the moment in time with 'now': now, at once, I shall begin. Their main work is grammatical and clarifying. They settle the sentence-construction ('which glories, those I shall tell'), explain why the glories cannot be told in full (because their expanse has no end), and one of them treats the endlessness of the second line as needing to be carried back and applied across the whole. One of these voices also raises a finer point: since Arjuna had asked about both yoga and vibhuti, glory and the power behind it, the glories named here are chosen as the ones helpful to yoga, while yoga itself is stated only briefly now because it will be taken up in detail later. The tone throughout is exact and explanatory rather than devotional.
Śaṅkarācārya · Śrī Ānandagiri · Madhusūdana Sarasvatī · Śrī Nīlakaṇṭha · Dhanapati Sūri
Viśiṣṭādvaita
For these commentators the heart of 'vibhuti' is being-governed: to be a glory of Krishna is to be ruled and set going by him. Ramanuja ties this verse back to earlier lines where Krishna said that all the states of beings, understanding and the rest, arise from him alone. He distinguishes two things the chapter speaks of: the 'discipline' (yoga) means Krishna being the creator, protector, and withdrawer who abides as the self of all beings and sets them going, the governing; and the 'glory' (vibhuti) means the beings so set going and governed. So the list of glories is really a display of God's rulership over all that exists. Vedantadeshika adds the practical frame: the chief ones are named precisely so the candidate has ample concrete material on which to fix contemplation, with 'by the chief' fixing the mode of selection and 'no end to my extent' fixing why the list must stop short.
Rāmānujācārya · Vedānta Deśika
Kashmir Shaivism
Abhinavagupta reads the whole vibhuti-passage, from 'I shall tell you' down to 'I stand abiding in the world', as guarding against a fatal misreading. When Krishna says 'I am the Self', he wards off any cutting-off. The danger is that hearing 'of immovable things I am the Himalaya' a listener might conclude 'only the Himalaya is the Lord and nothing else', which would destroy the vision of an undivided, partless Brahman. Because the all-embracing, whole and undivided pervasion does not arise in a mind that is otherwise disposed, this teaching is for one who longs to know that pervasion. He notes that the chapter speaks first in the language of difference-and-non-difference but gathers up non-difference alone at the end, when Krishna says in effect 'what need of all this? Upholding this, I stand abiding in the world with a single portion'. Citing the Rig Veda that a quarter of him is all beings while three quarters are deathless, he reads every named glory as the truth of the Lord alone, seen under varied forms, becoming the field of perception for everyone.
Ācārya Abhinavagupta
Bhakti
The devotional commentators hear 'hanta' as a word of tenderness, of compassion and inward yielding, not a flat marker of consent. Sridhara makes this the emotional centre of the chapter: the Lord is not coolly listing but warmly relenting, so the whole vibhuti-roll should be heard as a tender unfolding to a beloved devotee, not as a catalogue. Vishvanatha and Baladeva add a doctrinal point about the scope of 'vibhuti': both material and non-material things are meant, and because all of them have arisen from the Lord's power, all are to be meditated upon, in their gradations, as forms of the Lord himself. Baladeva refines this: some things are held to be directly forms of the Lord and are meditated on as such, while others are forms of only a portion of his power. Jnaneshwari renders the scene with great warmth: Krishna, the very Father of the creator, lovingly calls Arjuna 'Ba' (father), confessing that the vastness of his own being is only dimly present even to his own mind, and gives the chief glories as a seed that contains the whole tree, so that by them Arjuna may grasp the entire universe.
Śrīdhara Svāmī · Śrīla Viśvanātha · Śrīla Baladeva · Sant Jñāneśvar
Śuddhādvaita
These commentators read 'hanta' devotionally, as a vocative of compassion or of joy at Arjuna's prayer for knowledge of the Lord's own form. Vallabha is firm on one point that sets him apart: 'pradhanyatah', telling only the chief ones, is not a concession or apology for an incomplete list. It is the very mark of the discourse, because to attempt to name them all would be to fail, while naming the chief ones is enough to set the devotee's seeing in the right key. He explains 'vibhuti' as the Lord's becoming-manifest in 'prakriti' (primal nature) as his own portion, joined with some special feature, so that since everything is of glory-form, the chief glories rightly stand for all. He adds that the Lord remains imperishable through his nature of inconceivable lordship, and that this yoga will be stated at the chapter's end. Purushottama reads 'divya' as Krishna's play-form, the glories being told for Arjuna's sake because he asked and is fit, one born in the line of devotees.
Vallabhācārya · Śrī Puruṣottama
Modern
Sivananda states the verse plainly: Krishna will now tell only his most prominent divine glories, because they are illimitable and cannot all be described. Ramsukhdas draws out the inner meaning of 'divya'. Whatever specialness appears in any object, person, or event is in truth God's own; to see that specialness as belonging to God alone is divinity, and to see it as belonging to the object or person is non-divinity, that is, mere worldliness. He also sets this verse beside the next chapter for a striking contrast: here Arjuna asks for the glories in full and is told to hear them in brief because they have no end, yet later, when Arjuna timidly asks to see a single cosmic form, Krishna bids him behold hundreds and thousands of forms. Ramsukhdas's voice is non-sectarian devotional Vedanta throughout.
Swami Sivananda · Swami Ramsukhdas
A Seeker Asks
If God's glories are endless and only the chief ones can be named, how can a short, partial list help me know an infinite reality?
The list is meant to be a seed, not a complete inventory. Krishna names only the 'chief' glories, the foremost instance in each class, precisely because that is enough to set your seeing in the right key; trying to name them all would only fail, since they have no end.
Vallabhācārya · Śaṅkarācārya
The named glories are given as concrete material for contemplation. By fixing attention on the highest, most striking instances, the seeker gets a foothold; and hearing that the list is only indicative, you are reminded that even after the whole roll, infinitely more remains, so the list opens onto the infinite rather than fencing it in.
Vedānta Deśika
Jnaneshwari gives the image directly: the chief glories are like the seed that contains the whole tree, or the garden that, once owned, yields all its flowers and fruit. By grasping these few foremost forms, you grasp the entire universe, because each one is the Lord himself showing through.
Sant Jñāneśvar
And the deeper move is to read every glory back to its one source. The specialness in any of these things is God's own; to see it as his is to know him through it. So a finite list works not by summing up the infinite but by teaching the eye to find the same one reality at the head of everything it admires.
Swami Ramsukhdas · Śrīla Viśvanātha
Contemplation
Take this verse as a lens for daily seeing. Krishna calls his glories 'divya', divine, and the heart of that word is simple: wherever you meet something special, some brilliance in a person, a beauty in nature, a power in an event, that specialness is in truth God's own. The practice is a quiet shift of attribution. When you see the specialness and trace it back to God, that seeing is divinity. When you stop at the object or the person and credit the specialness to them alone, that is non-divinity, mere worldliness. You do not have to climb to an abstract infinite. You only have to let each striking thing in front of you point past itself to its source. The list Krishna is about to give is training for exactly this. He names the chief, the foremost of each kind, so that your eye learns to find him at the summit of whatever you admire, and from there to sense the endless extent that no list could exhaust.
Sit with this · Swami Ramsukhdas
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