Chapter 17 · Verse 20·Spoken by Krishna
दातव्यमिति यद्दानं दीयतेऽनुपकारिणे।देशे काले च पात्रे च तद्दानं सात्त्विकं स्मृतम्
dātavyam iti yad dānaṁ dīyate ‘nupakāriṇe deśhe kāle cha pātre cha tad dānaṁ sāttvikaṁ smṛitam
A gift given because it ought to be given, offered to one who cannot give back, at the right place, at the right time, and to a worthy person: that gift is held to be of light.
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Sanskrit recitation by Swami Brahmānanda
Audio from the Gītā Supersite, IIT Kanpur
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Convergence
his verse defines the first of three kinds of gift, the sattvic gift, where sattva means purity, clarity, and goodness. Krishna says such a gift is given with the settled conviction 'it is simply to be given'. The Sanskrit datavyam means 'to be given', and the whole weight of the verse rests on this inner stance: the giver gives because giving is right and is enjoined by scripture, treating the act itself as a duty, not as a transaction. The fruit or reward of the gift is not the aim. Several commentators stress this single conviction as the heart of sattvic charity.
Braided from 15 commentators
Śaṅkarācārya · Śrī Ānandagiri · Madhusūdana Sarasvatī · Śrī Nīlakaṇṭha · Dhanapati Sūri · Rāmānujācārya · Vedānta Deśika · Śrīdhara Svāmī · Śrīla Viśvanātha · Śrīla Baladeva · Śrī Puruṣottama · Lokmanya Tilak · Swami Ramsukhdas · Sant Jñāneśvar · Swami Sivananda
The gift is given to one who can render no return. The Sanskrit anupakarine means a non-helper, someone who has done the giver no favour, does none now, and is unlikely to do any in the future. This guards the purity of the act: when the recipient cannot reciprocate, the giving cannot be a disguised exchange or repayment. The commentators read this as the practical mark of selflessness; giving in the expectation of a return would drop the gift down into the rajasic (passionate, self-interested) category.
Braided from 13 commentators
Śaṅkarācārya · Madhusūdana Sarasvatī · Śrī Nīlakaṇṭha · Dhanapati Sūri · Rāmānujācārya · Vedānta Deśika · Śrīdhara Svāmī · Śrīla Baladeva · Śrī Puruṣottama · Lokmanya Tilak · Swami Ramsukhdas · Sant Jñāneśvar · Swami Sivananda
Sattvic giving is also fitted to the right place, the right time, and the right recipient, the three conditions named as desha, kala, and patra. The commentators illustrate place with a holy site such as Kurukshetra or Kashi, time with a sacred occasion such as a solar or lunar eclipse, an equinox, or a solstice, and recipient with a worthy person, typically a brahmana learned in the Veda and its auxiliary sciences, or one endowed with austerity (tapas) and sacred learning (shruta). The gift becomes sattvic not by its size but by the convergence of these right alignments.
Braided from 13 commentators
Śaṅkarācārya · Madhusūdana Sarasvatī · Śrī Nīlakaṇṭha · Dhanapati Sūri · Rāmānujācārya · Vedānta Deśika · Śrīdhara Svāmī · Śrīla Baladeva · Śrī Puruṣottama · Lokmanya Tilak · Swami Ramsukhdas · Sant Jñāneśvar · Swami Sivananda
Some commentators add a further nuance about the 'worthy recipient' (patra): such a person is desirable not only because he is learned, but because through his knowledge and austerity he can protect both himself and the giver. On this reading the fit recipient is a 'guardian' who shields the donor from misfortune, and scripture recommends giving only to such a one. The grammatical discussion of the word patre in several Sanskrit commentaries serves this same point: how the recipient is to be construed in the sentence, and whether the gift to a fit recipient forms a distinct strand of merit alongside the gift fitted to place and time.
Madhusūdana Sarasvatī · Śrī Nīlakaṇṭha · Śrīdhara Svāmī · Śrīla Baladeva · Swami Sivananda
Divergence
Śuddhādvaita
This school refuses to let sattvic charity be defined first by the modest formula of 'no desire for fruit'. It opens instead from a deeper acknowledgment: scripture warns that 'wealth is the root of mishaps', so gathered-up wealth is itself an anartha, a maker of harm. Yet that same wealth, when given away, becomes a means by which devotion (bhakti) is accomplished. Knowing this, the giver knows that wealth must be given. The right recipient, place, time, and worthy person are then the proper holdings within which the act of giving becomes sattvic. Notably, this reading widens the recipient through the word 'and' (cha) to include even the apatra, the unfit but hungry person, showing that the rule is not legalistic but shaped by devotion and opened to genuine need.
Śrī Puruṣottama
Modern
This non-sectarian devotional reading gives 'place, time, and recipient' two senses at once, both to be held together. The first sense is practical compassion: give the needed thing in the place that lacks it, at the time it is needed, to the person who is without it. The second is the traditional sense of sacred places, sacred occasions, and exalted recipients. Underlying both is a striking ground: all the things of creation belong to all and are for all, never as personal property. So even when one gives to the non-helper, the thing given is in truth already his; the giver was merely holding what was never his to keep. The understanding 'his thing is being given to him, not mine' must come first, and the gift that severs the giver's clinging bond with the thing, with its fruit, and with the act itself is what makes it sattvic.
Swami Ramsukhdas
Kashmir Shaivism
This source reads the verse mainly as a contrast-marker. The injunction 'it is to be given' is held simply so as to point up the defects in the other two kinds of gift that follow. Giving 'grudgingly' names the defect of the rajasic gift (being measured out reluctantly and the like), and dishonouring the gift follows from dishonouring its recipient, which marks the tamasic gift. On this view the verse explains how worldly people act according to their disposition into the three kinds, the sattvic and the rest, framing the sattvic gift chiefly by setting it against what it is not.
Ācārya Abhinavagupta
A Seeker Asks
If a truly pure gift must be tied to sacred sites, eclipse-timed occasions, and learned brahmin recipients, does that not make selfless giving a ritual luxury rather than a way I can practice toward an ordinary person in ordinary need?
The verse's living center is not the sacred backdrop but the inner stance: giving with the settled conviction 'it is simply to be given', for its own sake, with no aim at any reward. That conviction is available to anyone, anywhere, regardless of place, calendar, or the recipient's learning.
Śaṅkarācārya · Rāmānujācārya · Śrīla Viśvanātha · Lokmanya Tilak · Swami Ramsukhdas
The mark of giving to 'one who can render no return' actually points away from ritual privilege and toward exactly the ordinary person in need. It is meant precisely to keep the gift free of any expectation of repayment, which is the essence of selflessness; giving with an eye on a return is what makes a gift impure.
Śaṅkarācārya · Madhusūdana Sarasvatī · Swami Ramsukhdas · Śrīla Baladeva
And the tradition itself reads 'right place, time, and recipient' more broadly than ritual prescription. One devotional school holds that the rule is not legalistic but shaped by need, expressly including even the unfit, hungry person under its scope; another reads 'place, time, and recipient' first as giving the needed thing where it is lacking, when it is needed, to the one without it. So ordinary compassion is not a lesser version of the teaching but is named within it.
Śrī Puruṣottama · Swami Ramsukhdas
Contemplation
Begin with the conviction that giving is simply your duty, with no thought of what it will yield for you here or hereafter. When you hold something, you carry the responsibility of giving it. And see clearly before you give: the things of creation belong to all and are for all, never truly to you alone. So even the stranger who can never repay you is, in truth, only receiving what was already his; you were merely the one through whose hands it had not yet reached him. Hold this understanding first, 'his thing is being given to him, not mine,' and then give. A gift offered this way cuts your clinging bond to the thing, to its fruit, and to the very act of giving. That severing is what makes it pure.
Sit with this · Swami Ramsukhdas
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