Chapter 18 · Verse 62·Spoken by Krishna
तमेव शरणं गच्छ सर्वभावेन भारत।तत्प्रसादात्परां शान्तिं स्थानं प्राप्स्यसि शाश्वतम्
tam eva śharaṇaṁ gachchha sarva-bhāvena bhārata tat-prasādāt parāṁ śhāntiṁ sthānaṁ prāpsyasi śhāśhvatam
Take refuge in him alone with your whole being, Arjuna. By his grace you will attain supreme peace and the eternal abode.
Word by Word
Saved for this reading session
Three movements · tap a label to switch
Sanskrit recitation by Swami Brahmānanda
Audio from the Gītā Supersite, IIT Kanpur
Synthesis · a glossed leaf
machine-assisted draft, pending review
Convergence
rishna's command is to take refuge in that very Lord just named in the previous verse: the antaryami, the inner ruler who is already seated in the heart of every being. The commentators stress the word 'tam eva,' 'him alone.' The refuge is not to be placed in some distant god, in another deity, or in one's own separate power, but in the one who is nearest of all, already within. To go for refuge here means to take Him as one's resort and shelter so that He may remove the affliction of samsara, the wheel of birth and death.
Braided from 7 commentators
Śaṅkarācārya · Rāmānujācārya · Vallabhācārya · Śrī Puruṣottama · Śrīdhara Svāmī · Swami Sivananda · Swami Ramsukhdas
The refuge must be total, holding nothing back. The word 'sarva-bhavena,' 'with your whole being,' is read by nearly all the commentators as the heart of the verse: the surrender is not partial. It is to be made with mind, speech, and action together, or as one source puts it, with body, mind, intellect, feeling, and the sense of 'I' and 'mine' all turned over at once. No part of the seeker is to be left unsurrendered. Several sources add that this requires giving up egoism (ahamkara) and every secret desire, since pride and craving are the chief obstacles to true self-surrender.
Braided from 9 commentators
Śaṅkarācārya · Śrī Ānandagiri · Madhusūdana Sarasvatī · Vedānta Deśika · Śrī Puruṣottama · Śrīdhara Svāmī · Sant Jñāneśvar · Swami Sivananda · Swami Ramsukhdas
What is attained is attained 'by His grace' (tat-prasadat), not by the seeker's own effort. The commentators dwell on the word 'prasada,' favour. The fruit is twofold: 'param shanti,' the supreme peace, and 'shashvatam sthanam,' the eternal abode or station. The peace is the cessation of the affliction of samsara; the abode is the everlasting resting place. The grace is the Lord's own gift, so the result does not rest finally on whether Arjuna wins or loses his battle.
Braided from 11 commentators
Śaṅkarācārya · Madhusūdana Sarasvatī · Śrī Nīlakaṇṭha · Dhanapati Sūri · Rāmānujācārya · Vedānta Deśika · Vallabhācārya · Śrī Puruṣottama · Śrīdhara Svāmī · Lokmanya Tilak · Swami Ramsukhdas
This verse follows directly from the previous one and completes its logic. Because the Lord stands within all beings as their inner ruler and all souls are dependent on Him, taking refuge in Him is not a sentimental gesture but the only coherent move left to the seeker. Several commentators present it as the climax toward which the whole teaching has been building: the inner ruler who governs all is the very one in whom one must now consign oneself.
Śrīdhara Svāmī · Rāmānujācārya · Vallabhācārya · Swami Ramsukhdas
Divergence
Advaita Vedānta
These commentators read the eternal abode as the non-dual Self itself and the supreme peace as the cessation of ignorance and its effects. For one of them the 'station' is the abiding as the non-dual, self-luminous, supreme-bliss form, and the supreme peace is the turning back of avidya, ignorance. The refuge is to be held only 'as far as the arising of the knowledge of reality': surrender to the Lord is the means until truth-knowledge dawns by His grace, after which one rests as the liberated Self. One of these voices reads the 'supreme peace' as samadhi, citing the yoga teaching that attainment of samadhi comes through devoted surrender to the Lord (ishvara-pranidhana). They also raise and answer an objection: if the Lord impels all beings, would not all human effort, and the whole scriptural framework of injunction and prohibition, become pointless? The answer is that one is still to make the effort of taking refuge until knowledge arises.
Śaṅkarācārya · Śrī Ānandagiri · Madhusūdana Sarasvatī · Śrī Nīlakaṇṭha
Viśiṣṭādvaita
These commentators read the refuge as conforming to the Lord out of His own tender love, the Lord who, for those who take shelter in Him, has lowered Himself to sit as Arjuna's charioteer and commands 'do thus.' The 'whole being' fastens that the surrender is not partial. They warn that without this refuge one remains driven by the Lord's maya, ignorant, unable to escape action such as the war, and so will perish; therefore one should do the war and the rest in the manner the Lord has taught. The eternal abode is the literal supreme abode of Vishnu, vouched for, in their reading, by a chain of revealed texts: 'that supreme abode of Vishnu the wise see always,' the firmament where the ancient seers and Sadhya gods dwell, the light shining beyond this heaven, the further shore of the path.
Rāmānujācārya · Vedānta Deśika
Dvaita
These commentators are concerned to guard the Lord's supreme lordship against a possible misreading. They note that the verse speaks in an 'indirect' or oblique manner, comparing it to Bhima's deliberately ambiguous words about Drona. The worry is that from phrases like 'go to Him alone for refuge, by His grace' one might wrongly infer that Krishna is not himself the supreme Lord. They answer that the indirect form is settled in its true meaning and is 'otherwise accounted for': the verse must not be taken to diminish Krishna's lordship.
Madhvācārya · Śrī Jayatīrtha
Śuddhādvaita
These commentators read the verse as the Lord's command that one do one's own dharma at His bidding. The refuge is addressed especially to one who does not know the Lord or cannot carry out His command directly: even then, take refuge in the very Lord who stands in your heart, giving up all alternatives of desire and doubt. One of them stresses that being born in a good lineage frees one of egoism for this surrender. The settled conclusion is that action done by the Lord's command does not bind one who is His. They also read the refuge here as not a partial reliance but a full inward consigning, the very prapatti, complete self-surrender, that the next great verse will spell out.
Vallabhācārya · Śrī Puruṣottama
Bhakti
These commentators ground the refuge in the soul's total dependence on the supreme Lord and read the eternal abode as the Lord's own supreme place. Giving up egoism, one surrenders with the whole self. One of them gives a vivid image: surrender yourself completely to God with all your self in speech, mind, and body, just as the Ganges surrenders itself to the sea; then through His grace you become lord of tranquillity and rest in the bliss of the essence of the Self, where creation is created, where rest itself rests and experience itself gains experience, reigning unwasted on the seat of your own Self.
Śrīdhara Svāmī · Sant Jñāneśvar
Modern
These commentators present the verse as a call to total, perfect surrender with practical force. One warns plainly that desire and egoism are the two chief obstacles to self-surrender and must be killed ruthlessly, keeping no secret desire for silent gratification, and running to the Lord as sole refuge for freedom from the troubles and sorrows of samsara. One reads sharana not as a posture of the body but as the bhava of the mind by which one says 'I am His, the work is His, the outcome is His; I have no separate weight of my own,' and frames the whole verse as the climax of the inner-ruler-refuge (antaryami-sharanagati) toward which Krishna has been moving from the start. He adds a human note: people fail to value a great soul while present and weep only after he is gone, so Arjuna should seize this grace at once and not let the moment slip.
Swami Sivananda · Lokmanya Tilak · Swami Ramsukhdas
A Seeker Asks
If the Lord already moves all beings from within and the peace comes 'by His grace,' what is actually left for me to do?
The commentators meet this worry head-on. They raise exactly this objection: if the Lord impels every being, would not all human effort, and the entire scriptural framework of what to do and what to avoid, become pointless? Their answer is that one thing remains genuinely yours to do, and the verse names it: take refuge. The effort of turning yourself over to Him is your part, and it is to be kept up until the knowledge of reality arises by His grace.
Śrī Ānandagiri · Madhusūdana Sarasvatī
So the verse does not cancel action; it reframes it. You are still to act, to do the war and the rest in the manner the Lord has taught, but without claiming the result as your own private achievement. Indeed, refusing this refuge does not free you from acting: driven by the Lord's maya you would act anyway, ignorantly, and come to ruin. Action done at His command, by one who is His, does not bind.
Rāmānujācārya · Vallabhācārya
And the surrender that is asked is itself inward, not a performance. Sharana is the heart's stance, 'I am His, the work and the outcome are His, I have no separate weight of my own,' made with the whole of yourself. This is why the fruit can be called His grace and still ask everything of you: what you give up is precisely the ego that imagined the burden was yours to carry alone.
Swami Ramsukhdas · Swami Sivananda
Contemplation
Take the surrender out of the body and put it in the heart. Sharana is not a posture or a gesture; it is the inner stance by which you quietly say, 'I am His, the work is His, the outcome is His, and I carry no separate weight of my own.' Make that handing-over with the whole of yourself at once: body, mind, intellect, feeling, the sense of 'I' and the sense of 'mine,' all turned over together, leaving no corner of yourself unsurrendered. And notice the urgency: we tend to value a great soul only after he is gone, and to weep too late. The grace is being offered now, from the very one who is already seated in your own heart. Seize it without delay rather than letting the moment slip.
Sit with this · Swami Ramsukhdas
Pull up a chair.
You have come to sit with this verse. When you are ready to hear the translators and the commentators in full, tap a name in The seating.