98. Perform or Renounce

Arjuna asks, “O Krishna, you praise renunciation of actions (karma-sannyas) and yet you also advise their performance at the same time. Tell me with certainty, which is the better path” (5.1). On an earlier occasion too, Arjuna was looking for certainty between the paths of sankhya (wisdom or awareness) and karma (3.1).

Krishna, however, does not advise renunciation of karma (action) and instead, he says that one doesn’t attain siddhi (perfection) by renouncing karma (3.4). One is compelled to perform karmas as per his gunas (qualities or characters) (3.5). In fact, even maintenance of the human body is not possible without karma (3.8). Clarity comes from the subsequent reply of Krishna.

Karma has two sides. One is the executor or karta and another is karma-phal (fruits of action). Dropping the sense of doership (kartapan) by realising that gunas are the real karta is referred to by Arjuna as karma-sannyas. He subsequently refers to doing karma without expecting karma-phal as the performance of karma. In essence, Arjuna was enquiring whether to drop kartapan or karma-phal.

Krishna replies that salvation is found both by renunciation and the performance of actions. But of these, yoga of action is better than the renunciation of actions (5.2). The point to be noted is that this reply is specific to Arjuna who is worried about the fruits of action, which is the loss of his reputation as well as the demise of his teachers and relatives in the battle of Kurukshetra. Broadly, this applies to many of us being mind-oriented like Arjuna.

 Krishna clarifies that only children, not the wise, speak of sankhya and karma yoga differently. He who is truly established in one obtains the fruits of both (5.4). In essence, the two paths may be different, but the destination is the same.