47. sreyan svadharmo vigunah
paradharmat svanusIhitat
svabadvaniyatam karma
kurvan na 'pnoti kilbisam
(47) Better is one's own law though imperfectly carried out than the law of another carried out perfectly. One does not incur sin when one does the duty ordained by one's own nature. See III, 35. It is no use employing our minds in tasks which are alien to our nature. In each of us lies a principle of becoming, an idea of divine self-expression. It is our real nature, svabhava, finding partial expression in our various activities. By following its guidance in our thought, aspiration and endeavour, we progressively realize the intention of the Spirit for us. What we call democracy is a way of life which requires us to respect the rights of every human being to be a person, a unique entity. We should never despise any man, for he can do something which others cannot.
48. sahajam karma kaunteya
sadosam api na tyajet
sarvarambha hi dosena
dhumena 'gnir iv 'vrtãs
(48) One should not give up the work suited to one's nature, O Son of Quint (Arjuna), though it may be defective, for all enterprises are clouded by defects as fire by smoke.
Karma Yoga and Absolute Perfection
49. asaktabuddhih sarvatra
jitatma vigatasprhah
naiskarmyasiddhirn paramam
samnyasena 'dhigacchati
(49) He whose understanding is unattached everywhere, who has subdued his self and from whom desire has fled—he comes through renunciation to the supreme state transcending all work. The Gita repeats that restraint and freedom from desire are essential to spiritual perfection. Attachment to objects, a sense of ego, are the characteristics of our lower nature. If we are to rise to a knowledge of our true self, self-possessed and self-luminous, we must conquer our lower nature with its ignorance and inertia, its love of worldly possessions, etc. naiskarmya: the state transcending all work. It is not a complete withdrawal from all work. Such a quietism is not possible so long as we live in the body. The Gita insists on inner renunciation. As the ego and nature are akin, the liberated soul be-coming Brahman, the Pure Self described as silent, calm, inactive, acts in the world of prakrti, knowing what the latter is.The highest state is here described, not positively as entering into the Lord but negatively as freedom from lama.
Perfection and Brahman
50. siddhim prapto yatha brahma
tatha 'pnoti nibodha me
samasenai 'va kaunteya
nistha jnanasya ya para
(50) Hear from me, in brief, 0 Son of Kunti (Arjuna), how, having attained perfection, he attains to the Brahman, that supreme consummation of wisdom.
S. writes : "Though thus quite self-evident, easily knowable, quite near and forming the very self, Brahman appears—to the unenlightened, to those whose understanding is carried away by the differentiated phenomena of names and forms created by ignorance, as unknown, difficult to know, very remote, as though he were a separate thing. [1] As there is no need of evidence for knowing one's own body, even so there is no need of evidence for knowing the self which is nearer than the body. When we turn away from the outward and train our understanding, it is immediately comprehended. See IX, 2.
