The Bhagavad Gita
All 18 chapters and 700 verses, with the Sanskrit, a transliteration, an English translation and a plain meaning of each.
Chapter 1: Arjuna’s Dilemma47 verses. On the eve of war, Arjuna sees family on both sides, drops his bow and breaks down. His crisis opens the Gita.Chapter 2: Transcendental Knowledge72 verses. Arjuna asks for guidance. Krishna teaches that the Self never dies, that we should act without clinging to results, and what a steady mind looks like.Chapter 3: Selfless Action43 verses. No one can avoid action, Krishna says. Work done as duty, without craving its rewards, frees rather than binds.Chapter 4: Knowledge and Action42 verses. Krishna explains why he returns whenever dharma declines, and how knowledge turns everyday action into a path to freedom.Chapter 5: Renunciation29 verses. Give up action, or act without attachment? Both reach the same goal, Krishna says, but acting without attachment is the easier path.Chapter 6: Meditation47 verses. How to meditate and steady a restless mind. Practice and detachment tame it, and no sincere effort is ever lost.Chapter 7: Knowledge and Realisation30 verses. Krishna reveals himself as the source of all that exists, explains the hard-to-cross power of Maya, and describes who turns to him.Chapter 8: The Imperishable28 verses. What we hold in mind at death shapes what follows, so Krishna urges remembering him at all times.Chapter 9: The Royal Secret34 verses. Krishna shares his most intimate teaching: he sustains all things, and any offering made with love, however small, reaches him.Chapter 10: Divine Glories42 verses. Krishna names the many forms of his glory. Whatever is excellent, beautiful or powerful is a spark of his splendour.Chapter 11: The Cosmic Form55 verses. Given divine sight, Arjuna sees all of creation and destruction within Krishna’s universal form, and is awed and terrified.Chapter 12: Devotion20 verses. Krishna explains the path of devotion and describes the devotee dear to him: kind, calm and free of ill will.Chapter 13: The Field and Its Knower34 verses. The body is the field and awareness is its knower. Seeing the difference, and the one Self in all beings, brings freedom.Chapter 14: The Three Gunas27 verses. Goodness, passion and inertia shape all we think and do. Krishna explains how each binds us and how to rise above them.Chapter 15: The Supreme Person20 verses. Worldly life is an upside-down tree. Krishna urges cutting its roots with detachment and seeking the Supreme beyond all that perishes.Chapter 16: Divine and Demonic Natures24 verses. Krishna contrasts the qualities that lead to freedom, like fearlessness and compassion, with those that bind: pride, anger and greed.Chapter 17: Three Kinds of Faith28 verses. Faith takes its shape from our nature. Krishna shows how the three gunas colour our food, worship, discipline and giving.Chapter 18: Freedom through Surrender78 verses. The closing teaching: give up attachment, not duty, and surrender to Krishna. Arjuna’s doubts are gone, and he is ready to act.