Bhagavad Gita 2.28
Spoken by Krishna · Verse 28 of 72
अव्यक्तादीनि भूतानि व्यक्तमध्यानि भारत। अव्यक्तनिधनान्येव तत्र का परिदेवना॥
avyaktādīni bhūtāni vyakta-madhyāni bhārata / avyakta-nidhanāny eva tatra kā paridevanā
Before birth: unmanifest. After death: unmanifest. The life between is the brief visible part — what is there to grieve?
Word by word (4)
- avyakta-ādīni bhūtāni
- — beings are unmanifest in their beginning · Before birth: unmanifest, unknown, not perceptible. The before-birth state is 'avyakta' (unmanifest) — just as the after-death state is.
- vyakta-madhyāni bhārata
- — manifest in their middle (during life)
- avyakta-nidhanāni eva
- — and unmanifest in their end (at death)
- tatra kā paridevanā
- — wherefore then the lamentation? / where is the cause for grief?
'All beings are unmanifest before they are born, O Bharata. They are manifest in between — during life. And they are unmanifest again at the end. What, then, is there to grieve about?'
A modern analogy
Where were you before you were born? You didn't exist in manifest form. Where will you be after death? The same place you came from — the unmanifest. The visible life is a brief interruption of that non-manifest state. To grieve the return to the unmanifest is to grieve something woven into the very nature of existence.
Take with you
- The three-phase structure (unmanifest → manifest → unmanifest) places life in a cosmic perspective.
- 'Tatra kā paridevanā' — where is the cause for grief? A direct rhetorical question. It expects the answer: nowhere.
- This argument works even for materialists: before birth there was no suffering; what returns to the unmanifest is released from the possibility of suffering.
Public-domain translations (3) compare all →
Beings are unmanifest in their beginning, manifest in their middle state, O Bharata, and unmanifest again in their end. What is there to grieve about? [4]
Invisible before birth are all beings — and after death invisible again — they are seen between two unseen states. Why grieve for what is usual? [7]
Beings are not manifested before their birth, and are not manifested after their death; they are manifested between the two. What occasion is there for grief? [9]
This verse speaks to
Where this thread continues
At Brahma's dawn, all beings emerge from the unmanifest; at his dusk, they merge back into that same unmanifest.
At the end of each cosmic age, all beings return to My prakriti — at the next dawn, I send them forth again.
Arjuna sees his own people ready to die — and his body breaks before his mind can argue.
I taught this imperishable yoga to the sun-god at the dawn of time — it has been passed down through kings ever since.
Brahman is the Imperishable; Adhyātma is its presence in each body; Karma is the cosmic offering sustaining all beings.
All worlds up to Brahma's realm are subject to return — but those who attain Me, O Arjuna, are not reborn.
Verse 28 of 72 · back to Chapter 2