Bhagavad Gita 9.3
Spoken by Krishna · Verse 3 of 34
अश्रद्दधानाः पुरुषा धर्मस्यास्य परन्तप | अप्राप्य मां निवर्तन्ते मृत्युसंसारवर्त्मनि ||३||
aśraddadhānāḥ puruṣā dharmasyāsya parantapa | aprāpya māṃ nivartante mṛtyu-saṃsāra-vartmani || 3 ||
Those without faith in this teaching do not attain Me — they return to the path of rebirth fraught with death.
Word by word (3)
- aśraddadhānāḥ puruṣāḥ dharmasya asya parantapa
- — Persons without śraddhā for this dharma (teaching), O scorcher of foes · aśraddadhānāḥ = those without śraddhā (a = not; śrad-dadhāna = placing heart-faith; śraddadhāna = present participle of śrad + √dhā = to place one's heart; śraddadhāna = having śraddhā, faithful; aśraddadhānāḥ = lacking śraddhā, faithless — but śraddhā is not 'blind faith'; it is the living, engaged trust that comes from genuine reflection and exposure to teaching; aśraddadhāna is one who cannot or will not engage this way). puruṣāḥ = persons (people in general). dharmasya asya = for this dharma (dharma here = the teaching/path just described in V1-V2; the 'dharma' of Ch.9's rāja-vidyā). parantapa = O scorcher of foes (para = enemies; tapa = one who burns/scorches; parantapa = 'O scorcher of enemies'; honorific address to Arjuna indicating his power). V3 is the teaching's 'shadow side': after the seven-fold praise of V2, V3 identifies who CANNOT receive the teaching and what happens to them.
- aprāpya māṃ nivartante mṛtyu-saṃsāra-vartmani
- — Not attaining Me, they return on the path of the death-bound saṃsāra · aprāpya = not attaining (a = not; prāpya = gerund of √āp = to attain — 'not having attained'). māṃ = Me (accusative of aham — 'Me, Krishna'). nivartante = they return (ni + √vṛt = to turn back; nivartante = they turn back, return). mṛtyu-saṃsāra-vartmani = on the path of the death-bound saṃsāra (mṛtyu = death; saṃsāra = the cycle of birth, death, and rebirth; vartman = path, way — mṛtyu-saṃsāra-vartman = the path of the death-cycle; locative — 'on the path of death-fraught saṃsāra'). The construction is precise: aprāpya māṃ (not attaining Me — the missed destination) → nivartante (they return — the inevitable consequence) → mṛtyu-saṃsāra-vartmani (on/to the death-fraught path — the place they return to). This is the dark-path outcome of V8.25 now seen from the Ch.9 perspective: without the rāja-vidyā of V1-V2, without śraddhā for the teaching, one naturally returns to the cycle of death and rebirth.
- śraddhā vs. aśraddā — the root distinction that determines spiritual trajectory
- — V3's aśraddadhānāḥ (without śraddhā) is not mere disbelief but the absence of the engaged, living trust that allows the teaching to be received · Śraddhā is one of the Gita's most important and most misunderstood terms. It does NOT mean blind faith or belief without evidence. The Sanskrit root is śrad + √dhā: śrad = heart (cognate with Latin cor = heart, Greek kardia = heart); dhā = to place. Śraddhā = 'placing one's heart' — the genuine, engaged orientation of the whole being toward something as worthy of trust and practice. This is different from: (1) intellectual assent (I agree this is logically coherent); (2) emotional feeling (I want this to be true); (3) blind faith (I believe because someone told me to). Śraddhā is the whole-person engagement that results from genuine reflection, exposure to the teaching, and personal investigation. It is what allows the teaching to enter and transform. Aśraddadhānāḥ (those without śraddhā) are those who cannot or will not engage this way — whether from intellectual pride, habitual cynicism, or simple disinterest. For them, the teaching cannot land regardless of how clearly it is stated. V3 is thus the Gita's acknowledgment that not all teachings reach all people — the limitation is in the receptor, not the transmission.
Those without faith in this teaching, O scorcher of foes, fail to reach Me and return to the round of birth and death.
A modern analogy
A medicine that is not taken cannot heal. The aśraddadhānāḥ named in this verse are those who encounter the medicine (this chapter's teaching) but cannot or will not take it — whether from disbelief in its efficacy, resistance to the discipline, or simply lack of readiness. The consequence: the illness continues (mṛtyu-saṃsāra-vartman — the cycle of suffering continues). The verse is not condemning the non-taker but stating the natural result of not taking the medicine.
What it does NOT mean
The verse's judgment of the aśraddadhānāḥ is not condemnation. Those without śraddhā return to the cycle — they are not punished but simply continue the default trajectory of unresolved karma, the same helpless cycling described in the earlier teaching that beings dissolve and re-emerge again and again with no will of their own. The verse is descriptive, not punitive: this is what happens without the teaching's reception, naturally and mechanically. The compassionate reading: this verse motivates śraddhā-cultivation. Knowing the consequence of aśraddhā (return to the death-cycle) is the motivation to cultivate śraddhā through practice, reflection, and exposure to the teaching.
Take with you
- This verse is the Gita's honest acknowledgment that not every teaching works for every person at every moment. Śraddhā is required for the teaching to land. If you find yourself resistant to this chapter's teaching (doubting, defensive, dismissive), this is the moment to ask: 'What is blocking my śraddhā here? What in me is preventing the engaged, whole-person reception?' The block is worth examining — it is the aśraddhā that the verse identifies.
- Let mṛtyu-saṃsāra-vartman (the path of death-fraught rebirth) be a daily motivator for śraddhā-cultivation: the alternative to receiving this chapter's teaching is not neutral — it is a return to the cycle of suffering. This is not fear-based motivation but honest assessment of the stakes. The verse says: without śraddhā, the default continues. With śraddhā, the opening verse's promise — freedom from all that is inauspicious — becomes available.
- Apply this verse to teaching others: when you encounter someone who is genuinely aśraddadhāna (not yet ready for the teaching), the verse is the reminder that forcing the teaching will not work. The śraddhā must be prepared first — through exposure, through the person's own life-experience pointing toward the teaching's relevance, through the compassionate context that allows readiness to emerge.
Public-domain translations (4) compare all →
Persons without Shraddha for this Dharma, return, O scorcher of foes, without attaining Me, to the path of rebirth fraught with death. [4]
These who are unbelievers in this truth, O harasser of thy foes, find me not, but revolving in rebirth return to this world, the mansion of death. [6]
They that receive not this, failing in faith To grasp the greater wisdom, reach not Me, Destroyer of thy foes! They sink anew Into the realm of Flesh, where all things change! [7]
O terror of your foes! those men who have no faith in this holy doctrine, return to the path of this mortal world, without attaining to me. [9]
This verse speaks to
Where this thread continues
I shall declare the most secret knowledge with realization to you who do not cavil — knowing it frees you from all evil.
Arjuna asks: those who perform yajña with sincere śraddhā but without śāstric ordinance — what guṇa is their state?
Smoke, Night, dark fortnight, six months of the Southern sun — by this path the yogi attains the moon and returns.
O Krishna — the faithful yogi who fell short of yoga's perfection through wandering mind: what is their destination?
Śraddhā of the embodied is threefold — born of svabhāva (one's own nature): sāttvikī, rājasī, tāmasī. Hear this.
Whoever studies this sacred dialogue — by him I shall have been worshipped by jñāna-yajña; such is My conviction.
Verse 3 of 34 · back to Chapter 9