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Chapter 2 · Contents of the Gītā Summarized · 72 verses

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Duty & actionChapter 2 · Contents of the Gītā Summarized
2.462.48

Bhagavad-gītā As It Is · Text 2.47

Responsibility without ownership of outcomes

कर्मण्येवाधिकारस्ते मा फलेषु कदाचन ।

मा कर्मफलहेतुर्भूर्मा ते सङ्गोऽस्त्वकर्मणि ॥ ४७ ॥

karmaṇy evādhikāras te

mā phaleṣu kadācana

mā karma-phala-hetur bhūr

mā te saṅgo ’stv akarmaṇi

Translation

You have a right to perform your prescribed duty, but you are not entitled to the fruits of action. Never consider yourself the cause of the results of your activities, and never be attached to not doing your duty.

Read Śrīla Prabhupāda's purport on Vedabase.io
1

Understand it

What this verse is saying, and where it sits in the story.

Duty Without Attachment

  1. 1Perform your prescribed duty without claiming its fruits, seeing yourself as the cause of results, or avoiding your duty.
  2. 2Prabhupāda explains that attachment to results causes bondage, while duty done without attachment leads toward liberation.
  3. 3Arjuna’s refusal to fight would also be attachment. His path to salvation was to fight as a matter of duty, without attachment to results.

Where we are

In the story

Chapter 2, Contents of the Gītā Summarized: work without attachment; steady intelligence.

What it teaches

Study note

A concise instruction distinguishes action from attachment to results.

How it feels

Interpretive

Release from outcome anxiety

2

Key ideas in this verse

The spiritual concepts this verse connects to.

Offered action

Duty is to act, not to claim entitlement to fruits.

3

Live it

Take one thing from this verse into your day.

Ask yourself

Am I doing my duty sincerely while remaining attached to recognition or results?

Practice

Identify one duty to execute wholeheartedly without making the result your identity.

4

The story behind it

Mahābhārata episodes and stories from the purports that shed light on this verse.

All stories for chapter 2 ›
5

Related verses

Keep going: verses that carry this teaching further.

BG 3.19Exemplary action and leadership by exampleBG 3.30Offer every action to KrishnaBG 5.10Action without contamination

Study notes are editorial summaries, not the translation. Confirm them in the original text and purport.

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Back to step 3The key ideasNext · Step 5 of 7 · 5 minLive the teachingsBring it into your day with a practice and a question, straight from Prabhupāda's purports.