The Lord carries the getting and the keeping of those who think of him alone.
Krishna describes a worship with nothing else in it: no other deity held worthy, no other reward chased, the mind fixed on him alone. To such devotees he gives a promise in his own voice: their yoga-kṣhema, the gaining of what they lack and the guarding of what they have, he himself carries.
Those who worship me alone, thinking of nothing else, who are ever devoted to me: for them I secure what they lack and preserve what they have.
The chapter has been weighing worshippers who still strive for their own ends and are supported through that striving; here Krishna turns to those who no longer strive for themselves, and takes their whole burden into his own hand.
Where they agreethe convergence
Across schools and centuries the commentators come to the same ground. These are the points they share, and the voices that hold each one.
There is a devotee who thinks of him and of nothing else; no other reward pulls at the mind, no other worship divides it.
Across Advaita, Viśiṣṭādvaita, Dvaita, Śuddhādvaita, Bhedābheda, Kashmir Śaiva, Bhakti, and the modern voicesŚaṅkara · Ānandagiri · Madhusūdana · Nīlakaṇṭha · Dhanapati · Rāmānuja · Vedānta Deśika · Madhva · Jayatīrtha · Vallabha · Puruṣottama · Bhāskara · Abhinavagupta · Śrīdhara · Viśvanātha · Baladeva · Jñāneśvar · Sivananda · Tilak · RamsukhdasIn Śaṅkara, Ānandagiri, and 18 others’ words
The verse describes a special kind of devotee: those who worship with 'ananya' (literally 'no other'). Across the commentators this 'no other' is read first as exclusive single-mindedness. Krishna alone is the one they think of, the one they worship, with nothing else competing for their attention. They hold no other deity as worship-worthy and chase no other reward. Their mind is fixed and undivided, ever joined ('nitya-abhiyukta') to him, ceaselessly engaged in contemplation and service with body, senses, and mind. The word 'paryupasate' ('worship all around') is taken to mean they worship completely, on every side, without stint or limit.
To these he makes a promise: the gaining of what is not yet gained, the keeping of what is gained, he himself carries.
Across Advaita, Viśiṣṭādvaita, Śuddhādvaita, Bhedābheda, Bhakti, and the modern voicesŚaṅkara · Ānandagiri · Madhusūdana · Nīlakaṇṭha · Dhanapati · Vedānta Deśika · Vallabha · Puruṣottama · Bhāskara · Śrīdhara · Viśvanātha · Baladeva · Jñāneśvar · Sivananda · Tilak · RamsukhdasIn Śaṅkara, Ānandagiri, and 14 others’ words
To these devotees Krishna makes a concrete promise: he himself carries their 'yoga-kshema'. The commentators give this pair a settled definition that nearly all repeat. 'Yoga' is the gaining of what is not yet gained; 'kshema' is the guarding or preserving of what has already been gained. In the most common reading this covers the practical, worldly burden of staying alive and supplied: food, wealth, clothing, the upkeep of the body. The point of the promise is that the devotee does not have to carry this burden himself. The Lord takes the whole load of getting-and-keeping into his own hand.
They have stopped striving for their own gain and safety and taken him as sole refuge; so the providing falls to him alone.
Across Advaita, Bhakti, and the modern voicesŚaṅkara · Ānandagiri · Madhusūdana · Dhanapati · Viśvanātha · Baladeva · Sivananda · RamsukhdasIn Śaṅkara, Ānandagiri, and 6 others’ words
Several commentators stress why this promise belongs to these devotees in particular, and not in the same way to everyone. Because their minds are turned wholly to the Lord and emptied of self-seeking, they do not strive for their own gain and security; they have given up the calculus of getting and keeping. They take the Lord as their sole refuge. So it falls to the Lord alone to provide. The contrast is drawn sharply: other worshippers still exert their own effort for their own ends, and the Lord supports them through that effort, but for these single-hearted ones, who make no such effort for themselves, the Lord bears the burden directly, by his own will, without prompting any effort on their part.
And he carries it as a mother-bird feeds her young, forgetting her hunger; the bearing is no strain to him but a joy.
Across Bhakti, and the modern voicesViśvanātha · Baladeva · Jñāneśvar · Śrīdhara · SivanandaIn Viśvanātha, Baladeva, and 3 others’ words
The grammar itself is read as a sign of intimacy. Krishna says 'vahami', 'I bear' or 'I carry', rather than simply 'I do'. Commentators take this word choice deliberately: the burden of nourishing these devotees is borne by the Lord just as a householder bears the burden of nourishing his own family, or a mother-bird the burden of feeding her young, forgetting her own hunger. The image is one of loving responsibility taken up freely. Some add that this care reaches even to gifts the devotee never asked for; the devotee does not lay his burden on the Lord, the Lord himself takes it up out of affection for those who are dear to him.
This is the shared ground; it can be carried as it is. Below is where they differ.
Where they differthe divergence
Advaita Vedānta, in their fuller words
These commentators read 'ananya' ('no other') chiefly as non-duality. The devotee is 'non-separate', not held apart from God, having gone to the supreme Self, Narayana, as his very own Self. He knows 'I am the Lord Vasudeva himself, the Self of all; nothing distinct from me exists', and ever contemplates that one inner Self. So 'no other' means no second thing exists to be thought of at all. These are the renouncers, the seers of the supreme truth, who see God all round as unlimited. The reason the Lord carries their gain and security is stated as identity: the knower is the Lord's very Self, and dear to him; being non-other than the Lord, their aim is already accomplished through him. To the objection that the Lord supports other devotees too, the answer is that the others strive for themselves out of attachment to their own life and death, while these have no such greed and take the Lord as their only refuge, so the Lord alone bears their gain and security.
Viśiṣṭādvaita, in their fuller words
Here 'ananya' marks not identity but exclusive purpose and single attention. These great souls have the contemplation of the Lord as their one and only purpose, because they cannot hold themselves up at all without thinking of him. They worship him as endowed with all auspicious qualities and joined with all glory, all around, without stint. For them 'yoga-kshema' is given a higher, spiritual reading alongside the practical one: 'yoga' is the very attaining of the Lord himself, and 'kshema' is the keeping-safe that takes the form of no-return, never falling back from him. These sources frame the verse as a practical assurance: the candidate who has achieved inner singleness does not have to carry the practical burden on top of the spiritual one, for the Lord takes that burden into his own hand. They are the ever-joined who long for perpetual union with him.
Bhedābheda, in their fuller words
This commentator gives a spare, direct gloss. 'Ananya' are simply those for whom there is no other object of worship. For these ever-steadfast ones the Lord himself bears the gaining and the keeping. 'Yoga' is the gaining of what is not yet gained; 'kshema' is the safeguarding of what is gained. The reading stays close to the plain words without elaborating a further system here.
Dvaita, in their fuller words
These commentators explicitly resist reading 'ananya' as the non-dual knower. 'Ananya' means rather 'thinking of nothing else', those for whom no other thing stands as an object of thought. They support this with other scriptures: the Gautama hymns say that steadfast ones who give up all in the mind and think on the one God alone, pure and primal, 'without another, enter into the God himself', and the Moksha-dharma says that the Lord, whose orb of light shines, can be seen by those collected through one-pointedness. That seeing of the Lord, together with his radiance, is taken as the means to gain and security. 'Ever, on every side' means those who are joined in every way, engaged in the Lord's service with body, senses, and mind. The relationship is one of devoted service to a Lord who remains distinct, not of identity.
Śuddhādvaita, in their fuller words
These commentators place the verse at the center of the 'pushti-marga', the path of grace. The devotee's accomplishment comes not by his own means but by the Lord's 'anugraha', his free favor. 'Ananya' means free of any thought or means turned to another deity, another fruit, or another path; the devotee's very bhakti is itself obtained only by the Lord's grace, since bhakti is like a wish-granting tree that gives what no other means can reach. They distinguish two paths to the Lord, the 'maryada' (the regulated way, where means apply in due order) and the 'pushti' (the way of pure grace, where means are set aside and the Lord's free will alone is the cause, as with the dwellers of Vraja). On this reading 'yoga' is the gaining of wealth, grain, and clothing here for the use of the Lord's service, or the conjunction with him in service itself, and 'kshema' is the safeguarding of it, even unto the final good of moksha. Where the devotee's own power fails, the Purushottama himself manifests his power and accomplishes the thing; whatever the 'ananya' devotee cannot bring forth, the Lord brings forth out of his grace.
Kashmir Śaiva, in their fuller words
This commentator reads 'yoga-kshema' in a purely inward, spiritual register, distinct from any worldly maintenance. 'Ananya' are those for whom there is no other fruit to be desired, none apart from the Lord. The 'yoga', the 'gain', is the winning of the Lord's own nature, not won before. The 'kshema', the 'keeping', is the guarding of that gain once won, a footing now established firmly in the nature of the Blessed One, so secure that not even the fear of falling from yoga can arise. The whole promise is thus about attaining and never losing one's grounding in the divine nature.
Bhakti, in their fuller words
These devotional commentators emphasize grace and the Lord's loving attachment to his devotees. The happiness of the exclusive devotee is not gained by his own action but is given by the Lord alone, because in the devotee's desirelessness there is a kind of actionlessness, and so what is seen in his life is the Lord's gift, springing from the Lord's affection for those dear to him. They make much of 'vahami', 'I bear': the Lord carries the devotee's bodily upkeep just as a householder carries his family's, or a mother-bird her young's, forgetting her own hunger. One stresses that the devotee does not lay any burden on the Lord at all; the Lord takes it up by his own will, and far from being a strain, bearing the welfare of a dear devotee is supremely joy-giving to him, like delighting in a beloved consort. Several add that the promise reaches even to moksha, even when the devotee has not asked for it; the Lord himself, and not any host of lesser deities, carries the devotee all the way to himself.
A modern reading, in their fuller words
The modern commentators draw out different facets. One blends interpretations: 'ananya' as non-separate, the devotee looking on the Supreme as his own Self and worshiping the Lord in all beings, so that, having nothing he calls his own and no desire for life or death, all his wants are met by the Lord like a parent attending to a child. Another keeps the worldly reading firm: 'yoga-kshema' is daily maintenance in worldly life, getting what one lacks and protecting what one has, and notes from the Narayaniya doctrine that such solitary devotees, though they worship alone, still belong to the path of desireless action. Another reads the whole verse as the assurance that everything seen, heard, or understood is the Lord's own form and every activity his play; the devotee who firmly holds this stays in the Lord and is 'ananya', and the Lord himself, the indweller, carries both the means and the goal, so the devotee need seek no other guarantee anywhere. One offers no exposition of this verse's content but names three marks of the true devotee: even-mindedness, skill in action, and undivided devotion, which must be harmonized together.
A few questions to carry
These ask for understanding, not recall; each answer is settled by the commentary itself.
For a second sitting
Carry this with youwhat stays
The weight of this verse for the seeker rests in one shift. You are not asked to provide what you do not yet have, nor to anxiously preserve what you have gained. The means come, and the goal is kept, by the indweller who has accepted his single-hearted devotee as his own. So the practice is to let your sense of importance and preciousness rest in the Lord alone, in nothing else. When that is firm, remembrance of him happens on its own, without strain. And once it does, you can lay down the endless inner accounting of getting and keeping; there is no other guarantee, no other security, that you need to go searching for anywhere.
When all that you hold precious rests in the Lord alone, remembrance of him comes without strain, and the long inner accounting of getting and keeping can at last be laid down.
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machine-assisted draft, pending review
Convergence
he verse describes a special kind of devotee: those who worship with 'ananya' (literally 'no other'). Across the commentators this 'no other' is read first as exclusive single-mindedness. Krishna alone is the one they think of, the one they worship, with nothing else competing for their attention. They hold no other deity as worship-worthy and chase no other reward. Their mind is fixed and undivided, ever joined ('nitya-abhiyukta') to him, ceaselessly engaged in contemplation and service with body, senses, and mind. The word 'paryupasate' ('worship all around') is taken to mean they worship completely, on every side, without stint or limit.
Braided from 20 commentators
Śaṅkarācārya · Śrī Ānandagiri · Madhusūdana Sarasvatī · Śrī Nīlakaṇṭha · Dhanapati Sūri · Rāmānujācārya · Vedānta Deśika · Madhvācārya · Śrī Jayatīrtha · Vallabhācārya · Śrī Puruṣottama · Śrī Bhāskara · Ācārya Abhinavagupta · Śrīdhara Svāmī · Śrīla Viśvanātha · Śrīla Baladeva · Sant Jñāneśvar · Swami Sivananda · Lokmanya Tilak · Swami Ramsukhdas
To these devotees Krishna makes a concrete promise: he himself carries their 'yoga-kshema'. The commentators give this pair a settled definition that nearly all repeat. 'Yoga' is the gaining of what is not yet gained; 'kshema' is the guarding or preserving of what has already been gained. In the most common reading this covers the practical, worldly burden of staying alive and supplied: food, wealth, clothing, the upkeep of the body. The point of the promise is that the devotee does not have to carry this burden himself. The Lord takes the whole load of getting-and-keeping into his own hand.
Braided from 16 commentators
Śaṅkarācārya · Śrī Ānandagiri · Madhusūdana Sarasvatī · Śrī Nīlakaṇṭha · Dhanapati Sūri · Vedānta Deśika · Vallabhācārya · Śrī Puruṣottama · Śrī Bhāskara · Śrīdhara Svāmī · Śrīla Viśvanātha · Śrīla Baladeva · Sant Jñāneśvar · Swami Sivananda · Lokmanya Tilak · Swami Ramsukhdas
Several commentators stress why this promise belongs to these devotees in particular, and not in the same way to everyone. Because their minds are turned wholly to the Lord and emptied of self-seeking, they do not strive for their own gain and security; they have given up the calculus of getting and keeping. They take the Lord as their sole refuge. So it falls to the Lord alone to provide. The contrast is drawn sharply: other worshippers still exert their own effort for their own ends, and the Lord supports them through that effort, but for these single-hearted ones, who make no such effort for themselves, the Lord bears the burden directly, by his own will, without prompting any effort on their part.
Braided from 8 commentators
Śaṅkarācārya · Śrī Ānandagiri · Madhusūdana Sarasvatī · Dhanapati Sūri · Śrīla Viśvanātha · Śrīla Baladeva · Swami Sivananda · Swami Ramsukhdas
The grammar itself is read as a sign of intimacy. Krishna says 'vahami', 'I bear' or 'I carry', rather than simply 'I do'. Commentators take this word choice deliberately: the burden of nourishing these devotees is borne by the Lord just as a householder bears the burden of nourishing his own family, or a mother-bird the burden of feeding her young, forgetting her own hunger. The image is one of loving responsibility taken up freely. Some add that this care reaches even to gifts the devotee never asked for; the devotee does not lay his burden on the Lord, the Lord himself takes it up out of affection for those who are dear to him.
Śrīla Viśvanātha · Śrīla Baladeva · Sant Jñāneśvar · Śrīdhara Svāmī · Swami Sivananda
Divergence
Advaita Vedānta
These commentators read 'ananya' ('no other') chiefly as non-duality. The devotee is 'non-separate', not held apart from God, having gone to the supreme Self, Narayana, as his very own Self. He knows 'I am the Lord Vasudeva himself, the Self of all; nothing distinct from me exists', and ever contemplates that one inner Self. So 'no other' means no second thing exists to be thought of at all. These are the renouncers, the seers of the supreme truth, who see God all round as unlimited. The reason the Lord carries their gain and security is stated as identity: the knower is the Lord's very Self, and dear to him; being non-other than the Lord, their aim is already accomplished through him. To the objection that the Lord supports other devotees too, the answer is that the others strive for themselves out of attachment to their own life and death, while these have no such greed and take the Lord as their only refuge, so the Lord alone bears their gain and security.
Śaṅkarācārya · Śrī Ānandagiri · Madhusūdana Sarasvatī · Śrī Nīlakaṇṭha · Dhanapati Sūri
Viśiṣṭādvaita
Here 'ananya' marks not identity but exclusive purpose and single attention. These great souls have the contemplation of the Lord as their one and only purpose, because they cannot hold themselves up at all without thinking of him. They worship him as endowed with all auspicious qualities and joined with all glory, all around, without stint. For them 'yoga-kshema' is given a higher, spiritual reading alongside the practical one: 'yoga' is the very attaining of the Lord himself, and 'kshema' is the keeping-safe that takes the form of no-return, never falling back from him. These sources frame the verse as a practical assurance: the candidate who has achieved inner singleness does not have to carry the practical burden on top of the spiritual one, for the Lord takes that burden into his own hand. They are the ever-joined who long for perpetual union with him.
Rāmānujācārya · Vedānta Deśika
Bhedabheda
This commentator gives a spare, direct gloss. 'Ananya' are simply those for whom there is no other object of worship. For these ever-steadfast ones the Lord himself bears the gaining and the keeping. 'Yoga' is the gaining of what is not yet gained; 'kshema' is the safeguarding of what is gained. The reading stays close to the plain words without elaborating a further system here.
Śrī Bhāskara
Dvaita
These commentators explicitly resist reading 'ananya' as the non-dual knower. 'Ananya' means rather 'thinking of nothing else', those for whom no other thing stands as an object of thought. They support this with other scriptures: the Gautama hymns say that steadfast ones who give up all in the mind and think on the one God alone, pure and primal, 'without another, enter into the God himself', and the Moksha-dharma says that the Lord, whose orb of light shines, can be seen by those collected through one-pointedness. That seeing of the Lord, together with his radiance, is taken as the means to gain and security. 'Ever, on every side' means those who are joined in every way, engaged in the Lord's service with body, senses, and mind. The relationship is one of devoted service to a Lord who remains distinct, not of identity.
Madhvācārya · Śrī Jayatīrtha
Śuddhādvaita
These commentators place the verse at the center of the 'pushti-marga', the path of grace. The devotee's accomplishment comes not by his own means but by the Lord's 'anugraha', his free favor. 'Ananya' means free of any thought or means turned to another deity, another fruit, or another path; the devotee's very bhakti is itself obtained only by the Lord's grace, since bhakti is like a wish-granting tree that gives what no other means can reach. They distinguish two paths to the Lord, the 'maryada' (the regulated way, where means apply in due order) and the 'pushti' (the way of pure grace, where means are set aside and the Lord's free will alone is the cause, as with the dwellers of Vraja). On this reading 'yoga' is the gaining of wealth, grain, and clothing here for the use of the Lord's service, or the conjunction with him in service itself, and 'kshema' is the safeguarding of it, even unto the final good of moksha. Where the devotee's own power fails, the Purushottama himself manifests his power and accomplishes the thing; whatever the 'ananya' devotee cannot bring forth, the Lord brings forth out of his grace.
Vallabhācārya · Śrī Puruṣottama
Kashmir Shaivism
This commentator reads 'yoga-kshema' in a purely inward, spiritual register, distinct from any worldly maintenance. 'Ananya' are those for whom there is no other fruit to be desired, none apart from the Lord. The 'yoga', the 'gain', is the winning of the Lord's own nature, not won before. The 'kshema', the 'keeping', is the guarding of that gain once won, a footing now established firmly in the nature of the Blessed One, so secure that not even the fear of falling from yoga can arise. The whole promise is thus about attaining and never losing one's grounding in the divine nature.
Ācārya Abhinavagupta
Bhakti
These devotional commentators emphasize grace and the Lord's loving attachment to his devotees. The happiness of the exclusive devotee is not gained by his own action but is given by the Lord alone, because in the devotee's desirelessness there is a kind of actionlessness, and so what is seen in his life is the Lord's gift, springing from the Lord's affection for those dear to him. They make much of 'vahami', 'I bear': the Lord carries the devotee's bodily upkeep just as a householder carries his family's, or a mother-bird her young's, forgetting her own hunger. One stresses that the devotee does not lay any burden on the Lord at all; the Lord takes it up by his own will, and far from being a strain, bearing the welfare of a dear devotee is supremely joy-giving to him, like delighting in a beloved consort. Several add that the promise reaches even to moksha, even when the devotee has not asked for it; the Lord himself, and not any host of lesser deities, carries the devotee all the way to himself.
Śrīdhara Svāmī · Śrīla Viśvanātha · Śrīla Baladeva · Sant Jñāneśvar
Modern
The modern commentators draw out different facets. One blends interpretations: 'ananya' as non-separate, the devotee looking on the Supreme as his own Self and worshiping the Lord in all beings, so that, having nothing he calls his own and no desire for life or death, all his wants are met by the Lord like a parent attending to a child. Another keeps the worldly reading firm: 'yoga-kshema' is daily maintenance in worldly life, getting what one lacks and protecting what one has, and notes from the Narayaniya doctrine that such solitary devotees, though they worship alone, still belong to the path of desireless action. Another reads the whole verse as the assurance that everything seen, heard, or understood is the Lord's own form and every activity his play; the devotee who firmly holds this stays in the Lord and is 'ananya', and the Lord himself, the indweller, carries both the means and the goal, so the devotee need seek no other guarantee anywhere. One offers no exposition of this verse's content but names three marks of the true devotee: even-mindedness, skill in action, and undivided devotion, which must be harmonized together.
Swami Sivananda · Lokmanya Tilak · Swami Ramsukhdas · Mahatma Gandhi
A Seeker Asks
If I simply stop providing for myself and trust that God will carry my food, wealth, and safety, am I being faithful, or just irresponsible?
The promise is not a license to be passive; it is the natural result of a mind that has genuinely become single. The commentators are precise that the Lord bears the burden of those who, because their attention rests wholly on him, no longer strive for their own gain and security and have truly given up the inner calculus of getting and keeping. The condition is real desirelessness, not a deliberate scheme to make God do your chores.
Śaṅkarācārya · Madhusūdana Sarasvatī · Śrīla Viśvanātha · Swami Ramsukhdas
And the devotees in view are described as anything but idle: they are ever joined, ceaselessly engaged in contemplation and service with body, senses, and mind. The point is not that effort stops, but that self-seeking stops; one commentator even notes that such solitary devotees still belong to the path of desireless action.
Śrī Jayatīrtha · Śrī Ānandagiri · Lokmanya Tilak
Finally, the right posture is not to lay your burden on God as a demand but to let him take it up by his own will. The commentators are careful here: the devotee does not impose the burden at all; the Lord carries it out of his own affection, the way a householder gladly provides for his family. So faithfulness looks like wholehearted devotion that quietly drops anxiety, not a refusal to act paired with an expectation that God must perform.
Śrīla Viśvanātha · Śrīdhara Svāmī · Śrīla Baladeva
Contemplation
The weight of this verse for the seeker rests in one shift. You are not asked to provide what you do not yet have, nor to anxiously preserve what you have gained. The means come, and the goal is kept, by the indweller who has accepted his single-hearted devotee as his own. So the practice is to let your sense of importance and preciousness rest in the Lord alone, in nothing else. When that is firm, remembrance of him happens on its own, without strain. And once it does, you can lay down the endless inner accounting of getting and keeping; there is no other guarantee, no other security, that you need to go searching for anywhere.
Sit with this · Swami Ramsukhdas
All the translations and commentary
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