THE FOURTEENTH TEACHING

THE TRIAD OF
NATURE'S QUALITIES

Lord Krishna

I shall teach you still more
of the farthest knowledge one can know;
knowing it, all the sages
have reached perfection.

1

Resorting to this knowledge,
they follow the ways of my sacred duty;
in creation they are not reborn,
in dissolution they suffer no sorrow.

2

My womb is the great infinite spirit;
in it I place the embryo,
and from this, Arjuna,
comes the origin of all creatures.

3

The infinite spirit is the great womb
of all forms that come to be
in all wombs,
and I am the seed-giving father.

4

Lucidity, passion, dark inertia—
these qualities inherent in nature
bind the unchanging
embodied self in the body.

5

Lucidity, being untainted,
is luminous and without decay;
it binds one with attachment
to joy and knowledge, Arjuna.

6

Know that passion is emotional,
born of craving and attachment;
it binds the embodied self
with attachment to action.

7

Know dark inertia born of ignorance
as the delusion of every embodied self;
it binds one with negligence,
indolence, and sleep, Arjuna.

8

Lucidity addicts one to joy,
and passion to actions,
but dark inertia obscures knowledge
and addicts one to negligence.

9

When lucidity dominates
passion and inertia, it thrives;
and likewise when passion or inertia
dominates the other two.

10

When the light of knowledge
shines in all the body's senses,
then one knows
that lucidity prevails.

11

When passion increases, Arjuna,
greed and activity,
involvement in actions,
disquiet, and longing arise.

12

When dark inertia increases,
obscurity and inactivity,
negligence
and delusion, arise.

13

When lucidity prevails,
the self whose body dies
enters the untainted worlds
of those who know reality.

14

When he dies in passion,
he is born among lovers of action;
so when he dies in dark inertia,
he is born into wombs of folly.

15

The fruit of good conduct
is pure and untainted they say,
but suffering is the fruit of passion,
ignorance the fruit of dark inertia.

16

From lucidity knowledge is born;
from passion comes greed;
from dark inertia come negligence,
delusion, and ignorance.

17

Men who are lucid go upward;
men of passion stay in between;
men of dark inertia,
caught in vile ways, sink low.

18

When a man of vision sees
nature's qualities as the agent
of action and knows what lies beyond,
he enters into my being.

19

Transcending the three qualities
that are the body's source, the self
achieves immortality, freed from the sorrows
of birth, death, and old age.

20

Arjuna

Lord, what signs mark a man
who passes beyond the three qualities?
What does he do to cross
beyond these qualities?

21

Krishna

He does not dislike light
or activity or delusion;
when they cease to exist
he does not desire them.

22

He remains disinterested,
unmoved by qualities of nature;
he never wavers, knowing
that only qualities are in motion.

23

Self-reliant, impartial to suffering
and joy, to clay, stone, or gold,
the resolute man is the same
to foe and friend, to blame and praise.

24

The same in honor, and disgrace,
to ally and enemy, a man
who abandons involvements
transcends the qualities of nature.

25

One who serves me faithfully,
with discipline of devotion,
transcends the qualities of nature
and shares in the infinite spirit.

26

I am the infinite spirit's foundation,
immortal and immutable,
the basis of eternal sacred duty
and of perfect joy.

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