What this chapter is about
Krishna uses the metaphor of the Ashvattha tree (the cosmic tree of existence) to describe the illusory nature of the phenomenal world, and reveals himself as the Purushottama — the Supreme Person beyond both the perishable and the imperishable.
- Supreme Person
- Cosmic Tree
- Illusion
- Liberation
- God Beyond Duality
Verses
Chapter overview
Krishna opens with an upside-down tree. Roots above, branches below, leaves that are the verses of the scriptures — the whole visible world, growing downward, fed by the gunas, sending out roots that bind wherever they touch.
You will not find its beginning or its end by inspecting it, he says. It is not felled by study. Cut it with the axe of non-attachment, and then look for what it grew from.
What follows is the chapter's tenderest turn. A fragment of the divine, he says, becomes a living being in this world — and when it takes a body or leaves one, it carries the mind and senses along the way wind carries scent from a flower.
He names himself in ordinary places. The warmth in the belly that digests your food. The moisture in the moon that feeds every plant. The memory you are using now, and the forgetting.
Above the perishable and the imperishable both, he says, there is a third thing. That is what he is.
Browse by what you feel
Questions about Chapter 15
What is the upside-down tree at the start of Chapter 15?
15.1 describes an ashvattha with roots above and branches below, whose leaves are the Vedic hymns. 15.2 extends it — branches spreading up and down nourished by the gunas, with roots stretching downward into the world of men, binding through action. It is the whole visible world, drawing from a source you cannot see by inspecting the tree.
Why must the tree be cut down rather than studied?
15.3 says its form is not perceived here — no end, no beginning, no foundation. Having cut this firmly rooted tree with the strong axe of non-attachment, 15.4 says, one should seek the place from which there is no return. The instruction is to stop analysing the branches and sever the attachment that keeps you inside them.
What does 15.7 say about what a living being actually is?
An eternal fragment of himself, become a living soul in the world of the living, drawing to itself the mind and the five senses which rest in nature. It is the Gita's most intimate claim about identity — not that you resemble the divine, but that you are a portion of it.
What is the image in 15.8 about carrying the senses?
When the lord acquires a body or leaves one, he takes these along and goes, as the wind carries scents from their source. It answers what continues between lives without resorting to anything crude — not the body, but the whole configuration of mind and perception, travelling as fragrance does.
Where does Krishna say he can be found in ordinary bodily life?
15.12–15.15 place him in unremarkable functions: the light in the sun and moon and fire, the sap in the earth that nourishes all plants, the digestive fire in the bodies of living beings that consumes food. 15.15 adds that he is seated in the hearts of all, and from him come memory, knowledge, and their loss. Even forgetting is included.