Chapter 18 · Liberation through renunciation
Bhagavad Gita 18.47
Work born of your nature brings no sin.
Shri Bhagavan
श्रेयान्स्वधर्मो विगुणः परधर्मात्स्वनुष्ठितात् ।
स्वभावनियतं कर्म कुर्वन्नाप्नोति किल्बिषम् ॥
śreyānsvadharmo viguṇaḥ paradharmātsvanuṣṭhitāt / svabhāvaniyataṁ karma kurvannāpnoti kilbiṣam
Better is one's own duty, though imperfectly done, than another's duty well carried out. Doing the work appointed by one's own nature, a person incurs no fault.
हिंदी · दूसरे के भली भाँति किए हुए धर्म से अपना गुणरहित धर्म भी श्रेष्ठ है। अपने स्वभाव से नियत कर्म को करता हुआ मनुष्य पाप को प्राप्त नहीं होता।
What it means
Work born of your nature brings no sin.
The Gita repeats the teaching near its end and adds: doing the work laid down by one’s own nature, a person incurs no fault.
This is the Trust’s own reading, written for this site. The verse above it is the text.
Verses that share its vocabulary
Near it in the text’s own words.
- 3.35Your own svadharma, even carried out imperfectly, is better than another's dharma done well. It is better to die in your own dharma; another's brings danger.
- 2.31Look also to your own duty, and do not waver. For one born to protect, there is nothing better than a fight that is right.
- 2.33But if you will not fight this rightful fight, then you will have abandoned your own duty and your good name, and you will take on wrong instead.
- 3.5No one can stay even for a moment without doing something. Everyone is made to act, helplessly, by the gunas that arise from their own nature.
- 3.27Actions are carried out, in every case, by the gunas of nature. But a man whose mind is clouded by ego thinks that he himself is the one doing them.
- 3.28But the one who knows the truth about how the gunas and actions are divided, Mahabaho, understands that the gunas simply act upon the gunas, and he does not get attached.
Chosen by shared uncommon vocabulary, weighted so that a rare word counts for far more than a common one. A reading aid, not a claim that these verses mean the same thing.