प्रकाशं च प्रवृत्तिं च मोहमेव च पाण्डव ॥
न द्वेष्टिसम्प्रवृत्तानि न निवृत्तानि काङ्क्षति ॥ २२ ॥
śrībhagavānuvāca :—
prakāśaṃ ca pravṛttiṃ ca mohameva ca pāṇḍava ..
na dveṣṭisampravṛttāni na nivṛttāni kāṅkṣati .. 22 ..
The Blessed Lord said :
Light and activity and delusion present, O Pāṇḍava, he hates not, nor longs for them absent.
Read the commentary
Light is the effect of Sattva, activity of Rajas, and delusion of Tamas. He does not hate these when present, when they clearly present themselves as objects of consciousness. It is only in the absence of right knowledge that a man hates them thus: ‘I have now a Tamasic idea by which I am deluded; there has arisen in me the Rajasic activity which is painful, and urged on by this Rajas I have fallen from my true nature, and painful is this fall from my true nature; and the Sattvic guna, which is luminous, binds me by way of ascribing discrimination to me and causing attachment to happiness.’ But the man who has risen above the gunas does not thus hate them when they present themselves to his consciousness. Unlike a man of Sattva (or Rajas or Tamas) who longs for the Sattvic (or Rajasic or Tamasic) states which first presented themselves to his consciousness and then disappeared, he who has risen above the gunas does not long after things which have disappeared.—This is a mark which others cannot perceive; it serves as a mark for the individual himself, as it can be perceived by himself alone; no man indeed can perceive the hatred or the desire which presents itself to another man’s consciousness.
The conduct in life of the Liberated one.
Now follows the answer to the question, what is his conduct who has risen above the gunas?