GitaChapter 10Verse 3

Gita 10.3

Vibhuti Yoga

यो मामजमनादिं च वेत्ति लोकमहेश्वरम् | असम्मूढः स मर्त्येषु सर्वपापैः प्रमुच्यते ||३||

yo mām ajam anādiṁ ca vetti loka-maheśvaram | asammūḍhaḥ sa martyeṣu sarva-pāpaiḥ pramucyate ||3||

In essence: The recognition that frees - knowing the Unborn Lord dissolves all the chains that birth has bound.

A conversation between a seeker and guide to help you feel this verse deeply

Sadhak-Guru Dialogue

Sadhak: "The previous verse said even gods cannot know Krishna's origin. Now this verse says knowing Him as unborn brings liberation. How do I reconcile these?"

Guru: "What does 'aja' (unborn) mean? Is it a positive fact or the absence of something?"

Sadhak: "The absence of birth. So... knowing there is no origin to find?"

Guru: "Precisely. The gods cannot find the origin because there is none. The one who understands THIS - that the search for a beginning is itself the delusion - becomes free. They stop looking for what isn't there."

Sadhak: "So liberation comes from understanding that the Divine simply IS, without beginning or cause?"

Guru: "Yes. And what does that understanding do to your sense of separation from the Divine?"

Sadhak: "If the Divine had no beginning... and I exist within the Divine... then perhaps my essential being also has no beginning? The separation I feel is in time, but the Divine is beyond time."

Guru: "Now you're touching it. The delusion (moha) is believing you began and will end. The freedom (asammūḍha) is recognizing you participate in what never began and never ends. What happens to sin in that recognition?"

Sadhak: "Sin seems... impossible? If I know myself as participating in the eternal, temporary selfish impulses lose their grip. The small self that sins isn't the real self."

Guru: "This is why mere belief doesn't liberate, but recognition does. The verse says 'vetti' - knows, recognizes - not 'believes' or 'accepts.' When you truly recognize the unborn Lord, you recognize your own unborn nature. Sin belongs to what you imagined yourself to be, not what you truly are."

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🌅 Daily Practice

🌅 Morning

Contemplation of the Unborn: Upon waking, before the mind engages with the day's 'beginnings,' sit with the recognition: 'The Lord is unborn - without beginning. This consciousness that now awakens in me partakes of what never began.' Feel backward in time: your birth, before your birth, before your parents' birth, infinitely regressing - never reaching a first moment. Rest in that infinite recession as pointing toward the beginningless. Let this dissolve the sense that you are merely a creature of time.

☀️ Daytime

Catching delusion in real-time: When you find yourself acting from ego - defending yourself, attacking others, grasping for security - pause and ask: 'Is this the unborn Lord acting, or a deluded story about a separate self?' The verse says the one who knows becomes 'asammūḍha' (undeluded). Practice noticing the mūḍha (delusion) when it arises. You don't have to fix it; recognition begins the liberation. Notice three moments of ego-driven delusion today.

🌙 Evening

Release of sins through recognition: Before sleep, recall any actions today that felt 'sinful' - unkind words, selfish choices, harmful thoughts. Instead of guilt, apply the verse's teaching: 'The one who knows the unborn Lord is freed from all sins.' Ask: 'What false identity performed those actions? What would I have done if I truly knew myself as participating in the beginningless Lord?' Let the actions belong to the deluded self; let your true Self rest in the recognition of the Unborn.

Common Questions

If understanding that God is unborn and beginningless liberates from all sins, why doesn't everyone who learns this doctrine become liberated?
The verse uses 'vetti' (knows) not 'śṛṇoti' (hears) or 'paṭhati' (reads). There's an enormous difference between intellectual learning and genuine knowing. You can understand the doctrine 'God is unborn' without that understanding transforming your being. Real knowing changes the knower. It's like the difference between knowing fire is hot (information) and touching fire (transformation). Liberation comes from the kind of knowing that restructures perception, not from collecting correct concepts. This is why the verse pairs 'vetti' with 'asammūḍha' (undeluded) - true knowing dispels delusion; mere information doesn't.
Does liberation from 'all sins' mean past sins are forgiven, or that future sins become impossible?
Both, understood correctly. Past sins are 'forgiven' not by divine decree but by the dissolution of the one who sinned - the deluded ego-identity that performed those actions. When you wake from a dream, are the dream-actions forgiven or simply recognized as never having been real in the way you thought? Similarly, liberation reveals that the 'sinner' was always a case of mistaken identity. Future sins become impossible not through suppression but through the absence of their cause - fundamental delusion. One who truly knows the unborn Lord cannot simultaneously operate from the finite selfishness that generates sin. The recognition is itself the liberation.
'Among mortals' (martyeṣu) - does this mean liberation is only for humans, not for gods or other beings?
This phrase highlights human opportunity rather than excluding others. Among mortals - beings subject to death - this knowledge is especially precious because it reveals the deathless amid the dying. Gods (devas) live vastly longer but still within cyclic existence; sages have profound knowledge but can still be bound. The mortal condition, with its urgent awareness of limitation, can be the very catalyst for seeking the unlimited. 'Among mortals' suggests that even in our seemingly lowest position - brief lives, limited knowledge, prone to delusion - liberation is available. It's a statement of accessibility, not exclusion.