SrI: SrImathE SatakOpAya nama: SrImathE rAmAnujAya nama: SrImath varavaramunayE nama:
SlOkam – Original
yathanthO yOginaS chainam paSyanthyAthmanyavasthitham |
yatanthO’pyakruthAthmAnO nainam paSyanthyachEthasa: ||
word-by-word meaning
yathantha: yOgina: cha – the yOgis who engage in efforts (such as karma yOga, to surrender unto me)
Athmani avasthitham – present in their body
Enam – this jIvAthmA
paSyanthi – see (with the eyes of yOga);
yathantha: api – though they attempt (without surrendering unto me)
akruthAthmana: – not having purity in their mind (and due to that)
achEthasa: – not having the heart (to see the AthmA)
Enam na paSyanthi – do not see the AthmA truly.
Simple Translation
The yOgis who engage in efforts (such as karma yOga, to surrender unto me) see (with the eyes of yOga) this jIvAthmA who is present in their body; though they attempt (without surrendering unto me), not having purity in their mind (and due to that) not having the heart (to see the AthmA), do not see the AthmA truly.
Rendering based on ALkoNdavilli gOvindhAchArya swAmy’s English translation of gIthA bhAshyam
‘And the persisting Yogis perceive him who in body dwells; but if they be of mind unrefined and impotent, they perceive him not in spite of their effort.’
The persistence is the effort of the Yogis in the Paths of Karma etc., undertaken after resorting to Me (to crown their efforts with success). Their culture in these Paths purify their inner nature, and with the eye of Yoga, they perceive the true nature of atma abiding in the body (ātmani) as distinct from the body.
But if their effort is destitute of confidence and trust in Me, their inner nature remains unrefined; and therefore are they impotent or of feeble mind, incapacitated for ātma-vision, and hence such do not perceive him.
After affirming that both the state of liberated souls —described as the light of intelligence (jñāna-jyotiḥ), lighting up even the external luminaries, the sun, moon fire, etc., whose power, it was said, was but limited to that of removing the gloom preventing the senses from perceiving objects;— and the state of bound souls (baddh-ātma) are both of them the constituent feature of Bhagavān’s manifested Kosmic glory, as in Stanzas: ‘That, My supreme light’ (Gi: XV-6), ‘This portion of Myself—ancient—(is) the life-entity in this world of life’ (Gi: XV-7); it is now declared that even the lights of those luminaries, etc., which are but matter so disposed is a part of Bhagavān’s glory.
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