2.20 The body is killed; that is not Krishna speaks
न जायते म्रियते वा कदाचि न्नायं भूत्वा भविता वा न भूयः
अजो नित्यः शाश्वतोऽयं पुराणो न हन्यते हन्यमाने शरीरे
na jāyate mriyate vā kadāchin
nāyaṁ bhūtvā bhavitā vā na bhūyaḥ
ajo nityaḥ śhāśhvato ’yaṁ purāṇo
na hanyate hanyamāne śharīre
It is not born, and it does not die. Having been, it does not cease to be. Unborn, unending, everlasting, ancient — the body is killed; that is not.
Explanation
The body is killed; that is not.
This is the verse people quote when they want the Gita to be about immortality, and it is worth slowing down.
Unborn, unending, everlasting, ancient — having been, it does not cease to be. None of the terms are personal. What is deathless here is not anybody.
Going further
Word by word
- na jāyate
- is not born
- mriyate
- dies
- vā
- or
- kadāchit
- at any time
- na
- not
- ayam
- this
- bhūtvā
- having once existed
- bhavitā
- will be
- vā
- or
- na
- not
- bhūyaḥ
- further
- ajaḥ
- unborn
- nityaḥ
- eternal
- śhāśhvataḥ
- immortal
- ayam
- this
- purāṇaḥ
- the ancient
- na hanyate
- is not destroyed
- hanyamāne
- is destroyed
- śharīre
- when the body
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This is the verse people quote when they want the Gita to be about immortality. It is worth slowing down here, because the claim is stranger and more careful than that.
Krishna does not say you will survive. He says: there is something in you about which birth and death are simply not the right words — the way asking whether the number seven is heavy is not a question with an answer. The body is killed. That, he says, is not the kind of thing that can be killed.
Whether you take this literally or as a description of something in experience, the practical effect is the same: it loosens the grip of the thing Arjuna is most afraid of.