Lord Krishna
Divine TeacherThe Supreme Lord, the charioteer and divine guide of Arjuna. Krishna delivers the eternal wisdom of the Gita, revealing the nature of the soul, duty, and the path to liberation.
Speaking: Chapter 13, Verse 33
Verse 33
The Yoga of the Field and the Knower of the Field
Just as the all-pervading space is not tainted because of its subtlety, so the Self, though dwelling everywhere in the body, is never tainted.
Context & Meaning
One of the most beautiful analogies in the Gita: the Self is like space (ākāśa). Space is everywhere — it pervades the inside of a garbage bin and the inside of a temple with complete impartiality, yet it is not tainted by anything it contains. The impurities of the garbage bin do not contaminate the space; the holiness of the temple does not sanctify the space. Space simply is, unaffected by what it contains. So too the Self — present everywhere in the body, touching every experience from birth to death — is never tainted, never modified, never diminished.
Scholar Commentaries
2 commentaries · Public domainAdi Shankaracharya
AdvaitaThe ākāśa analogy is perhaps the most precise description of the Self's relationship to the world that language can achieve. Space is all-pervading and therefore contains all things, yet it is unaffected by any of them. Consciousness pervades all experience and therefore "contains" all experience, yet it is unaffected by any experience. To realise this is to realise the Self.
Madhvacharya
DvaitaThe analogy of space illustrates the transcendence of the divine Self from the perspective of non-attachment. Just as space is not polluted by what it contains, God is not bound by what He sustains. This freedom-in-engagement is the divine model for the soul's own liberation — to be fully present without being entangled.