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 5, Verse 8
Verse 8
Hard VerseThe Yoga of Renunciation
A person in the divine consciousness, although engaged in seeing, hearing, touching, smelling, eating, moving about, sleeping and breathing, always knows within himself that he actually does nothing at all.
Context & Meaning
The person of true knowledge — even while seeing, hearing, touching, tasting, walking, sleeping, breathing — inwardly knows: "I do nothing." The Self is the witness, never the actor.
Scholar Commentaries
1 commentary · Public domainAdi Shankaracharya
Advaita VedantaThis verse and the next (5:9) together describe the liberated person acting in the world. The key is "tattvavit" — one who knows the truth. The truth is that the Atman neither does nor experiences anything; all action belongs to the body-mind through the gunas of prakriti. The wise person acts fully while remaining inwardly untouched — like a lamp that illumines a room without being affected by what happens in it.