Verse 6.38

Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration, Word-for-word and English translation of verse 6.38:

कच्चिन् नोभय-विभ्रष्टश् छिन्नाभ्रम् इव नश्यति ।
अप्रतिष्ठो महा-बाहो विमूढो ब्रह्मणः पथि ॥ ३८ ॥

kaccin nobhaya-vibhraṣṭaś chinnābhram iva naśyati |
apratiṣṭho mahā-bāho vimūḍho brahmaṇaḥ pathi || 38 ||

kaccit–whether?; na ubhaya-vibhraṣṭaḥ–unsuccessful in both (karma and yoga); chinna-abhram–a riven cloud; iva–like; naśyati–he perishes; apratiṣṭhaḥ–without shelter; mahā-bāho–O mighty-armed Kṛṣṇa; vimūḍhaḥ–utterly baffled; brahmaṇaḥ–of spiritual realization; pathi–on the path.

O mighty-armed Kṛṣṇa, if a person falls from the processes of both karma and yoga and becomes deviated from the path of attaining spiritual realization, does he not perish like a riven cloud, with no shelter anywhere?

Commentary: Sārārtha-Varṣiṇī Ṭīkā

(By Śrīla Viśvanātha Cakravartī Ṭhākura; the innermost intention of the commentary named ‘the shower of essential meanings’)

Arjuna is raising a question: “What happens to a person who has deviated from the paths of karma and yoga?” In other words, “What happens to a person who has given up the path of karma and has also not attained perfection in the path of yoga? Does that yogī not face the same fate as a riven cloud, which has separated from a cloud mass and which dissolves into thin air, because it remains separate from other clouds? When a yogī begins the path of yoga, he has the desire to give up sense enjoyment, but at the same time, because his detachment is not complete, the desire to enjoy his senses remains within him. This is a very difficult situation. Since he has abandoned the path of karma, which is the means to enter the heavenly planets, the next world is lost, and by not attaining perfection in yoga, which is the means for liberation, he also fails to achieve that. From this it appears that he has lost both worlds. That is why I am asking You whether a person who has deviated from the practice of attaining spiritual realization becomes bereft of all shelter. Is he lost or not?”