The Three Gunas (Gunatraya Vibhaga Yoga)

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THE BLESSED LORD SAID:

 

1. I shall again declare that sublime knowledge, the best of all knowledges;

which having learnt, all the sages have passed to high perfection from here.

 

2. They who, having resorted to this knowledge, have attained to unity with Me,

are neither born in the creation, nor disturbed in the dissolution.

 

3. My womb is the great Brahman; in that I place the germ; thence, O Bharata, is

the birth of all beings.

 

4. Whatever forms are produced, O son of Kunti, in any wombs whatsoever, the

Great Brahman is their womb, I the seed-giving Father.

 

5. Sattva, Rajas, Tamas - these gunas, O mighty-armed, born of Prakriti, bind

fast in the body the embodied, the indestructible.

 

6. Of these, Sattva, which, from its stainlessness, is lucid and healthy, binds

by attachment to happiness and by attachment to knowledge, O sinless one.

 

7. Know thou Rajas (to be) of the nature of passion, the source of thirst and

attachment; it binds fast, O son of Kunti, the embodied one by attachment to

action.

 

8. But, know thou Tamas to be born of un-wisdom, deluding all embodied beings;

by headlessness, indolence and sloth, it binds fast, O Bharata.

 

9. Sattva attaches to happiness, rajas to action, O Bharata, while Tamas,

enshrouding wisdom, attaches, on the contrary, to heedlessness.

 

10. Sattva arises, O Bharata, predominating over Rajas and Tamas; and Rajas,

over Sattva and Tamas; so Tamas, over Sattva and Rajas.

 

to be continued...