{"entry":{"slug":"bg-chapter-01","title":"Bhagavad Gīta Chapter 1 — Arjuna-Viṣāda Yoga","devanagari":"अर्जुनविषादयोग","iast":"arjuna-viṣāda-yoga","type":"bg-chapter","url":"https://thecodex.expert/sanatana-dharma/texts/bhagavad-gita/chapter-01/","codex":"sanatana-dharma","last_verified":"2026-05","confidence":"high"},"chapter":{"number":1,"name":"Arjuna-viṣāda-yoga","name_translation":"The Yoga of Arjuna's Grief","verses":47,"speaker_primary":"Dhṛtarāṣṭra + Sañjaya + Arjuna (Kṛṣṇa is silent)","setting":"Kurukṣetra battlefield, just before the war"},"summary":"Dhṛtarāṣṭra asks Sañjaya to report from Kurukṣetra. Both armies assembled. Arjuna asks Kṛṣṇa to drive the chariot between the armies. He sees his beloved teachers, uncles, cousins, sons arrayed as enemies. Overwhelmed by grief and moral anguish, he makes several arguments against fighting (personal grief; futility; kinship; collapse of kula-dharma). He lays down his bow and sits. Kṛṣṇa says nothing throughout — the teacher waits for the student to be ready to receive.","key_verse":{"ref":"BG 1.1","devanagari":"धर्मक्षेत्रे कुरुक्षेत्रे समवेता युयुत्सवः","iast":"dharma-kṣetre kuru-kṣetre samavetā yuyutsavaḥ / māmakāḥ pāṇḍavāś caiva kim akurvata sañjaya","translation":"On the field of Dharma, on the field of Kurus, having assembled together wishing to fight — what did my people and the Pāṇḍavas do, Sañjaya?","note":"Opening verse: battlefield simultaneously named dharma-kṣetra (field of Dharma) — establishing the Dharmic stakes of what follows."},"arjunas_arguments":["Personal grief (BG 1.28–1.30) — limbs fail, mouth parched, body quivers","Futility (BG 1.36) — killing brings only sin","Kinship (BG 1.37) — how can we be happy killing our own people?","Kula-dharma collapse (BG 1.40–1.44) — destroying family Dharmas collapses social tradition and harms the living and dead"],"note_on_cowardice":"Arjuna's paralysis is NOT cowardice. He is the world's greatest archer. What stops him is moral anguish about killing beloved teachers and family, not fear of dying. The Gīta takes his arguments seriously; Kṛṣṇa addresses each across 18 chapters.","shankaras_reading":"The opening verse establishes Kurukṣetra as dharma-kṣetra — the field where Dharma will be worked out. The entire Gīta is the response to the problem presented in Ch.1. Arjuna's grief = the textbook example of adhyāsa (superimposition of non-self qualities onto the Self) — the disease for which the Gīta is the cure.","closing_verse":"BG 1.47: Arjuna drops his bow and sits, mind overwhelmed by grief. The image of complete paralysis before the teaching begins.","sources":[{"tier":1,"citation":"BG 1.1–1.47 with Śaṅkara Gītābhāṣya · Gambhirananda (Advaita Ashrama, 2006), pp. 1–49"},{"tier":2,"citation":"Zaehner (OUP, 1969), pp. 101–122"},{"tier":2,"citation":"Hiltebeitel, Dharma (OUP, 2011)"}],"navigation":{"previous":null,"next":{"chapter":2,"url":"/sanatana-dharma/texts/bhagavad-gita/chapter-02/","name":"Sāṃkhya Yoga"}},"provenance":{"confidence":"high","last_verified":"2026-05","citation":"\"BG Chapter 1 — Sanātana Dharma Codex\", thecodex.expert/sanatana-dharma/texts/bhagavad-gita/chapter-01/, last updated May 2026."}}