Bhagavad Gītā · Chapter 7, Verse 24
अव्यक्तं व्यक्तिमापन्नं मन्यन्ते मामबुद्धयः।
परं भावमजानन्तो ममाव्ययमनुत्तमम्।।
परं भावमजानन्तो ममाव्ययमनुत्तमम्।।
avyaktaṁ vyaktim āpannaṁ manyante mām abuddhayaḥ
paraṁ bhāvam ajānanto mamāvyayam anuttamam
also searched as "avyaktam vyaktim apannam manyante mam abuddhayah"
Translation
Not knowing My higher, immutable, and unsurpassed nature, the ignorant think of Me as an entity that has now become manifest, though I was previously unmanifest.
Vāṇi's rendering
The unseeing think I am merely this visible form — not knowing my higher being, changeless, beyond all.
Word by word
| Sanskrit & transliteration | Meaning |
|---|---|
| अव्यक्तम्avyaktam | the unmanifest — that which has no visible form |
| व्यक्तिम्vyaktim | into manifestation, into a visible form |
| आपन्नम्āpannam | having arrived at, having come into |
| मन्यन्तेmanyante | they think, they suppose |
| माम्mām | me |
| अबुद्धयःabuddhayaḥ | the unseeing, those without discernment |
| परम्param | higher, supreme |
| भावम्bhāvam | being, state of existence |
| अजानन्तःajānantaḥ | not knowing |
| ममmama | my (joined by sandhi with the next word) |
| अव्ययम्avyayam | changeless, never wearing away |
| अनुत्तमम्anuttamam | beyond all, with nothing higher |
Frequently asked
What does Bhagavad Gita Chapter 7 Verse 24 mean?
Krishna says people take the form they can see as the whole of him — as if the formless had turned into a body at some point in time. He calls this a failure of sight, not of devotion. His higher being is avyaya, changeless. It was never absent, and the form never became a substitute for it.
What does avyaktam vyaktim apannam manyante mam abuddhayah mean?
It means: the unseeing think that I, the unmanifest, have come into visible form. Krishna is correcting an assumption, not a ritual. To imagine he began when the body appeared is to imagine he can end when it goes. Nothing in him arrives, and nothing in him departs.
Is it wrong to worship Krishna's form then?
No. The verse does not condemn the form; it condemns stopping at it. Arjuna speaks to a person the whole way through and is never told to stop. What Krishna asks is that you not mistake the visible for the limit. Love the form, and keep knowing there is more behind it.
Why does Krishna call these people abuddhayah?
Not stupid — unseeing. The word points at a missing discernment, not a missing intellect. Clever people make this error constantly: they measure what appears, decide that is the total, and never ask what holds the appearance. You can be sharp about everything visible and still miss the one thing that does not change.
Read every verse this way, held — inside Vāṇi.
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Commentary
A form is easier to hold than what has no edges. Krishna says the unseeing look at the body standing before Arjuna — dark-skinned, holding reins — and conclude that is all there is: something formless that became something, the way clay becomes a pot. He did not become. The visible did not replace the invisible; it never covered it. What you can see of anyone is the least of them, and this is truest of Krishna. Arjuna's advantage was never that he saw the form. It was that he kept asking past it. You look at what stands before you and call it the whole. Ask past it.