Karma Yoga
Arjuna, confused by Krishna's praise of both knowledge and action, asks why he should fight if wisdom is superior to action. Krishna answers that no one can remain entirely without action even for a moment, since the very processes of nature compel activity — the real choice is not between acting and not acting, but between acting selfishly and acting selflessly. He teaches that action performed as yajna, as an offering rather than as grasping self-interest, does not bind the doer, and that a wise person should still perform their duty as an example for others to follow, just as Krishna himself, having nothing left to gain, continues to act for the sake of the world. The chapter also introduces the idea that all action is really carried out by the gunas (qualities) of material nature, with the ego wrongly claiming ownership of it as 'I am the doer.' It closes with Krishna naming desire and anger, born of passion, as the real enemies that drag a person into sin.
“Perform your allotted duty, for action is better than inaction. Even the mere maintenance of your body would not be possible through inaction.”
“The world is bound by action, except when action is performed as sacrifice. Free from attachment, Arjuna, perform your work as an offering.”
“Always perform your prescribed duty without attachment, for by acting without attachment a person attains the Supreme.”
“Whatever a great man does, others follow; whatever standard he sets, the world pursues.”
“All actions are performed by the gunas of nature alone; the self, deluded by ego, thinks 'I am the doer.'”
“Better is one's own duty, though imperfectly performed, than the duty of another well performed. Better is death in one's own duty; the duty of another invites danger.”
“Krishna said: It is desire, it is anger, born of the guna of passion — all-devouring and deeply sinful; know this to be the enemy here.”
Krishna's answer to Arjuna's question of what impels a person to sin even against their own will.
Chapter summaries composed for MyBrahman; verse translations from the public-domain Kashinath Trimbak Telang translation (1882, Sacred Books of the East, vol. 8) where directly checkable, and/or widely-attested traditional renderings of famous verses, cited by standard chapter.verse numbering.