Also called the Ashtavakra Samhita — a dialogue between the sage Ashtavakra and King Janaka of Videha on the nature of the Self

Ashtavakra Gita - The Song of Self-Realization

अष्टावक्र गीता

4 versesChapter 8

Verses · श्लोक

Verse 1THE FAMOUS six-fold definition of bondage as movements of the mind

six verbs of bondagevāñchati śocatimuñcati gṛhṇātihṛṣyati kupyatiordinary weather of the mind

अष्टावक्र उवाच ॥ तदा बन्धो यदा चित्तं किंचिद् वांछति शोचति। किंचिन् मुंचति गृण्हाति किंचिद्धृष्यति कुप्यति॥८-१॥

aṣṭāvakra uvāca || tadā bandho yadā cittaṁ kiṁcid vāṁchati śocati| kiṁcin muṁcati gṛṇhāti kiṁciddhṛṣyati kupyati ||8-1||

Ashtavakra said: There is bondage when the mind wants something or grieves over something, when it lets go of something or grasps at something, when it delights over something or grows angry about something.

Modern Reflection

Ashtavakra opens the chapter with a list, not a doctrine: vāñchati (wants), śocati (grieves), muñcati (releases), gṛhṇāti (grasps), hṛṣyati (delights), kupyati (angers) — six ordinary verbs, none of them exotic, all of them things a mind does dozens of times before breakfast. A father in a Delhi kitchen, scrolling his phone over morning chai, feels each of the six in about four minutes: wants the news to be different, grieves a headline, releases a worry about traffic, grasps at a plan for the evening, delights at a photo from his daughter, and grows briefly angry at a reply-all email. Nothing in the list is dramatic; that is precisely the point. Ashtavakra is not describing spectacular sin. He is describing the ordinary weather of an untrained mind, item by item, so that bondage stops being a vague spiritual condition and becomes six specific, nameable, watchable events.

Verse 2

negation of the six verbsmirror versemukti as absence of gripsame terrain different relationshiprecovery vocabulary

तदा मुक्तिर्यदा चित्तं न वांछति न शोचति। न मुंचति न गृण्हाति न हृष्यति न कुप्यति॥८-२॥

tadā muktiryadā cittaṁ na vāṁchati na śocati| na muṁcati na gṛṇhāti na hṛṣyati na kupyati ||8-2||

There is liberation when the mind does not want or grieve, does not release or grasp, does not delight or grow angry.

Modern Reflection

This verse is the photographic negative of the one before it — every verb from verse one repeated, each with na, not, placed in front. Ashtavakra could have defined liberation with a new vocabulary, describing bliss or light or expansion. He chose instead to hold up the exact same list and simply mark it absent. A retired schoolteacher in Pune, asked by a former student what enlightenment feels like, says only that the news these days interests her without disturbing her, that she still notices when a plan falls through without the falling-through becoming a grievance, that pleasure still visits without turning into craving for its return. She is describing muktiḥ, liberation, by the same six-item checklist Ashtavakra uses, not by claiming some new exalted state has replaced her ordinary mind.

Verse 3

sakta asaktadṛṣṭi as bondageattachment to viewsloosening the grip not the opinionideological rigidity

तदा बन्धो यदा चित्तं सक्तं कास्वपि दृष्टिषु। तदा मोक्षो यदा चित्तमसक्तं सर्वदृष्टिषु॥८-३॥

tadā bandho yadā cittaṁ saktaṁ kāsvapi dṛṣṭiṣu| tadā mokṣo yadā cittamasaktaṁ sarvadṛṣṭiṣu ||8-3||

There is bondage when the mind is attached to certain particular views. There is liberation when the mind is unattached amid all views.

Modern Reflection

Dṛṣṭi, view or perspective, is a wide word in Sanskrit — it covers a philosophical position, a way of seeing a person, an opinion about a policy, a taste in art. A family in Ahmedabad splits every festival season into a small civil war over whether decorations should be traditional or modern, whether music should be devotional or filmi, and the fight recurs every year with the same intensity as the first time. Ashtavakra's diagnosis is not that either side is wrong about decorations; it is that saktam kāsvapi dṛṣṭiṣu, attachment to certain particular views, is itself the bondage, regardless of which view is held. The verse's cure, asaktam sarva-dṛṣṭiṣu, unattached amid all views, does not ask anyone to stop having preferences about music or decoration. It asks whether the preference can be held the way a hand holds something light, rather than the way a fist holds something it is afraid to lose.

Verse 4THE FAMOUS closing aphorism of chapter eight — where there is no 'I', there is liberation

yadā nāhaṁ tadā mokṣaḥthe I as the hinge of bondagehelayā with easeneither grasp nor releaseahaṁkāra

यदा नाहं तदा मोक्षो यदाहं बन्धनं तदा। मत्वेति हेलया किंचिन्मा गृहाण विमुंच मा॥८-४॥

yadā nāhaṁ tadā mokṣo yadāhaṁ bandhanaṁ tadā| matveti helayā kiṁcinmā gṛhāṇa vimuṁca mā ||8-4||

When there is no 'I', that is liberation. When there is 'I', that is bondage. Having understood this, with ease, neither grasp anything nor release anything.

Modern Reflection

This is the verse the whole chapter has been building toward, and it is quoted on its own more than almost any other line in the text: yadā nāhaṁ tadā mokṣo, yadāhaṁ bandhanaṁ tadā — when no I, liberation; when I, bondage. A Kolkata classical vocalist, mid-performance, describes the moments a raga truly comes alive as the moments she cannot locate herself doing the singing — the moment self-consciousness returns, the phrasing stiffens. She has never read Ashtavakra, but she is describing his equation exactly: the ahaṁkāra, the I-making, is the very hinge on which bondage turns, not any particular thought or desire. The verse's final instruction is the most radical move in the chapter: helayā, with ease, casually, mā gṛhāṇa vimuñca mā, neither grasp nor release. Even trying to get rid of the 'I' is itself a project run by the 'I' — so the verse ends by declining to prescribe an effort at all.

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