He who knows this embodied one to be the slayer, the doer of the act of slaying, and he, another, who thinks this one slain, the object of the act of slaying, thinking 'by the slaying of the body I am slain': those two, for want of discernment, do not know the Self. The two who, through the slaying of the body, take the Self, the object of the notion 'I', as 'I am the slayer' or 'I am slain', do not know the true nature of the Self. For this Self does not slay, is not the doer of the act of slaying, and is not slain, is not its object, since it is changeless. How is the Self changeless? The second verse.

Whoever takes this self, whose nature has been described, to be a slayer, or the cause of slaying, and whoever takes it to be slain by any cause, neither of the two knows. By the reasons given, since the self is eternal, it is not a cause of slaying; and for the same reason this self is not slain. And the verb 'to slay', when its object is the self, means the bringing about of separation from the body. Even scriptural texts such as 'let one not harm any beings' and 'a brahmin is not to be slain' have for their scope the bringing about of a separation from the body that is not sanctioned.

But the ordinary way of speaking of the self as slayer or slain is mistaken, Krishna says with 'he who thinks this a slayer'. For the reasons already given, this self neither slays nor is slain. A reflection has no action of its own; it is endowed with action only through the action of the original. Scripture too says, 'it is as if it thinks' (Brihadaranyaka Upanishad 4.3.7).