For that one whose delight is in the supreme Self there is no purpose, no use, served by action done. Then perhaps there is the harm called transgression in action not done? No: for him there is, here in the world, no harm whatever, no incurring of transgression, no loss of the Self. Nor has he, among all beings, from Brahmā down to the unmoving things, any resort to a thing as a purpose, any reliance, any leaning, on some particular being for an end to be accomplished by an action, such that an action for that end would have to be carried out. And you are not yet established in this right vision, which stands like the flood of water spreading on every side. Since it is so.

For that very reason, for him there is no purpose in a means done for the beholding of the self, no purpose at all, and no harm in a means for the beholding of the self left undone, since his beholding of the self does not depend on a means. For him who, of himself, is turned away from all insentient things other than the self, there is no recourse, as purpose or as means, to any of the particular transformations of matter, the elements such as space together with their effects, on account of which a means would be undertaken to turn him away from them; for he is the liberated man indeed. Since it is only for one whose beholding of the self does not depend on a means that there is no setting out on a means; and since, even for one who has set out on a means, the discipline of action is, being easy to do, free of heedlessness, and inclusive of the dwelling on the truth of the self, the better; and since even for the man of the discipline of knowledge the course of bodily life depends on the following on of action; therefore the discipline of action alone is, for the accomplishing of the beholding of the self, the better.

For such a one, at the time of action, there is no purpose to be gained, and none lost, beyond his delight in the self, in doing or not doing the deed; there is no fault for him in not performing the twilight rites and the like. Setting this aside, there is no resort of purpose for him in any of the beings. He on whom a purpose rests, a purpose accomplished by some seeing and the like, is one who has something to gain. Even though, through mere knowledge, no lapse befalls him, that holds equally of Arjuna, so that this exemption does not become a thing useful for the teaching of action to Arjuna. And a lapse would be the indicator of a slight unwelcome thing that has begun to bear fruit, and of a great one, like the slaying of Vritra, were the lapse great.