The Imperishable (akṣara), that which does not perish, is the supreme Self, by the scripture 'at the command of this Imperishable, O Gārgī' (Bṛhadāraṇyaka 3.8.9). The syllable Om is not what is meant here, since it is later marked off by a further qualification, 'Om, the one-syllabled Brahman' (Gītā 8.13); and the word 'supreme' is the more fitting qualification for the Imperishable that is Brahman, beyond which there is none higher. The very own being of that supreme Brahman, its presence in each body as the inmost Self, is called the 'adhyātma': the thing which, taking the body, the self, as its base, proceeds as the inmost Self and ends in the Brahman that is the supreme reality, that own being is the adhyātma. The 'bhūta-bhāva-udbhava-kara' is the maker of the coming-to-be of beings: the becoming of beings is the bhūta-bhāva, its arising is the bhūta-bhāva-udbhava, and that which brings this about is the maker of it. 'Visarga' is the letting-go, the relinquishing, with a deity in view, of a substance such as the oblation-cake; that very thing, marked as a letting-go, is the sacrifice, named 'karma', action. From this, which is the seed, beings moving and unmoving arise through the sequence of rain and the rest.

The Blessed Lord spoke. What is indicated as 'that Brahman' is the supreme imperishable; since it does not perish, it is the imperishable, the field-knower in its assemblage-form; so too the revealed text, 'the unmanifest is dissolved into the imperishable, the imperishable into darkness', and the rest. The supreme imperishable is the own-form of the self freed of matter. One's own being (svabhava) is called the adhyatma. One's own being is matter; the subtle elements, their impresses, and the rest, which are not the self yet become connected with the self, set forth as a thing to be known in the doctrine of the five fires; both of these the seekers of liberation must know, the one as a thing to be attained, the other as a thing to be given up. The state of being a being, the state of being a man and the rest, and the emission that brings it about, established by the revealed text 'at the fifth oblation the waters come to be called man', the emission that is born of the connection with a woman, that is what is called 'action' (karma); and that, in its entirety with all that attends it, the seekers of liberation must know as a thing to be shunned, since it is to be recoiled from. Its being a thing to be shunned will be stated right after, in 'wishing for which they practise continence'.

'The supreme imperishable' is Brahman; this is said to ward off the doubt that it might mean the Veda and the like. 'That which is with reference to the self' is the adhyatma; or else, 'that which is in the sphere of the self'. So too, the 'own-being' (svabhava) is the one belonging to the living being. By the derivation 'the disposition named one's own is svabhava', the own-being is the living being, which always exists, in one constant manner; that is the sense. The word 'disposition' (bhava) is for the setting-apart of the inner organ and the rest, since the inner organ and the rest do not stand in one constant manner, being subject to modification. The word 'own' (sva) is for the setting-apart of the Lord. The action of the Lord that brings about the arising of beings, the living beings, and the states, the insentient things, is the 'sending-forth' (visarga); the sense is that visarga is creation in a special way.