Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 2, Verse 16

नासतो विद्यते भावो नाभावो विद्यते सतः । उभयोरपि दृष्टोऽन्तस्त्वनयोस्तत्त्वदर्शिभिः

nāsato vidyate bhāvo nābhāvo vidyate sataḥ | ubhayorapi dṛṣṭo'ntastvanayostattvadarśibhiḥ

Translation

Of the unreal no being there is; there is no non-being of the real. Of both these is the truth seen by the seers of the Essence.

— Alladi Mahadeva Sastri

Word meanings

na

not

asataḥ

of the non-existent

vidyate

is

bhāvaḥ

being

na

not

abhāvaḥ

non-being

vidyate

is

sataḥ

of the existent

ubhayoḥ

of the two

api

also

dṛṣṭaḥ

(has been) seen

antaḥ

the end (the final truth)

tu

indeed

anayoḥ

of these

tattvadarśibhiḥ

by the truth-seeing

Śaṅkarācārya's commentary

There is no being (bhāva), no existence, of the unreal (asat) such as heat and cold and their causes. Heat, cold, and the rest, and their causes, though perceived through the organs of sense, are not absolutely real (vastu-sat); for they are effects or changes (vikāra), and every change is temporary. No objective form, such as an earthen pot, proves to be real, since it is not perceived apart from clay; thus every effect is unreal, because it is not perceived as distinct from its cause, and because it is not perceived before its production or after its destruction. The cause, such as clay, is likewise unreal, since it is not perceived apart from its own cause. — (Objection): Then nothing at all exists. — No: every fact of experience involves a twofold consciousness, that of the real (sat) and that of the unreal (asat). That is real of which our consciousness never fails, and that unreal of which it fails. In every experience the twofold consciousness arises with reference to one and the same substratum (samānādhikaraṇa) — "a cloth existent," "a pot existent" — yet of the two, the consciousness of "pot" is temporary, while the consciousness of "existence" is unfailing. Wherefore the Self, whose consciousness never fails, is real; the body and the pairs of opposites, whose consciousness fails, are unreal. This conclusion — that the real is ever-existent and the unreal is never-existent — concerning the Self and the not-Self is always present before the minds of those who attend only to the truth, to the real nature of the Brahman, the Absolute, the All, "That." Following the view of such truth-seers, shake off grief and delusion, and, being assured that all phenomena (vikāras) are really non-existent and are like the mirage mere false appearances, calmly bear heat and cold and the other pairs of opposites.