Before the verses

The Introduction

Bhagavad-gītā As It Is

The book opens with Śrīla Prabhupāda's Introduction, before verse 1.1.

One page of directions before the verses begin. It says how this book is to be taken, who is speaking on every page, and what reading it gives — so the verses that follow are heard the way the speaker intended.

Read the Introduction on Vedabase

What it says

Six things to hold before verse one

Take the medicine by the label
The Introduction opens with the whole method: the Gītā is taken as its speaker directs, not as we would like it to say.
If we want to take a particular medicine, then we have to follow the directions written on the label. We cannot take the medicine according to our own whim or the direction of a friend. It must be taken according to the directions on the label or the directions given by a physician. Similarly, Bhagavad-gītā should be taken or accepted as it is directed by the speaker Himself.
Śrīla Prabhupāda · Introduction
The speaker is on every page
Before any verse, know whose words these are.
The speaker of Bhagavad-gītā is Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa. He is mentioned on every page of Bhagavad-gītā as the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Bhagavān.
Śrīla Prabhupāda · Introduction
It comes down in a succession
The Gītā is not a new reading of the world; it has been handed down, teacher to student, from Kṛṣṇa Himself.
Here the Lord informs Arjuna that this system of yoga, the Bhagavad-gītā, was first spoken to the sun-god, and the sun-god explained it to Manu, and Manu explained it to Ikṣvāku, and in that way, by disciplic succession, one speaker after another, this yoga system has been coming down.
Śrīla Prabhupāda · Introduction
Five basic truths
The whole subject of the Gītā is these five: the Lord, the living being, material nature, eternal time and activity. Four are eternal; karma is not, and so it can be changed.
The subject of the Bhagavad-gītā entails the comprehension of five basic truths.
Śrīla Prabhupāda · Introduction
Why it was spoken
Arjuna's trouble is our trouble. The Gītā was spoken to answer it — not to stop us acting, but to purify the acting.
The Bhagavad-gītā teaches that we have to purify this materially contaminated consciousness. In pure consciousness, our actions will be dovetailed to the will of the īśvara, and that will make us happy. It is not that we have to cease all activities. Rather, our activities are to be purified, and purified activities are called bhakti.
Śrīla Prabhupāda · Introduction
What reading it gives
The Introduction closes with the Gītā-māhātmya, the book's own praise of itself.
This one book, Bhagavad-gītā, will suffice, because it is the essence of all Vedic literatures and especially because it is spoken by the Supreme Personality of Godhead.
Śrīla Prabhupāda · Gītā-māhātmya 4
The sum and substance
One sentence holds what the whole book is for.
If one adopts the principles enunciated in Bhagavad-gītā, he can make his life perfect and make a permanent solution to all the problems of life. This is the sum and substance of the entire Bhagavad-gītā.
Śrīla Prabhupāda · Introduction

Then

How to read the GītāThe six steps for one verse, from the same Introduction Chapters & storiesThen go chapter by chapter

Begin at verse 1.1

Next in Learn · 3 of 9 · 5 minStudy a verseOne verse with its Sanskrit, word meanings, translation, three study points and how to apply it.Back · LearnHow to read the Gītā