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Chapter 8 · Attaining the Supreme · 28 verses

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How to study this verse, in six steps

1Remember who is speaking. Kṛṣṇa is speaking. Take the verse as He directs.
2Say the verse and its words. Read the Sanskrit, then each word with its meaning.
3Read the translation as it is. Let the translation say what it says, without adding your own meaning.
4Read the purport. Hear the verse through the disciplic succession.
5Bring your own question. Ask: where does this verse meet my life, my trouble, my doubt?
6Act on it, remembering Kṛṣṇa. Carry one instruction into your work today.

Read the full guide: how to read the Bhagavad-gītā ›

Liberation & destinyChapter 8 · Attaining the Supreme

8.20 8.22

Bhagavad-gītā As It Is · Text 8.21

Mortality, cosmic cycles and eternal destination

Īśvara · God

अव्यक्तोऽक्षर इत्युक्तस्तमाहु: परमां गतिम् ।

यं प्राप्य न निवर्तन्ते तद्धाम परमं मम ॥ २१ ॥

avyakto ’kṣara ity uktas

tam āhuḥ paramāṁ gatim

yaṁ prāpya na nivartante

tad dhāma paramaṁ mama

Translation

That which the Vedāntists describe as unmanifest and infallible, that which is known as the supreme destination, that place from which, having attained it, one never returns – that is My supreme abode.

Read Śrīla Prabhupāda's purport on Vedabase.io

Understand it

What this verse is saying, and where it sits in the story.

3 study points

Kṛṣṇa’s Supreme Abode

1
Kṛṣṇa’s supreme abode is the highest destination. Those who reach it never return to the material world.
2
Prabhupāda explains that this abode is Goloka Vṛndāvana, where all desires are fulfilled and the Lord is served.
3
Kṛṣṇa and His supreme abode are nondifferent: both have the same spiritual quality.

Key points from the purport

These notes cover verses 8.20–21

Describes the spiritual world, the abode of the Lord. The Spiritual world is:

Eternal — Free from birth and death

Infallible, because Krishna’s superior energy is opposite to material energy in quality

Full of unlimited bliss, as opposed to the material world which is full of miseries

Fulfils all desires

All attractive

Unmanifest to mundane eyes

Transcendental to manifest and unmanifest (difference from material world – repeatedly manifest and unmanifest) – Lord’s abode never changes like material world / Composed of cit-sakti

Supreme destination

A place of no return

Description of Abode — Brahma Samhita (“chintamani...”) Study Purport

As ‘ultimate destination’ — Katha Upanishad

A place of no return — Bhagavad-gita (8.15; 8.21; 15.6)

Absolute nature — Krishna’s abode is non-different from Him

Replica of Goloka Vrindavan — Bhauma Vrindavan (on this planet)