Ashtavakra Gita 15.11
Ashtavakra Gita 15.11 is a verse from chapter 15 (What you are). The sage Ashtavakra speaks it to King Janaka. In plain English it says: "In you, the endless ocean, the wave of the world rises or sinks by its own nature. You neither grow nor shrink."
Ashtavakra, to King Janaka
त्वय्यनन्तमहाम्भोधौ विश्ववीचिः स्वभावतः ।उदेतु वास्तमायातु न ते वृद्धिर्न वा क्षतिः ॥
tvayyanantamahāmbhodhau viśvavīciḥ svabhāvataḥ |udetu vāstamāyātu na te vṛddhirna vā kṣatiḥ ||
In you, the endless ocean, the wave of the world rises or sinks by its own nature. You neither grow nor shrink.
What to notice
This is Janaka's own line from 7.2, given back to him by his teacher with 'I' changed to 'you'.
Word by word
- tvayi
- in you
- ananta-mahā-ambhodhau
- in the endless great ocean
- viśva-vīciḥ
- the wave of the world
- svabhāvataḥ
- by its own nature
- udetu
- let it rise
- vā
- or
- astam āyātu
- let it sink
- na te
- not for you
- vṛddhiḥ
- growth
- na vā kṣatiḥ
- nor loss
Reading the verse
In chapter 7 Janaka said: in me, the endless ocean, the wave of the world rises or sinks by its own nature, and I neither grow nor shrink. Here Ashtavakra says the same line with one change. In you. The teacher hands the student's insight back to him, confirmed. The verb forms matter. Udetu and astam āyātu are imperatives of permission: let it rise, let it set. There is no command to stop the wave or to ride it, only permission for it to do what it does. Then: na te vṛddhir na vā kṣatiḥ, there is no growth and no loss for you. Advaita teachers use this verse to describe a calm that does not depend on outcomes. A good year and a bad year are both waves. The ocean is not richer after a high tide. Someone who has watched savings go up and down, or a career rise and stall, can test the verse against that experience and see whether the one watching ever changed.
Same thread in the Bhagavad Gita
Bhagavad Gita 2.70Krishna describes the ocean that stays unmoved while rivers pour into it, and the person at peace like it.Chapter 15, What you are: Ashtavakra's second long teaching: you are awareness, the world is waves on your ocean, so move about at ease.
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Sources and method
Sanskrit from the common text of the Ashtavakra Gita, also called the Ashtavakra Samhita. Where our source had obvious typing errors we restored the standard reading and listed each change in our review notes. IAST is generated from the Devanagari. The English, the word meanings and the notes are Wisdom's own, written in the Advaita tradition of Shankara's school, the line followed by commentators such as Swami Nityaswarupananda and Swami Chinmayananda, with Lala Baij Nath's public-domain translation of 1907 as a reference.
Wisdom translation, edited by Ankur Shukla. Commentary AI-drafted, human review pending.