A core teaching · expansive in mood · a little context helps
“The divine can be named briefly, never exhausted.”
Krishna said: I will tell you briefly of my divine manifestations, chief of them, Arjuna, for there is no end to their विस्तार.
The verse in reading order — each Sanskrit word with its meaning beneath. Tap a word to focus on it.
Read literallythe Blessed Lord said · indeed · to you · I will tell · divine · indeed · my own manifestations · O best of the Kurus · there is not · end · of me
Krishna agrees to describe his chief divine manifestations, but only in brief, because his full extent has no limit.
Krishna speaks this verse, on the battlefield of Kurukshetra, in the chapter titled "Vibhuti Yoga" (The Yoga of Divine Glories).
Verse 19 sits in Chapter 10 of the Bhagavad Gita — Vibhuti Yoga, "The Yoga of Divine Glories". The chapter has 42 verses in total.
Ask a grandmother to name everything she has cooked in sixty years and she will give you a few dishes and laugh. Krishna answers Arjuna the same way: here are the main ones, the rest has no end.
Did you like this verse?
Krishna agrees to name only the chief of his manifestations, since the full list has no end.
What this verse means
Krishna agrees to describe his chief divine manifestations, but only in brief, because his full extent has no limit.
Context & commentary
Arjuna keeps asking Krishna to explain how to remember him in daily life. Krishna now answers by promising a selective list of his chief manifestations, while making clear that his full greatness cannot be contained in any list.
What it looks like today
Ask a grandmother to name everything she has cooked in sixty years and she will give you a few dishes and laugh. Krishna answers Arjuna the same way: here are the main ones, the rest has no end.
“Any list of God's forms is a sample; the whole cannot be counted.”
Explore related themes: vibhuti (43 verses), krishna teaching (11 verses)