New to the Gita?
The story so far
Five minutes of context before verse 1.1.
One family, two claims
Long ago, the Kuru clan ruled a kingdom from Hastinapura. When the old king died, two sets of cousins stood to inherit: the five Pandavas, sons of the late King Pandu, and their hundred Kaurava cousins, sons of the blind King Dhritarashtra. The eldest Kaurava, Duryodhana, believed the throne was his — and spent his life making sure the Pandavas never touched it.
The wound that never healed
Through a rigged game of dice, Duryodhana stripped the Pandavas of their kingdom, their wealth, and nearly their honour — then sent them into thirteen years of forest exile. When they returned and asked only for five villages, he refused them even land enough to stand a needle on. Every embassy of peace failed. Both sides began gathering the armies of the known world.
The morning of the war
The Gita opens at dawn on Kurukshetra, the plain both armies chose for the war. The Pandavas' greatest archer, Arjuna, has asked his charioteer — his friend and cousin Krishna — to drive him between the armies for a final look at the enemy. What he sees there breaks him: teachers, grandfathers, cousins, and friends on both sides. He lowers his bow and refuses to fight.
Four voices
Everything you read is spoken by one of four voices, marked with a badge on every verse: blind King Dhritarashtra, who asks the first question from his palace; Sanjaya, his charioteer gifted with distant sight, who narrates the battlefield; Arjuna, who doubts and questions; and Krishna, who answers — warrior, friend, and, as the dialogue deepens, the supreme itself.
How to read
- Start small. Begin at Chapter 1, verse 1 and read at your own pace — or pick any chapter that calls to you.
- Use the layers. Every verse shows Sanskrit, transliteration, word meanings, translation, and commentary. Hide any layer from the Aa display menu if it distracts you.
- Words to know first. Three terms unlock most of the book: dharma (duty), karma (action and its bondage), ātman (the deathless self). The glossary defines forty such terms, and dotted-underlined words throughout the text link straight to it.