एतैरेतावद्भिश्चतुर्गुणैरभिषिच्य चतुर्जालं ब्रह्मकोशं यन्मृत्युर्नावपश्यति । तमतीत्य मल्लोककामो मल्लोकमवाप्नोति नान्यं मल्लोकात्परम् । यमवाप्य न शोचति । न स पुनरावर्तते न स पुनरावर्तते
etairetāvadbhiścaturguṇairabhiṣicya caturjālaṃ brahmakośaṃ yanmṛtyurnāvapaśyati | tamatītya mallokakāmo mallokamavāpnoti nānyaṃ mallokātparam | yamavāpya na śocati | na sa punarāvartate na sa punarāvartate
«Having bathed [it] with these, fourfold — [he obtains] the fourfold net, the treasury of Brahman, which death does not see. Having surpassed it, one desiring my world attains my world; there is no other, higher world than mine; having obtained which, he does not grieve; he does not return again, he does not return again».
224a1d72c072 · published Aug 7, 2026, 4:41:18 AM UTC
Available inRUENPage between verses with
The ladder is brought to its top, and at the top it is said twice: na sa punaḥ āvartate, «he does not return again». This expression in the upaniṣads is a mark of the limit: the returnable steps are over, beyond it there is no more going and coming. The Gītā says the same in the same words about its own highest abode: «having attained which, they do not return» — yad gatvā na nivartante tad dhāma paramaṃ mama (15.6); and further: «having come to Me, they know birth no more» (8.16).
The coincidence of words here is complete, and the difference lies not in them but in what is placed at the top. Here at the top stands mal-loka, «my world»; and it is said there is nothing higher than it. Now one must say honestly of the inconsistency the book has set for itself. The world of the sun cost one cartload, heaven — two, and the highest, non-returnable one — four.
That is, along the whole ladder, including its last step, one and the same price stands, only in ever larger amounts; and it turns out that non-return is bought with the same grain as heaven, only more of it. This, to my mind, is the weakest point in the whole chapter, and its weakness matters. If liberation is the last cell of the same price list, it differs from the rest of its rows only by the sum; and the difference between the cycle of births and release from it cannot be a difference of sum.
The Vaishnava side draws a line here, and draws it sharply. Heaven is bought; the abode is given: «not by the Vedas, not by austerity, not by charity, not by sacrifice can I be seen thus; but by undivided devotion I can» (Gītā 11.53–54). The difference between «buying it fourfold» and «being let in» is, in essence, the whole difference between ritual and relationship.