203.  Only some one, i.e., very few.  Few perfection, i.e., for knowledge of self.  Thus all the commentators.

204.  The last word of the first line of this sloka is param (higher) and not aparam with the initial a silent owing to the rules of Sandhi.  Many of the Bengal texts have aparam, not excepting the latest one printed at Calcutta.

205.  Kama which I have rendered desire is explained by Sreedhara as the wish for an unattained object; and raga as the longing or thirst for more.  The second Kama is explained as desires of the class of love or lust.

206.  Daivi is explained by Sankara as divine; by Sreedhara as marvellous.

207.  The divine desires are about sons, fame, victory over enemies, etc., regulations, such as fasts etc.; their own nature, i.e., disposition as dependent on the acts of their past lives.  Thus all the commentators.

208.  The worshipper obtains his desires, thinking he gets them from the godhead he worships.  It is however, that gives him those.

209.  The divinities being perishable, myself imperishable.  What these obtain is perishable.  What my worshippers obtain is imperishable.

210.  The ignorant, without knowledge of my transcendent essence take me to be no higher than that what is indicated in my human and other incarnate manifestations.  Thus Sreedhara.

211.  Adhyatman is explained as all that by which Brahman is to be attained.  All actions mean the whole course of duties and practices leading to the knowledge of Brahman.

212.  The three words occurring in this sloka and explained in the next section, forming as they do the subject of a question by Arjuna.

213.  Bhava is production, and Udbhava is growth or development.  Thus Sreedhara.

214.  All the doors, i.e., the senses.  Confining the mind within the heart, i.e., withdrawing the mind from all external objects.  Murdhni is explained by Sreedhara to mean here “between the eyebrows.”

215.  All these regions being destructible and liable to re-birth, those that live there are equally liable to death and re-birth.

216.  The meaning, as explained by Sreedhara, is that such persons are said to know all, and not those whose knowledge is bounded by the course of the sun and the moon.

217.  In this round of births and deaths, the creatures themselves are not free agents, being all the while subject to the influence of Karma, as explained by the commentators.

218.  The commentators explain the word fire, the light, day, &c., as several godheads presiding over particular times.

219.  The atmosphere occupies space without affecting it or its nature.  So all things are in the Supreme Being without affecting him.

220.  My nature, i.e., the unmanifest principle or primal essence.

221.  Prakriti which I render “nature” is explained by the commentators as Karma, the influence of Karma or action being universal in setting the form of a particular entity at the time of its creation.