मृत्युः सर्वहरश्चाहमुद्भवश्च भविष्यताम् | कीर्तिः श्रीर्वाक्च नारीणां स्मृतिर्मेधा धृतिः क्षमा ||३४||
mṛtyuḥ sarva-haraś cāham udbhavaś ca bhaviṣyatām | kīrtiḥ śrīr vāk ca nārīṇāṃ smṛtir medhā dhṛtiḥ kṣamā || 34 ||
I am all-seizing Death, and the birth of those to come; among feminine: Fame, Prosperity, Speech, Memory, Forbearance.
Word by word (3)
- mṛtyuḥ sarva-haraḥ ca aham
- — I am all-seizing Death · mṛtyuḥ = Death (mṛtyu = death — from √mṛ = to die; the personification of death; in the Kaṭha Upaniṣad, Yama is Mṛtyu — the young Naciketas travels to the realm of Mṛtyu to ask about the nature of the ātman). sarva-haraḥ = the all-seizing/all-taking (sarva = all + hara = seizing, taking — from √hṛ = to take/seize; sarva-hara = 'the one who takes everything, the all-seizer'; Death takes without exception, without partiality — everything is taken by mṛtyu in time). ca = and. aham = I. mṛtyuḥ sarva-haraḥ aham = 'I am Death, the all-seizer.' V10.30 said kālaḥ kalayatāṃ (Time among measurers) — finite time that measures and destroys. V11.32 will say kālo'smi loka-kṣaya-kṛt (I am Time, the world-destroyer). V10.34's mṛtyuḥ sarva-haraḥ is the death-face of the same teaching: the divine IS Death, not merely a deity who sends death. Death is the divine's concentrated expression in the domain of taking-all.
- udbhavaḥ ca bhaviṣyatāṃ
- — And the birth/origin of those who are to be born · udbhavaḥ = birth, arising, origin (ud = up/forth + bhava = arising — from √bhū = to be; udbhava = 'arising upward, coming forth, origin, birth'). ca = and. bhaviṣyatāṃ = of those who are to be/those who will exist in the future (genitive plural of bhaviṣyat = 'one who will be/exist in the future'; from √bhū = to be in the future tense; bhaviṣyatāṃ = genitive plural 'among those who will come to exist'). The divine = Death (the end of all existing beings) AND the birth/origin of all future beings (those who are yet to come). The full circle: the divine is both the dissolution of what is now and the arising of what will be. This is the Brahman-cycle: sarga (creation/udbhava) → sthiti (sustenance) → pralaya (dissolution/mṛtyu). V10.34 captures both sarga and pralaya ends: mṛtyuḥ (pralaya-face) + udbhavaḥ bhaviṣyatāṃ (sarga-face of what is yet to come).
- kīrtiḥ śrīḥ vāk ca nārīṇāṃ — smṛtiḥ medhā dhṛtiḥ kṣamā
- — Among feminine qualities: Fame, Prosperity, Speech; and Memory, Intelligence, Steadiness, Forbearance · nārīṇāṃ = among feminine qualities/goddesses (genitive plural of nārī = woman, feminine; here used for the personified feminine virtues — each of these is a feminine deity in the Indian tradition). kīrtiḥ = Fame, glory (kīrti = 'spreading fame, celebrated glory' — from √kīrt = to celebrate/glorify; Kīrti = the goddess of fame). śrīḥ = Prosperity, beauty, splendor (Śrī = the goddess Lakṣmī herself; śrī = beauty, prosperity, auspiciousness — the most auspicious of the seven divine feminine qualities). vāk = Speech, language (vāk = 'speech, voice, word' — from √vac = to speak; Vāk = the goddess of speech, the equivalent of Sarasvatī; vāk is the personified principle of all meaningful utterance). smṛtiḥ = Memory (smṛti = 'what is remembered, memory, tradition' — from √smṛ = to remember; Smṛti = both the faculty of memory and the class of Hindu texts based on remembered tradition as opposed to śruti = directly heard). medhā = Intelligence, mental brilliance (medhā = 'mental acuity, intellectual power, wisdom' — from √medh = to possess mental power; Medhā = the goddess of intelligence). dhṛtiḥ = Steadiness, firmness (dhṛti = 'holding firm, steadiness, resolve' — from √dhṛ = to hold; Dhṛti = the quality that sustains effort without wavering). kṣamā = Forbearance, patience, forgiveness (kṣamā = 'patience, endurance, forbearance, forgiveness' — from √kṣam = to endure patiently; Kṣamā = the goddess of patience/forgiveness, one of the highest virtues in the Indian tradition).
V34: mṛtyuḥ sarva-haraḥ (Death that seizes everything — the pralaya/dissolution face of the divine) + udbhavaḥ bhaviṣyatāṃ (the birth and arising of all future beings — the sarga/creation face) + among feminine divine qualities: kīrtiḥ (Fame/glory), śrīḥ (Prosperity/Lakṣmī herself), vāk (Speech/Sarasvatī), smṛtiḥ (Memory), medhā (Intelligence), dhṛtiḥ (Steadiness), kṣamā (Forbearance). V34 is one of the most all-encompassing verses in the catalogue: from Death (the end of all beings) through Birth (the beginning of all future beings) to seven feminine divine virtues.
A modern analogy
V34's seven feminine virtues (Fame, Prosperity, Speech, Memory, Intelligence, Steadiness, Forbearance) are the Gita's catalogue of the divine's expression in human excellence. Think of people you most admire — in every case, their greatness comes from one or more of these: the speaker whose words genuinely illumine (vāk-vibhūti), the leader whose calm presence holds a team through difficulty (dhṛti-vibhūti), the grandmother who forgives without holding grudges (kṣamā-vibhūti), the scholar with extraordinary memory and precision (smṛti + medhā-vibhūti). All are divine expressions, V34 says.
What it does NOT mean
V34's mṛtyuḥ sarva-haraḥ (I am all-seizing Death) is not saying death is punishment or that the divine is indifferent to suffering. The all-seizing quality of death is the divine's concentrated expression in the domain of endings — the force that ensures nothing can hold on indefinitely. This is the same teaching as V2.27 (jātasya hi dhruvo mṛtyuḥ — for the born, death is certain) delivered from the divine's own voice: Death is not the divine's enemy but the divine's own concentrated expression in the domain of completion and release.
Take with you
- V34's kṣamā (forbearance/forgiveness) as the most practically difficult of the seven feminine vibhūtis: identify one person or situation toward which you have held resentment. The kṣamā-practice: not forcing forgiveness but recognizing that the burden of the resentment is yours, not theirs. Write one sentence — not for them, for yourself: 'I am willing to put down this burden.' This is the beginning of kṣamā, the divine's vibhūti in the domain of release from the past.
- V34's dhṛti (steadiness/constancy) as the key quality for long projects: anything worth building requires sustained effort without assurance of visible progress. dhṛti is the quality that says: 'I continue even when I cannot see the progress.' In your most important current long-term commitment — what specific dhṛti-practice do you have? Regular re-commitment (weekly or monthly), a ritual of recommitment, a community of accountability — these are dhṛti-practices for the sustained action the divine's dhṛti-vibhūti expresses.
- V34's mṛtyuḥ sarva-haraḥ as a memento mori practice: once a week, spend 5 minutes with the fact of your own death — not morbidly, but with honest recognition. 'Everything I am holding right now will be taken by the all-seizing Death in time. Given this: what is genuinely important to do today?' The Stoics called this memento mori (remember you will die) — the Gita calls it mṛtyuḥ sarva-haraḥ as a divine vibhūti. Both point to the same clarifying function of death-awareness.
V10.34 is one of the most philosophically encompassing verses in the vibhūti catalogue, ranging from cosmic death through future birth to seven feminine divine virtues: 1. Mṛtyuḥ sarva-haraḥ (all-seizing Death): Three death-vibhūti mentions across the chapter: V10.29's Yama (the cosmic judge who administers karma after death), V10.30's kāla (finite time that measures/destroys), V10.34's mṛtyuḥ sarva-haraḥ (death itself as a vibhūti — the force that takes all). And V11.32 will be the climax: kālo'smi loka-kṣaya-kṛt (I am Time the world-destroyer). The progression: death as administrator (Yama) → death as measurer (kāla) → death as all-seizer (mṛtyuḥ sarva-haraḥ) → death as cosmic destroyer (V11.32). V10.34's mṛtyuḥ is the most direct: the divine IS the force of death in its all-seizing completeness. 2. Udbhavaḥ bhaviṣyatāṃ: The counterpart to mṛtyuḥ. The divine = the dissolution of the existing AND the arising of the yet-to-be. This pairing (death + birth) is the cosmic Brahman-cycle: pralaya (dissolution) and sarga (creation/arising) are both divine expressions. No being that will ever exist has NOT already been in the divine's awareness as bhaviṣyat (future). The divine holds all possible futures. 3. The seven feminine vibhūtis (kīrtiḥ, śrīḥ, vāk, smṛtiḥ, medhā, dhṛtiḥ, kṣamā): These seven are all personified as goddesses in the Indian tradition. Śrī = Lakṣmī herself (prosperity, beauty, auspiciousness). Vāk = Sarasvatī's domain (speech, word, knowledge). Together they represent the complete feminine divine expression in the domain of human virtue. The inclusion of feminine qualities as vibhūtis is theologically significant: the divine's concentrated expression in the human domain includes both the masculine (warrior-valor, strength, courage) and the feminine (fame, speech, memory, forbearance) qualities. The grouping: kīrtiḥ (how one is held in the world), śrīḥ (what one embodies materially and spiritually), vāk (how one communicates) = three outward-facing feminine qualities. smṛtiḥ (what one retains), medhā (how one processes), dhṛtiḥ (how one persists), kṣamā (how one releases) = four inner feminine qualities. Together: the complete feminine virtue-map.
Advaita lens
Shankaracharya: mṛtyuḥ sarva-haraḥ (all-seizing Death) is the teaching of anitya (impermanence) expressed as a vibhūti. In Advaita, death is the teacher that reveals what is NOT the ātman: 'Whatever can be taken away was never truly mine.' Each death — of a loved one, a role, a certainty — reveals the ātman by removing what covered it. The all-seizing quality of mṛtyu is Māyā's unwrapping function: each loss unwraps another layer of the false identification until what remains is the ātman (the akṣaya = imperishable, V10.33). The teaching: death as the ultimate teacher of Advaita.
Bhakti lens
For bhakti, V34's Śrī (= Lakṣmī herself) as one of the feminine vibhūtis: Lakṣmī is Viṣṇu's consort. By naming Śrī as a vibhūti, the Gita places the goddess of prosperity — Viṣṇu's own divine consort — in the vibhūti catalogue. For Vaiṣṇava bhakti traditions, this confirms: prosperity (śrī) and beauty (śrī) are divine expressions, not to be renounced or demonized. Material beauty and flourishing, when aligned with dharma, are the divine's concentrated expression in the domain of prosperity. V34's Śrī-vibhūti gives bhakti traditions their scriptural basis for honoring Lakṣmī alongside Viṣṇu.
Karma-Yoga lens
V10.34 for karma yoga: dhṛti (steadiness/firmness) and kṣamā (forbearance) are the karma yogi's most critical inner qualities. Dhṛti sustains long-term action without visible reward (V2.47's 'release the fruit' requires dhṛti to continue working when the fruit is not visible). Kṣamā prevents the accumulation of reactivity that would compromise the clarity of future actions (V3.37's kāma-krodha are the enemies of sustained dharma-action; kṣamā releases the krodha/resentment that accumulates from difficult circumstances). V34's dhṛti + kṣamā = the karma yogi's essential inner equipment.
Modern parallels
V34's seven feminine virtues parallel Carol Gilligan's (1982) theory of ethics of care — a moral framework centered on relationships, responsibility, and attentiveness (rather than rules and rights). Gilligan's feminine ethics includes: responsiveness to others' needs (parallels kṣamā/forbearance), sustaining relationships (parallels dhṛti/constancy), communication (parallels vāk/speech), wisdom from experience (parallels smṛti/memory + medhā/intelligence). V10.34 identified these same qualities as divine vibhūtis 2500+ years before Gilligan's formal articulation.
Practice
V34 kṣamā-release meditation (15 minutes): sit quietly. Bring to mind the person or situation toward which you carry the most resentment. Feel the resentment as a physical sensation (typically in the chest, throat, or belly). Breathe into it without suppressing or expressing. Then slowly breathe out with the word 'kṣamā' — forbearance, patience, release. Do this 10 times. Notice: the divine's concentrated expression in this moment is the kṣamā-quality — the quality that releases the grip of the past. You are not excusing what happened. You are releasing the weight you have been carrying. This is kṣamā as a living divine expression.
Public-domain translations (3) compare all →
And I am the all-seizing Death, and the prosperity of those who are to be prosperous; of the feminine qualities (I am) Fame, Prosperity (or beauty), Inspiration, Memory, Intelligence, Constancy and Forbearance. [4]
I am all-grasping death, and the birth of those who are to be; among feminine things I am fame, fortune, speech, memory, intelligence, patience, and forgiveness. [6]
And bitter Death which seizes all, and joyous sudden Birth, / Which brings to light all beings that are to be on earth; / And of the viewless virtues, Fame, Fortune, Song am I, / And Memory, and Patience; and Craft, and Constancy [7]
This verse speaks to
Where this thread continues
I am Time, the world-destroyer — even without you, none of these warriors shall survive; they are already slain!
Birth means death is certain. Death means birth is certain. Grief over the unavoidable serves no one.
Those who eat yajna's remnants reach eternal Brahman. Without offering, not even this world is theirs.
Intellect, wisdom, patience, truth, calm, restraint, joy, pain, birth, death, fear, fearlessness — all arise from Me.
Arjuna asks: what does the truly wise person look like? How do they speak, sit, and move?
Those who know Me as Adhibhūta, Adhidaiva, and Adhiyajña — they know Me even at death, with unified minds.