Osho’s Commentary

This tree of the world, this samsara, is so vast that you cannot see its form, its beginning, or its end. You are a small leaf on a small branch; how can you see the whole tree? So what is the way out? Krishna gives you an axe: the strong axe of asanga, of non-attachment, of detachment. You must cut down this tree. But who will wield this axe? Your own “I”? No, my friend. The ego cannot cut the ego. The ego is the very root of this tree in the world of men. The real cutting happens when you drop the axe itself and surrender. That is why Krishna immediately says, “Seek refuge in that primeval source from which this whole play began.” The ultimate axe is not detachment, but sharanagati, surrender. It is to say to the divine, “I cannot cut this tree. My hands are too weak. Now, you do it.” In that moment of total helplessness, in that surrender, the real transformation happens. And who can reach that eternal state? Not the scholar, not the powerful, not the virtuous man full of pride. But the one who is free from pride and delusion, who has conquered the habit of attachment, whose desires have fallen silent, and who has gone beyond the dualities of pleasure and pain. He who is nirdvandva, balanced between the opposites—he, the undeluded one, reaches that eternal home.