न त्वेवाहं जातु नासं न त्वं नेमे जनाधिपाः।
न चैव न भविष्यामः सर्वे वयमतः परम्।।2.12।।
But certainly it is not a fact that I did not exist at any time; nor you, nor these rulers of men. And surely it is not that we all shall cease to exist after this.
Osho’s Commentary
Krishna now throws a thunderbolt. He shatters the whole illusion of time. He says there was never a time when we were not, and there will never be a time when we shall not be. We live in a small, fragmented world of past, present, and future. But from the peak of consciousness from which Krishna is speaking, time is an eternal now. Birth and death are just small incidents in a beginningless and endless journey. The form changes, the name changes, but the essential reality, the consciousness, remains. You were, you are, and you will be. This is the first declaration of the immortality of the soul. Krishna is trying to shift Arjuna’s focus from the perishable body to the imperishable Self.