English Translation of Chapter 2 without Verses 
।2.1।  Sanjaya said: Krishna saw Arjuna full of compassion, grief, depressed and full of tears. Thus Krishna spoke following words.

।2.2।  Lord Krishna said: O Arjuna, how have these impure feelings came in your mind? These lead not to higher planets and neither result in fame. These type of feelings are shown by vicious persons.

।2.3।  O Arjuna, do not yield to this type impotent behaviour and don't allow these feelings to flourish in you. Give up such petty weakness of heart and arise.

।2.4।  Arjuna said: O killer of enemies, Krishna, how can I fight with arrows in battle with men like Bhishma and Drona, who are adorable?

।2.5।  It would be better to live in this world by begging than to live at the cost of the lives of my great teachers. If they are killed, all materialistic pleasures we enjoy, will be tainted with blood.

।2.6।  We do not even know whether it is better conquering them or being conquered by them. I don't care to live, after killing the prominent kaurava commandants, standing before us on the battlefield.

।2.7।  Now I am confused about my duty and have lost all composure because of miserly weakness. As your disciple I request you to tell me for certain what is best for me.

।2.8।  I do not see anything which can drive away this grief which is drying up my senses. I will not be able to dispel it even if I win a prosperous, unrivaled kingdom on earth or kingdom of demigods in heaven.

।2.9।  Sanjaya said: Arjuna, who can overpower the sleep and chastiser of enemies, told Krishna, “Govinda, no war,” and fell silent.

।2.10।  O descendant of Bharata (Dhritrashtra), at that time Krishna, smiling, spoke the following words to the grief-stricken Arjuna, in the midst of both the armies.

।2.11।  The Lord said - O Arjuna! you are talking like a wise man but you grieve for those who should not be grieved for. The wise grieve neither for the dead nor for the living.

।2.12।  It is not that I, you and these kings did not exist at any time in the past (I, you and these kings were always there at any time in the past); And surely it is not that we all shall cease to exist in future (We will be always there in the future also).

।2.13।  Just as the self, associated with a body faces childhood, youth and old age, similarly it passes into another body. A wise man is not deluded by that.

।2.14।  O Arjuna, sense-objects give rise to feelings of cold and heat, pleasure and pain. They come and go like winter and summer, and are impermanent. Tolerate them.

।2.15।  O Arjuna, That person becomes eligible for immortality, whom sensual desires do not trouble and reamins alike in pleasure and pain.

।2.16।  The unreal can never come into being, the real never ceases to be. The conclusion about these two is known to wisemen.

।2.17।  But know That to be indestructible by which all this is pervaded. None can destroy this Immutable (Imperishable).

।2.18।  The embodied one in these destructible bodies is everlasting, indestructible, and indeterminable. Therefore, O Arjuna, join the battle.

।2.19।  He who thinks of this incarnate One as the killer, and he who thinks of this One as the killed - both of them do not know. This One does not kill, nor is It killed.

।2.20।  It is not born, nor does It ever die. It is not that takes birth and will go through the cycle (of birth and death) to be born again. Unborn, eternal, ancient (changeless) and primeval, It is not slain when the body is slain.

।2.21।  O Arjuna, he who knows this One(Soul) as indestructible, eternal, birthless (unborn) and undecaying (immutable), how and whom does that person kill, or whom does he cause to be killed.

।2.22।  As a man discards worn-out garments and puts on new ones, so does the embodied self, discards Its worn-out body and enter into new one.

।2.23।  Weapons can not cut It, fire can not burn It, water can not moisten (wet) It, and air can not dry It.

।2.24।  This (Self) cannot be cut, burnt, wet, nor dried up. It is eternal, all-pervading, stable, immovable and ancient.

।2.25।  This (self) is said to be unmanifest, inconceivable and unchanging. After knowing this, it is not proper for you to grieve.

।2.26।  O Arjuna, if you think of It as being constantly going through birth and death, even then, you should not grieve.

।2.27।  Death is certain for what is born; and birth is certain after death. Therefore you should not lament over a thing that is inevitable.

।2.28|  O Arjuna, all beings remain unmanifest in the beginning; become manifest in the middle, become unmanifest after death. What is there to grieve about.

|2.29।  Someone visualizes It with amazement, someone talks of It as a wonder; and someone hears of It with astonishment. Hardly anyone realizes It even after hearing about It.

।2.30।  The self in the body of everyone, is ever indestructible, O Arjuna; therefore, you should not grieve for any creature.

।2.31।  For kshatriya, there is no greater good than a righteous war. Considering it as your own duty, you should not waiver.

।2.32।  O Arjuna, war has come on its own accord which is an open door to the heaven and kshatriyas gets delighted by fighting such a war.

।2.33।  If you will not fight this righteous war then you shall incur sin by avoiding your own duty and loosing your fame.

।2.34।  People will speak ill of you for all time, and to an honoured person, dishonour is worse than death.

।2.35।  The great warriors will think that you have fled from battle in fear. These men who held you in high esteem will see you in disgrace.

।2.36।  Your enemies will speak many indecent words while denigrating your might. Nothing can be more painful than that.

।2.37।  If slain, you will obtain heaven; or if victorious, you shall enjoy the earth. Therefore, O Arjuna, arise with a resolve (determination) to fight.

।2.38।  Engage in battle, treating conquest and defeat, gain and loss and happiness and sorrow with equanimity. Fighting with this mindset, you will not incur sin.

।2.39।  I have narrated this topic in context of Sankhya philosophy, now listen to it from a different view, endowed with that wisdom you will get rid of the bondage of action.

।2.40।  In this there is no loss of effort, nor is there any harm (contrary results). Even a little practice of this knowledge protects one from great fear.

।2.41।  O Arjuna, the resolute mind is one-pointed (who knows what is to be done and what is to be avoided); the minds of the irresolute are many-branched and endless.

।2.42।  O Arjuna, Those undiscerning people who are busy in the eulogising words of the Vedas, and utter flowery speeches, saying, there is nothing greater (than the attainment of Heaven).

।2.43।  Full of desires, considering heaven as the only glorious goal, for the attainment of pleasure and grandeur, leading to new births as the result of their works, (those people with such mindset) prescribe various specific actions (rites).

।2.44।  For those who are attached to pleasure and power, whose minds are drawn away by such flowery teaching, they don't develop resolute mind for meditation (Samadhi).

।2.45।  O Arjuna, Vedas deal with three attributes (qualities) of nature. You must be free from the three Gunas and be free from the pairs of opposites. Be self-absorbed, abide in pure Sattva; never care to acquire things and to protect what has been acquired.

।2.46।  Vedas have no utility for a realized person as a man in front of a grand reservoir of water has no utility of a well.

।2.47।  Your right is for action alone, not for the results. Do not consider yourself the reason of the results of action and do not be inclined (attached) to inaction.

।2.48।  O Arjuna, remaining even-minded in success and failure, perform actions in equanimity, abandoning attachment. Even-mindedness is said to be the Yoga.

।2.49।  O Arjuna, Action with attachment is far inferior to action done with evenness of mind. Seek refuge in wisdom; who work with motive of fruit are miserable.

।2.50|  Possessed of wisdom, one rejects both, virtue and vice (good and bad results of action). Be steadfast in Yoga. Yoga is skillfulness in action.

।2.51|  The wise who possess evenness of mind, relinquishing the fruits of action, are freed from the bondage of rebirth, and go to the place devoid of illness.

।2.52|  When your mind will go beyond the tangle of delusion regarding sense objects, then you will acquire dispassion for what has to be heard and what has been heard about materialistic pleasures.

।2.53|  When your mind will become unshakable and steadfast in the Self even after hearing hearing different versions and interpretations of the Vedas, then you will attain Yoga.

।2.54|  Arjuna said - O Krishna, What is the description of him who has steady wisdom (stabilized intellect) and is in the superconscious state? How does such self-absorbed person speaks, sits and walks?

।2.55|  Krishna Said- O Arjuna, when someone relinquishes all the desires from the mind and is content in himself by the self, then he is the person with the steady wisdom.

।2.56|  Whose mind is not shaken by adversity, who does not hanker after pleasures, and is free from attachment, fear and anger, is called a sage of steady wisdom.

।2.57|  He, who has no desire in anything; and who neither rejoices nor hates on getting good or bad, his intellect is properly stabilized.

।2.58|  When someone withdraws his senses from the sense-objects, like the tortoise which withdraws its limbs on all sides, his wisdom becomes steady.

।2.59|  Leaving their taste behind, the sense-objects retreat from the embodied persons, who abstain from food; his taste too disappears when he sees the Supreme.

।2.60|  O Arjuna,the turbulent senses, forcefully carry away the mind of even a wise man, though he is ever striving.

।2.61|  Having restrained all of them he should sit in meditation (relying on me for everything); whose senses are under control, his wisdom is steady.

।2.62|  When a man thinks of the objects, he gets attached to them; from attachment desire is born; from desire anger arises.

।2.63|  From anger comes delusion; from delusion loss of memory; from loss of memory the destruction of discrimination; from destruction of discrimination he perishes.

।2.64|  But the self-controlled man, moving among the sense-objects with the senses free from attraction and repulsion, attains to happiness.

।2.65|  After getting to this stage of happiness, all his sorrows vanish, because the wisdom of one who has a serene mind soon becomes firmly established.

।2.66|  For the unsteady there is no wisdom and self-absorbed feeling. And for an unmeditative man there is no peace. How can there be happiness for one without peace?

।2.67|  When the mind follows even one of the senses experiencing their objects, his understanding is carried away by them as the wind carries away a ship on the waters.

।2.68|  O Arjuna, Whose senses don't get attached to their objects, his wisdom is firmly set.

।2.69|  What is night for all beings, the controlled one is awake in that; when all beings are awake, that is the night to the sage who sees.

।2.70|  Just as rivers enter into the ocean continuously and ocean remains firmly established, similarly, When a human behaves in the same way (does not gets distracted) when desires enter - he attains peace; not he who longs for the objects of desire.

।2.71|  That man attains peace who, abandoning all desires, moves about without longing, egoism and sense of possession.

।2.72|  O Arjuna, this is the eternal state, attaining to this, none is deluded. Even if one is established in this at the end of life, one attains to oneness with Almighty.