BG 16.1: The Lord said: Fearlessness, purity of mind, devotion to meditation on the knowledge (of the self), alms-giving, self-control, worship, study of Vedas, austerity, uprightness:

BG 16.2: Non-injury, truth, freedom from anger, renunciation, tranquillity, non-slandering others, compassion to all beings, freedom from desire, gentleness, the sense of shame, freedom from fickleness;

BG 16.3: Grandeur, patience, fortitude, purity, freedom from hatred, and from over-pride—these, O Arjuna, belong to him who is born to a divine destiny.

BG 16.4: Pomposity, arrogance, self-conceit, wrath, rudeness and ignorance—these, O Arjuna, belong to him who is born to a demoniac destiny.

BG 16.5: The divine destiny is deemed to lead to liberation, the demoniac to bondage. Grieve not, O Arjuna, you are born to a divine destiny.

BG 16.6: There are two types of beings in this world—the divine and the demoniac. The divine has been described at length. Hear from Me, O Arjuna, about the demoniac.

BG 16.7: The demoniac men know neither action nor renunciation. Cleanliness is not in them, nor even right conduct, nor truth.

BG 16.8: They maintain: ‘The universe is without truth, without any foundation and without a Lord (Īshvara). What else can exist without mutual causation? It has lust for its cause.’

BG 16.9: Holding this view, these men of lost souls and feeble understanding do cruel deeds for the destruction of the world.

BG 16.10: Turning to insatiable desires, seizing through delusion unjustly acquired wealth, and following impious vows, they act, full of ostentation, pride and arrogance.

BG 16.11: Obsessed by unlimited cares which end with dissolution, looking upon enjoyment of desires as their highest aim, and convinced that this is all;

BG 16.12: Bound by hundreds of fetters of hopes, given over to desire and anger, they strive unjustly to gather wealth for the gratification of their desires.

BG 16.13: ‘This I have gained today, and this desire I shall attain. This wealth is mine, and this also shall be mine hereafter’.

BG 16.14: ‘This enemy is slain by me; and others also I shall slay. I am the Lord, I am the enjoyer, I am successful, I have strength, I have happiness.’

BG 16.15: ‘I am wealthy and high-born; who else is equal to me? I shall sacrifice, I shall give alms, I shall rejoice.’ Thus they think, deluded by ignorance.

BG 16.16: Bewildered by many thoughts, ensnared by the net of delusion, addicted to sensual enjoyments, they fall into a foul Naraka.

BG 16.17: Self-conceited, self-sufficient, possessed of the intoxication of wealth and pride, they perform sacrifices in name only, with ostentation and not according to the injunctions of the Shastras.

BG 16.18: Depending on their egoism, power and pride, and also of desire and wrath, these malicious men hate Me in their own bodies and in those of others.

BG 16.19: Those haters, cruel, the vilest and the most inauspicious of mankind, I hurl forever into the cycles of births and deaths, into the wombs of demons.

BG 16.20: Fallen into demoniac wombs in birth after birth, these deluded men, not attaining Me, further sink down to the lowest level, O Arjuna.

BG 16.21: Desire, wrath and greed—this is the triple gateway to Naraka, ruinous to the self. Therefore one should abandon these three.

BG 16.22: One who has been released from these threefold gates of darkness, O Arjuna, works for the good of the self. Hence he reaches the supreme state.

BG 16.23: He who, abandoning the injunctions of the Shastras, acts under the influence of desire, attains neither perfection nor pleasure, nor the supreme state.

BG 16.24: Therefore, let the Shastra be your authority for determining what should be done and what should not be done. Knowing what is enjoined in the injunctions of the Shastra, you should perform work here.