Verse 18.28
अयुक्तः प्राकृतः स्तब्धः शठो नैष्कृतिकोऽलसः ।
विषादी दीर्घसूत्री च कर्ता तामस उच्यते ॥
Transliteration
ayuktaḥ prākṛtaḥ stabdhaḥ śaṭho naiṣkṛtiko'lasaḥ |
viṣādī dīrghasūtrī ca kartā tāmasa ucyate ||
By Sanskrit System · Machine draft · @indic-transliteration/sanscript 1.3.3
Translation
Unsteady, vulgar, unbending, cheating, malicious, lazy, desponding and procrastinating such an agent is called Tamasic.
From the owner's sheet · +1 more
Undisciplined, coarse, obstinate, deceitful, malicious, lazy, despondent and procrastinating: such a doer is called tamasic.
By Sanskrit System · Machine draft · claude-opus-5-5 · 2026-11-08 · +1 more
Word by word
By Sanskrit System · Machine draft · claude-opus-5-5 · 2026-11-08
Explanation
The tamasic doer is undisciplined, crude, stubborn, deceitful, spiteful, lazy, gloomy and given to putting things off. The list mixes moral faults with failures of energy and care. It portrays a person who neither acts well nor fully avoids action, but drifts and delays. Procrastination appearing alongside deceit is telling: the Gita treats inertia (tamas) as a serious obstacle, not a harmless habit. This completes the threefold picture of the doer.
By Sanskrit System · Machine draft · claude-opus-5-5 · 2026-11-08