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Sages have sung in many ways, in various distinctive chants and also in the suggestive words indicative of the Absolute, full of reasoning and decisive.

It has been sung by the sages in many ways, separately in various metres, and also in the well-reasoned and decisive words of the aphorisms on Brahman.

Krishna places his teaching within a long tradition. The seers have sung of the field and its knower in many ways and in many metres, which most readers take as a reference to the Vedic hymns and Upanishads. It has also been set out in the brahma-sūtra-padas, words about Brahman that are reasoned and conclusive. Some identify these with the text known as the Brahma Sutras; others take the phrase more broadly as concise statements about Brahman found in the Upanishads. Either way, the verse claims continuity: what Krishna teaches is not new invention but the distilled insight of the sages.