Q0303

Bhagavad Gita

A verified English rendering from the curated archive.

English

One should lift oneself by the Self and not degrade oneself; for the Self alone is friend and enemy of the self.
Thinker Bhagavad Gita
School Hindu Philosophy
Source Bhagavad Gita 6.5
Theme Self
Another quotation More from this thinker

Source context

This English passage is associated with Bhagavad Gita 6.5, within the tradition of Hindu Philosophy. The wording below is a verified rendering prepared for careful reading rather than a claim of unique translation authority.

A short reading

Read in the register of self, the sentence asks the reader to test an assumption rather than to collect a slogan. In Bhagavad Gita's wider work, similar claims are usually offered as prompts for judgment: what would have to be true for the sentence to hold, and what would follow if it did?

How to cite this quotation

APA: Bhagavad Gita. (n.d.). One should lift oneself by the Self and not degrade oneself; for the Self alone is friend and enemy of the self. In Philosophy Blind Box. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0303

MLA: Bhagavad Gita. “One should lift oneself by the Self and….” Philosophy Blind Box, https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0303.

Chicago: Bhagavad Gita. “One should lift oneself by the Self and….” Philosophy Blind Box. Accessed 2026. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0303.

Same thinker

More from Bhagavad Gita

  1. You have a right to action alone, never to its fruits.
  2. Contacts with the senses give cold and heat, pleasure and pain; they come and go and are impermanent—endure them.
  3. Treating pleasure and pain, gain and loss, victory and defeat as the same…
  4. Contacts with the senses, O son of Kunti, give cold and heat, pleasure and pain; they come and go — endure them.
  5. One should lift oneself by oneself; one should not degrade oneself.

All quotations by Bhagavad Gita

Same theme

More on self

  1. A friend is another self.
  2. A person's character is their destiny.
  3. I searched for myself.
  4. It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare; it is because we do not dare that they are difficult.
  5. Claim yourself for yourself.

Browse the self theme