If three different authors wrote the Gita across several centuries, who combined their works into a single text? Desai proposes that Badarayana, the author of the Brahmasutra, served as the final editor who wove together disparate strands into the unified 700-verse text we know today.
Badarayana is one of the most influential yet mysterious figures in Hindu philosophy. He authored the Brahmasutra (also called Vedanta Sutra), the foundational text of Vedanta philosophy that all later commentators, from Shankara to Ramanuja to Madhva, had to interpret.
The Brahmasutra is a collection of terse aphorisms summarizing Upanishadic philosophy. It mentions the Bhagavad Gita by name, indicating that by Badarayana’s time, the Gita existed as a recognized text. This suggests Badarayana worked with an already-compiled Gita or may have played a role in its final compilation.
Desai presents several reasons for identifying Badarayana as the Gita’s final editor:
The Gita’s final form displays a systematic organization that suggests editorial intelligence. The text moves from crisis (Arjuna’s despair) through philosophical instruction to resolution (Arjuna’s commitment to fight). This narrative structure may have been imposed on earlier, less organized materials.
Certain passages seem designed to reconcile apparent contradictions. When the text says “all paths lead to Me” or presents multiple yogas as complementary rather than competing, this may be editorial smoothing of originally conflicting positions.
The Gita’s philosophical organization parallels the Brahmasutra’s approach: presenting multiple perspectives, acknowledging objections, synthesizing seemingly opposed views. This suggests a common editorial mind.
What did the editor actually do? Desai proposes several levels of editorial intervention:
The editor’s achievement was to create the impression of a unified teaching from diverse sources. The multiple paths (karma, jnana, bhakti) are presented not as contradictions but as complementary approaches for different temperaments. The shifts in philosophical framework are smoothed into an apparent progression.
Similar editorial synthesis appears in other ancient texts:
In each case, editors created apparent unity from diverse sources while leaving traces of the original multiplicity.
Despite editorial efforts, the seams remain visible to careful readers. The Gita’s internal contradictions, shifts in audience and vocabulary, and varying philosophical frameworks all point to its composite origins. The editor unified but did not fully homogenize.
The editor may have preserved diversity intentionally, recognizing value in each perspective, or may have been constrained by the reverence already accorded to the source materials. Ancient editors often worked conservatively, adding and arranging rather than extensively rewriting.
In Desai’s analysis, the Gita has not three but four contributors:
126 verses on karma yoga for the educated elite
119 verses responding to Buddhist challenge
455 verses promoting bhakti for the masses
Editorial work unifying the three sources