Sanskrit
ऊर्ध्वमूलमधःशाखमश्वत्थं प्राहुरव्ययम् । छन्दांसि यस्य पर्णानि यस्तं वेद स वेदवित् ॥
ūrdhvamūlam adhaḥśākham aśvatthaṃ prāhur avyayam chandāṃsi yasya parṇāni yas taṃ veda sa vedavit
Translation
With roots above, branches below, the Asvattha is said to be indestructible; the leaves of it are hymns; he who knoweth it is a Veda-knower.
Annie Besant · The Bhagavad-Gita, translated by Annie Besant (4th ed., 1922) — Wikisource · Public Domain
Explanation
The chapter opens with a striking inverted-tree image — roots above, branches below — reversing ordinary experience of a tree to signal that the “roots” of manifest existence sit in Brahman above, not in the visible world beneath it. The Ashvattha (the sacred peepal, Ficus religiosa) stands here for samsara itself, and its leaves are called hymns because Vedic ritual, for all its authority, still belongs to the branches rather than the root. Calling the one who sees this structure a “Veda-knower” is a deliberate provocation: real Vedic knowledge, the verse implies, is grasping what the hymns hang from, not reciting them. This opens a four-verse metaphor that verses 2-4 will extend and then instruct the seeker to fell.