Sanskrit
अपरेयमितस्त्वन्यां प्रकृतिं विद्धि मे पराम् । जीवभूतां महाबाहो ययेदं धार्यते जगत् ॥ ५ ॥
aparā iyam itas tv anyāṃ prakṛtiṃ viddhi me parām jīvabhūtāṃ mahābāho yayedaṃ dhāryate jagat
Translation
This the inferior. Know My other nature, the higher, the life-element, O mighty-armed, by which the universe is upheld.
Annie Besant · The Bhagavad-Gita, translated by Annie Besant (4th ed., 1922) — Wikisource · Public Domain
Explanation
The higher nature answers what verse 4’s eightfold inventory couldn’t account for: what actually sustains and animates that matter. Called jiva-bhuta — literally “become-life” — it is the life-principle rather than another item on the list; matter and life-principle are presented as two modes of the same underlying reality, not two separate substances. Chapter 13’s later field/knower-of-the-field distinction formalizes almost exactly this same two-nature split in different vocabulary.