Bhagavad Gita 14.5
सत्त्वं रजस्तम इति गुणाः प्रकृतिसम्भवाः । निबध्नन्ति महाबाहो देहे देहिनमव्ययम् ॥ ५ ॥
sattvaṁ rajas tama iti guṇāḥ prakṛti-sambhavāḥ | nibadhnanti mahā-bāho dehe dehinam avyayam ||5||
Translation
Sattva, rajas, tamas, these qualities born of prakriti bind, O mighty-armed, the imperishable embodied one in the body.
Reflection
Which strand, sattva, rajas, or tamas, is most active in you right now?
Read this verse in its chapter: Chapter Fourteen
Now the instrument arrives. Three strands run through every mind and every situation: sattva (clarity, lightness), rajas (drive, restlessness), tamas (dullness, inertia). All three are products of prakriti, the mother-side. Their job, from the bondage point of view, is to tie the imperishable knower to a perishable body. The dehin himself is described as unchanging; the binding is not to his nature but to his attention. He looks at the gunas long enough to identify with them. Liberation will not be the destruction of the gunas; it will be the loosening of the look.