ब्रह्मभूतः प्रसन्नात्मा न शोचति न काङ्क्षति ।
समः सर्वेषु भूतेषु मद्भक्तिं लभते पराम् ॥ १८.५४ ॥

brahma-bhūta: prasannātmā na śocati na kāṅkṣati |
sama: sarveṣu bhūteṣu mad-bhaktim labhate parām || 18.54 ||

Integration of knowledge and devotion

Krishna does not stop here. He has something more to say in the same strain:

One who has become Brahman (i.e. who abides in Brahman) is always cheerful. He neither grieves nor desires. Being equal towards all beings, he attains unflinching devotion to the Supreme.

To be a brahma-bhūtaḥ means to be cheerful in heart and mind. What is there for him to worry about? The external world and its bounties do not and cannot by themselves cause any problems to anyone. Our own mind, by virtue of its propensity, alights on them through the senses to create notes of allurement and dislike. When the mind leaves all its pulls and pressures to remain calm and quiescent, what can the world do? If at all, it remains a beautiful expression of the same Brahman, which the mind has now become.

Freed of all possessiveness and preferences, the seeker attains equal vision, a subject Krishna has always been stressing variously. Thence, says Krishna, the brahma-bhūtaḥ begets unflinching devotion to the supreme Reality. By saying this, is Krishna lifting devotion to a pedestal higher than jñāna? Does it appear so? The next statement seems to indicate something more.