Chap­ter XVII of the Bha­gavad-Gita delves into the nuances of faith, wor­ship, and the inher­ent nature of human beings as ques­tioned by Arju­na and expound­ed by Krish­na. Arju­na’s inquiry per­tains to the fate of those who, dis­re­gard­ing sacred tra­di­tions and scrip­tures, fol­low their con­vic­tion in wor­ship. Krish­na cat­e­go­rizes faith into three dis­tinct types, stem­ming from the qual­i­ties (Gunas) — Satt­va (truth and good­ness), Rajas (pas­sion and activ­i­ty), and Tamas (igno­rance and iner­tia).

Krish­na elu­ci­dates that an indi­vid­u­al’s faith mir­rors their inher­ent nature. Those who are pure in spir­it (‘Sooth­fast’) wor­ship the divine, while adher­ents of pas­sion (Rajas) bow to ambi­tious spir­its and demons, and the beings shroud­ed in dark­ness (Tamas) ven­er­ate ghosts and spir­its of the low­er order. He strong­ly crit­i­cizes prac­tices of severe penance that are per­formed out of pride and hypocrisy, declar­ing such prac­ti­tion­ers as devi­at­ing towards demon­ic, not divine. He empha­sizes that wor­ship, aus­ter­i­ty, and char­i­ty exist in three forms, each influ­enced by the doer’s nature.

Con­cern­ing food, Krish­na explains it also falls into three cat­e­gories reflect­ing the Gunas. The ‘Sooth­fast’ con­sume healthy, sat­is­fy­ing foods that pro­mote virtue, strength, and joy. The pas­sion­ate, dri­ven by intense desires, pre­fer foods that are over­ly spicy, hot, and lead to dis­com­fort and ill-health. The igno­rant indulge in stale, taste­less, and impure food, suit­able for those aligned with dark­ness.

Krish­na defines sac­ri­fices (rit­u­als) in a three­fold way as well. A sac­ri­fi­cial act per­formed duti­ful­ly, with­out antic­i­pa­tion of reward and with a devout heart, aligns with Satt­va (truth and good­ness). Actions exe­cut­ed for the sake of per­son­al gain or rep­u­ta­tion fall into Rajas (pas­sion), taint­ed by self­ish motives. Last­ly, sac­ri­fices per­formed dis­re­spect­ful­ly, with­out adher­ence to scrip­tur­al man­dates, not accom­pa­nied by appro­pri­ate offer­ings or hymns, are cat­e­go­rized under Tamas (dark­ness), con­sid­ered the most degrad­ed form of wor­ship.

Through these expla­na­tions, Krish­na guides Arju­na (and the read­ers) on under­stand­ing the inter­con­nect­ed­ness of an indi­vid­u­al’s nature with their faith, dietary habits, and sac­ri­fi­cial prac­tices, out­lin­ing the paths that lead towards divine or demon­ic des­tinies based on one’s inher­ent qual­i­ties and actions.