Arjuna continues his arguments to Krishna against the advisability of such a civil war between the two factions of the same royal family. A Dharma-hunting Arjuna is here mentally manufacturing a case for himself justifying his cowardly retreat from the post of duty where destiny has called upon him to act.

He repeats what he had said earlier because Krishna, with his pregnant silence, is criticising Arjuna’s attitude. The provocatively smiling lips of the Lord are whipping Arjuna into a sense of shame. He wants the moral support of his friend and charioteer to come to the conclusion that what he is feeling in his own mind is acceptable and just. But the endorsement and the intellectual sanction are not forthcoming from either the look of Krishna or the Lord’s words.

Sri Sankaracharya did not comment on this sloka. The commentary starts from 2.10.