Here Arjuna exposes himself and expresses his unfaltering faith in his teacher and confesses “I REGARD ALL THAT YOU SAY TO ME AS TRUTH.” ‘Keshava’ is “one who removes all sorrows of those who have surrendered to him.” Even though he accepts as truth all that Krishna says, he cannot comprehend the significance of the Lord’s declarations. In short, Arjuna admits here that his heart is satisfied and is overflowing with faith and belief but his intellect is starved and thirsty.
The thirst-to-know, under which the famished personality of Arjuna groans, is echoed in the second half of the second line, when he admits that “NEITHER THE DEVAS NOR THE DANAVAS KNOW YOUR PERSONALITY.” The ‘Danavas’ are the sons of Danu, and frequently challenge the heaven, obstruct the sacrifices, and lead generally in undivine life. ‘Devas’ are highly sensitive denizens of the heaven who are described in the Puranas as persons who have subtler perceptions, stronger emotions and mightier intellectual comprehensions than the mortals have.
Subjectively, ‘Devas’ stand for the nobler and the higher comprehensions in us, and the ‘Danavas’ for the hosts of negative urges. Arjuna, the son of Kunti, is expressing his despair that the IDENTITY of the Self can be fixed up neither by the subtlest and the noblest of our perceptions, nor can we apprehend this Self through our ‘Danava’-like challenge to possess, to acquire, to investigate and to know. Neither the good in us can embrace the Truth, nor can the bad in us challenge and bring up the Truth as an opposing force right in front of us. There are only two methods of meeting another being or thing; either as a friend or as a foe, either as something that we like or as something that we abhor. In neither way can we come to apprehend the individuality, the total personality (Vyakti) of the Self — It being the subject, both in Its expression as an individual (Yoga) and in Its expansion as the cosmic (Vibhuti).
IF NONE CAN KNOW THE TRUTH, WHY IS ARJUNA ASKING KRISHNA TO EXPLAIN? WHAT EXACTLY IS THE SPECIAL QUALITY THAT ENABLES HIM TO EXPLAIN THAT WHICH NONE ELSE CAN EVEN KNOW?
