SB 3.26.15 · Srimad-Bhagavatam

Devanagari

एतावानेव सङ्ख्यातो ब्रह्मण: सगुणस्य ह । सन्निवेशो मया प्रोक्तो य: काल: पञ्चविंशक: ॥ १५ ॥

Verse text

etāvān eva saṅkhyāto brahmaṇaḥ sa-guṇasya ha sanniveśo mayā prokto yaḥ kālaḥ paṣca-viṁśakaḥ

Synonyms

etāvān — so much ; eva — just ; saṅkhyātaḥ — enumerated ; brahmaṇaḥ — of Brahman ; sa — guṇasya — with material qualities ; ha — indeed ; sanniveśaḥ — arrangement ; mayā — by Me ; proktaḥ — spoken ; yaḥ — which ; kālaḥ — time ; paṣca — viṁśakaḥ — the twenty-fifth .

Translation

All these are considered the qualified Brahman. The mixing element, which is known as time, is counted as the twenty-fifth element.

Translation (Visvanatha Cakravarti Thakura)

What I have described as the situation of the Brahman as the material world, of which time is the twenty-fifth element, has thus been enumerated. Sa-guṇasya means “of the material world starting with mahat-tattva.” Time is described in two ways. It is the twenty-fifth element, a particular condition of prakṛti.

Purport

According to the Vedic version there is no existence beyond Brahman. Sarvaṁ khalv idaṁ brahma ( Chāndogya Upaniṣad 3.14.1). It is stated also in the Viṣṇu Purāṇa that whatever we see is parasya brahmaṇaḥ śaktiḥ; everything is an expansion of the energy of the Supreme Absolute Truth, Brahman. When Brahman is mixed with the three qualities goodness, passion and ignorance, there results the material expansion, which is sometimes called saguṇa Brahman and which consists of these twenty-five elements. In the nirguṇa Brahman, where there is no material contamination, or in the spiritual world, the three modes — goodness, passion and ignorance — are not present. Where nirguṇa Brahman is found, simple unalloyed goodness prevails. Saguṇa Brahman is described by the Sāṅkhya system of philosophy as consisting of twenty-five elements, including the time factor (past, present and future).