Arjuna uvaacha:
pashyaami devaamstava deva dehe sarvaanstathaa bhootavisheshasanghaan |
brahmaanameesham kamalaasanasthamrisheenshcha sarvaanuragaanshcha divyaan || 15 ||
 
Arjuna said:
O Lord, I see deities as well as special classes of beings in your body. Brahma, the lord, seated upon a lotus, and all the sages and divine serpents.
 
pashyaami : I see
devaam : deities
tava : your
deva : O Lord
dehe : in your body
sarvaan : all
tathaa : as well as
bhoota : beings
vishesha : special
sanghaan : classes
brahmaanam : Brahma
eesham : the lord
kamala : lotus
asanastham : seated upon
risheen : sages
cha : and
sarvaan : all
uragaan : serpents
cha : and
divyaan : divine
 
Whenever our emotions are running high, we either keep quiet or speak non-stop. Arjuna now comes out of his silence and speaks at a fast pace to describe what he sees in front of him. The meter of this shloka has changed to indicate the change in pace. Traditionally, these shlokas are also chanted at a slightly faster speed to get their full flavour. So what does Arjuna see?
 
Arjuna says that he sees all kinds of deities and other kinds of beings, which include Lord Brahma seated upon a lotus, as well as the divine sages and divine serpents. The sages include the sapta-rishis such as Vashishtha and the serpents include Vasuki. We had come across these and other beings in the prior chapter when Ishvara himself described his divine manifestations. But Arjuna does not see all of these in different places. He sees them all situated on Ishvara’s cosmic form.
 
What does this indicate? The sages live on earth, the deities live in a higher plane, and serpents live in yet another plane. Arjuna realizes that he is seeing worlds that beyond the earth and beyond the human capacity of vision. He also saw Lord Brahma who, according to Srimad Bhagavatam, arose out the navel of Lord Vishnu and created all the worlds.
 
So Arjuna, in the cosmic form, saw the creator and his creation. More importantly, he realized that Ishvara was beyond the process creation, which he had learned in the eighth chapter.
 
Footnotes
1. “Eesham” could also mean Lord Shiva. This indicates that Arjuna saw both creation and dissolution in the cosmic form.