Shree Bhagavaan uvaacha:
pashya me paartha roopaani shatashotha sahastrashaha |
naanaavidhaani divyaani naanaavarnaakriteeni cha || 5 ||
 
Shree Bhagavaan said:
Behold, O Paartha, my hundreds and thousands of divine forms, of myriad kinds, and of various colours and shapes.
 
pashya : behold
me : my
paartha : O Paartha
roopaani : forms
shatashotha : hundreds
sahastrashaha : thousands
naanavidhaani : myriad kinds
divyaani : divine
naana : various
varna : colours
akriteeni : shapes
cha : and
 
In response to Arjuna’s request, Shri Krishna immediately agreed to show Ishvara’s divine form. This entire chapter, written in a poetic style, elaborately describes this form and Arjuna’s reaction to it. It is said that the chanting of this chapter is one of the highest forms of meditation possible.
 
To get things started, Shri Krishna “turned on” the “screen” upon which this divine form could be shown to Arjuna. He began by revealing the amount of diversity in the sheer number of colours, shapes and forms that he was about to show to Arjuna. The literal words used are “hundreds” and “thousands”, but in essence they mean infinite and innumerable.
 
While demonstrating the features of the latest LCD TV, the salesman will try his best to show as many channels he possibly can so that the customer is convinced about the capabilities of the TV such as number of pixels, colours and so on. Or if its a sari shop, the salesperson will try to show innumerable varieties of the very same red colour so that the customer is confident about the range and variety in that shop’s inventory.
 
Shri Krishna, however, was not concerned only with lining up the diversity of forms that he was ready to show. He also wanted to highlight that there was one thing common among that infinite diversity – Ishvara himself. He indicated this by saying “pashya me roopani” – behold my forms, not behold all these forms.