नाहं वेदैर्न तपसा न दानेन न चेज्यया।शक्य एवंविधो द्रष्टुं दृष्टवानसि मां यथा॥
nāhaṃ vedair na tapasā na dānena na cejyayāśakya evaṃ-vidho draṣṭuṃ dṛṣṭavān asi māṃ yathā
Word by word
The verse says
Not by the Vedas, not by discipline, not by giving, not by sacrifice can I be seen in the way that you have seen me.
In plain words
He says it again. Four methods this time instead of five.
The repetition is not an accident. It was said at verse 48 and here it is again, five verses later.
He clearly expects this one to be misremembered.
Where you've felt this · in study
Your doctor tells you three times in one appointment that the tablets will not work if you stop taking them when you feel better. She is not being patronising. She has watched several hundred people do exactly that.
Going deeper
Saying something twice in five verses is how a text signals that it expects to be misread.
The methods being ruled out are the ones a serious person would naturally reach for, and the pull toward them is strong enough that Krishna names them twice. Study, discipline, giving and sacrifice are all genuinely recommended elsewhere in this book. None of them produces this.
The reason for the repetition becomes clear in the next verse, which supplies the one thing that does.
And there is something generous in the structure. It would have been possible to state the positive requirement first and leave the negative implied. Instead the ground is cleared twice, so that when the answer arrives there is nothing left for it to be confused with.