Shloka 45

Udyoga-parva Adhyāya 34 — Vidura’s Counsel on Deliberation, Speech-Discipline, and Dharmic Kingship

Devanagari script

मानाग्निहोत्रमुत मानमौनं मानेनाधीतमुत मानयज्ञ: । एतानि चत्वार्यभयंकराणि भयं प्रयच्छन्त्ययथाकृतानि

Transliteration

mānāgnihotram uta mānamaunaṃ mānenādhītam uta mānayajñaḥ | etāni catvāry abhayāṅkarāṇi bhayaṃ prayacchanty ayathākṛtāni ||

Translation

বিদুর বলেন—শ্রদ্ধাসহ অগ্নিহোত্র, শ্রদ্ধাসহ মৌন, শ্রদ্ধাসহ স্বাধ্যায় এবং শ্রদ্ধাসহ যজ্ঞ—এই চারটি কর্ম স্বভাবতই ভয়নাশক; কিন্তু বিধিমতো না হলে এগুলিই ভয়ের কারণ হয়ে ওঠে।

Word by Word

• {'māna': 'reverence, due regard

• also a sense of honor/dignity (here: respectful, proper attitude)', 'agnihotram': 'Agnihotra

• the Vedic fire-offering/household oblation', 'maunam': 'silence

• vow of silence, restraint of speech', 'adhītam': 'what is studied/recited

• Vedic study, svādhyāya', 'yajñaḥ': 'sacrifice

• ritual offering, sacred rite', 'etāni': 'these', 'catvāri': 'four', 'abhayāṅkarāṇi': 'fear-removing, producing fearlessness', 'bhayam': 'fear, danger, anxiety', 'prayacchanti': 'they give, bestow, produce', 'ayathākṛtāni': 'done improperly

Speaker

विदुर उवाच

Characters & Entities

• Vidura
• Agnihotra
• Mauna
• Adhyayana (Svadhyaya)
• Yajna

Educational Q&A

What is the core teaching?

Practices that are meant to protect and purify—ritual fire-offering, disciplined silence, sacred study, and sacrifice—remove fear only when performed correctly and with proper reverence; done wrongly or mechanically, they become spiritually and socially harmful and thus generate fear.

What is happening in the narrative?

In Udyoga Parva, Vidura is instructing and warning about dharma and right conduct during a tense pre-war context; he emphasizes that even revered religious disciplines can backfire if performed without correctness and the right inner disposition.