Shloka 6
Dvaipāyana–Kīṭa Saṃvāda: Karmic Memory, Fear of Death, and Embodied Pleasure
यथा नागपदे<न्यानि पदानि पदगामिनाम् | सर्वाण्येवापिधीयन्ते पदजातानि कौज्जरे
yathā nāgapade 'nyāni padāni padagāminām | sarvāṇy evāpidhīyante padajātāni kauñjare ||
Bhishma sprach: „Wie in der Spur eines Elefanten alle anderen Fährten der fußgehenden Wesen umfasst und überdeckt sind, so wird auch alles Übrige in dem höchsten Grundsatz gesammelt, der hier gelehrt wird.“
भीष्म उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse uses a simile to express comprehensiveness: as an elephant’s footprint can contain the smaller tracks of other animals, so one supreme dharmic principle or virtue can encompass and subsume many subsidiary duties and virtues.
Bhīṣma continues his instruction in the Anuśāsana Parva, illustrating his point with a vivid natural image—an elephant’s footprint—to show how multiple teachings or duties are gathered under a single overarching ethical principle.