Shloka 27
Jvarotpatti — The Origin and Distribution of Jvara
Fever
जन्तुष्वेकतमेष्वेवं भावा ये विधिमास्थिता: । भावयोरीप्तितं नित्यं प्रत्यक्ष गमनं तयो:
jantuṣv ekatameṣv evaṁ bhāvā ye vidhim āsthitāḥ | bhāvayor īpsitaṁ nityaṁ pratyakṣa-gamanaṁ tayoḥ ||
Asita sprach: Unter den Lebewesen werden jene latenten Dispositionen (bhāvas), die auf ‘vidhi’—dem bestimmenden Verlauf, geformt durch den Schwung des eigenen Karma—ihren Stand genommen haben, eben von der Erinnerung fortwährend ergriffen und mitgetragen. Darum bewegen sich in Wachen wie im Traum die beiden (Gruppen von Dispositionen) auf das zu, was sie begehren, und treten unmittelbar hervor: Die Menschen begegnen, ihren Neigungen gemäß, immer wieder den von rajas und tamas gefärbten Dingen und Erfahrungen.
असित उवाच
Educational Q&A
Perception is not neutral: the mind’s stored dispositions (bhāvas), grounded in one’s karmic course (vidhi), repeatedly shape what becomes vivid and ‘direct’ in experience. Thus, in waking and dreaming alike, one tends to meet the world through the coloring of one’s dominant guṇas—especially rajas and tamas here—seeing and seeking what one already inclines toward.
In Shanti Parva’s reflective instruction, Asita explains an inner mechanism of experience: how karmically formed tendencies persist through memory and manifest as recurring perceptions and dream-contents. The passage frames ethical self-cultivation as requiring attention to one’s underlying dispositions, since they govern what one repeatedly experiences and pursues.