Shloka 7
Liberation and Truth — Chanakya Niti
नान्नोदकसमं दानं न तिथिर्द्वादशी समा ।
न गायत्र्याः परो मन्त्रो न मातुर्दैवतं परम् ॥
nānnodakasamaṁ dānaṁ na tithir dvādaśī samā |
na gāyatryāḥ paro mantro na mātur daivataṁ param ||
No gift equals giving food and water; no lunar day matches Dvādaśī; no mantra surpasses the Gāyatrī; and no deity is higher than one’s mother.
FAQs
In the wider nīti (didactic-ethical) literature, compact verses often catalogue culturally prominent values drawn from ritual life, household ethics, and public reputation. This verse reflects a milieu in which food-and-water charity, lunar observances (tithi), widely revered Vedic formulae such as the Gāyatrī, and kinship-based reverence (especially toward the mother) functioned as recognizable markers of moral and religious prestige in premodern South Asian society.
Rather than offering a general definition, the verse ranks a particular form of giving—food and water—as preeminent. Historically, this aligns with South Asian textual traditions that treat sustenance-giving as a paradigmatic, socially legible form of generosity because it addresses immediate bodily need and is feasible across a broad range of donors.
The verse uses a repetitive comparative-negation structure (na … sama / na … paraḥ / na … param) to create a four-part hierarchy. Key terms are culturally loaded: dāna evokes normative gift economies; tithi and Dvādaśī index ritual calendrics; Gāyatrī functions both as a specific mantra and as a symbol of Vedic authority; and daivata is applied to the mother, extending the semantic field of 'deity/object of worship' into the domain of household ethics.