Shloka 773
मानसतीर्थ-शौचप्रशंसा | Praise of the ‘Mental Tīrtha’ and the Marks of Purity
आवर्तनानि चत्वारि साधयेच्चाप्यसौ नर: । वह पुरुष सौ पद्म वर्षोके समान दस महाकल्प तथा चार चतुर्युगीतक अपने पुण्यका फल भोगता है
āvartanāni catvāri sādhayec cāpy asau naraḥ |
Bhīṣma said: ‘That man who successfully completes the four prescribed cycles (āvartanas) enjoys the fruit of his merit for an immeasurably long span—likened to a hundred lotus-years, ten mahākalpas, and four caturyugas.’ The verse underscores the Mahābhārata’s ethical emphasis that disciplined, correctly performed religious observances yield enduring spiritual reward.
भीष्म उवाच
Educational Q&A
The core teaching is that steadfast completion of prescribed religious disciplines (here, ‘four āvartanas’) generates vast puṇya, whose reward is portrayed as lasting across immense cosmic time-measures—highlighting the Mahābhārata’s link between disciplined dharma-practice and enduring karmic results.
Bhīṣma is instructing (as a dharma-teacher figure) about the spiritual efficacy of a particular observance: he states that a person who completes the four cycles of that practice enjoys its meritorious fruit for extraordinarily long periods, expressed through grand cosmological units (lotus-years, mahākalpas, caturyugas).