Mahabharata — Anushasana Parva, Shloka 15
अजुन उवाच कुर्या भूतानि तुष्टो5हं क्रुद्धो नाशं तथानये । कर्मणा मनसा वाचा न मत्तो5स्ति वरो द्विज:
arjuna uvāca kuryā bhūtāni tuṣṭo 'haṃ kruddho nāśaṃ tathānaye | karmaṇā manasā vācā na matto 'sti varo dvijaḥ ||
Arjuna said: “When I am pleased, I can bring living beings into existence; when angered, I can likewise bring about their destruction. By deed, by mind, and by speech, no brahmin is superior to me.”
अजुन उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse foregrounds the ethical danger of unchecked self-assertion: claiming supremacy in thought, word, and deed—especially over brahmins—signals pride and a misuse of power, which dharma literature repeatedly warns against.
The speaker (identified here as Arjuna) boasts of near-cosmic power—creation when pleased and destruction when angered—and declares that no brahmin surpasses him in action, mind, or speech, reflecting a confrontational assertion of status and capability.