Shloka 57
Aśvatthāmā’s Stuti of Rudra and Śiva’s Empowerment (सौप्तिकपर्व, अध्याय ७)
अश्वत्थामाने कहा--भगवन्! आज मैं आंगिरस कुलमें उत्पन्न हुए अपने शरीरकी प्रज्वलित अग्निमें आहुति देता हूँ। आप मुझे हविष्यरूपमें ग्रहण कीजिये ।।
bhavadbhaktyā mahādeva parameṇa samādhinā | asyām āpadi viśvātmann upākurmi tavāgrataḥ ||
Aśvatthāmā said: “O Blessed Lord! Today I—born in the line of Aṅgirasa—pour my very body as an oblation into the blazing fire. Receive me as havisya, the sacrificial offering.” With devotion to you, O Mahādeva, and with the highest samādhi, O Universal Self, in this calamity I place an oblation before you—making myself the offering.
संजय उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse highlights how, in extreme distress, a warrior may turn to intense devotion and single-pointed concentration to seek divine intervention; it also implicitly questions the ethics of seeking sacred power after grievous wrongdoing, showing the tension between ritual piety and moral accountability.
In the Sauptika episode’s aftermath, the narration presents a prayer-like offering to Śiva (Mahādeva), where the speaker (contextually tied to Aśvatthāmā’s desperate situation) declares an oblation before the deity, signaling a last resort for protection or power amid a dire crisis.