Shloka 16
Adhyāya 115: On Restraint Under Verbal Provocation in the Assembly (सभायां आक्रोश-सहिष्णुता)
जैसे साँप अपने फनको ऊँचा उठाकर प्रकाशित करता है, उसी प्रकार जनसमुदायमें किसी महापुरुषकी निन्दा करनेवाला दुरात्मा अपने ही दोषोंको प्रकट करता है ।।
yathā sarpaḥ svaphanaṃ ūrdhvaṃ kṛtvā prakāśayati, tathā janasamūhe mahāpuruṣa-nindakaḥ durātmā svadoṣān eva prakāśayati. taṃ svakarmāṇi kurvāṇaṃ pratikartuṃ ya icchati, sa bhasmakuṭa ivābuddhiḥ kharo rajasi sajjati.
Bhishma said: Just as a serpent raises its hood high and thereby makes itself conspicuous, so too a wicked man who slanders a great person in the midst of the people only reveals his own faults. And whoever wishes to retaliate against such a vile man who is merely doing his own deed of backbiting becomes like a foolish donkey rolling in a heap of ashes—stuck in dust and suffering, gaining nothing but distress.
भीष्म उवाच
Educational Q&A
Slandering the noble publicly exposes the slanderer’s own defects; and retaliating against such a person only entangles one in further misery. The ethical counsel is restraint in response, letting the wrongdoer’s vice reveal itself without dragging oneself into the same dust.
In Shanti Parva’s instruction on dharma, Bhishma advises Yudhishthira through vivid similes: the slanderer is like a snake that makes itself conspicuous by raising its hood, and the retaliator is like a donkey rolling in ashes—both images warning against public blame and against vengeful reaction.