Shloka 163
त्यजतां जीवितं श्रेयो निवृत्ते पुण्यपापके । इस संसारके सम्पूर्ण प्राणियोंमें जब दुःख ही नहीं है, तब सुख कहाँसे हो सकता है? यह सुख और दुःख दोनों ही प्रकृतिस्थ प्राणियोंके धर्म हैं, जो कि सब प्रकारके संसर्गदोषको स्वीकार करके उनके अनुसार चलते हैं। जिन्होंने ममता और अहंकार आदिके साथ सब कुछ त्याग दिया है, जिनके पुण्य और पाप सभी निवृत्त हो चुके हैं, ऐसे पुरुषोंका जीवन ही कल्याणमय है
śaunaka uvāca | tyajatāṃ jīvitaṃ śreyo nivṛtte puṇya-pāpake |
Śaunaka said: For those in whom both merit and sin have come to rest, renunciation—even of life—is held to be the higher good. In the world of embodied beings, pleasure cannot be found without the shadow of suffering; happiness and sorrow arise as natural conditions of creatures bound to prakṛti, moving amid the defects of contact and association. But the one who has abandoned all possessions and claims along with ‘mine-ness’ and ego, and in whom the impulses of virtue and vice have ceased, such a person’s very living becomes auspicious and welfare-bearing.
शौनक उवाच
Educational Q&A
True welfare (śreyas) lies in detachment: when ego and possessiveness are abandoned and the dualities of merit and sin no longer bind, one’s life becomes intrinsically auspicious; pleasure and pain are seen as natural to embodied existence under prakṛti.
In the didactic setting of Śānti Parva, Śaunaka speaks a reflective teaching on the inevitability of pleasure and pain for embodied beings and praises the state of renunciation in which both puṇya and pāpa have ceased to operate.