Shloka 8
न शृण्वन्ति न पश्यन्ति न गन्धरसवेदिन: । न च स्पर्श विजानन्ति ते कथं पाउ्चभौतिका:,वे न सुनते हैं, न देखते हैं, न गन्ध और रसका ही अनुभव करते हैं और न उन्हें स्पर्शका ही ज्ञान होता है; फिर वे पाउ्चभौतिक कैसे कहे जाते हैं?
bharadvāja uvāca |
na śṛṇvanti na paśyanti na gandharasa-vedinaḥ |
na ca sparśaṁ vijānanti te kathaṁ pañcabhautikāḥ ||
Bharadvāja said: “They do not hear; they do not see; they do not even apprehend smell and taste, nor do they recognize touch. How, then, can they be called ‘made of the five elements’?”
भरद्वाज उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse questions how something can be termed ‘pañcabhūtika’ (composed of the five gross elements) if it lacks the functioning of the five sense-perceptions (hearing, sight, smell, taste, touch). It pushes the inquiry into what truly constitutes embodied existence—mere material composition, or the presence of operative faculties (indriyas) and consciousness.
In a philosophical dialogue within Śānti Parva, Bharadvāja raises a pointed doubt: if certain beings or states are described as elemental bodies, why are the sensory experiences absent? The question challenges the interlocutor to clarify the relation between the gross elements, the sense-organs, and the experiencing self.