Shloka 36
बलीन्द्रसंवादः — Kāla, Anityatā, and the Limits of Agency
Mahābhārata 12.217
सूच्या सूत्र यथा वस्त्रे संसारयति वायक: । तद्वत् संसारसूत्र हि तृष्णासूच्या निबद्धयते,जैसे कपड़ा बुननेवाला बुनकर सूईसे वस्त्रमें सूतको पिरो देता है, उसी प्रकार तृष्णारूपी सूईसे संसाररूपी सूत्र ग्रथित होता है
sūcyā sūtraṃ yathā vastre saṃsārayati vāyakaḥ | tadvat saṃsārasūtraṃ hi tṛṣṇāsūcyā nibaddhyate ||
Bhishma said: “Just as a weaver, using a needle, threads the yarn through a cloth, so too the ‘thread’ of worldly existence is fastened and woven by the needle of craving. It is desire that stitches beings into saṃsāra and keeps the fabric of repeated birth and suffering intact.”
भीष्म उवाच
Educational Q&A
Craving (tṛṣṇā) is the binding instrument that ‘stitches’ a being into saṃsāra; by reducing desire, one loosens the very mechanism that keeps worldly bondage continuous.
In Śānti Parva, Bhīṣma instructs on dharma and liberation-oriented ethics. Here he uses a vivid craft metaphor—needle, thread, and cloth—to explain how desire functions as the practical cause that binds life to repeated worldly entanglement.