Shloka 42
Śakra–Namuci-saṃvāda: Śoka-nivāraṇa and Daiva-vicāra
Indra and Namuci on grief, composure, and inevitability
यथार्णवगता नद्यो व्यक्तीर्जदगति नाम च | नदाश्न ता नियच्छन्ति तादृश: सत्त्वसंक्षय:,जैसे नद और नदियाँ समुद्रमें मिलकर अपने नाम और व्यक्तित्व (रूप) को त्याग देती हैं तथा जैसे बड़े-बड़े नद छोटी-छोटी नदियोंको अपनेमें विलीन कर लेते हैं, उसी प्रकार जीवात्मा परमात्मामें विलीन हो जाता है। यही मोक्ष है
yathārṇavagatā nadyo vyaktīr jaḍagati-nāma ca | nadāś ca tā niyacchanti tādṛśaḥ sattva-saṅkṣayaḥ ||
Bhīṣma said: “Just as rivers, on reaching the ocean, relinquish their separate identity—name and distinct form—and just as great rivers absorb the smaller streams into themselves, so too the individual self, when its limiting conditions are exhausted, becomes merged in the Supreme Self. This dissolution of separateness is liberation.”
भीष्म उवाच
Educational Q&A
Liberation (mokṣa) is portrayed as the ending of separateness: when the conditions that sustain individual identity are exhausted, the jīva’s distinct ‘name and form’ no longer stand apart and it abides as one with the Supreme—like rivers losing their separate identity upon entering the ocean.
In the Śānti Parva’s instruction section, Bhīṣma continues advising Yudhiṣṭhira on the highest good. Here he uses a natural metaphor—rivers merging into the ocean and larger rivers absorbing smaller ones—to explain the idea of final release and the dissolution of individual limitation.