Shloka 47
Śakra–Namuci-saṃvāda: Śoka-nivāraṇa and Daiva-vicāra
Indra and Namuci on grief, composure, and inevitability
यथोर्णनाभि: परिवर्तमान- स्तन्तुक्षये तिष्ठति पात्यमान: । तथा विमुक्तः प्रजहाति दु:खं विध्वंसते लोष्ट इवाद्रिमृच्छन्,जैसे मकड़ी जाला तानकर उसपर चक्कर लगाती रहती है; किंतु उन जालोंका नाश हो जानेपर एक स्थानपर स्थित हो जाती है, उसी प्रकार अविद्याके वशीभूत हो नीचे गिरनेवाला जीव कर्मजालमें पड़कर भटकता रहता है और उससे छूटनेपर दुःखसे रहित हो जाता है। जैसे पर्वतपर फेंका हुआ मिट्टीका ढेला उससे टकराकर चूर-चूर हो जाता है, उसी प्रकार उसके सम्पूर्ण दुःखोंका विध्वंस हो जाता है
yathorṇanābhiḥ parivartamānaḥ tantukṣaye tiṣṭhati pātyamānaḥ | tathā vimuktaḥ prajahāti duḥkhaṃ vidhvaṃsate loṣṭa ivādrimṛcchan ||
Bhīṣma said: “Just as a spider, having spread its web, keeps moving about upon it, yet when the threads are exhausted it comes to rest in one place, so too the being—once freed—abandons sorrow. And as a clod of earth hurled against a mountain is shattered on impact, so are all his sufferings utterly destroyed.”
भीष्म उवाच
Educational Q&A
Bondage is like a self-spun web: the embodied being wanders within the network of actions and their results, but when the supporting ‘threads’ are exhausted and one becomes free, sorrow is abandoned and suffering is crushed completely—like a clod shattered against a mountain.
In Śānti Parva, Bhīṣma instructs Yudhiṣṭhira on peace, dharma, and the path beyond grief. Here he uses two vivid similes—spider and web, clod and mountain—to describe the transition from karmic wandering to liberation and the consequent annihilation of duḥkha.