Shloka 35

Śuka’s Guṇa-Transcendence and Vyāsa’s Consolation (शुकगति-वर्णनम्)

Devanagari script

नाभिरज्यति कसम्िमेंक्षिन्नानर्थे न परिग्रहे । नाभिरज्यति चैतेषु व्यर्थत्वादू रागरोषयो:

Transliteration

janaka uvāca | nābhirajyati kasmiṁścin nānarthe na parigrahe | nābhirajyati caiteṣu vyarthatvād rāgaroṣayoḥ ||

Translation

Janaka said: “My mind does not become attached to anything—neither to what is purposeless and harmful, nor to the hoarding of possessions. And it does not incline toward these impulses of passion and anger either, for I see desire and wrath as futile and without true value.”

Word by Word

• [{'term': 'nābhirajyati', 'definition': 'does not become attached

• is not enamored'}, {'term': 'kasmiṁścit', 'definition': 'in anything whatsoever

• in any matter'}, {'term': 'anarthe', 'definition': 'in what is non-beneficial, purposeless, harmful, or leading to misfortune'}, {'term': 'parigrahe', 'definition': 'acquisition, grasping, hoarding

• possession/accumulation'}, {'term': 'ca', 'definition': 'and

• also'}, {'term': 'eteṣu', 'definition': 'in these (things/impulses)'}, {'term': 'vyarthatvāt', 'definition': 'because of futility/emptiness

• due to being pointless'}, {'term': 'rāga', 'definition': 'attachment, passion, infatuation

• emotional coloring that binds'}, {'term': 'roṣa', 'definition': 'anger, wrath, irritation'}, {'term': 'rāgaroṣayoḥ', 'definition': 'of attachment and anger (dual genitive)'}]

Speaker

जनक उवाच

Characters & Entities

• Janaka

Educational Q&A

What is the core teaching?

Janaka teaches vairāgya (non-attachment): the wise do not cling to harmful aims or to accumulation, and they refuse to be driven by rāga (passion) and roṣa (anger), recognizing these emotions as ultimately futile and ethically unproductive.

What is happening in the narrative?

In the Śānti Parva’s discourse on peace and right conduct, King Janaka speaks as a model of inner renunciation while living as a ruler, describing how his intellect remains unentangled from possessions and from the reactive emotions of desire and anger.