Shloka 36
Dharma-śaṅkā-nivāraṇa: Yudhiṣṭhira’s Response on Karma-Phala and Trust in Dharma
तथैव धाता भूतानामिष्टानिष्टफलप्रद: । यदि न स्यान्न भूतानां कृषपणो नाम कश्नन,क्योंकि यदि ईश्वर सब प्राणियोंको इष्ट-अनिष्टरूप फल नहीं देते तो उन प्राणियोंमेंसे कोई भी दीन नहीं होता
tathaiva dhātā bhūtānām iṣṭāniṣṭaphalapradaḥ | yadi na syān na bhūtānāṁ kṛpaṇo nāma kaścana ||
Yudhiṣṭhira said: “So too the Ordainer (Dhātā) of beings is the giver of results—both desirable and undesirable. If He were not so, then among creatures there would be no one at all who could be called wretched or destitute; for it is precisely the allotment of mixed outcomes that makes some fall into hardship.”
युधिछिर उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse frames worldly inequality and suffering as arising from the dispensation of mixed outcomes (iṣṭa/aniṣṭa phala). A moral order operates in which beings receive pleasant and unpleasant results; without such allotment, the category of the ‘wretched’ (kṛpaṇa) would not arise.
Yudhiṣṭhira is reasoning about the structure of moral causality and divine governance: the cosmic Ordainer is described as the bestower of both favorable and unfavorable fruits, explaining why some beings experience hardship while others do not.