Mahabharata 3.201.5636 — Vana Parva, Adhyaya 201, Shloka 5636
Dharma-vyādha’s Analysis of Moral Decline and the Mahābhūta–Guṇa Schema (धर्मव्याधोपदेशः)
अन्तरा चैव नाश्नाति तस्य लोका हानामया: । जो लोग छठी राततक उपवास करते हैं
antarā caiva nāśnāti tasya lokā hānāmayāḥ |
Dijo Vaiśampāyana: «Quien se abstiene de comer en el intervalo alcanza mundos libres de decadencia y enfermedad. Se dice que quienes ayunan hasta la sexta noche viajan en carros celestes (vimānas) uncidos a pavos reales. Oh hijo de Pāṇḍu, quienes comen una sola vez y luego pasan tres noches sostenidos sólo por ello—sin tomar alimento entre medias—llegan a reinos meritorios, intactos de dolencia y aflicción».
वैशम्पायन उवाच
Educational Q&A
The passage teaches that disciplined restraint in eating—undertaken as a vrata—generates puṇya, leading to exalted posthumous states described as realms free from decline, disease, and sorrow. It frames bodily self-control as an ethical-spiritual practice with karmic results.
Vaiśampāyana is describing to a Pāṇḍava (addressed as ‘son of Pāṇḍu’) the specific fruits of certain fasting patterns: fasting up to six nights is poetically rewarded with travel in peacock-yoked vimānas, while eating once and then abstaining for three nights yields access to meritorious, affliction-free worlds.
Ask anything about this verse
Curious about the meaning, context, or a word? Ask, and continue the conversation in the Vedapath app.
A free Google sign-in keeps your chat saved across web and the app.
Read Mahabharata in the Vedapath app
Scan the QR code to open this directly in the app, with audio, word-by-word meanings, and more.