Shloka 10
Dvaipāyana–Kīṭa Saṃvāda: Karmic Memory, Fear of Death, and Embodied Pleasure
न भक्षयन्त्यतो मांसं तपोयुक्ता मनीषिण: । दोषांस्तु भक्षणे राजन् मांसस्येह निबोध मे
na bhakṣayanty ato māṁsaṁ tapoyuktā manīṣiṇaḥ | doṣāṁs tu bhakṣaṇe rājan māṁsasy eha nibodha me ||
Bhīṣma dit : « C’est pourquoi les hommes de discernement, voués à l’austérité, ne mangent pas de chair. Ô roi, apprends maintenant de moi les fautes qui, en ce monde, accompagnent la consommation de viande — écoute. »
भीष्म उवाच
Educational Q&A
Bhishma links spiritual discipline (tapas) and ethical discernment with abstaining from meat, and he frames meat-eating as carrying moral defects that he is about to enumerate.
In the Anushasana Parva’s instruction section, Bhishma addresses the king (Yudhishthira), transitioning into a detailed critique of meat consumption by announcing that he will explain its faults.