Shloka 20
Adhyāya 118: Saciva-parīkṣā
Testing and Appointment of Ministers/Servants
थ्वा त्वं द्वीपित्वमापन्नो द्वीपीव्याप्रत्वमागत:
tvaṃ tvam dvīpitvam āpanno dvīpīvyāpratvam āgataḥ
Bhīṣma dit : « Tu es passé à l’état de léopard, et du léopard tu as encore progressé, traversant ainsi des naissances animales successives. Ainsi fus-tu d’abord un chien, puis un léopard, puis tu entras dans le ventre d’un tigre ; du tigre tu devins un éléphant ivre de rut ; de l’éléphant tu parvins au ventre d’un lion ; et, ayant été un lion puissant, tu as de nouveau obtenu le corps d’un śarabha. »
भीष्म उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse illustrates saṃsāra governed by karma: moving into stronger or more dominant bodies is still bondage to birth, and ethical purification—not mere power or predatory success—is what leads beyond repeated embodiment.
Bhīṣma addresses a being (or interlocutor) by recounting its sequence of animal incarnations—dog to leopard to tiger to elephant to lion to śarabha—using the progression as a didactic example about the continuity of rebirth and the consequences of one’s tendencies and actions.