Mahabharata — Anushasana Parva, 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 ||
भीष्म ने कहा: इसलिए तप में लगे विवेकी पुरुष मांस नहीं खाते। राजन्, अब इस लोक में मांस-भक्षण के जो दोष हैं, उन्हें मुझसे जानो—सुनो।
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.