Shloka 13
Prāyaścitta and Contextual Non-Culpability (प्रायश्चित्त-निमित्त-अदोषवाद)
जो दूध देनेवाली पचीस हजार कपिला गौओंका दान करता है, वह समस्त पापोंसे छुटकारा पा जाता है ।।
vyāsa uvāca | yo dugdha-denīḥ pañca-viṃśati-sahasraṃ kapilā gāvo dānaṃ karoti sa sarva-pāpebhyaḥ pramucyate || go-sahasraṃ sa-vatsānāṃ dogdhrīṇāṃ prāṇa-saṃśaye | sādhubhyo vai daridrebhyo dattvā mucyeta kilbiṣāt || yadā mṛtyu-kālaḥ sannihitaḥ syāt tadā sadācāri-daridra-brāhmaṇebhyo dugdha-denīḥ eka-sahasraṃ sa-vatsā gāvo dattvāpi manuṣyaḥ sarva-pāpebhyaḥ mucyate ||
जो दूध देनेवाली पचीस हजार कपिला गौओं का दान करता है, वह समस्त पापों से मुक्त हो जाता है। और जब प्राणों पर संकट हो तथा मृत्यु निकट आ गई हो, तब साधु-स्वभाव वाले दरिद्रों—विशेषतः सदाचारी निर्धन ब्राह्मणों—को बछड़ों सहित दूध देनेवाली एक हजार गौएँ दान करके भी मनुष्य पाप से छूट जाता है।
व्यास उवाच
Educational Q&A
Generous giving—especially of life-sustaining gifts like milk-giving cows to worthy and needy recipients—functions as a strong form of moral purification (prāyaścitta), capable of relieving one from accumulated wrongdoing, even at the approach of death.
Vyāsa states a dharma-teaching within Śānti Parva: he describes the merit and expiatory power of go-dāna, specifying large-scale gifts (25,000 kapilā cows) and, in a death-near situation, the gift of 1,000 cows with calves to virtuous poor people, particularly poor brāhmaṇas.