Shloka 80
अपर्यन्ते बले मग्नो जह्मादपि च जीवितम् | तस्मिंश्न निहते युद्धे कथं जीवेत मादृूश:
aparyante bale magno jahmād api ca jīvitam | tasmiṁś ca nihate yuddhe kathaṁ jīvet mādṛśaḥ ||
Yudhiṣṭhira said: “Overwhelmed and sinking in this boundless host, I have even abandoned the hope of life. If he is slain in this battle, how could one like me go on living?”
युधिष्ठिर उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse highlights how war’s enormity can crush even a dharma-minded leader: when one’s moral and emotional anchor is lost, the will to live falters. It underscores the ethical cost of violence and the dependence of resolve on righteous support and trusted protectors.
Yudhiṣṭhira, facing an apparently limitless opposing force, confesses that he has already relinquished hope for his own survival. He then says that if the person he refers to is killed in the battle, he sees no way that someone like him could continue living—an expression of acute fear and grief amid the Drona Parva fighting.