Shloka 27
Chapter 136: Pandava Counter-Encirclement and the Vāyavya-Astra Disruption
क्रुद्धा इव मनुष्येन्द्र भुजड़ा: कालचोदिता: । नरेन्द्र! वे रक्तका आहार करनेवाले बाण क्रोधभरे कालप्रेरित भुजंगोंके समान सूतपूत्र कर्णका खून पीने लगे ।। प्रसर्पमाणा मेदिन्यां ते व्यरोचन्त मार्गणा:
sañjaya uvāca |
kruddhā iva manuṣyendra bhujaṅgāḥ kālacoditāḥ |
narendra te raktakā āhārakaraṇe vāṇāḥ krodhabhare kālapreritabhujaṅgān iva sūtaputra-karṇasya khūnaṃ pītvā iva lelihuḥ ||
prasarpamāṇā medinyāṃ te vyarocanta mārgaṇāḥ ||
Sañjaya said: O best of men, those arrows—like wrathful serpents driven by Time—seemed to drink the blood of Karṇa, the son of a charioteer. Spreading over the earth, those missiles shone forth, as if impelled by anger and the inexorable force of destiny.
संजय उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse frames battlefield violence through the lens of Kāla (Time/Fate): even great heroes are subject to an impersonal cosmic force. The serpent-simile intensifies the moral atmosphere—wrath and destiny together drive destruction—inviting reflection on impermanence and the limits of human power in war.
Sañjaya describes arrows striking Karṇa so fiercely that they are imagined as serpents ‘drinking’ his blood. The missiles spread across the ground and gleam as they move, emphasizing the ferocity and momentum of the ongoing combat.