Shloka 2736
Chapter 136: Pandava Counter-Encirclement and the Vāyavya-Astra Disruption
अर्धप्रविष्टा: संरब्धा बिलानीव महोरगा: । जैसे क्रोधमें भरे हुए महान् सर्प बिलोंमें प्रवेश करते समय आधे ही घुस पाये हों, उसी प्रकार वे बाण पृथ्वीमें घुसते हुए शोभा पा रहे थे
ardhapraviṣṭāḥ saṃrabdhā bilānīva mahoragāḥ |
Sañjaya said: The arrows, driven in with fierce force, looked as though they were only half-entered into the earth—like great serpents, enraged, slipping into their burrows yet caught midway. The image underscores the battlefield’s relentless violence: weapons strike with living intensity, and wrath itself seems to animate the instruments of war.
संजय उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse offers a moral-psychological insight through imagery: anger (krodha) makes violence feel ‘alive’ and unstoppable. By likening arrows to enraged serpents, it warns how wrath intensifies harm and turns the battlefield into a realm where destructive impulses dominate.
Sañjaya describes the scene of combat: arrows strike and lodge in the ground, appearing half-buried. Their fierce, jutting presence is compared to great snakes entering their holes but remaining partly outside—an image that heightens the terror and intensity of the battle.