Shloka 8
ज्यानेमिघोषस्तनयित्नुमान् वै धनुस्तडिन्मण्डलकेतुशृड्भ: । शरौघवर्षाकुलवृष्टि मां श्व संग्राममेघ: स बभूव राजन्,राजन! वह संग्राम वर्षाकालीन मेघके समान प्रतीत होता था। प्रत्यंचाकी टंकार और पहियोंकी घर्घराहटका शब्द ही उस मेघकी गर्जनाके समान था। धनुष ही विद्युन्मण्डलके समान प्रकाशित होता था और ध्वजाका अग्रभाग ही उस मेघका उच्चतम शिखर था तथा बाण-समूहोंकी वृष्टि ही उसके द्वारा की जानेवाली वर्षा थी
jyānemi-ghoṣa-stanayitnumān vai dhanus-taḍin-maṇḍala-ketu-śṛṅgaḥ | śaraugha-varṣākula-vṛṣṭimāṁś ca saṅgrāma-meghaḥ sa babhūva rājan ||
Sañjaya said: O King, he appeared like a monsoon cloud of battle. The roar of his bowstring and the rumbling of his chariot-wheels were like thunder; his bow flashed like a circle of lightning; the tip of his banner rose like the cloud’s highest peak; and the dense shower of his arrows was the rain it poured upon the field—an image of war’s overwhelming force, where prowess becomes a storm that engulfs all who stand before it.
संजय उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse offers no direct moral injunction; its ethical force lies in its imagery: war, once unleashed, becomes like a monsoon storm—impersonal, engulfing, and difficult to restrain. It implicitly cautions that martial power can overwhelm discernment, and that leaders (addressed as ‘O King’) must recognize the scale and consequences of the violence they set in motion.
Sañjaya reports to King Dhṛtarāṣṭra that a warrior (implied from context) appears like a ‘battle-cloud’: the bowstring and wheels sound like thunder, the bow flashes like lightning, the banner’s tip stands like a cloud-peak, and volleys of arrows fall like heavy rain upon the battlefield.