Shloka 14
Jayadrathasya śoka-bhaya-vilāpaḥ — Droṇena āśvāsanaṃ ca
Jayadratha’s lament and Droṇa’s reassurance
नैषां पश्यामि हन्तारं प्राणिनां संयुगे क्वचित् । विक्रमेणोपसम्पन्नास्तपोबलसमन्विता:
naiṣāṃ paśyāmi hantāraṃ prāṇināṃ saṃyuge kvacit | vikrameṇopasampannās tapobalasamanvitāḥ ||
Yudhiṣṭhira said: “In battle I do not see, at any time, any slayer for these living beings. They are endowed with heroic prowess and sustained by the strength born of austerity—so it seems that no single agent can be pointed to as the killer.”
युधिछिर उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse reflects a dharmic-ethical hesitation about assigning simple personal blame for death in war: when warriors are equally fortified by valor and inner power (tapobalam), causality appears complex, suggesting the limits of human judgment about who truly ‘kills’ and how outcomes arise.
In the Drona Parva’s battle setting, Yudhiṣṭhira speaks reflectively about the combatants: seeing them as powerful and spiritually/ascetically strengthened, he expresses that he cannot clearly identify a definite ‘slayer’ for the living beings amid the chaos of war.