Shloka 19
गोमूल्यनिर्णयः — The Determination of Value through the Cow
Nahuṣa–Cyavana Episode
इस तरह बाह्य और बाह्मतर जातिकी स्ट्रियोंसे समागम करनेपर प्रतिलोम वर्णसंकरोंकी सृष्टि बढ़ती जाती है। क्रमश: हीन-से-हीन जातिके बालक जन्म लेने लगते हैं। इन संकर जातियोंकी संख्या सामान्यतः: पंद्रह है ।।
agamyāgamanāc caiva jāyate varṇa-saṅkaraḥ | bāhyānām anujāyante sairandhryāṃ māgadheṣu ca ||
Bhishma said: From illicit unions—approaching women with whom union is forbidden—there arises the mixing of social orders (varṇa-saṅkara). In particular, when men of the Brahmin order consort with Sairandhrī women among the Māgadhas, the offspring that is born is described as skilled in personal adornment and attendant services (such as applying unguents and arranging ornaments) for kings and other elites, living by a servile mode of livelihood even without being formally a slave. The passage frames such unions as ethically disordered and socially destabilizing, leading to progressively degraded mixed groups.
भीष्म उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse warns that illicit or forbidden sexual unions (agamyāgamanam) are seen as producing varṇa-saṅkara—social and genealogical confusion—leading to unstable or degraded social outcomes; it also links certain mixed unions to specific service-oriented occupations.
In Bhishma’s instruction on dharma, he explains how prohibited unions generate mixed progeny and gives an example involving Brahmin men and Sairandhrī women among the Māgadhas, describing the kind of livelihood traditionally attributed to such offspring.