Shloka 28
Brāhmaṇa-vandana: Criteria for Veneration, Disciplined Speech, and Protective Kingship (अनुशासनपर्व, अध्याय ८)
दण्डपाणियर्यथा गोषु पालो नित्यं हि रक्षयेत् । ब्राह्मणान् ब्रह्म च तथा क्षत्रिय: परिपालयेत्
daṇḍapāṇir yathā goṣu pālo nityaṁ hi rakṣayet | brāhmaṇān brahma ca tathā kṣatriyaḥ paripālayet ||
ဘီရှ္မက မိန့်တော်မူသည်– «တုတ်ကိုင်ထားသော နွားထိန်းက နွားများကို အမြဲစောင့်ရှောက်သကဲ့သို့၊ က္ෂတ္တရိယသည်လည်း ဗြာဟ္မဏတို့နှင့် ဗြဟ္မ—အနက်အားဖြင့် ဝေဒသက္ကရာဇ်တရားစဉ်ကို—အမြဲတမ်း ကာကွယ်စောင့်ရှောက်ရမည်»။
भीष्म उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse teaches that a Kṣatriya’s dharma is protective: like a vigilant herdsman guarding cattle with a staff, the ruler/warrior must actively and continuously safeguard Brāhmaṇas and the Vedic sacred order (brahma), ensuring the stability of dharma in society.
In Bhīṣma’s instruction on conduct and duties, he uses a practical analogy from pastoral life to define royal responsibility: protection is not occasional but constant, and it extends beyond physical security to preserving the institutions of sacred learning and ritual authority.