Shloka 2

Devanagari script

के पूर्व प्राहरंस्तत्र युद्धे हृदयकम्पने । मामका: पाण्डवेया वा तन्ममाचक्ष्व संजय,संजय! हृदयको कम्पित कर देनेवाले संग्राममें किन्होंने पहले संग्राम किया, मेरे पुत्रोंने या पाण्डवोंने? यह मुझे बताओ

Transliteration

ke pūrvaṃ prāharan tatra yuddhe hṛdayakampane | māmakāḥ pāṇḍaveyā vā tan mamācakṣva sañjaya sañjaya ||

Translation

ဓြတရာഷ്ടရက ပြောသည်– «နှလုံးကို တုန်လှုပ်စေသော အဲဒီစစ်ပွဲမှာ အရင်ဆုံး ထိုးနှက်သူက ဘယ်သူနည်း—ငါ့သားတွေကလား၊ ပाण्डု၏သားတွေကလား။ သဉ္ဇယ၊ ငါ့ကို ပြောပြပါ»

Word by Word

केwho (which persons)

पूर्वम्first, earlier

प्राहरन्struck, attacked

तत्रthere

युद्धेin the battle

हृदयकम्पनेin the heart-trembling (battle)

मामकाःmy men (my sons’ side)

पाण्डवेयाःthe Pandavas’ men

वाor

तत्that (fact)

ममto me / of me

आचक्ष्वtell, declare

संजयO Sanjaya

Speaker

धृतराष्ट उवाच

Characters & Entities

Dhṛtarāṣṭra

Sañjaya

Māmakāḥ (Kauravas)

Pāṇḍaveyāḥ (Pāṇḍavas)

Character Dynamics

Dharma Sankata (Moral Dilemma)

War Context

Verse Rasa (Emotional Essence)

Philosophical Teaching

Political Layer

Geographic Context

Meter (Chandas)

Sandhi Notes

Educational Q&A

What is the core teaching?

The verse highlights moral anxiety around initiating violence: Dhṛtarāṣṭra seeks to know who began the fighting, implying that the first strike carries ethical weight and responsibility in a dharma-centered worldview.

What is happening in the narrative?

Dhṛtarāṣṭra questions Sañjaya about the opening of the battle—whether the Kauravas (his side) or the Pāṇḍavas struck first—revealing his fear, attachment to his sons, and concern over blame at the outset of war.