Shloka 22

Bhīṣma’s Recollection of the Duel: Charioteer’s Fall, Brahmin Protection, and Portents after Rāma’s Collapse

Devanagari script

ततो हाहाकृते लोके सदेवासुरराक्षसे । इदमन्तरमित्येवं मोक्तुकामो5स्मि भारत

Transliteration

tato hāhākṛte loke sadevāsurarākṣase | idam antaram ity evaṁ moktukāmo 'smi bhārata ||

Translation

ထို့နောက် နတ်တို့၊ အသူရတို့၊ ရက္ခသတို့နှင့်တကွ လောကတစ်လောကလုံး၌ အော်ဟစ်ငိုကြွေးသံများ ပေါ်ထွန်းလာသောအခါ၊ အို ဘာရတ၊ ဤအကြားကာလတိုတောင်းကို အခွင့်အရေးဟုယူ၍ ငါသည် (လုပ်သင့်သည့်အရာကို) ပြောကြားမည်ဟု စကားဖွင့်ရန်ရှိ၏။

Word by Word

ततःthen, thereafter

हाहाकृतेin (a state of) wailing/crying 'hā hā'

लोकेin the world

सदेवtogether with the gods

असुरwith the asuras

राक्षसेwith the rākṣasas

इदम्this

अन्तरम्interval, gap, opportunity

इतिthus (quotative)

एवम्in this manner

मोक्तुकामःdesiring to release/let go

अस्मिI am

भारतO Bhārata

Speaker

भीष्म उवाच

Characters & Entities

Bhīṣma

Bhārata (addressee, i.e., Dhṛtarāṣṭra/descendant of Bharata)

Devas

Asuras

Rākṣasas

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?

In a moment of universal turmoil, Bhīṣma emphasizes the ethical urgency of using a rare ‘interval’—a brief opening before irreversible harm—to speak and act according to dharma.

What is happening in the narrative?

Bhīṣma, addressing a Bharata prince (commonly Dhṛtarāṣṭra in this context), notes that the world is in an uproar and declares his intention to use the intervening moment to deliver counsel—implying a last chance to avert or mitigate impending catastrophe.