Shloka 323
Adhyāya 41 — Kṛṣṇa’s Battlefield Briefing and the Renewal of the Great Engagement
उपसर्गाद् बहुधा सूदतेश्व प्रायेण सर्व त्वयि तच्च महाम् । “शद् शास, शो, शू, श्वस् अथवा षद् तथा नाना प्रकारके उपसर्गोंसे युक्त सूद* धातुसे भी शत्रु शब्दकी सिद्धि होती है। मेरे प्रति इन सभी धातुओंका सारा तात्पर्य तुममें संघटित होता है
sañjaya uvāca | upasargād bahudhā sūdateśva prāyeṇa sarva tvayi tac ca mahām | ṣaḍ śāsa, śo, śū, śvas athavā ṣaḍ tathā nānā-prakārake upasargaiḥ yukta sūd-dhātose’pi śatru-śabdasya siddhir bhavati | mama prati etāsu sarvāsu dhātuṣu sarva-tātparyaṁ tum̐me saṅghaṭitaṁ bhavati |
Disse Sañjaya: “Pela força dos prefixos, de muitos modos, costuma-se derivar o sentido de ‘inimigo’—até mesmo da raiz verbal sūd quando unida a diversos preverbos. Contudo, ó grande, todas essas tonalidades de significado, tomadas em conjunto, parecem convergir em ti em relação a mim: tudo o que a palavra ‘inimigo’ pode implicar por tais derivações, o seu pleno alcance está, por assim dizer, encarnado em ti.”
संजय उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse highlights how language can gather many nuanced meanings—here, the idea of ‘enemy’—and how, in a moral and emotional context, those nuances can be felt as fully realized in a particular person. It underscores the ethical weight of enmity: hostility is not merely a label but a convergence of intentions and actions.
Sañjaya speaks in a reflective, rhetorically charged way, invoking grammatical/derivational reasoning about how the word ‘enemy’ can be formed. He then applies that layered meaning to a personal relationship, implying that the full sense of antagonism is, for him, concentrated in the addressed ‘great one’.