Shloka 36
Bhīṣmadeva’s Passing Away in the Presence of Lord Kṛṣṇa
व्यवहितपृतनामुखं निरीक्ष्य स्वजनवधाद्विमुखस्य दोषबुद्ध्या । कुमतिमहरदात्मविद्यया य- श्चरणरति: परमस्य तस्य मेऽस्तु ॥ ३६ ॥
vyavahita-pṛtanā-mukhaṁ nirīkṣya sva-jana-vadhād vimukhasya doṣa-buddhyā kumatim aharad ātma-vidyayā yaś caraṇa-ratiḥ paramasya tasya me ’stu
เมื่ออรชุนเกิดความลังเลด้วยอวิชชาเมื่อเห็นเหล่าญาติมิตรในสนามรบ พระองค์ทรงขจัดความเขลา ะนั้นด้วยความรู้แจ้งแห่งจิตวิญญาณ ขอให้จิตใจของข้าพเจ้าจงภักดีต่อพระบาทดุจดอกบัวของพระองค์
The kings and the commanders were to stand in the front of the fighting soldiers. That was the system of actual fighting. The kings and commanders were not so-called presidents or ministers of defense as they are today. They would not stay home while the poor soldiers or mercenaries were fighting face to face. This may be the regulation of modern democracy, but when actual monarchy was prevailing, the monarchs were not cowards elected without consideration of qualification. As it was evident from the Battlefield of Kurukṣetra, all the executive heads of both parties, like Droṇa, Bhīṣma, Arjuna and Duryodhana, were not sleeping; all of them were actual participants in the fighting, which was selected to be executed at a place away from the civil residential quarters. This means that the innocent citizens were immune from all effects of fighting between the rival royal parties. The citizens had no business in seeing what was going to happen during such fighting. They were to pay one fourth of their income to the ruler, whether he be Arjuna or Duryodhana. All the commanders of the parties on the Battlefield of Kurukṣetra were standing face to face, and Arjuna saw them with great compassion and lamented that he was to kill his kinsmen on the battlefield for the sake of the empire. He was not at all afraid of the giant military phalanx presented by Duryodhana, but as a merciful devotee of the Lord, renunciation of worldly things was natural for him, and thus he decided not to fight for worldly possessions. But this was due to a poor fund of knowledge, and therefore it is said here that his intelligence became polluted. His intelligence could not be polluted at any time because he was a devotee and constant companion of the Lord, as is clear in the Fourth Chapter of the Bhagavad-gītā. Apparently Arjuna’s intelligence became polluted because otherwise there would not have been a chance to deliver the teachings of Bhagavad-gītā for the good of all polluted conditioned souls engaged in material bondage by the conception of the false material body. The Bhagavad-gītā was delivered to the conditioned souls of the world to deliver them from the wrong conception of identifying the body with the soul and to reestablish the soul’s eternal relation with the Supreme Lord. Ātma-vidyā, or transcendental knowledge of Himself, was primarily spoken by the Lord for the benefit of all concerned in all parts of the universe.
FAQs
This verse shows that blaming the Lord (doṣa-buddhi) arises when one becomes vimukha—turned away from Him—and that Krishna can remove such distorted thinking through ātma-vidyā, restoring devotion to His feet.
As Bhishma lay on the bed of arrows, he offered prayers acknowledging his earlier conflicted vision during the war and glorified Krishna for dispelling his misunderstanding and granting him steady devotion at the end of life.
When resentment or blame arises, redirect the mind toward spiritual understanding—study, remembrance, and prayer—so the heart shifts from fault-finding to surrender and devotion.