Shloka 26
अश्वशिरो-आख्यानम्
Aśvaśiras / Hayaśiras Narrative: Retrieval of the Vedas
प्रतिछतितं भूतभव्यं त्वयि सर्वमिदं जगत् | चत्वारो ह्ाश्रमा देव सर्वे गार्हस्थ्यमूलका:
praticchaditaṁ bhūtabhavyam tvayi sarvam idaṁ jagat | catvāro hy āśramā deva sarve gārhasthyamūlakāḥ ||
Nārada thưa: “Bạch Đấng Thiêng, toàn thể thế gian này—cả quá khứ lẫn tương lai—đều được bao hàm và dung chứa trong Ngài. Và bốn āśrama (bốn giai đoạn đời sống) đều lấy nếp sống gia chủ làm gốc.”
नारद उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse affirms that the four āśramas are sustained by gārhasthya (householder life): through livelihood, hospitality, charity, and support of students, forest-dwellers, and renunciants, the householder becomes the practical foundation of the wider dharmic system.
Nārada addresses a divine interlocutor, praising them as the locus in which the whole cosmos—past and future—is held, and then pivots to a dharma instruction: emphasizing the centrality of the householder stage within the framework of the four āśramas.