Shloka 68
इन्द्रद्युम्नोपाख्यानम्
Indradyumna Upākhyāna: On Kīrti, Smṛti, and Restoration
भविष्यति युगे क्षीणे तद् युगान्तस्य लक्षणम् । यदा रौद्रा धर्महीना मांसादा: पानपास्तथा
bhaviṣyati yuge kṣīṇe tad yugāntasya lakṣaṇam | yadā raudrā dharmahīnā māṃsādāḥ pānapās tathā
Mārkaṇḍeya nói: “Khi thời đại đã suy kiệt, đó sẽ là những dấu hiệu của tận cùng yuga: con người trở nên hung bạo, lìa bỏ dharma, lại đắm vào việc ăn thịt và uống rượu men.”
मार्कण्डेय उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse frames the end of an age (yugānta) as a moral and social collapse: dharma weakens, and people become harsh and driven by coarse appetites. Ethical order is presented as the true measure of a yuga’s health.
Mārkaṇḍeya is describing prophetic signs of the yuga’s exhaustion, listing behavioral markers—cruelty, loss of dharma, and indulgence in meat and drink—as indicators that the world has entered a terminal phase of the age.