Itihāsa / Mahābhārata / Vyādha Gītā

Vyādha Gītā (व्याधगीता)

A teaching in the Vana-parva of the Mahābhārata. A brāhmaṇa named Kauśika has learning, and a temper. A bird fouls him. His look is enough. The bird dies. He goes for alms to a house. The woman of the house is late because she is serving her husband. She knows, without being told, what happened on the road, and she sends him on to a teacher he would not have chosen: a butcher of Mithilā, a dharmavyādha (धर्मव्याध), who keeps a meat shop and serves his parents.

The butcher's claim is svadharma (स्वधर्म), one's own duty. The work a person is in can be a hard trade. The measure is how the mind stands inside it: service of the parents, truthfulness, and a self that is other than the body doing the work. Ahiṃsā (अहिंसा), in this talk, is a quality of the person. The page names the shop. The work of the shop stays off the page. The vulgate and the critical edition do not give the episode one shared chapter number. The episode is stable. The numeral is not, so this page does not freeze one. No śloka is supplied from memory to look like the text.

What a learned man is sent to learn

• Birth and Vedic study did not keep Kauśika's anger from killing. The woman of the house is the first correction.
• The second correction is the trade. A butcher who serves his parents can be the teacher of a brāhmaṇa.
• Svadharma is the word the Gītā will later speak to a warrior. Here it is spoken to a man who thought his birth was the qualification.
• The self the butcher points at is the same witness the forest will examine again, at the Yakṣa's lake, with a different hearer.

नेपालीमा

व्याधगीता महाभारतको वनपर्वको शिक्षा हो। कौशिक नामका ब्राह्मण पण्डित छन्, र रिसाहा पनि। एउटा चराको मैलाले उनलाई छुन्छ। हेराइ नै काफी हुन्छ। चरा मर्छ। उनी भिक्षाका लागि एउटा घर पुग्छन्। घरकी स्त्री ढिलो हुन्छिन्, किनकि उनी पतिलाई सेवा गर्दै थिइन्। बाटोमा के भयो, कसैले नभनी नै उनलाई थाहा हुन्छ, र उनले कौशिकलाई उनले नसोचेको गुरुकहाँ पठाउँछिन्। मिथिलाका धर्मव्याध, मासुको पसल गर्ने, आमाबाबुको सेवा गर्ने।

व्याधको दाबी स्वधर्म हो। मानिसको काम कठिन पेशा हुन सक्छ। नाप मन त्यसभित्र कसरी उभिन्छ भन्ने हो: आमाबाबुको सेवा, सत्य, र काम गरिरहेको शरीरभन्दा अर्को आत्मा। यस कुरामा अहिंसा व्यक्तिको गुण हो। यो पृष्ठले पसलको नाम लिन्छ। पसलको काम पृष्ठबाहिर रहन्छ। प्रचलित पाठ र आलोचनात्मक संस्करणले यो घटनालाई एउटै अध्याय अङ्क दिँदैनन्। घटना स्थिर छ। अङ्क होइन, त्यसैले यो पृष्ठले अङ्क अड्याउँदैन। पाठजस्तो देखाउन सम्झनाबाट कुनै श्लोक हालिएको छैन।

Where it sits

The Yakṣa's questions are the other examination in the same forest, set near the end of the exile, with Yudhiṣṭhira as the one who can answer. The Mokṣadharma is the long answer Bhīṣma gives the king from the bed of arrows. The butcher is the earlier, sharper case: the teacher is the person the student came prepared to despise.