Upaniṣads · Rāma-tāpanī Uttara 5.17
॥
Devanāgarī
ब्राह्मणं क्षत्रियं वैश्यं शूद्रं हत्वा च किल्बिषम् । संचिनोति नरो मोहात् यद्यत् तदपि नाशयेत्
Transliteración (IAST)
brāhmaṇaṃ kṣatriyaṃ vaiśyaṃ śūdraṃ hatvā ca kilbiṣam | saṃcinoti naro mohāt yadyat tadapi nāśayet
Palabra por palabra
SánscritoIASTSignificado
ब्राह्मणम् क्षत्रियम् वैश्यम्brāhmaṇam kṣatriyam vaiśyama brāhmaṇa, a kṣatriya, a vaiśya; brāhmaṇa, kṣatriya and vaiśya
शूद्रम् हत्वा च किल्बिषम्śūdram hatvā ca kilbiṣamand a śūdra having slain — the guilt; and a śūdra having killed — the offence
संचिनोति नरः मोहात्saṃcinoti naraḥ mohāta man heaps up out of delusion; a man gathers through blindness
यत् यत् तत् अपि नाशयेत्yat yat tat api nāśayetwhatever it be, that too it will destroy; whichever it is, this too it will annihilate
Traducción
“Whatever guilt a man heaps up out of delusion by slaying a brāhmaṇa, a kṣatriya, a vaiśya or a śūdra — whatever it be, that too it will destroy.”
Versión
f4c8eb160f21 · publicado 29 jul 2026, 5:15:19 UTC
Disponible enRUENPasa de verso en verso con
Slaying, and all four estates are named in order.
This enumeration is not indifferent. The dharma-śāstras appoint different expiations for slaying according to who is slain, and the difference between them is great.
Here all four are named in a row and the difference is lifted: “whatever it be”.
Note too the word mohāt — “out of delusion, out of blindness”. Moha means the darkening in which a man does not see what he does.
This is no excuse for the slayer and no softening of guilt: the word states the cause. Men kill in blindness, not by calculation; and hence the remedy against slaying is not punishment but the recovering of sight.
Recall that the whole book speaks of the same. The demons perished “from their own exaltation”; Rāvaṇa bore Sītā away “for his own cessation”. Evil is described as a darkening, not as a power.
And therefore the name that restores clarity proves stronger than what was done in the dark.