गजस्थाश् च महामात्रा निर्भिन्नहृदया रणे ॥
रथिभिः पातिता भल्लैर् विकीर्णाङ्कुशतोमराः ॥
क्रौञ्चवद् विनदन्तो ऽन्ये नाराचाभिहता गजाः ॥
परान् स्वांश् चापि मृद्नन्तः परिपेतुर् दिशो दश ॥
गजाश्वरथसंघानां शरीरौघसमावृता ॥
बभूव पृथिवी राजन् मांसशोणितकर्दमा ॥
gajasthāś ca mahāmātrā nirbhinnahṛdayā raṇe ||
rathibhiḥ pātitā bhallair vikīrṇāṅkuśatomarāḥ ||
krauñcavad vinadanto 'nye nārācābhihatā gajāḥ ||
parān svāṃś cāpi mṛdnantaḥ paripetur diśo daśa ||
gajāśvarathasaṃghānāṃ śarīraughasamāvṛtā ||
babhūva pṛthivī rājan māṃsaśoṇitakardamā ||
The warriors mounted on elephants and their mahouts, with chests pierced through, struck down in battle by chariot-fighters with bhalla-arrows, fell, having dropped their goads and darts. Other elephants, wounded by naracha-arrows, trumpeting shrilly like the krauncha bird, trampling foes and their own alike, rushed about in all ten directions. Strewn with heaps of bodies of elephants, horses, and chariots, the whole earth, O king, became a mire of flesh and blood.
6440064a06d4 · 发布于 2026年7月19日 15:00:04 UTC
可用语言RUEN用方向键翻颂
Wounded elephants, maddened by pain, trample "foes and their own alike" without distinction -- suffering unlit by reason knows neither friend nor enemy. And the earth, turned into a "mire of flesh and blood," reveals the final limit to which war descends: a flowering field becomes a quagmire of bodies. It is telling that the tradition does not soften this picture -- it shows war as it is at its very depth, without glory or splendor. The verse teaches that suffering not illumined by reason is blind and strikes indiscriminately; that enmity, unleashed to its extreme, turns the nurturing earth into a bloody swamp; and that whoever looks upon this without revulsion for war itself has not yet understood its cost, nor the measure by which spilled blood will be repaid.