Quotes About Mahabharata

Dharma, in any case, is at the heart of the poem; it is not only untranslatable, but the Mahabharata's characters are still trying to figure it out at the epic's end.

More than anything, babus need to answer this—what is your dharma? To listen to your masters or to do the right thing? According to the Mahabharata, Krishna advised Arjuna to fight his own cousins. Since Arjuna was fighting a virtuous war, it became his dharma to fight and not give in to attachment. The babus need to sit down and reflect on their own new dharma.

Neither birth nor sacraments nor study nor ancestry can decide whether a person is twice-born (i.e., a Brahmin)," the Mahabharata declares, "character and conduct only can decide.

Of what avail is the praise or censure of the vulgar, who make a useless noise like a senseless crow in a forest?