Arjuna
कुलक्षये प्रणश्यन्ति कुलधर्माः सनातनाः । धर्मे नष्टे कुलं कृत्स्नमधर्मोऽभिभवत्युत ॥
kulakṣaye praṇaśyanti kuladharmāḥ sanātanāḥ | dharme naṣṭe kulaṃ kṛtsnamadharmo'bhibhavatyuta ||
When a family is destroyed, its age-old family dharmas perish. When dharma is lost, lawlessness overwhelms the entire family.
Explanation Arjuna is explaining to Krishna why he recoils from fighting his own relatives. He argues that when a family is wiped out, its inherited duties and customs (kula-dharma, the traditional practices that sustain a family) are lost too. Without them, disorder (adharma, the opposite of dharma) takes hold of what remains of the family.
Previous verse 1.39 Chapter 1 · Arjuna's despair Next verse 1.41
About the Bhagavad Gita
The Bhagavad Gita, in Sanskrit श्रीमद्भगवद्गीता (Śrīmad Bhagavad Gītā ), “the song of the Lord”, is a dialogue of 18 chapters and 700 verses from the Bhishma Parva of the Mahabharata. On the battlefield of Kurukshetra, as the war is about to begin, the warrior Arjuna loses heart at the thought of fighting his own kin, and his charioteer Krishna answers him: on duty, on acting without attachment to the results, on knowledge, meditation and devotion. Sanjaya recounts the conversation to the blind king Dhritarashtra. The name is also written Bhagwad Gita, Bhagvad Gita, Bhagavat Gita or Bhagavad Geeta; with the honorific, Shrimad Bhagavad Gita, Srimad Bhagavad Gita or Shrimad Bhagwat Geeta; and often simply the Gita or Geeta.
Every verse is here in the original Sanskrit, with a Roman (IAST) transliteration, a plain-language translation and a short explanation, in English, Hindi, Arabic, Spanish, French and Tamil. The translations were made from the Sanskrit for this site and reviewed; they follow no published translation. Reading is free, with no account or advertising, and your progress stays in your browser. The verses are numbered 1.1 to 18.78, 701 in all, counting the question that opens chapter 13.
Languages: English · हिन्दी · العربية · Español · Français · தமிழ்