Verse 6.78

Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation by Ganganath Jha:

नदीकूलं यथा वृक्षो वृक्षं वा शकुनिर्यथा ।
तथा त्यजन्निमं देहं कृच्छ्राद् ग्राहाद् विमुच्यते ॥ ७८ ॥

nadīkūlaṃ yathā vṛkṣo vṛkṣaṃ vā śakuniryathā |
tathā tyajannimaṃ dehaṃ kṛcchrād grāhād vimucyate || 78 ||

He, who leaves this body, either as the tree leaves the bank, or as the bird leaves the tree, becomes freed from the shark of misery.—(78.)

Medhātithi’s commentary (manubhāṣya):

Continuing the figure of the body spoken of as the hut, we have the simile—‘as the bird leaves the tree’. What is meant is, not that the body should be voluntarily given up, by entering into the fire, or such methods of suicide, but one shall not cultivate attachment to it. And then the body shall fall off by itself, by the exhaustion of Karmic residuum; just as the tree on the banks falls off. This is what has been said above (40) in regard not rejoicing at death.

But when the man has acquired the inner light, has controlled the movements of his breath, and has withdrawn his mind from all manifestations of illusion;—he may even voluntarily leave off the body; in the same manner as the bird leaves the tree.

‘Shark’—which is like the shark, resembling it in being a source of trouble; hence the text has added the term ‘misery’; Even for the man who has attained discriminative wisdom, troubles continue to beset him so long as the body lasts; as such is the very nature of it.

This second alternative (of leaving the body voluntarily has been put forward in view of there being objections against the former one (of awaiting the chance of the falling off of the body I—(78)