Verse 11.234 [Austerity (tapas): its Value]

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

तपोमूलमिदं सर्वं दैवमानुषकं सुखम् ।
तपोमध्यं बुधैः प्रोक्तं तपोऽन्तं वेददर्शिभिः ॥ २३४ ॥

tapomūlamidaṃ sarvaṃ daivamānuṣakaṃ sukham |
tapomadhyaṃ budhaiḥ proktaṃ tapo'ntaṃ vedadarśibhiḥ || 234 ||

All happiness among gods and men has been declared by the wise ones to whom the Veda was revealed to have austerity for its source, austerity for its middle and austerity for its end.—(234)

 

Medhātithi’s commentary (manubhāṣya):

In the world of men whatever ‘happiness’—in the form of glory of lordship over men and countries and so forth—or physical, in the form of good health and the like,—or social, such as that obtained from wealth, children and so forth—or the sensual, in the form of pleasures derived from the wife and others;—and also that of the gods,—what has been described in the Veda, in such passages as ‘hundred pleasures of men constitute one pleasure of the gods’;—of all this austerity is the ‘source,’—the cause of its origin.

Austerity is its ‘middle’— The continued existence of a thing is called its ‘middle.’

Similarly Austerity is its ‘end..’

The view of persons learned in the Veda is that Austerity brings about the same desirable results, in the form of Heaven and other desirable things, as those brought about by the sacrificial and other acts.—(234)

 

Comparative notes by various authors

(verses 11.234-244)

Viṣṇu (95.17).—‘What is hard to follow, hard to reach, remote, or hard to do,—all that may be accomplished by devotion.’