As Arjuna continues to gaze upon the battlefield, his vision expands, and with it, his horror. The twenty-seventh verse, known as the Shvashuran Suhridash Chaiva verse, describes the moment he stops seeing two distinct armies and sees only one thing: his family, arrayed for mutual destruction. The Shvashuran Suhridash Chaiva verse marks the point where his professional assessment ends and his personal agony begins.
Sanskrit Verse
श्वशुरान् सुहृदश्चैव सेनयोरुभयोरपि ।
तान्समीक्ष्य स कौन्तेयः सर्वान्बन्धूनवस्थितान् ॥ २७ ॥Transliteration
śvaśurān suhṛdaścaiva senayorubhayorapi |
tānsamīkṣya sa kaunteyaḥ sarvānbandhūnavasthitān || 27 ||Word for Word Translation
śvaśurān – fathers-in-law; suhṛdaḥ – well-wishers; ca – also; eva – certainly; senayoḥ – of the armies; ubhayoḥ – of both; api – as well; tān – all those; samīkṣya – after seeing; saḥ – he; kaunteyaḥ – the son of Kunti; sarvān – all kinds of; bandhūn – relatives; avasthitān – situated.
English Translation
When the son of Kunti, Arjuna, saw all these different grades of friends and relatives, fathers-in-law and well-wishers, situated in both armies, he became overwhelmed with compassion and spoke thus.
Explanation
Each Bhagavad Gita verse whispers ancient truths, let’s listen closely with Vedic Stories…
The Shvashuran Suhridash Chaiva verse is a crucial deepening of Arjuna’s crisis. The key phrase is “senayor ubhayor api”—in both armies. He is no longer just looking at the enemy. He looks at the Kaurava side and sees his grandfather and teacher; he then looks back at his own side and sees his brothers, sons, and dear friends like Satyaki. He realizes with crushing finality that this Kurukshetra War is not simply a matter of him fighting his relatives; it is a war where his relatives will be fighting and killing each other on all sides.
The verse specifically mentions “shvashuran” (fathers-in-law) and “suhridah” (well-wishers or friends). This expands the circle of relationships beyond immediate blood ties. This is a total social catastrophe. The entire network of his life—his entire world—is present on this field, ready to be annihilated.
As a result, the verse says he, the son of Kunti (“Kaunteya”), becomes filled with “paramaya kripaya”—supreme compassion or pity. This is the turning point. The warrior’s spirit, the `kshatriya` duty, is suddenly drowned by an overwhelming wave of compassion. The great hero Arjuna is no longer thinking about victory; he is thinking about the immense and unbearable suffering this conflict will cause.
Conclusion
The Shvashuran Suhridash Chaiva verse teaches us about the immense power of compassion to override all other duties and motivations. Arjuna’s reaction is a profoundly human one. When faced with the reality of causing immense pain to those we are connected to, even the most righteous of duties can feel like a monstrous crime. His crisis is born not of cowardice, but of empathy.
This verse asks us to consider the limits of our own convictions. It is one thing to stand for a principle, but what happens when that stand requires the destruction of everything we love? The Shvashuran Suhridash Chaiva verse shows that Arjuna’s heart, far from being hard, is incredibly soft. It is this very softness that makes him a worthy recipient of the divine wisdom he is about to receive, as his problem is now a genuine spiritual dilemma, not just a military one.
Read Next: Bhagavad Gita Chapter 1 – Verse 28 – Kripaya Parayavisto
