Mahabharata 15: Hard Weapons ‘pon Things Soft Poem by Aniruddha Pathak

Where there is wisdom there's peace,
Beget composure, come to bliss
O Bharata;
Hard weapons fall flat ‘pon things soft,
But soft ones work wonders so oft.
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Here is the transliteration of the original verse:

yatah buddhih tatah shāntihpra-shamam gacċha bhārata |
na a-dāruņi patet shastramdāruņye tat nipātyate || sabhā 73-5 ||

Note, dāruņi= those that are harsh, rough, ruthless. Too soft and malleable resists harsh weapons, just as hardness defies them. The game of dice and what happened later had shattered many. Dhritarashtra at long last realised that he had let it happen what should have been prevented from the very beginning. He also perhaps realised the serious consequences of what had happened. He was goaded by the oracle that warned, or perhaps the inherent goodness in him surfaced if only for a while as we would soon see. He advised Yudhishthir to go back to his capital, Indraprastha, as if nothing had happened, free from all obligations of the lost gamble. He had these words of wisdom to add (this verse) . Forget and forgive was his advice for now.

Yet, if man were to learn from what happened history would have been different. No sooner than the Pandu princes returned to their capital, Duryodhan convinced his father to call Yudhishthir again for a game of dice. All others tried to dissuade him but in vain. Gandharee also dissuaded Dhritarashtra, even warned him against this new move, but to no avail. Yudhishthir too when received the invitation readily accepted it, knowing too well what might happen. The gambler in him left their fate to destiny. One would have thought it otherwise, for he was born of the Lord of Justice (dharma-rāja) .