विषं विषयवैषम्यं न विषं विषमुच्यते । जन्मान्तरघ्ना विषया एकदेहहरं विषम् ॥ १३ ॥
viṣaṁ viṣayavaiṣamyaṁ na viṣaṁ viṣamucyatē | janmāntaraghnā viṣayā ēkadēhaharaṁ viṣam || 13 ||
Translation
The perilousness of the objects of sense is poison; poison is not called poison. The objects kill across births; poison takes a single body.
Word by word
- viṣaṁ
- is poison
- viṣaya
- of the objects of sense
- vaiṣamyaṁ
- the perilousness
- na
- not
- viṣam
- poison
- ucyatē
- is called
- janma
- births
- antara
- across
- ghnā
- kill
- viṣayā
- (viṣayāḥ) the objects
- ēka
- a single
- dēha
- body
- haraṁ
- takes
Meaning
A play on words with a hard point. Viṣa is poison; viṣaya is an object of the senses; and Rāma says the real poison is the treachery (vaiṣamya, the crookedness, the commentary says) of the objects, not what is ordinarily called poison. The proof is a comparison of harm. Poison destroys the one body it enters, the commentary explains; the objects, through the desires and deeds they leave behind, put body after body into the mouth of death in other births. One kills once; the other keeps killing. The reader is used to keeping poison out of reach. The verse asks for the same care with what is let into the mind through the eyes and ears, because its effect does not end with this life.