शान्तिः श्रेयः परं विद्धि तत्प्राप्तौ यत्नवान्भव । भोक्तव्यमोदनं प्राप्तं किन्तत्सिद्धौ विकल्पितैः ॥ ४ ॥
śāntiḥ śrēyaḥ paraṁ viddhi tatprāptau yatnavānbhava | bhōktavyamōdanaṁ prāptaṁ kintatsiddhau vikalpitaiḥ || 4 ||
Translation
Know peace to be the highest good, and strive to attain it. When the rice that is to be eaten has been cooked, what is the use of doubts about how it was cooked?
Word by word
- śāntiḥ
- peace
- śrēyaḥ
- good
- paraṁ
- the highest
- viddhi
- know
- tat
- its
- prāptau
- for the attainment
- yatnavān
- striving
- bhava
- be
- bhōktavyam
- that is to be eaten
- ōdanaṁ
- the rice
- prāptaṁ
- has been cooked (is attained)
- kiṁ
- what
- siddhau
- about the cooking
- vikalpitaiḥ
- with doubts
Meaning
The commentary meets a further objection: when the whole world is known to be unreal, the illustrations and arguments, which belong to that world, are shown to be unreal too, so how can they have led to anything real? Its answer is the cooked rice. Once the meal is ready, it does no harm that the fire and the pot were not the meal. A means that falls away after the end is reached has not failed; it has finished. So Rāma is told to aim at peace and not to stop at the instruments.