"'"As a skilful physician, having duly diagnosed a disease, prescribes a medicine by the application of his intelligence for effecting a cure, even so men, for the accomplishment of their acts, use their intelligence, aided by their own wisdom. What they do is again disapproved by others. A man, in youth, is affected by one kind of understanding. In middle age, the same does not prevail with him, and in the period of decay, a different kind of understanding becomes agreeable to him. When fallen into terrible distress or when visited by great prosperity, the understanding of a person, O chief of the Bhojas, is seen to be much afflicted. In one and the same person, through want of wisdom, the understanding becomes different at different times. That understanding which at one time is acceptable becomes the reverse of that at another time.Mbh 10.3.2 · Mahabharata · Sauptika-parva
Mbh 10.3.2
Mahabharata · translated by Kisari Mohan Ganguli
Themes in this passage
WisdomHealingSufferingChildrenImpermanenceWealth
Wisdom in other traditions
The same theme, as Christianity, Buddhism, Islam and Hellenism address it.
The heart of the prudent getteth knowledge; and the ear of the wise seeketh knowledge.Proverbs 18:15 · Bible · Proverbs
Without knowledge there is no meditation, without meditation there is no knowledge: he who has knowledge and meditation is near unto Nirvana.Dhp 25.372 · Dhammapada · The Bhikshu (Mendicant)
He giveth wisdom unto whom He will, and he unto whom wisdom is given, he truly hath received abundant good. But none remember except men of understanding.Quran 2:269 · Quran · The Cow
Then Helen thus: “Whom your discerning eyes Have singled out, is Ithacus the wise; A barren island boasts his glorious birth; His fame for wisdom fills the spacious earth.”Iliad 3.22 · Iliad · 3
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