Mahabharata Quotes:

The author of the Mahabharata has not established the necessity of physical warfare; on the contrary he has proved its futility.

- Mahatma Gandhi

source: Mahatma Gandhi (2010). “The Bhagavad Gita According to Gandhi”, p.17, North Atlantic Books

topic: War, Mahabharata, Futility

If I was asked what is the greatest treasure which India possesses and what is her finest heritage, I would answer unhesitatingly that it is the Samskrit language and literature and all that it contains. This is a magnificent inheritance and so long as this endures and influences the life of our people, so long will the basic genius of India continue. If our race forgot the Buddha, the Upanishads and the great epics (Ramayana and Mahabharata), India would cease to be India .

- Jawaharlal Nehru

topic: Epic, Race, Greatest Treasure, Mahabharata

A scene of Mahabharata where the Surya Devta(Sun God)would come to bless Kunti with a baby The child watching this on TV says "I have been taught that Neil Armstrong had taken several days to reach the moon.Surya Devta took only half a minute to land up in the Kunti's room; that too, he didn't even need a rocket-he had simply walked. Science and Sanskrit had always appeared contradicting subjects to me at school:-)

- Ravinder Singh

topic: Baby, Children, Taken, Sun God, Sanskrit

The ultimate dreamer is Vishnu floating on the cosmic Milky Ocean, couched upon the coils of the abyssal serpent Ananta, the meaning of whose name is Unending. In the foreground stand the five Pandava brothers, heroes of the epic Mahabharata, with Draupadi, their wife: allegorically, she is the mind and they are the five senses.

- Joseph Campbell

source: Joseph Campbell, M. J. Abadie (1981). “The Mythic Image”, p.7, Princeton University Press

topic: Brother, Ocean, Hero, Vishnu, Foreground

To me the Mahabharata is a profoundly religious book, largely allegorical, in a way meant to be a historical record.

- Mahatma Gandhi

source: Mahatma Gandhi (1968). “Collected Works”

topic: Religious, Book, Historical, Religious Books, Mahabharata

Great stories like the Mahabharata don't belong to any one culture, they belong to the world.

- Sharad Devarajan

topic: Journey, Stories, World, Mahabharata

In Tharoor's hands [the story of modern India] is transformed into Mahabharata magic.... Endlessly inventive, irreverent, wise, ingenious,... it takes on at one level or another the entire panorama of modern India....Energetic and eventful.

- M. G. Vassanji

topic: Wise, Hands, Magic, Modern India, Panorama

The Bhagavad Gita is not as nice a book as some Americans think…Throughout the Mahabharata ... Krishna goads human beings into all sorts of murderous and self-destructive behaviors such as war.... The Gita is a dishonest book …

- Wendy Doniger

source: Philadelphia Inquirer, November 19, 2000.

topic: War, Nice, Book, Destructive Behavior, Self Destructive