Sanskrit
कुलक्षये प्रणश्यन्ति कुलधर्माः सनातनाः । धर्मे नष्टे कुलं कृत्स्नमधर्मोऽभिभवत्युत ॥
kulakṣaye praṇaśyanti kuladharmāḥ sanātanāḥ dharme naṣṭe kulaṃ kṛtsnam adharmo'bhibhavaty uta
Translation
In the destruction of a family the immemorial family traditions perish; in the perishing of tradition, lawlessness overcomes the whole family;
Annie Besant · The Bhagavad-Gita, translated by Annie Besant (4th ed., 1922) — Wikisource · Public Domain
Explanation
Arjuna opens a social-consequences argument distinct from the personal and moral ones already made: beyond the deaths themselves, destroying a family destroys its inherited dharma — customs, rites, the structures that hold it together — and lawlessness fills the resulting vacuum. This argument, unlike the earlier ones, is never directly answered anywhere in the Gita; Krishna’s response in Chapter 2 addresses the metaphysics of self and the duty to fight, but doesn’t revisit this specific claim about family and social order.
Study deeper
Word by word
- kula-kṣayeकुल-क्षये
- when a family is destroyed
- praṇaśyantiप्रणश्यन्ति
- perish
- kula-dharmāḥकुल-धर्माः
- the family's inherited duties
- sanātanāḥसनातनाः
- immemorial
- dharme naṣṭeधर्मे नष्टे
- when dharma is destroyed
- kulaṃ kṛtsnamकुलं कृत्स्नं
- the whole family
- adharmo'bhibhavaty utaअधर्मोऽभिभवत्य् उत
- adharma indeed overwhelms
Commentary
Site Commentary
Notice the specific theory of dharma this verse assumes: something structurally dependent on family continuity, which perishes when the family does. Later in the Gita, dharma gets relocated to something closer to an individual’s own inherent nature — svadharma — which doesn’t depend on lineage at all. The word carries two different senses across the text, and this verse is using the more fragile one.
Original commentary written for this site · © Amit Singh — original commentary
Concepts
Apply this verse
Lessons
Personal
- When a structure you rely on for stability — a family tradition, a routine — seems at risk, ask whether the deeper value it protects is actually tied to that specific structure, or whether it could survive in a different form. Not every value is as fragile as its current container.
Professional
- When a process or team structure that's always upheld your standards is under threat, distinguish the standard itself from the specific structure carrying it — the standard may be able to survive a reorganization even if the current structure can't.
Family & Social
- If a family tradition feels like it's ending, ask what value it was actually protecting, and whether that value needs the exact same form to survive — some things you care about outlast the specific structure that first carried them.
Ask yourself
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