Now I Am Become Death, the Destroyer of Worlds — J. Robert Oppenheimer
Oppenheimer famously quoted this from The Bhagwat Geeta in the context of the nuclear bomb. The way this sentence is structured feels weird to me. “Now I am Death” or “Now I have become Death” sound much more natural in English to me.
Was he trying to simulate some formulation in Sanskrit that is not available in the English language?
The original line comes from Chapter 11 Verse 32 of the Bhagavad Gita.
The most literal translation would be: “I am mighty Time, the source of destruction of the worlds.” But काल can alternatively mean Death, and it looks like that’s the interpretation Oppenheimer chose. The verb here is a simple “am”, as in “I am Time/Death”. So the “am become” part is not due to any feature of Sanskrit itself.
But people usually take some liberty while translating poetry. Given the context (i.e. Krishna convincing Arjuna to fight, and showing him his true form), it makes sense to use “I have become” or even “I am become” (as explained in the other comments, it’s grammatically correct).
Thanks for sharing your knowledge of ancient Hindu scripture, SexualPolytope.
We need a r/rimjobsteve community on lemmy
Great explanation. Do you have any formal education in Sanskrit or the gita?
I did learn Sanskrit in school for a few years (I’m Indian). I have some personal interest in the scriptures; although admittedly, I mostly read 12-16th century Bengali scriptures (e.g. শ্রীকৃষ্ণকীর্তন, বৈষ্ণব পদাবলী etc.). But I do know some bits about the Sanskrit scriptures as well.
I knew the reference but not the language. Thank you for the explication!