hitopadesha

One of the things I want to do with this blog is to also write stories that continue across multiple entries. As most of the stories of Hindu mythology are highly interlinked and sometimes contradictory it would be quite difficult to bring structure to it and present it as a comprehensive piece of text without dedicating large amounts of time doing research. So my plan is to write such complex stories as snapshots of different scenes which by itself forms a sub-story of the main story. I will try to keep the length short and provide as much reference as possible (both external and internal) so that a person reading this without any background will still be able to connect them and make sense out of this complex mythology. This is the first of a series of posts on Mahabharata and I will number them in the title to easily identify in which order it was written. It is of course also labled by appropriate categories for easy search.

The previous post was about Kubera and I am thinking that I should put such posts as separate pages and try to eventually put them on a side panel so they can be read as a wikipedia for those who are interested in character details rather than the stories. And, leave the main blog solely dedicated to stories which are short and interesting. So you can expect to see some changes in the structure shortly but until then it will run as a continuous blog.

In this post, I plan to write the background of the Mahabharata so as to set a platform and give perspective to the complex epic and will try to end it with a short story from it. Mahabharata was composed by the Sage Veda Vyasa and written by Lord Ganesha (see post) after the epic war was over. The war was fought between the cousins Pandavas and Kauravas over the kingdom of the Kuru clan and eventually it was won by the Pandavas. The war lasted eighteen days and from it came the profound philosophical literature the Bhagawat Gita. The Mahabharata involves a number of characters whose lives are interwined in extremely complex ways and it is also the source of numerous interesting stories ranging from simple descriptions of specific incidents to a complex novel by itself. It was also the period in which Lord Vishnu took the incarnation of Lord Krishna and for the first time in the entire cycle of life God Himself performs deeds that are of questionable nature from some perspectives, in order to keep up dharma from a larger perspective. Many of such details will come eventually in different blogs in the future.

As for today we shall see just a small snippet from this epic as the blog is already getting too long for a casual read.

All preparations was going on in full swing for the war between the Pandavas and the Kauravas. The Pandavas wanted Hanuman (the monkey God) to grace their flag for the war and went to request him for permission. But in the course of all the incidents that took place which was culminating in a war, many of those actions were of questionable nature and were not performed according to the dharmic laws from one perspective. As Hanuman was a great devotee of Lord Rama, who even in the worst of situations was known to have kept his dharma, he did not feel comfortable lending his name for the war. But he was also caught up in a dilemma since Lord Krishna was involved in this war and was working on the side of Pandavas. Lord Krishna is one of the incarnations of Lord Vishnu who also reincarnated as Lord Rama before this. So Hanuman could not say no to this request and finally relented with a condition that his picture on the flag will not face the direction in which the war is taking place thereby symbolically establishing that he is not a witness to a war which is fought in a dubious way in some sense.

That’s it for today and see you soon in yet another interesting story from the Hindu mythology.

peace,
aditya.