Lesson 2: Important Religious Texts.
The Two Great Epics & The Bhagavad Gita.
The Two Great Epics:
The Two Great Epics, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata, are Itihases and a part of the Smriti Literature of the Hindus as both contain a number of important codes of conduct.
The Ramayana:
The Ramayana, historians tentatively estimate, tells of life in India at around 1000 B.C. It is an enormously moving tale of great ideology woven round Vishnu’s seventh Avatar Rama. The incorporated ideology dovetails with Hinduism so perfectly that even today, 3000 years after it was written, the various characters of the story, especially Rama, his younger half-brother Lakshman, his servant Hanuman and his wife Sita, are still held as exemplary and modern day Indians are urged to be like them.
As an Itihaas, a historical recitation, the Ramayana does not preach overtly but utilizes complex human situations to raise intricate moral issues and then goes on to establish norms by solving these issues with uncommon moral dexterity and acumen. Like the Puranas, the Ramayana also uses simple language that can be easily understood by the masses and, as such, excerpts and instances from it are much recited by the common people. It is still not uncommon in India to hear almost illiterate persons narrating parts of the Ramayana with unerring accuracy. It is part of the oral tradition of India and passes on from generation to generation through word of mouth. In the words of Swami Vivekananda, one of the great sages and architects of modern India, the Ramayana by Sage Valmiki has been described thus - "Rama, the ancient idol of the heroic ages, the embodiment of truth, of morality, the ideal son, the ideal husband, and above all, the ideal king, this Rama has been presented before us by the great Sage Valmiki. No language can be purer, none chaster, none more beautiful, and at the same time simpler, than the language in which the great poet has depicted the life of Rama." The Ramayana, as written by Sage Valmiki, has been called the “Adi Kavya” or “Original Poem”. Other important versions of the Ramayana are those composed in Avadhi, a local vernacular of North India, by Goswami Tulsidas – Sri Ram Charit Manas – and Kambaramayana in Tamil by Kambar.
The Ramayana has seven sections or khandas –
- The Bala Khanda, describing Rama's boyhood;
- The Ayodhya Khanda, describing Rama's father's death, coronation and, ultimately, his exile to the forest;
- The Aranya Khanda, describing Rama's exploits in the forest including Sita's abduction;
- The Kishkinda Khanda, describing the meeting with Hanuman and the great monkey's departure to Lanka to rescue Sita;
- The Sundara Khanda, describing Hanuman's meeting with the imprisoned Sita, his destruction of Lankapuri with fire and his return to Rama;
- The Yuddha Khanda, describing the great war between the armies of Rama and Ravana, Ravana's death, Sita's rescue and Rama's return to Ayodhya;
- The Uttara Khanda, describing Sita's banishment, the birth of the twins - Lav and Kush, the return of Sita to the earth, her mother, Rama's reinstatement to the fold of society and, ultimately, his demise.
The Mahabharata:
As the legend goes, the original Ved Vyasa composed the Mahabharata and narrated it to Lord Ganesha who was the scribe who wrote it down. That is why, scholars say, there are no mistakes in the script of the Mahabharata. Nevertheless, present day historians say that, initially, the Mahabharata was only a set of folktales and folksongs of Gods, Goddesses, kings, queens, heroes and others generated and performed by wandering bards, minstrels and dance-troupes. These stories and poems may have been initially composed by seers and sages since they all have religious connotations and were usually performed to initiate religious devotion. Later, at around 350 B.C., a unified text of about 1, 00,000 stanzas in Sanskrit began to appear all over India distributed by kings, other wealthy men and influential priests. This is the sacred text of the Mahabharata as we know it today. It continued to provide inspiration for the performance media not only in India but throughout Southeast Asia, as it continues to do even today. The Mahabharata is not only a historical chronicle of the ancient times in the Indian Subcontinent but it is also such a powerful and compelling narration that it, together with the other epic the Ramayana, has proved to be a pivotal platform around which the entire Hindu culture has subsequently evolved and stabilized. Again, like the Ramayana, the Mahabharata is such a symbolic literature that the characters in it are role models of both evil and good. Young Hindus are still urged to either emulate or shun the good and evil characters respectively. The central theme of the Mahabharata is that “Evil never prospers” and evil is neither forgiven nor forgotten either here on earth or in the heavens. While the Ramayana primarily teaches self-sacrifice the Mahabharata is made of sterner stuff and teaches self-assertion, even among kith and kin. It has a Machiavellian touch that professes that everything goes in war and duplicity and chicanery are permissible when they are used to vanquish one’s enemy. This central lesson is inculcated in the Bhagavad Gita, which is an inherent part of this great epic. The Vishnu avatar who is closely associated with the Mahabharata is Lord Krishna, the eighth avatar. Like the Ramayana the Mahabharata is also a peoples’ text and is part of the oral tradition and is passed on from generation to generation by word of mouth.
This is the end to the section on the two great epics of Hindu literature. They are both considered sacred texts as they both contain biographies of the two great Vishnu avatars - Rama and Krishna.
The Bhagavad Gita:
The Bhagavad Gita is also known as the Gitopanishad and since it contains the essence of Vedic knowledge it is also one of the most important Upanishads available. “Bhagavad Gita” means “Song of God” literally. The words in it were spoken by Lord Krishna, Vishnu’s eighth avatar, to Arjuna, one of the warrior Pandava brothers of the Mahabharata. The setting of the Gita is one of the most powerful in history. Just as the two armies of the Kurus and the Pandavas, the two main adversaries of the Mahabharata, meet on the battlefield Arjuna begins to feel doubt about the morality of continuing with the battle as the Kurus were his own cousins and he would be inflicting unimaginable sorrow on his aunt and blind uncle by killing any one of his hundred cousins. It is then that his charioteer Krishna tells him of the inescapability of the human condition and advices him to perform his duty, his karma, and leave the balancing of the consequences to the gods. In this singular treatise Krishna advices Arjuna to assert himself telling him that none is above the self and, to protect the self, it is sometimes necessary to make war against even near and dear ones. Also in this treatise Krishna tells Arjuna that he, Krishna, is the essence of everything living and nonliving, the Eternal Brahman. Krishna then shows Arjuna his universe-engulfing shape, many-mouthed, yawing and consuming all – the Mahakal (eternal time) aspect that ultimately subsumes all. Krishna tells Arjuna that there is Brahman in everything living and non-living but the Eternal Brahman is the one rest and abode of everything towards which everything intends to move to abide by it for all time. Krishna also tells Arjuna that all around him everything is Maya (delusion) and the confusion arises when the senses intrude between the individual Brahman and the Eternal One. This is the one reason why beings cannot escape the cycles of interminable births and deaths and merge with the Eternal. The essence of the Gita is – “Karma is Dharma” – Duty is Religion. Krishna also tells Arjuna that the Karma must be selfless – a sacrifice to the Eternal without expectation of returns. This is at odds to his previous exhortation to Arjuna to assert his self as it is above all. The reconciliation is also given in the Gita – the self must always be on the side of the righteous. Thus, the Gita asserts that the good must prevail at all costs. The Gita is the primary text for Vaishnavites, those who assert that Vishnu together with his avatars is the Supreme Being. In contrast to the other Upanishads the Gita is more popular and a number of common people of all ages have had knowledge of its contents and there is a rough estimation of its essence even among the general populace of the Hindus. The Gita is Sruti Literature as it comprises the revelations of Lord Krishna, the eight avatar of Vishnu. The Gita is contemporaneous with the Mahabharata.
