The Vedic Period (V)

 Bangalore: Sunday, December 18, 1988. 12:18pm

______________________________

 

 

Mahabharata (II)

“Awake, Arise, Stop not till the goal is reached’...these are the words of our great seer Swami Vivekananda.

Such words are the outpourings of a strong soul, so filled with eagerness, vitality and enthusiasm that it sucks in all that it sees, hears and feels on its way to its destination. No doubt it must have heard the words spoken by the son of Ganga Bheeshma telling Yudhishtra: “Awake, Arise or forget yourself”....

Yes, to reach that goal, that destination which every person desires to achieve, one needs to know ‘oneself’. Thus the key to Vivekananda’s claim and message lies in unlocking that door and those windows which will let in the breeze of self-knowledge.

No doubt, this balmy breeze did touch the mind of Duryodhana. Though balmy by nature, we could see its vibrating effect in his strength of character and personality as well as feel it germinating in ourselves. Max Mueller, in his book – or should we rightly say in his lectures that he delivered to the ICS officers in England, said that, if any institution was successful in germinating the seed which will make the individual pursue the path to know oneself – then, it needn’t think itself to be useless.

Yes! The Discovery of India by Nehru reveals itself to be an institution by itself. It houses teachers and students, the learned and the unlearned, the innocent and the matured and not to forget the divine and the earthly. In his analysis of Mahabharata, Nehru sows the seed of curiosity in our mind. As he moves on with his process of gardening our mind, we realise how adept he is at this art. Using the right kind of manure and touch, he incites us at the spot which touches us the most. The radical makes its way deep down in the pursuit of self-knowledge, while the plumule shoots up towards the sun to procure knowledge which will help us in knowing ourselves.

As we read his book, and see and hear Shyam Benegal’s version of this great litterateur, we observe that there exists a wonderful symbolic relationship between the two of them. Nehru, through his book, depends on Shyam Benegal to reach out to the wide audience who are starved for an insight into him, while our beloved director depicts Nehru effectively whenever he is strongly inspired by his ideas. To reach out to us, one has to be adroit at it, and Shyam Benegal who does it so competently, thus owes a lot to our dreamy statesman.

Without diverging, let us come back to our leader of the Kauravas – Duryodhana, whom we meet today at Kurukshetra, in a pitiable state, for he has been slain by Bheema. We see him, approaching the doors of death. Yet he does so in such a mature manner that we feel like bowing our heads, saluting this great soul. He accepts his mistake, and thus proves himself to be humble. An acceptance of reality comes with the knowledge of it, and in turn, one acquires the knowledge of looking into oneself.

Gandhari’s curse on Krishna proves itself to be the outpourings of a soul torn between love and faith, and Krishna’s answer to her curse is as stongly justified as the curse is inflicted by her. The proceedings in this epic reveals itself to be the beginning of humanity, for it is from here that we see manking questioning the ways of his fellow beings as well as his ‘divine’ God!.