Story From Mahabharatha

jayasala42 · May 24, 2019

Novalis said: ↑

Dear Jayasala,

Sporadically, yet intensely, we come across films like Zack Snyder's Watchmen and Christopher Nolan's The Dark Knight which though are retellings of the unerring super-hero tales of honour and valiance are animatedly neo-noir of the brutal upmanship in humans. Choose friends with whom your friendship can sustain, choose enemies with whom you can afford hostility. Rest are situational drifts imposing some workable relationship like that of our cat and rat. Growing up in the 90s, I felt the shift in social empathy from guileless to savvy. The pontifical adages were being supplanted by hard-hitting pragmatism.

I found your 'cat and rat' featurette too steeped in the neo-noir wisdom.

The millennial generation have no ear for chestnuts on naive and worn-out wisdom. But such neo-noir wisdom inquired in this blog is aloft! Living in a world of mutual and sling-shot competition, we are urged to foster inescapable situations where words are honored and promises are kept rather than be deluded that inadvertent pledge in every occasion is unfailingly fulfilled.

....this rat too created such situation wherein the cat honored its word not from bound virtue but from circumstantial catch. If the rat had been conventional smart and took the cat's hurried word as binding at facevalue, it would have turned into a meal.

...the rat sensed the inherent foul play and ensured that it was not short-foxed by enforcing the situational impediment rather than foolishly rely on the cat's integrity.

The unyielding vedanta is on the slump with the millennials nurtured in the much-needed arthashastra to prosper in the world.

Jayasala, I am impressed with your forthright retelling of pragmatic wisdom rather than chivalrous and rhetorical wisdom of the forlorn generation. You seem to have a good pulse of the shifting ideals reengaged in well-founded possibilities moreso for this generation. This 'cat and rat' philosophy is quite the norm of sustainable living where ethical integrity in others is derivative of our own trickery on them. I think, with such invention and wits, the rat could thrive even amongst the undesirable lions.

Your story-telling technique is charming!

Do keep us engaged with more of such imperative learnings.
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Dear Madam Novalis,

Thank you very much for your detailed response.Actually you have enriched my snippet with many many valuable inputs.
You are right.The modern generation people are after victory and good results. They are prepared to bend a little, ( not break) to achieve the desired results.
I just wanted to show that our epics contained not only chivalry and attributing glory to the valourous but also intermittently they glorified petty creatures for the common sense and shrewdness. We have many Panchatantra stories of this type.In addition to the main story of the family feud and war arising therefrom, Mahabharatha contains many incidents showing the strength and weakness of human beings and they resulted in success/failure depending on many factors inclusive of common sense approaches.

No wonder many mythological stories from our land have formed the basis of business techniques in Management Studies in many of the famous management schools abroad.Even a small grass may turn out to be a powerful instrument at times of crisis.
Thanks again.
jayasala 42

jayasala42 · May 24, 2019

SpringB said: ↑

That was a wonderful cat rat story.great sharing of wisdom very few writers original post and replies are coherent and you are one among them. Share such simple stories. Enjoy these
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Thank you Spring B for your lovely response.
Jayasala 42

Anaadhi · May 24, 2019

Dear Mam,
Thanks for your share about this story.
There are many substories in Mahabharatha. I came across a story long ago which is there as kind of folklore story but not in the original version of Mahabharatha as told here. I haven’t read the original version of Mahabharatha but I do know this story. There are a few different versions of this story but essentially the gist is of Sakuni’s revenge. Just shared as your thread made me remember this one.
Shakuni - A Villian or a Victim of Circumstance?
Regards.

Novalis · May 24, 2019

jayasala42 said: ↑

I just wanted to show that our epics contained not only chivalry and attributing glory to the valourous but also intermittently they glorified petty creatures for the common sense and shrewdness.
Click to expand...

Yes, I looked up the tale of Lomasha (cat) and Palita (rat) attributed to Mahabharata.

Usually, such subplotted characters (story within a story) are distinctly identified in characternyms, which means the etymology of Lomasha must insinuate some cat-like feature, similar with Palita.

I probed further after filtering out the Spanish interruptions that Lomasha means "hairy" and Palita means "guarded" in Sanskrit. There are other differing etymologies on the net, but I loved the sound of the characters; how often are talking cats and rats named Lomasha and Palita.

Thank you for the venturesome post.

jayasala42 · May 24, 2019

Anaadhi said: ↑

Dear Mam,
Thanks for your share about this story.
There are many substories in Mahabharatha. I came across a story long ago which is there as kind of folklore story but not in the original version of Mahabharatha as told here. I haven’t read the original version of Mahabharatha but I do know this story. There are a few different versions of this story but essentially the gist is of Sakuni’s revenge. Just shared as your thread made me remember this one.
Shakuni - A Villian or a Victim of Circumstance?
Regards.
Click to expand...

Dear Anaadhi madam,
As you say there are many sub stories in Mahbharatha in the main version and in the folk lore.These stories give room for ennobling or demoralising certain important characters and also impart life lessons to readers.
Jayasala 42

jayasala42 · May 24, 2019

Novalis said: ↑

Yes, I looked up the tale of Lomasha (cat) and Palita (rat) attributed to Mahabharata.

Usually, such subplotted characters (story within a story) are distinctly identified in characternyms, which means the etymology of Lomasha must insinuate some cat-like feature, similar with Palita.

I probed further after filtering out the Spanish interruptions that Lomasha means "hairy" and Palita means "guarded" in Sanskrit. There are other differing etymologies on the net, but I loved the sound of the characters; how often are talking cats and rats named Lomasha and Palita.

Thank you for the venturesome post.
Click to expand...

It is nice that you have taken special efforts to do special search on this. My idea was about the moral of the story and the impact it has on human beings.
Jayasala 42

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Story From Mahabharatha

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