The Travails of Lord Krishna

Today is Janmashtami, a day celebrated by all Hindus as the birthday of Lord Krishna, one of the two great avatars of Vishnu, the other being Lord Rama. It may appear a bit strange to you that I have come here to tell you about the end of these two Avatars on the birthday of one of them! Their ends tell us that even Avathars can find no respite from the attributes of the times in which their Avatars took place. There is plenty for us to learn from their exit.

While Rama never exhibited any symptom of His awareness of His divine status, Lord Krishna makes no secret about it. Rama came to this world in Tretha yuga when all humans had all the Divine attributes in abundance and there was no need for Him to proclaim Himself as God in such a situation. But Krishna comes in almost at the end of Dwapara yuga and the advent of Kali yuga. Anarchy reigns supreme and He finds it necessary to reveal His Divine status to assert His position as the protector of Dharma. Even then, it has little effect on the wrong doers and so He resorts to even questionable strategies to fulfill the purpose of His avatar. Krishna Himself explains this to the Pandavas thus: “All your bravery could not have defeated the Kauravas. Duryodhana could never be beaten in a fair fight. Out of the desire to do good for you, I used my power of Maya in many ways on the battlefield. If I had not, you would never have won the war. Deception is in order, when the enemy is stronger. The gods themselves are not above it. We have only followed their example”

Let us look at the sublime end of the most revered avatar of Rama. One fine morning, Rama sets out for the Sarayu River, dressed in fine silk. He is chanting the Vedic mantras. All citizens, ministers, animals and birds follow Him with fervent devotion. Rama proceeds for six miles towards the River. Brahma and all the gods appear in the sky and the whole firmament glowed with a transcendent splendor, a gentle breeze blew. Myriad musical instruments playing from the heavens filled the earth with the sweetest of music. Rama steps into the Sarayu River and enters the abode of Vishnu, in His own body along with His younger brothers. At the request of Rama, Brahma gives abode in the celestial world to everyone assembled on the banks of the river. All beings, animate and inanimate, that enter the waters of The Sarayu River attain the region of the gods. What a sublime end to the most uncomplicated Avatar!

Krishna on the other hand predicts to Uddhava thus: “There is just a week more left for me to finish the last of my tasks, the annihilation of the House of the Yadhavas and at Dwaraka, the sea will break her bounds and enter the city when I am gone. The moment I leave this earth, her glory will diminish and Kali yuga which is waiting to be born, will occupy her completely”. Krishna is actually the leader of the House of the Yadhavas but despite their proximity to Krishna they bring about their own destruction! On a dark night, a drunken brawl among the Yadhavas snowballs into a fierce fight. The fight was terrible and bloody and resulted in the total massacre of the Yadhavas. Krishna watched the fight, unmoved and unperturbed. Perhaps there was some emotion in His mighty heart but no one knew. Was it not all as He planned? The Kurus first and then the Yadhavas. ‘Parithranaya Sadhunam’ and ‘vinasayacha dushkritham’ were what He had promised. And His promise culminates with the death of his own heroes, Satyaki, Kritavarma, Aniruddha, Pradyumna, Gada, Samba and many others.

When a hunter’s arrow pierced His sole, Krishna cries out in pain and asks His charioteer Dharuka to pull it out. The blessed arrow was the medium chosen to convey Him back to Vaikunta. Krishna had assumed the form of a human being and He decided that He should die like a human being. All His life, Krishna lived in the grey area of the right and the wrong because in the light of the attributes of the times in which He was living, there was no way for Him to ensure that His means were as just as His End. He gives no excuses for His acts which appeared questionable for He had a promise to keep namely the protection of Dharma. The only explanation for all these happenings can be Krishna’s oft-repeated word-Destiny! Destiny is of one’s own making. Why I am I and you are you is a matter of endless speculation and fascination. The happenings in the Kurukshetra War and the events following them overwhelm us. But we must stand up and endeavour to see the reason behind them.

Sri

 

My dear Kerman
How smoothly you have usurped Iyerviji's unassailable position as the First Lady of the Community! But I know she loves you a lot and will not be upset about this.

Both the avatars of Rama and Krishna were human and yet divine. They had all the attributes of both human and divine. But Lord Rama lived in a Yuga when everyone had the divine attributes in abundance. We always say that when Gods have to manifest on earth for any reason, they assumed a human form. Hence the famous saying , 'Deivam manushya roopena'. Even in Kaliyuga, when a good Samaritan suddenly makes his appearance to help someone in distress, we consider it as the manifestation of the divine in human form.

In the case of Rama, He never had to proclaim Himself as God because there was no need for it. Even when He fought Ravana, He preferred to do it as a righteous human who has been terribly wronged. In fact, He never exhibited even half the superhuman powers that Lord Hanuman did! Hanuman did it all as the Servant of the Lord and He too never proclaimed that He had any divine powers.

But Lord Krishna's times were entirely different. The negative attributes of the humans were at their peak. To bring about some semblance of order, Krishna had to summon His Divine powers from time to time. We treat them as His Leelas but essentially, He had to resort to them as He advanced towards His goal of establishment of the right over the wrong. His next Avatar will only be to preside over the total destruction of a highly decayed and irredeemable world. We are fast heading into it!
Sri

 

My dear Viswa
Your visit to my thread is always an indication that it has passed muster. Thank you for your early visit. You are right about the misguided characters in our epics. Kooni and Sakuni were the catalysts that hastened the Lords towards the purpose of their Avatar. If Kooni had not played her role, Rama would have got enthroned and ruled Ayodhya for a few thousand years forgetting all about Ravana! Kaikayi too would have forgotten all about the boons that Dasaratha granted her earlier in their life. All said and done, she loved Rama more than Kausalya herself until Kooni sowed the seeds of jealousy and hatred in her. Sakuni was more like the dice that he used to cause misery to the Pandavas and he played into the intricate web of the Lord’s Maya. If we have to explain the Lord’s methods in the Dwapara Yuga, I can only think of the famous Tamil saying that nothing is handier to remove a thorn than using another thorn!

I too agree with you that Kelly’s question was very relevant. And I also agree with you that if an Avatar came our way today, we would put Him in a museum and make money out of it. If you see some of the world’s outstanding magicians playing their awesome tricks on YouTube, we may start wondering if their acts are mere deft of hands or a result of their supernatural powers. In the famous comedy, ‘Oh, God!’ in which George Burns comes in the role of God, people found it difficult to believe he could be God! Same was the case with Bruce, the Almighty in which Jim Carrey is invested with awesome powers! If Lord Krishna puts up His appearance, we will not recognize Him if He comes dressed as any of us. He has to be attired in the traditional pattern of expensive clothes and jewels with a feather of peacock and a flute in His hand! This is going to be His biggest challenge when He has to put in His appearance as Kalki. If He comes dressed as Vettel and in a single seater supersonic jet instead of a flying horse, He will go unnoticed.

Dr.Hawkins’ theory of a collective human consciousness of close to 1000 is purely Utopian! It will never happen. It cannot even be fostered in a well-knit community like IL! So the quality of life will continue to deteriorate until it is time for the last Avatar! Do you know that when the last cycle ended, it started all over again with the Avatars of Matsya and Koorma. More interestingly, in Matsya Avatar, Manu is directed to play the same role as Noah in building an Ark and saving a pair each of the living being!
Sri

 

My dear Srama
Knowing that you are extremely adept in hitting the Bull’s Eye, I am not surprised at all that the very first line of your FB does just that! If you hold certain principles very close to your heart and if you are asked to act against them, won’t you be in a great dilemma? God is no exception in this regard. From the lofty ideals He set up as Rama, to take a plunge to the abysmal depths of apparent moral depravity could be difficult even for a man, let alone God. And He had to do that for the sake of upholding ‘Dharma’ and the irony of it all could have caused Him great agony. He was utterly miserable when He was put on the mat by Gandhari. She breathes fire when she sees the dead bodies of her sons in the battlefield and sends for Krishna. She holds Him entirely responsible for the death of her sons telling Him, ‘You could have guided my sons properly if you really wanted to and solved the dispute amicably. You failed to do so. You took the side of the Pandavas from the beginning and your partiality was very much reflected even when you came to my son pleading their case.’ She goes on to curse Him and the clan of yadhavas with total annihilation. Krishna defends Himself saying that He had to resort to unrighteous conduct to counter the unrighteousness of her sons. Don’t you think that these are enough to cause travails to the Avatar?

You sound interesting there when you talk of God saving the world. In today’s situation, God will have to destroy half the world to save the other half! This percentage will keep increasing in favour of destruction. Keep reading this thread Srama. You will get more and more enlightened about Krishna as you read my further inputs in response to others.
Sri