A series of short articles on the Bhagavad Gita for busy, stressed people
living and working in these volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous times.
This scripture born in a battlefield teaches us how to face our challenges,
live our life fully and achieve excellence in whatever we do.
[Continued from the previous post]
Then, O Lord of the earth, seeing
Duryodhana's men in position and the armies about to clash, Arjuna, raising his
bow, told Krishna, “O Krishna, take my chariot between the two armies. I want
to see the warriors I am about to fight. I want to have a look at those
gathered here for battle wishing to please the evil-minded son of Dhritarashtra”.
BG 1.20-23
The Mahabharata tells us that a year after the princes
completed their studies under Drona and Arjuna gave him the guru dakshina he
wanted in the form of Drupada defeated, captured, tied up and brought to him,
Yudhishthira was appointed the crown prince of Hastinapura. He was the rightful
heir of the throne as the son of the previous king, Pandu, and had impeccable
ethical integrity, apart from total commitment to the welfare of his people,
great self-mastery, steadfastness, determination, firmness, fortitude,
patience, benevolence, and scores of other qualities that were considered
essential in a king in those days. The Mahabharata tells us that this was done
‘moved by kindness to the people’, bhrityaanaam anukampaarthe, perhaps a way of
saying that this was done in response to the desire of the people. He started
ruling the kingdom with the help of his four brothers. His brothers subdued
more kings than their father Pandu had done and soon his fame exceeded that of
his celebrated father who was adored by the people.
Dhritarashtra is now filled with jealousy towards the
Pandavas. Constantly thinking and worrying about them, according to the epic,
“he could not sleep in the nights,” – sa chintaaparamo raajan na nidraam alabhan
nishi.
One day he calls his minister Kanika and confesses to
him of his jealousy. “The Pandavas are growing in fame every day,” he tells
him, “and, O Brahmana, I am jealous of them “utsiktaah paandavaa nityam
tebhyo’sooye dvijottama. He seeks Kanika’s advice about what to do promising he
would do whatever Kanika asks him to. Kanika apologizes to him in advance for
the evil nature of what he is going to say, seeks his protection in advance,
and then gives him such dark lessons in grabbing power and retaining it that
dwarf even Machiavilli in evil.
Kanika tells the blind king to use speech as a tool for deception. “Vaangmaatreṇa vineetah syaad, hridayena
yathaa kshurah,” he tells him: Confine your sweetness to your words. In
your heart, be like the dagger. He asks Dhritarashtra to be ruthless. “Putro
vaa yadi vaa bhraataa pitaa vaa yadi vaa suhrd, arthasya vighnam kurvaaṇaa
hantavyaa bhootivardhanaiḥ,” Kanika tells him: Kill the person who stands in
the way of your attaining goals even if
he is your son, brother, father, or friend. The minister advices him to turn cruelty
into an art, as the fisherman does. “Naahatvaa matsyaghaateeva praapnoti
paramaaṁ shriyam.” Without piercing the very vitals
of others, without accomplishing many stern deeds, without slaughtering after
the manner of the fisherman, one cannot acquire great prosperity. Another advice
Kanika gives his king is to follow the ways of the razor. “Kshuro bhootvaa haret
praanaan, nishitah kaalasaadhanah;
pratichhanno lomahaari, dvishataam parikartanah,” he tells
Dhritarashtra. “In the matter of
destroying their enemies, kings should forever resemble razors in every
particular; pitiless and sharp, hiding their intents as razors hide in leather
scabbards, they should strike when the opportunity arises as daggers are used
when the occasion demands, sweeping off their foes with all their allies and
dependents as daggers shave the head or the chin without leaving a single
hair.”
After he finishes his
teachings, Kanika winds up what he had to say by telling a fable.
Once there lived a jackal in the forest with his four
friends: a tiger, a mouse, a wolf and a mongoose. There was a large herd of
deer in the jungle and their leader was a male deer in the prime of its youth,
big as a bull and faster than a tiger. Tempted by the majestic deer the five
friends chased him several times but every time the swift deer outran its
chasers. Even the tiger, fastest among the friends, failed repeatedly.
Eventually, they sat together and devised a plan, elemental in its simplicity:
when the deer sleeps, the mouse will crawl up to it and bite its leg. After
that the deer will not be able to run at his normal speed. At that time the
tiger can chase and kill it.
The brilliant plan was put into practice and the five
friends sat around the killed deer to feast upon its delicious meat. The jackal
now asked all his friends to go and have a bath and come back for the meal. He
would guard it in the meantime, he told them.
The tiger came back first. The jackal incited him
saying the mouse was laughing at the tiger’s strength. The tiger left the meal
and went away saying he did not want any part of a meal caught with the help of
a mouse. The mouse came next and the jackal incited him saying the mongoose has
said the meat is poisoned because it has been bitten by the tiger and so he
wouldn’t touch it. Instead, he would eat the mouse. The scared mouse retreated
to its hole. When the wolf came next, the jackal told him the tiger was furious
with him and had gone to fetch his wife and together they had plans upon him,
hearing which the scared wolf ran away. The mongoose was the next to come. The
jackal told him that he had driven away all the other animals with his strength
and if he dared he should fight him, the jackal. A scared mongoose too ran
away. And the jackal had the entire deer the size of a bull all for himself.
This is how the minister sums up his teachings to
Dhritarashtra, the heart of which is to let no values stand in the way of
fulfilling your selfish ambitions and to grab what you want without a thought
of others.
And that is exactly how Duryodhana behaves with the
Pandavas, showing them no sympathy or pity. He tries to destroy them again and
again, refuses to give them even as much land as a needle tip though
Yudhishthira was the rightful heir to the Bharata throne. He even goes to the
jungle to eliminate the Pandavas while they are living there for twelve years
following the foul game of dice he played with Yudhishthira.
We learn what we want to learn, what appeals to our
heart. Numerous rishis and wise men try to teach Duryodhana dharma throughout
his life, Vyasa himself tries it, his own mother and father try to on so many
occasions, Vidura tries repeatedly, but he refuses to learn. What he learns and
practices is what Kanika teaches his father, because his teachings appeal to
him instantly, just as the ways of Shakuni appeals to him. During his peace
negotiations, as requested by Dhritarashtra, Krishna tries to teach him what is
right and what is wrong and that too has no effect on him.
Because Duryodhana is asuri by nature, only asuri
teachings appeal to him.
Our sanskaras, vasanas and karmas that we bring with
us into this life from our former existences decide what we are influenced by
and practice in life, just as they decide whether we are born asuri or daivi.
Krishna tells Arjuna in the sixteenth chapter of the Gita that he is born
daivi: maa shuchah sampadam daiveem abhijaatosi paandava – Do not
grieve Arjuna, you are born with daivi sampada. But Duryodhana’s case is just
the opposite.
In the Mahabharata war Yudhishthira is persuaded to do
one single wrong – tell a lie about the death of Ashwatthama – and he feels
guilty about it all his life. But Duryodhana commits wickedness after
wickedness and he feels no guilt about it. Before telling Krishna in the Kuru
assembly that he would not give the Pandavas as much land as the size of a
needle tip, the speech Duryodhana gives Krishna is highly revealing. He does
not see that he has done any wrong against the Pandavas in their entire life!
What he has done is no more than practicing the ways of the kshatriyas as
taught by the rishis, he believes. His asuri nature makes him blind to his own
evil nature and evil deeds. Perhaps this is the reason why Krishna despairs in
the Gita later, prakritim yaanti bhootaani nigrahaḥ kim kariṣhyati – all beings
follow their own nature, what can suppression do? [BG 3.33]. Being blind to
one’s own evil nature and being insensitive to other’s sufferings is part of
being asuri in nature.
“You must speak, Krishna, after reflecting on all
circumstances,” says Duryodhana in the Kuru Sabha. “You find fault with me
alone and address me in harsh words without any reason, just because the
Pandavas give you much respect. But before censuring me, have you assessed the
strengths and weaknesses of both sides? [Duryodhana here equates strength with
being right and weakness with being wrong!] You, Kshatri [Vidura], the king
[Dhritarashtra], the acharya, and the grandsire all reproach me alone all the
time, never another person. However, I DO NOT FIND THE LEAST FAULT IN MYSELF.
And yet all of you hate me – and that includes my own father! I have been
reflecting and reflecting on this and yet I DO NOT FIND ANY SERIOUS FAULT IN
ME, NOR DO I FIND ANY SMALL FAULT IN ME. Not even the minutest!”
That is Duryodhana, the evil minded son of
Dhritarashtra, the durbiddhi, as Arjuna refers to him while asking Krishna to
take his chariot between the two armies.
Duryodhana is proud of everything he has done in his
life and believes and asserts proudly he has never erred from kshatra dharma,
the way of the kshatriyas. But he forgets that kshatra dharma does not teach
cheating, betrayal, treachery, lying, poisoning people, setting fire to their
houses, and violating the dignity of women.
Unfortunately, that he learnt and practiced the ways
of Kanika and Shakuni and of no one else was not just his tragedy and the
tragedy of the Pandavas, but the tragedy of all the kshatriyas born in India in
his age, of this sacred land itself.
No culture gave more importance to leadership than
ancient India did. Speaking of leadership India said raja yugam uchyate – the
king is called the four ages. The Mahabharata says whether it is Satya Yuga in
a country or Treta, Dwapara or Kali, depends on the king. When the king is what
he should be, a man of integrity and other virtues, and does what is expected
of him, we have Satya Yuga, the age of perfection, in his country. And we have
Treta Yuga or Dwapara Yuga or Kali Yuga in the country, depending on to what
extent the king comes near the ideals set for him. When the king fails
miserably in being what he should be and doing what he should do, we have the
Age of Kali.
During a lesson Yudhishthira receives from Bhishma in
the Shanti Parva of the epic, the dharma king asks his grandsire whether the
leader creates the age or the age creates the leader. And Bhishma says: kalo
vaa kaaranam raajnah raajaa vaa kaalakaaranam iti te samshayo maa bhoot, raajaa
kaalasya kaaranam. “Let there be no doubt in your mind as to whether the king
makes the age or the age makes the king: The king makes the age.”
Whether it was in the past or today, whether it is in
a kingdom or a family or an organization, the leader makes the age. Put in
today’s terms: Let there be no doubt in
your mind as to whether the leader makes the age or the age makes the leader:
The leader makes the age
I once worked for an institution in which the
leadership changed and with it, almost overnight, the institutional climate
changed too. Under the old leadership, if the institution was in Satya Yuga,
under the new leadership it entered the Kali Yuga. The changes were instant and
total and the only change that had happened was the change in leadership.
It is not that the asuri leadership principles Kanika
taught Dhritarashtra do not work – they work, but only for a short time, and
ultimately it destroys. It destroys those who practice it. Their effectiveness
is short lived and eventually they backfire, as we see in the Mahabharata
itself. That is why the Katha Upanishad speaks of the path of short term good
as the path of preyas and the road widely travelled; and the path of long time
good as the path of shreyas and the road less travelled. Speaking of these two
paths, the Upanishad says:
shreyas cha preyas cha manushyam etas tau sampareetya
vivinakti dheerah; shreyo hi dheero’bhipreyaso vrineete preyo mando
yogakshemaad vrineete // - Katha Upanishad,
1/2/2
Translated loosely, the mantra means that as man walks
on the path of life, both shreyas and preyas appear before him and the intelligent
man, differentiating between the two, chooses shreyas for lasting good, whereas
the fool chooses preyas for immediate gains.
Much of the tragedy the world is facing today is
because we have been ignoring shreyas and choosing preyas at the individual, at
the family, at the community and at the national level, leading to
dissatisfaction, frustration and unhappiness. Modern industry and business
inspired by western models have for a while now been consistently choosing
preyas over shreyas, which explains much of the tragedy in our world today, in
spite of the great advances in science and technology, and why we our planet is
on the brink of destroyed.
Power should not be in the hands of durbuddhis, nor
should our leaders and leadership be of asuri nature.
O0O
Photo courtesy: Devender Malhotra
Thank you in advance for your questions and comments.
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