C2-RAMAYANA --THE SUBLIME STORY OF LORD RAMA

In India traditional Hindus worship a great Prince Charming ,the mighty divine Prince Rama, as incarnation of god almighty of the universe. His life story truly reflects the great and sublime philosophic traditions of ancient India . It can also be said that his sublime story reflects the great mystery of human existence on the lonely planet earth among the billions of galaxies in the universe. The holy story had cast a spell on the lives of traditional Hindus for last 2000 years and established high moral traditions in traditional Hindu society. There are hundreds of thousands of temples for Lord Rama in India in almost every village and town. Poets say his life story is like the soft moon shine and is like nectar creating joy and peace in minds .It is said that even in heaven his name is recited by the greatest gods with reverence. He was a Prince Charming and darling of people . He was a young warrior prince who had the capacity to conquer even the entire universe of billion galaxies . But he was a gentle philosophic and poetic personality and at heart was a sublime saint and ascetic .He was the eldest son of the mighty king Dasaradha the ruler of a mighty kingdom of Ayodhya. Dasaradha was so great a warrior that he helped the gods to win a ferocious battle against their enemies. Prince Rama was the heir to the throne and was darling of people because of his lovable qualities and scholarly and philosophic and majestic personality. He treated the earthly world as mirage and treated only the beautiful world of holy gods as the real world . He was often engaged in great scholarly discussions with holy men about necessity of morality, piety, truthfulness and love during man's sojourn on this planet earth. He talked of philosophy though being the greatest warrior of his time. Even great sages and philosophers considered him as more learned than themselves. Many of them thought that such an extraordinary prince with a flair for combating evil doers must be having a special purpose for his life fixed by the gods. He subdued and eliminated many cruel and wicked princes and warlords who tormented ordinary people and behaved arrogantly and cruelly. He protected the weak ,poor and helpless people irrespective of race and caste. Above all he protected the ascetics who lived in forest hermitages and meditated for years on moral ,social and philosophical issues .In return the mighty hermits having great spiritual achievements taught great secrets of magical warfare to him. The great sage Viswamitra who could by himself create earths and heavens not only taught him world conquering “astras” ( magical weapons)but took him to a great competition in magical archery. By winning the competition he won the hand of the most beautiful princess Sita also. Princess Sita was the daughter of Janaka a great philosopher-king . ******* Lord Rama had three younger brothers who were also invincible warriors and heroic and gentle persons like him. They were the princes Laxmana, Bhratha and Shatrughna .The people and the nobles and entire royal family were agreed that the eldest of the princes prince Rama who was extremely talented, scholarly, brave and noble-minded should be the next king. With such whole-hearted support the old king announced one fine day that prince Rama would be next king. All were happy and the celebrations started. But prince Rama’s step mother got an evil idea that her own son prince Bharatha should become the next king. She suddenly reminded the old king about an old forgotten boon and asked him to honor it . The old king was a noble-hearted person never failing to fulfill his word. The queen heartlessly asked the king to make her son as the next king and to banish prince Rama to forests for fourteen years and also to order Prince Rama that he lead an ascetic’s life among hermits in the forests for all those years. The old king was shocked and being caught in a dilemma fell seriously ill and became unconscious. The heroic and philosophic minded prince Rama true to his noble character ,and to the consternation of everybody , announced without a moment’s hesitation that he would fulfill his stepmother’s wishes without the least delay and keep his father’s prestige unsullied. Prince Rama loved all his mothers like a child. He loved and respected his father just as passionately as he did in his childhood. He had the capacity to conquer entire universe and could have rebelled and brushed aside all the obstructions to his becoming king. But he was a divine minded philosopher and a noble and ascetic-like person. He did not react like an ordinary prince .His wife princess Sita too was as noble and pious minded as prince Rama .She loved prince Rama more than her own life. She loved him not because he was an invincible warrior or a Prince Charming but because of his ascetic saintly philosophic character . She insisted on accompanying him to forest. She said that royal life has no charm for her and that in her great husband’s presence the most fearful forest would be like heaven to her and that she herself would remove all the thorns and stones in the paths where her husband walked! Prince Laxmana (younger brother of Prince Rama and who accompanied him like a shadow) was also a great warrior and great conqueror. He could not bear the punishment meted out to his elder brother by the heartless queen Kaikeyi. He too insisted on accompanying his revered elder brother and sister in law to the forests to protect them. He too renounced palace life and accompanied prince Rama to the forest. Soon the mighty prince Bharatha ,for whom his mother created all the storm, returned from a visit to his maternal uncle. On hearing of the developments he became extremely angry and sad and tried even to kill his mother but was prevented by his brothers. He asked prince Rama to take back the throne. However prince Rama was not a person to change his decision and vowed to implement his mighty father’s promise and keep up his father’s prestige . He consoled and pacified everybody saying he would return from forests only after the full fourteen years. ******** The story has almost come to an end . But new difficulties arise.The most cruel and mighty king Ravana who heard of the great beauty of princess Sita decided to kidnap her. He was already angry with prince Rama who killed a number of his big generals for their evil deeds. He implements his plan of kidnapping the princess when princes Rama and Laxmana were away . He forcibly takes her in his magical chariot to his faraway island kingdom flying through the sky and imprisons her in the royal garden. However due to the divine powers of the holy princes Sita an invisible magical fire surrounds her and protects her every moment and Ravana was unable even to approach her.(The author of Ramayana Sage Valmiki says that gods deliberately created the incident of kidnapping of Princess Sita to provoke Lord Rama to eliminate the cruel king Ravana who was tormenting all the three worlds including the world of gods). Prince Rama on realizing that his beloved wife was kidnaped by the cruel and ferocious king felt extremely sad and dejected and was quite unable to bear her separation . Though being a calm philosophic person he became very agitated like any human being and seethed with anger saying that he would destroy the three worlds if princess Sita was not brought back to him safely. After some time he suppresses his grief and anger . He and prince Laxmana searched widely in the forest and soon befriended a king of the forest tribes . The king was all praise for prince Rama and was greatly impressed by prince Rama’s martial skills . He puts his huge armies at disposal of prince Rama and directed his generals to proceed to all corners of earth and search for the princess Sita. Prince Rama also befriends Hanuman a great and wise minister of the king . Hanuman was also one of the world’s greatest warriors and also a saintly person and becomes a lifelong friend and companion and admirer of Lord Rama. He helps Lord Rama in many ways—in finding whereabouts of princess Sita and helping in the later ferocious war with the cruel Ravana. With all this help lord Rama planned in detail to cross the sea channel and invade the cruel Ravana’s kingdom without any delay. Seeing Prince Rama’s anger even the mighty sea god was frightened . He suggests to prince Rama to arrange for dropping of millions of boulders and trees into the sea by the million strong army of the tribal king . The sea god created a strong floating bridge up to Ravana's kingdom . The cruel king Ravana's younger brother the pious Vibhishana who heard of the noble and divinely ascetic personality of prince Rama came over to lord Rama and asked for asylum . Vibhishana also reveals a great secret about a sure way to eliminate Ravana . King Ravana was a mighty warrior whom even the gods feared.Now king Ravana at last found a match in lord Rama . Lord Rama enters Ravana’s city and after a ferocious and prolonged war kills Ravana. Now prince Rama ,in a way shocking to all his admirers , refuses to accept princess Sita .The divine princess unable to bear this shocking unexpected treatment by her own godly husband jumps into a huge fire to kill herself. The fire god appears in his dazzling form, cools all the fires and personally escorts queen Sita to her husband saying to Lord Rama respectfully that there never lived a holier woman in universe than princess Sita. Only then prince Rama accepts her, travels to Ayodhya and becomes the king and emperor. He rules on earth for ten thousand years and rules in such a way that even the heavenly kingdom of gods was no match for Lord Rama’s Ayodhya.