MAHABHARATA

The innermost narrative kernel of the Mahābhārata tells the story of two sets of paternal
first cousins—the five sons of the deceased king Pāṇḍu (the five Pāṇḍavas) and the one hundred
sons of blind King Dhṛtarāṣṭra (the 100 hundred Dhārtarāṣṭras)—who became bitter rivals, and
opposed each other in war for possession of the ancestral Bharata kingdom with its capital in the
"City of the Elephant," Hāstinapura, on the Gaṅgā river in north central India. What is
dramatically interesting within this simple opposition is the large number of individual agendas
the many characters pursue, and the numerous personal conflicts, ethical puzzles, subplots, and
plot twists that give the story a strikingly powerful development.

The five sons of Pāṇḍu were actually fathered by five Gods (sex was mortally dangerous
for Pāṇḍu, because of a curse) and these heroes were assisted throughout the story by various
Gods, seers, and brahmins, including the seer Kṛṣṇa Dvaipāyana Vyāsa (who later became the
author of the epic poem telling the whole of this story), who was also their actual grandfather (he
had engendered Pāṇḍu and the blind Dhṛtarāṣṭra upon their nominal father's widows in order to
preserve the lineage). The one hundred Dhārtarāṣṭras, on the other hand, had a grotesque,
demonic birth, and are said more than once in the text to be human incarnations of the demons
who are the perpetual enemies of the Gods. The most dramatic figure of the entire Mahābhārata,
however, is Kṛṣṇa, son of Vasudeva of the tribe of Andhaka Vṛṣṇis, located in the city of
Dvārakā in the far west, near the ocean. His name is, thus Kṛṣṇa Vāsudeva. But he also a human
instantiation of the supreme God Vāsudeva-Nārāyaṇa-Viṣṇu descended to earth in human form
to rescue Law, Good Deeds, Right, Virtue and Justice (all of these words refer to different facets
of "dharma," the “firm-holding” between the ethical quality of an action and the quality of its
future fruits for the doer). Kṛṣṇa Vāsudeva was also a cousin to both Bhārata phratries, but he
was a friend and advisor to the Pāṇḍavas, became the brother-in-law of Arjuna Pāṇḍava, and
served as Arjuna's mentor and charioteer in the great war. Kṛṣṇa Vāsudeva is portrayed several
times as eager to see the purgative war occur, and in many ways the Pāṇḍavas were his human
instruments for fulfilling that end.

The Dhārtarāṣṭra party behaved viciously and brutally toward the Pāṇḍavas in many
ways, from the time of their early youth onward. Their malice displayed itself most dramatically
when they took advantage of the eldest Pāṇḍava, Yudhiṣṭhira (who had by now become the
universal ruler of the land) in a game of dice: The Dhārtarāṣṭras 'won' all his brothers, himself,
and even the Pāṇḍavas' common wife Draupadī (who was an incarnation of the richness and
productivity of the Goddess "Earthly-and-Royal Splendor," Śrī) they humiliated all the Pāṇḍavas
and physically abused Draupadī; they drove the Pāṇḍava party into the wilderness for twelve
years, and the twelve years had to be followed by the Pāṇḍavas' living somewhere in society, in
disguise, without being discovered, for one more year.
 The Pāṇḍavas fulfilled their part of that bargain, but the villainous leader of the
Dhārtarāṣṭra party, Duryodhana, was unwilling to restore the Pāṇḍavas to their half of the
kingdom when the thirteen years had expired. Both sides then called upon their many allies and
two large armies arrayed themselves on 'Kuru's Field' (Kuru was one of the eponymous ancestors
of the clan), eleven divisions in the army of Duryodhana against seven divisions for Yudhiṣṭhira.
Much of the action in the Mahābhārata is accompanied by discussion and debate among various
interested parties, and the most famous sermon of all time, Kṛṣṇa Vāsudeva's ethical lecture
accompanied by a demonstration of his divinity to his charge Arjuna (the justly famous
Bhagavad Gītā) occurred in the Mahābhārata just prior to the commencement of the hostilities of
the war. Several of the important ethical and theological themes of the Mahābhārata are tied
together in this sermon, and this "Song of the Blessed One" has exerted much the same sort of
powerful and far-reaching influence in Indian Civilization that the New Testament has in
Christendom. The Pāṇḍavas won the eighteen day battle, but it was a victory that deeply troubled
all except those who were able to understand things on the divine level (chiefly Kṛṣṇa, Vyāsa,
and Bhīṣma, the Bharata patriarch who was emblematic of the virtues of the era now passing
away). The Pāṇḍavas' five sons by Draupadī, as well as Bhīmasena Pāṇḍava's and Arjuna
Pāṇḍava's two sons by two other mothers (respectively, the young warriors Ghaṭotkaca and
Abhimanyu, were all tragic victims in the war. Worse perhaps, the Pāṇḍava victory was won by
the Pāṇḍavas slaying, in succession, four men who were quasi-fathers to them: Bhīṣma, their
teacher Droṇa, Karṇa (who was, though none of the Pāṇḍavas knew it, the first born, pre-marital,
son of their mother), and their maternal uncle Śalya (all four of these men were, in succession,
'supreme commander' of Duryodhana's army during the war). Equally troubling was the fact that
the killing of the first three of these 'fathers,' and of some other enemy warriors as well, was
accomplished only through 'crooked stratagems' (jihmopāyas), most of which were suggested by
Kṛṣṇa Vāsudeva as absolutely required by the circumstances.

The ethical gaps were not resolved to anyone's satisfaction on the surface of the narrative
and the aftermath of the war was dominated by a sense of horror and malaise. Yudhiṣṭhira alone
was terribly troubled, but his sense of the war's wrongfulness persisted to the end of the text, in
spite of the fact that everyone else, from his wife to Kṛṣṇa Vāsudeva, told him the war was right
and good; in spite of the fact that the dying patriarch Bhīṣma lectured him at length on all aspects
of the Good Law (the Duties and Responsibilities of Kings, which have rightful violence at their
center; the ambiguities of Righteousness in abnormal circumstances; and the absolute
perspective of a beatitude that ultimately transcends the oppositions of good versus bad, right
versus wrong, pleasant versus unpleasant, etc.); in spite of the fact that he performed a grand
Horse Sacrifice as expiation for the putative wrong of the war. These debates and instructions
and the account of this Horse Sacrifice are told at some length after the massive and grotesque
narrative of the battle; they form a deliberate tale of pacification that aims to neutralize the
inevitable miasma of the war.
 In the years that follow the war Dhṛtarāṣṭra and his queen Gāndhārī, and Kuntī the mother
of the Pāṇḍavas, lived a life of asceticism in a forest retreat and died with yogic calm in a forest
fire. Kṛṣṇa Vāsudeva and his always unruly clan slaughtered each other in a drunken brawl
thirty-six years after the war, and Kṛṣṇa's soul dissolved back into the Supreme God Viṣṇu
(Kṛṣṇa had been born when a part of Nārāyaṇa-Viṣṇu took birth in the womb of Kṛṣṇa's mother).
When they learned of this, the Pāṇḍavas believed it time for them to leave this world too and
they embarked upon the 'Great Journey,' which involved walking north toward the polar
mountain,that is toward the heavenly worlds, until one's body dropped dead. One by one
Draupadī and the younger Pāṇḍavas died along the way until Yudhiṣṭhira was left alone with a
dog that had followed him all the way. Yudhiṣṭhira made it to the gate of heaven and there
refused the order to drive the dog back, at which point the dog was revealed to be an incarnate
form of the God Dharma (also known as Yama, the Lord of the Dead, the God who was
Yudhiṣṭhira's actual, physical father), who was there to test the quality of Yudhiṣṭhira's virtue
before admitting him to heaven. Once in heaven Yudhiṣṭhira faced one final test of his virtue: He
saw only the Dhārtarāṣṭras in heaven, and he was told that his brothers were in hell. He insisted
on joining his brothers in hell, if that be the case. It was then revealed that they were really in
heaven, that this illusion had been one final test for him. So ends the Mahābhārata!

SUMMARY

Some fourteen centuries B.C. the king of a northern Indian nation dies, leaving five sons,
all the offspring of gods. in the care of his blind brother, who succeeds him. Although the five
princes are raised along with the blind king's one hundred sons, a fierce jealousy grows among
the cousins. Yudhishthir, oldest of the five, is the rightful heir to the throne, but Duryodhan,
oldest of the hundred, is very ambitious and wants the crown for himself. His devious tricks lead
eventually to the great war which climaxes the epic.
Arjun, Yudhishthir's younger brother, is a skilled archer and receives armor and weapons
from the gods. Each brother is skilled in some area, but in spite of their regal birth and divine
lineage, the five princes and their mother spend much of their lives in exile. Duryodhan drives
them from the palace and attempts to burn them in their small home, but they escape and
disguise themselves as hermit priests. In this guise, and through Arjun's skill in archery, they win
the hand of the beautiful princess Draupadi, who marries Yudhishthir. With her powerful father
behind them. the brothers force Duryodhan to give them their inheritance. He divides the
kingdom, giving Yudhishthir the richest portion.
After his ritualistic coronation. Yudhishthir becomes a powerful and benevolent king. He
is well-loved, but has a fatal weakness gambling. Duryodhan exploits this weakness by sending
an emissary with loaded dice, who wins Yudhishthir's crown, lands, wealth, brothers, and wife
Draupadi. Yudhishthir himself has to become a slave to pay his debt. Duryodhan greatly insults
Draupadi, but his father, the blind former king, grants her three wishes in an attempt to make up
for his son's rudeness. She asks for the freedom of her husband and his brothers and Duryodhan
grants i n condition that they go intoexile.
For twelve years the five brothers and Draupadi live as hermits in the forest. During the
thirteenth year they conceal them- selves as servants in the household of a powerful neighboring
king. On one occasion. during the king's absence. Duryodhan's soldiers raid his cattle. The prince
is unable to protect his father's property, but the five brothers come to his aid and drive the
soldiers out. When they reveal their identities the king, in gratitude, gives his daughter in
marriage to Arjun's son.
Gathered for the wedding, the leaders and elders from neighboring kingdoms support
Yudhishthir's claim to his former throne. He petitions Duryodhan to return it to him now that the
specified terms of the exile have been fulfilled. Duryodhan refuses.
Both Yudhishthir and Duryodhan now enlist allies from neighboring kingdoms and
prepare for a monumental war. As they are drawn up for battle, the god Krishna appears to Arjun
and attempts to answer his questions about the validity of war. This is the section of the poem
known as the Bhagavad Gita.
After eighteen days of slaughter, Yudhishthir is victorious and resumes his position as
king. However, many of his friends and kinsmen, including Arjun's son, have been killed, and
the victory is a hollow one.