Episode 18 - Arjun Slept Here

Episode 18 - This is a longer, pithy episode, covering the way the brothers decided to prevent future conflicts over their shared wife, and Arjun's subsequent adventures when he breaches those rules.  Despite the punishment he receives for breaking the oath he swore, Arjun ended up having a lot of adventures and getting to know a lot of hot princesses around India.  Draupadi would have been better off keeping him closer to home!

So Arjun ends up coming back from his year-long exile with a new wife-- Krishna's sister-- and leaving a trail of baby boys across the sub-continent.  After his return home, he and Krishna spend a lot of time together in Indraprastha, and we are told that they are the re-incarnation of the ancient seers Nar and Narayan.

While they are hanging out together, Krishna suggests that they go to the river for a kind of picnic, and while they are there, Agni the god of fire meets them and requests their aid in burning down the Khandava Forest, which was the home of Taksaka the snake and under the protection of Indra.

Arjun and Krishna get some cool new weapons as part of the deal.  Arjun gets the famous Ghandiva Bow and an inexhaustible quiver of arrows. Krishna gets his Sudarshana discus.  The pair of friends then help the Fire God to burn down the forest, fighting off legions of magical creatures and even an army of Gods.

It is interesting that Arjun's marriage to Subhadra was in large part the result of Krishna's suggestions.  I also noticed that the pair were sitting near the forest where they could meet the Fire God due to Krishna's suggestion that they have a picnic.  I'm going to keep score on this and we'll see just how much of this story moves along due to Krishna's well-placed suggestions!  It's going to be a lot!!!

This episode actually covers the end of  Book 1 of the Mahabharata, called the Book of the Beginning.  There are 18 books in total, and we'll start Book 2 next time, which is called the Book of the Assembly Hall.

In case you were not able to figure it out, I did start using some of the alternate names for Krishna and Arjun in this story. Some of Krishna's alternate names are: Vasudev & Madhusudana.  I refer to Arjun as Partha, Dhananjaya, and Gudakesha.

Episode 12 - Krishna at Play

Episode 12 - We finally get started with Krishna.  His mother and father were both of the house of Yadu in Mathura-- Krishna's mother Devaki was King Ugrasena's daughter.  Unfortunately, Devaki's brother, Crown Prince Kamsa was a bad guy, and he got an early warning that his sister's eighth child would be the death of him.  After a palace coup, King Kamsa threw Devaki and Vasudeva into prison and killed their first six babies as soon as they were born.

The seventh child, Balaram, was magically transported into the womb of Rohini-- Vasudevas other wife living in Vraja with the Gopas.  Unlike Balaram, Krishna managed to be born in his natural mother's womb, but was secretly exchanged with the Gopa chieftain's daughter within hours of their birth.  As far as anyone could tell, Krishna was born to the Gopi Yashoda, and Devaki had a daughter who was killed by Kamsa as soon as she was discovered.

So, while Krishna and Balaram are technically full brothers, it appeared as if they were unrelated, and Krishna was simply the son of a cowherder chieftain.  This arrangement worked well in keeping him hidden from Kamsa, but it must have been tricky convincing everyone that he really had royal blood and wasn't just some low-caste nobody!  We'll see how he pulls this off in later episodes.

The Bhagavata Purana is so utterly dazzled by Krishna's divinity that these everyday practicalities seem to fade out in the glare, but I'll try to keep a lookout for how the mundane folks around him-- those who did not recognize his divinity-- tried to make sense of his story and his position in society.

I have to admit that so far Balaram is a bit of a cipher to me.  We are told that he is the avatara of Adisesha, who is the Cosmic Snake; Vishnu's pal.  Somehow Adisesha appears as himself when Vasudeva makes his journey with Krishna to Vraja, but Balram was already a child at the time.  Later, we are told that Balaram and Krishna are equally avataras of Vishnu.  Hopefully we'll be able to untangle this riddle as we go along.  So far, I admit that I don't quite get it!

If anyone can explain to me how Balaram relates to Krishna, I'd love to hear it.  I'll try to come up with an analysis of the two characters as we move further along into the story.  They make an amazing contrast, often taking opposite sides on important issues.