काव्ये विश्वासटिप्पन्यः | 2016-04-06__80

[[Mohan K.V 2016-04-06, 20:41:33 Source]]

सदास्वादः

भवान् इन्द्रद्युम्नं राजानम् अभिजानाति [?]

(bhavān indradyumnaṃ rājānam abhijānāti ?)

Meaning

“Do you remember King Indradyumna?” Well, who wants to know?

Context

This chapter’s phrase is from the Vana-parva of the Mahābhārata [sarga 191 in the BORI critical edition, 199 in the Gorakhpur edition, and 198 in K. M. Ganguli’s translation]. In their initial days of exile in the forest, the Pāṇḍavas meet a number of sages, and Yudhiṣṭhira delights in hearing tales from them. They meet the sage Mārkaṇḍeya, who was famed to be immortal, and very old.

मार्कण्डेयम् ऋषयः पाण्डवाश् च पर्यपृच्छन्, “अस्ति कश्चिद् भवतश् चिर-जात-तर?” इति

mārkaṇḍeyam ṛṣayaḥ pāṇḍavāḥ ca paryapṛcchan, “asti kaścid bhavataḥ cira-jāta-taraḥ?” iti

“The Pāṇḍavas and the ṛṣis asked Mārkaṇdeya, ‘Is there anyone older than you?’”

Note that this section is one of the relatively rare prose portions of the Mahābhārata. Mārkaṇḍeya replied:

अस्ति खलु राजर्षिर् इन्द्रद्युम्नो नाम क्षीण-पुण्यस् त्रिदिवात् प्रच्युतः “कीर्तिस् ते व्युच्छिन्ना” इति ।

स माम् उपातिष्ठत्, “अथ प्रत्यभिजानाति मां भवान्?” इति

asti khalu rājarṣiḥ indradyumnaḥ nāma kṣīṇa-puṇyaḥ tridivāt pracyutaḥ “kīrtiḥ te vyucchinnā” iti |

sa mām upātiṣṭhat, “atha pratyabhijānāti māṃ bhavān?” iti

“Yes indeed! There is a saintly king by name Indra-dyumna. His puṇya ran out, and he was thrown out of heaven, [being told] ‘Your fame is all gone’.

He approached me, and asked, “Sir, do you recognize me?”

There’s a lot going on behind these telegraphic words! We recall how svarga, heaven, is supposed to work. One does good deeds, earns puṇya, and after one’s death, one rises to heaven to enjoy one’s earnings. Each day in heaven uses up some puṇya. After one’s account is empty, one comes back to earth to earn more of it, and the cycle continues. We’d earlier seen some far-sighted real estate investments being planned on the basis of this mechanism.

When exactly does one’s residence permit in svarga expire? As long as one’s kīrti—‘fame’—exists, as long as someone remembers one’s good deeds, one is good to stay. Unfortunately, the system has determined Indradyumna to be at risk of being forgotten. He has been sent down to earth, and has been asked to find at least one person who remembers him and his good deeds. If he can, he can return to heaven. If not, he has to remain on earth. He considers his situation: he had done so much good in his life on earth that he spent a very long time in heaven; almost everyone he knows is dead now. Whom can he ask? He hits upon an idea: how about asking an old-timer, like Mārkaṇḍeya, who is also famed to be immortal?

[Some quick notes on the style. Note the simplistic sentence structure, which in our modern eyes we see as almost telegraphic. The sentence cannot even be translated to any modern regional language without adding clarifying linguistic elements for context. Even then, the cultural context needs to be added and explained separately. The Sanskrit original almost appears to be a compressed code of sorts, highly contextual and dense.]

To Indradyumna’s question, Mārkaṇḍeya replies:

कार्य-चेष्टाकुलत्वात् न वयं वासायनिकाः । ग्रामैक-रात्र-वासिनो न प्रत्यभिजानीमो अप्यात्मनो ऽर्थानाम् अनुष्ठानम् । न शरीरोपतापेन आत्मनः समारभामहे ऽर्थानाम् अनुष्ठानम् ।

kārya-ceṣṭā-ākulatvāt na vayaṃ vāsāyanikāḥ | grāmaika-rātra-vāsinaḥ na pratyabhijānīmaḥ api ātmanaḥ arthānām anuṣṭhānam | na śarīra-upatāpena ātmanaḥ samārabhāmahe arthānām anuṣṭhānam |

“We don’t mingle with the public because we’re occupied with work. [As to remembering your good deeds], We live just one night in any village, and don’t even remember our own deeds. Our vratas have weakened our body and we can barely perform any good deeds ourselves.”

Tough luck there, but one probably could have seen it coming: an immortal being surely can’t be expected to pay a lot of attention to the transient flappings of fireflies. If the triviality of 24×7 news stresses us out, imagine poor Mārkaṇḍeya’s fate! It’s heartening though to note that he’s keeping himself busy, and complains of aches and pains just like us. :-)

[‘vāsāyanika’ is literally ‘house-way-person’, ‘one who goes from house to house’. Here and in the rest of the essay, abhijānāti/pratyabhijānāti can mean both ‘recognize’ and ‘remember’. We sense a difference between the English words, but the same word is used for both in Sanskrit, with a number of implications for meaning.]

Mārkaṇḍeya could have just ended it here, but he’s a good-hearted fellow and wants to help. After thinking a bit, an idea strikes him:

अस्ति खलु हिमवति प्रावारकर्णो नाम उलूकः । स मत्तः चिरजातो भवन्तं यदि जानीयात् । इतः प्रकृष्टे चाध्वनि हिमवान् । तत्रासौ प्रतिवसति ।

asti khalu himavati prāvāra-karṇaḥ nāma ulūkaḥ | sa mattaḥ cirajātaḥ bhavantaṃ yadi jānīyāt | itaḥ prakṛṣṭe ca adhvani himavān | tatrāsau prativasati |

“In the Himālayas, there lives an owl by name Prāvāra-karṇa. He is older than me, and may remember you. But the Himālayas are a long way from here, and he’s there…”

Poor Indradyumna is desperate. Mārkaṇḍeya tells the Pāṇḍavas,

स माम् अश्वो भूत्वा तत्र आवहद् यत्र बभूव उलूकः । अथैनं स राजर्षिः पर्यपृच्छत् “प्रत्यभिजानाति मां भवान्?” इति ।

sa mām aśvaḥ bhūtvā tatra āvahad yatra babhūva ulūkaḥ | atha enaṃ sa rājarṣiḥ paryapṛcchat “pratyabhijānāti māṃ bhavān?” iti |

“Indradyumna took the form of a horse, and took me to the owl right away. He asked it, ‘Do you recognize me?’”

The owl thinks for a minute, but alas, it can’t remember. Indradyumna must have been before its time. But it knows someone who might: it tells him that far away in the eastern coast near modern-day Puri, there is a lake by name Indradyumna-sara. Near the lake lives a crane by name Nāḍī-jaṅgha, who is older than any of them. He might remember… Indradyumna immediately takes Mārkaṇḍeya and the owl across the country to visit the crane. His urgency is palpable!

They find the crane and ask it the same question. Alas, Indradyumna’s time was before even the crane’s, and it can’t seem to recognize him. But the crane knows of a tortoise, Akūpāra, who’s older than even him, and thankfully for the travel budget it lives in the same lake. Maybe it knows?

This whole series reminds us of asking for directions on an Indian village road… the willingness of random people to help is a wonderful feeling.

ततः स बकः तम् अकूपारं कच्छपं विज्ञापयामास — “अस्त्यस्माकम् अभिप्रेतं भवन्तं कञ्चिद् अर्थम् अभिप्रष्टुम् । साध्वागम्यतां तावद्” इति

tataḥ sa bakaḥ tam akūpāraṃ kacchapaṃ vijñāpayāmāsa — “asti asmākam abhipretaṃ bhavantaṃ kañcid artham abhipraṣṭum | sādhu āgamyatāṃ tāvad” iti

“The crane then requested Akūpāra, ‘There is something we’d like to ask of you. Please come out.’”

The respectfulness of the question is nicely brought out. Literally, it is, “We have an intent to ask you something”. In English, there appears to be a gentleness gradient: “Do X” < “We would like you to do X” < “Please do X” < “Could you please do X?” < “We would be grateful if you could please do X” < … we wonder if the ordering is similar for everyone, and how far the sequence can go.

Akūpāra slowly comes out, and they all ask him the question: does he recognize Indradyumna? As they wait with bated breath:

स मुहूर्तं ध्यात्वा बाष्प-पूर्ण-नयन उद्विग्न-हृदयो वेपमानो विसंज्ञ-कल्पः प्राञ्जलिः अब्रवीत्, “किम् अहम् एनं न प्रत्यभिजानामि ! इह ह्यनेन सहस्र-कृत्वश् चितिषु यूपा आहिताः । सरश्चेदम् अस्य दक्षिणा-दत्ताभिर् गोभिर् अतिक्रममाणाभिः कृतम् । अत्र चाहं प्रतिवसामि” इति ॥

sa muhūrtaṃ dhyātvā bāṣpa-pūrṇa-nayanaḥ udvigna-hṛdayaḥ vepamānaḥ visaṃjña-kalpaḥ prāñjaliḥ abravīt, “kim aham enaṃ na pratyabhijānāmi! iha hi anena sahasra-kṛtvaḥ citiṣu yūpāḥ āhitāḥ | saraḥ ca idam asya dakṣiṇā-dattābhiḥ gobhiḥ atikramamāṇābhiḥ kṛtam | atra ca ahaṃ prativasāmi” iti ||

“The tortoise paused for a minute. Its eyes filled with tears, its heart shook, its whole body trembled, and it almost seemed to faint. It folded its little hands and said, “How can I not recognize him! In this very place, he laid the pillars for a thousand yajñas! This lake was formed when the massive herd of cows that he gave away as charity passed this way. I have been living here ever since.”

What a description! As important as the recollection of the fact of the charity is the feeling of gratitude of the tortoise. The actions of one person making the life of another a bit better — there is no other good than this.

[Some grammar notes: kṛtvas is an interesting particle. It is always suffixed to a number, to mean ‘x-times’. ‘Namo namaste’stu sahasra-kṛtvaḥ’ ‘I salute you a thousand times’. Note how few verbs are used in Akūpāra’s lines, and instead how samāsas carry the full weight of the meaning. Even when verbs are used, they are in very simple moods. All nouns are in very simple forms.]

As soon as Akūpāra says this, all of Indradyumna’s problems are resolved:

अथैतत् कच्छपेनोदाहृतं श्रुत्वा समनन्तरं देवलोकाद् देवरथः प्रादुर् आसीत् | वाचश् च अश्रूयन्त इन्द्रद्युम्नं प्रति, “प्रस्तुतस् ते स्वर्गः । यथोचितं स्थानम् अभिपद्यस्व । कीर्तिमान् असि। अव्यग्रो याहि” इति ।

“As soon as the tortoise spoke thus, a chariot from heaven appeared. A voice spoke to Indradyumna, ‘Svarga is yours and ready. Accept your rightful place. You have kīrti; go forth without hindrance!’”

Right on! Note how the pivotal qualification appears to be, ‘You have kīrti’, which is spoken with a sense of finality, ‘When it is clear you have that, nothing more needs to be said, all doubts have been resolved’. It is commonly translated as ‘fame’, but that word is too diffuse to capture the specific kind of ‘remembered-ness’ exemplified here. ‘Fame’ has connotations of a large public being aware of someone in a somewhat impersonal way; kīrti, and its cousins like kīrtaka, kīrtanā, and kīrtita are more about fond, personal remembrance.

Indradyumna is grateful, and bids goodbye to the tortoise and crane. He then makes sure the two travel-weary old-timers, the owl and Mārkaṇḍeya, get back home safe, and makes his way to heaven. In a later birth, Indradyumna becomes the famous elephant involved in the story of Gajendra-mokṣa.

A summary verse of sorts is presented:

दिवं स्पृशति भूमिं वा शब्दः पुण्यस्य कर्मणः |

यावत् स शब्दो भवति तावत् पुरुष उच्यते ||

divaṃ spṛśati bhūmiṃ vā śabdaḥ puṇyasya karmaṇaḥ |

yāvat sa śabdo bhavati tāvat puruṣa ucyate ||

“Till talk of his good deeds remains in heaven or earth, a man lives.”

The sincere student that he unquestionably was, Yudhiṣṭhira learnt the lesson well. He used the exact same verse as an answer in the Yakṣa-praśna a little while later.

We think the story and its allegorical truth reaches much farther than is apparent at the surface. There are innumerable Mahābhāratas happening every day in our societies, our families, even our very bodies. A child’s school test is a deadly Yakṣa-praśnā; a seasonal allergy a great civil war that guffaws at the Kurukṣetra; a Whatsapp message a veritable Kṛṣṇa-sanḍhāna that just might avert the destruction of a clan. One desperately searches for a poet, for a Vyāsa, or even an Akūpāra, to recall them, “hold them up to the light like a color slide”, blow the dust off the surface to reveal their angularities, pluck gently to feel their tensions, … in short, celebrate them, lest they be lost forever to the blackness of time.

Parting Thought

In the Kaṭhopanisad, after Naciketa asks Yama for the secret of death, Yama tries to evade the question, and instead offers consolations of chariots, wealth, and entertainment. The young Naciketa spectacularly snubs him, saying,

‘tavaiva vāhas tava nṛtya-gīte…lapsyāmahe vittam adrākṣma cet tvā? jiviṣyāmo yāvad īṣiśyasi tvam? ’

‘Keep your [silly] cart, song and dance to yourself!… What does it mean to gain wealth when Death is in sight? What does ‘living’ even mean when you still rule?’

[lit. “[Sure], we will acquire wealth, having seen you. We will live as you rule”, the sarcasm is biting!]

Yama is very pleased with the child’s resolve, and as he begins to explain the secret, he remarks:

नैषा तर्केण मतिर् आपनेया

प्रोक्तान्येनैव सुज्ञानाय प्रेष्ठ ।

यां त्वम् आपः सत्य-धृतिः बतासि

तादृक् नो भूयात् नचिकेतः प्रष्टा ॥ 1.2.9

naiṣā tarkeṇa matir āpaneyā

proktā anyena eva sujñānāya preṣṭha |

yāṃ tvam āpaḥ satya-dhṛtiḥ bata asi

tādṛk naḥ bhūyāt naciketaḥ praṣṭā ||

“This mindset can’t be acquired from logic or argument.

My dear one, it can only be taught by another way [or person, thing, …].

You have got it, by holding fast to the truth.

May we find an inquirer like you, Naciketa!”

If Yama, who talks to literally every living being, feels this way, any teacher can console himself for the perennial lack of truly interested students, as can any author for his thin readership! As with Bhavabhūti, the hope is simply, utpatsyate tu mama ko ‘pi samānadharmā, kālo hyayaṃ niravadhiḥ vipulā ca pṛthvī – “One day, there will arise someone who will truly know me: this world is vast, and time infinite.”

This is also an apt complement to the Indradyumna story: one needs poets and people who can remember, no doubt; but one also needs someone to ask and listen with interest.

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