The Ramayana Read online

  With a sigh, knowing what the consequences of this boon would be, Brahma said, “So be it,” and vanished.

  Ravana’s triumphant roar echoed through the world. The Himalaya trembled; the sea rose in hilly waves and dashed against the shores of Bharatavarsha. Of course, the Rakshasa had thought it beneath his dignity to ask for invincibility against the puny race of men. For which mortal man could hope to threaten awesome Ravana’s life? He was certain that now he was immortal.

  And quickly, with his two boons, the Demon became sovereign of all he surveyed. For long ages he ruled, and darkness spread …

  PROLOGUE

  Hanuman could see into the little cloister from his leafy perch. He saw Sita shiver, when she knew the Lord of Lanka had arrived. Quickly she covered her body with her hands. Like frightened birds, her eyes flew this way and that, avoiding Ravana’s smoldering gaze as he came and stood, tall and ominous, before her.

  He drank deeply of the sight of her. He did not appear to notice how disheveled she was, or the dirt that streaked her tear-stained face. Before him, Ravana, master of the earth, saw his hopes, his life, his heaven and hell; and, if he had known it, his death as well. She stared dully at the bare ground on which she sat. She was like a branch, blossom-laden, but cut away from her mother tree and sorrowing on the ground.

  Ravana fetched a sigh. In his voice like sleepy thunder he said, “Whenever I come here, you try to hide your beauty with your hands. But for me, any part of you I see is absolutely beautiful. Honor my love, Sita, and you will discover how deep and true it is. My life began when I first saw you and yet you are so cruel to me.”

  She said nothing, never looked up at him. Hanuman, little monkey in his tree, sat riveted by what he saw and heard. Ravana’s eyes roved over her slender form, and they blazed. He whispered, “Sita, give yourself to me! I will love you as women only dream of being loved. Rule my heart, rule me, and be queen of all the earth. We will walk hand in hand in this asokavana, just we two, and you will know what happiness is.”

  But again she set a long blade of grass between herself and him, like a sword. She said, “I am another man’s wife, Rakshasa. How can you even think of me as becoming yours, when I am already given? Not just for this lifetime, but forever, for all the lives that have been, and all those to come. I have always belonged to Rama and always will. You have so many women in your harem. Don’t you hide them from the lustful gazes of other men? How is it, then, you cannot conceive that I would be true to my Rama? That it is natural for me, because I love him.”

  He looked away from her. Not that he saw anything except her face, even when he did; but he could not bear what she said, which was so savage and so true. He had never encountered such chastity, and to believe in it would mean denying everything he had lived for. Ravana turned his gaze away from her and a smile curved his dark lips.

  Undaunted, Sita continued, “You court doom for yourself and your kingdom. Have you no wise men in your court to advise you against your folly?”

  He laughed. “They all know I am a law unto myself. They know I am invincible.”

  “You have violated dharma; punishment will come to you more swiftly than you think. You don’t know Rama. He is not what you imagine him to be. You speak of this sea being an obstacle between him and me. But I say to you, Ravana, even if the ocean of stars lay between us my Rama would come to find me.”

  BOOK ONE

  BALA KANDA

  {The beginning}

  1. On the banks of the river Tamasa

  “Holy One, I wonder if any man born into the world was blessed with every virtue by your Father in heaven.”

  Long ago, the sage Valmiki sat meditating in his hermitage on the banks of the Tamasa. The river murmured along beside the dark, gaunt rishi, whose hair hung down to his shoulders in thick dreadlocks. But otherwise the secluded place was silent; not even birds sang, lest they disturb Valmiki’s dhyana.

  Suddenly the silence was shattered; the air came alive with the abandoned plucking of a vina. A clear voice sang of the Blue God who lies on his serpent bed, upon eternal waters. Valmiki’s eyes flew open. Though he had never seen him before, he had a good idea who his visitor was.

  Narada, the wanderer, was Brahma’s son, born from his pristine thought in time out of mind. A curse had been laid on Narada before the earth was made: that he would roam the worlds without rest. Once he sent his brother Daksha’s sons, who wanted to create the first races of men, on an impossible quest. He had asked them how they could become creators unless they first saw the ends of the universe. And Daksha cursed Narada to wander forever homeless and restless himself, for the endless wandering he sent those children on.

  A fine aura enveloped Narada. Valmiki’s disciples stood gaping at him, until their master called briskly to them. Then they ran to fetch arghya, milk and honey, for the guest, who accepted their offering graciously.

  Valmiki folded his hands. “Be seated, Maharishi.”

  Valmiki sat beside the hermit from heaven, by the languid Tamasa. As if he sought something, Narada stared up and down the river’s course, while Valmiki sat absorbed.

  Narada strummed a fluid phrase on his vina. “A blessing, dear Valmiki, for your thoughts!”

  Valmiki laughed. “Muni, you are as subtle as Vayu the Wind. You can enter men’s minds and read their thoughts; and surely mine as well.” He paused, then declared, “Holy One, I wonder if any man born into the world was blessed with all the virtues by your Father in heaven.”

  “Tell me what the virtues are, and I will tell you the man who has them.”

  Valmiki began in his inward way, enunciating each attribute carefully: “Integrity, bravery, righteousness, gratitude, dedication to his beliefs, a flawless character, compassion for all the living, learning, skill, beauty, courage beyond bravery, radiance, control over his anger and his desires, serenity, a lack of envy, and valor to awe Indra’s Devas.” As Narada’s eyes grew wistful, Valmiki continued. “I know I am asking for perfection in a mere mortal. But I wondered if a man of this world could have all these, which not even the Gods possess.” The sage was convinced his perfect man could only be the figment of a romantic imagination.

  Narada still gazed out over the river’s crisp currents, as if the water on which the noon sun sparkled could conjure the image of Valmiki’s paragon. At last he said softly, “In these very times such a man was born into the world. His name is Rama.”

  Narada beckoned to Valmiki’s disciples to come closer as he began his story, as if it was a secret that not the jungle behind them nor their thatched huts on its hem should share, so precious was it. Weaving his tale into the river’s drift, Narada began the legend of Rama, prince of Ayodhya, who was as noble as the sea is deep, as powerful as Mahavishnu, whose Avatara he was when the treta yuga was upon the world, as steadfast as the Himalaya, handsome as Soma the Moon God, patient as the Earth, generous as Kubera, just as Dharma; but his rage if roused like the fire at the end of time. His audience sat entranced, as heedless of the time that passed as they were of the flowing river. Valmiki sat in the lotus posture with his eyes shut, to listen to the tale of a human prince who was as immaculate as the stars.

  The Tamasa turned dark with dusk, but the disciples sat entranced. Never before had they heard such a story. Twilight turned to night; the moon rose over the river. Narada’s legend was of a living man. But he did not speak about Ramarajya, when a perfect kshatriya ruled Ayodhya as the world’s very heart, but of a time before Rama became king, the bitter time of his exile. It was those years in the wilderness that left such an indelible impression upon the memory of the race of men.

  Moonlight turned to darkness, and darkness to scarlet dawn on the susurrant eddies of the Tamasa, when Narada finished his epic of Rama. There was not a dry eye among his listeners at what finally befell the exquisite Sita. Valmiki’s disciples saw even their master wept.

  Narada broke his trance; he stretched his ageless body and rose. With an airy wave, he was off again
, plucking on his vina. Yawning, the disciples set about their daily tasks: fetching water and kindling the morning fires. But Valmiki stood a long time staring after Narada.

  2. A curse

  Long after Narada’s visit to his asrama, the story of Rama haunted Valmiki. Months after he heard the legend he saw images of Rama’s life before his eyes, whenever he shut them to meditate.

  One morning, Valmiki walked along the banks of the Tamasa with his youngest disciple. Spring was in the air, abundant and heady. The sage saw the river was sparklingly clear, and decided to bathe in it. He sat dipping his feet in the jeweled flow and a fine languor stole over him. He said to his boy of sixteen summers, “Look, child, the water is like the heart of a rishi.”

  The serene youth handed his master the valkala, the tree bark with which to scrub himself. Above them, a kadamba spread its awning, and in the living branches they heard the sweetest song: two krauncha birds were mating there, abandoned to spring’s fever. The male danced around his mate, fluttering his wings dizzily when he hopped onto her back. A smile on his lips, Valmiki leaned back to watch the ritual of love. On and off his mate the male krauncha danced, his joyful song setting the leaves alight; and she sang her ecstasy.

  Suddenly, the air was riven by a vicious whistling. An arrow flew savagely to its mark. With a scream, the male krauncha fell off his mate’s back and down to the ground below. His breast was a mess of blood and broken feathers; the arrow still stuck in him like a monstrous curse. For a few moments his little body heaved in agony; then he was gone. The shocked silence of the woodland was broken by the screams of the she bird.

  Valmiki sprang to his feet, trembling. He saw a pale-eyed hunter stalk into the clearing. The she bird screamed her grief at him. The jungle man squinted up at her and grinned at Valmiki, showing stained teeth like fangs. A curse erupted from the rishi:

  Ma Nisada pratishtam tvamagamah shasvatih samah,

  Yatkrauncha mithunade kamavadhih kamamohitam!

  Glaring the shifty fellow down, Valmiki strode from that glade. Part of him wondered at the strange expression of his anger; it had such a lilt to it, though the doom it pronounced on the hunter was final: because he had killed the bird at love, he would not live the full span of his life.

  All day, those words returned to the sage’s mind and echoed there in cadence. Valmiki thought: Because I spoke in such a rage of sorrow my curse welled from me in rhythm and meter. Later, as night fell, his disciples sat around their meditating guru. Under rushlights hung on the mud walls of the hermitage, they studied sacred scriptures inscribed on palm leaves.

  Valmiki himself could not forget the morning. Again and again he heard the rapturous song of the birds; the evil hum of the arrow; the cry of the male krauncha and the soft sound of his small body striking the ground. And then the she bird’s frantic screams. He saw the hunter’s pale eyes, slanted like a cat’s in his face, and he heard his own voice pronouncing judgment on the man in perfect meter.

  Valmiki heard a gasp from his disciples. He opened his eyes, and it seemed as if a piece of the sun had fallen among them: Brahma had come to the asrama, dazzling the night.

  Valmiki prostrated himself before the Creator. The padadhuli, the spirit dust from the God’s holy feet, washed into him in golden waves. Brahma blessed the rishi and his sishyas, enfolding them in his pulsing aura, which surely removed their sins of a hundred lives. They stood before him with their eyes cast down because they could not look directly at his splendor.

  In his voice of ages, Brahma said, “Valmiki, I put the sloka on your tongue with which you cursed the hunter. I sent Narada to you, so you could hear the legend of the perfect man from him. I want you to compose the life of Rama in the meter of the curse. You will see clearly not only into the prince’s life, but into his heart; and Lakshmana’s, Sita’s, and Ravana’s. No secret will be kept from you and not a false word will enter your epic. It shall be known as the Adi Kavya, the first poem of the earth. As long as Rama is remembered in the world of men, so shall you be. The epic you are going to compose will make you immortal.”

  His hand raised in a blessing, Brahma faded from their midst. The dazed Valmiki found himself helplessly murmuring his curse again, “Ma Nisada pratishtam tvamagamah,” in the meter called anushtup.

  3. The Ramayana

  On the banks of the Tamasa, Valmiki composed the epic of Rama. He sat facing east on a seat of darbha grass. His mind was as still as the Manasa lake upon the northern mountain, so the images of Narada’s inspiration played on it like sunbeams. Noble words sprang in a crystal stream from his heart, as his disciples sat around him, listening breathlessly.

  In a week, Valmiki composed twenty-four thousand verses. The legend came to him as if he was just an instrument and the real poet was another, far greater than himself. He divided the vast poem into six books1 and five hundred cantos. When he had completed his work of genius, he called it the Ramayana.

  When Valmiki had finished the Ramayana, two young men appeared in his asrama. They were as handsome and alike as the Aswini twins of heaven, and had voices like gandharva minstrels. The rishi knew they had been sent by providence. He taught them his poem. Lava and Kusa learned the Ramayana even as they heard it from the poet’s lips, and they sang it as Valmiki himself could not. Valmiki knew Brahma had chosen them to take his Adi Kavya through the sacred land.

  When they had Valmiki’s epic by heart, Lava and Kusa prostrated themselves before him. With his blessing, they went from asrama to asrama in those holy times. Clad in tree bark and deerskin, Lava and Kusa came with their lambent song. Their voices matched as one, the Ramayana flowed from them like another Ganga, Rishis who heard them were enchanted and blessed the beautiful youths.

  One day, Lava and Kusa came to a military camp on the edge of a great forest. There a king of the earth had undertaken an aswamedha yagna, a horse sacrifice. The twins went into his presence and, in an assembly of the greatest rishis, sang the Ramayana. The king climbed down from his throne and came to sit on the ground among the common people. He sat spellbound, and tears ran down his dark and sealike face. But Lava and Kusa did not know the epic they sang was about this very man, to whom inscrutable destiny had brought them.

  He was Rama himself and he was their father.

  4. Ayodhya

  This is a story, sang the twins, to the rhythmical plucking of their vinas, of the ancient line of kshatriyas descended from Manu, made immortal by his son Ikshvaku, and later by Sagara and his sons. It is the tale of a perfect man, the greatest in his noble line.

  The kingdom of Kosala was cradled by the river Sarayu. Kosala was ruled by kings of the race of Brahma’s son Manu, descended from Surya, the Sun God. Down the deep streams of time, the House of Ikshvaku was renowned for the justice and valor of its kings. Kosala was a blessed country, verdant and fertile; ages ago at its heart, Manu the lawmaker created a city to be his capital and called it Ayodhya.

  The turrets of Ayodhya reached for the stars and her fame as a focus of dharma on earth was known in Devaloka, the realm of the Gods. As glorious as Indra’s Amravati above was Ayodhya in the world. Ancient trees lined her wide streets, washed with scented water at dawn and dusk so the city of truth was always swathed in fragrance.

  Great Dasaratha ruled Ayodhya with bhakti as his scepter. His people were free from green envy, that insidious corrupter of nations: their king’s virtue flowed among them like a river of fortune, and their hearts were wise and serene. The mean and ugly of spirit were never born in Ayodhya; why, it seemed a race of Gods had been incarnated in the mortal world to people this greatest of cities.

  King Dasaratha had eight ministers, brilliant and dedicated men: Jayanta, Sumantra, Dhriti, Vijaya, Siddharta, Arthasadaka, Mantrapala, and Asoka. Then there were the rishis who advised him, among them his kulaguru, his family preceptor: the immortal Vasishta. The lamps to the Gods in the temples of Ayodhya never burned low, nor did the faith in the hearts of Dasaratha’s subjects. With heaven’s grace,
the king’s granary and his treasury were always full; quiet and measureless goodness was upon his kingdom.

  But even such a rajarishi, a royal sage, was not perfectly happy. Dasaratha had no heir, no son to light up the autumn of his life and succeed him when he died. As the king grew older, his despair grew with him and it began to feed on his spirit. Not a day passed without Dasaratha’s priests offering a prayer to the Gods to bless him with a son. But it seemed they fell on deaf ears in heaven.

  One day, the king thought he should perform an aswamedha yagna. He called Vasishta, Vamadeva, and his ministers, and asked for their counsel.

  His charioteer, Sumantra, said, “My lord, have you heard of Rishyashringa?2 He is a simpleton in the world, but a prodigy of the spirit. Once the Devas cursed the kingdom of Anga and a famine fell on it. Your friend King Romapada sought Rishyashringa’s intervention. No sooner did Romapada lure the muni into his kingdom, by giving him his daughter’s hand, than it began to rain and the famine ended. Sire, I have heard Sanatkumara has foretold that four sons shall be born to you, when you perform an aswamedha yagna with Rishyashringa as your priest.”

  Dasaratha went to Anga and persuaded Romapada to send his flamelike son-in-law to conduct the aswamedha in Ayodhya. Messengers rode home before Dasaratha and his guest, and the city was decked out in arches, flowers, and banners to welcome the rishi.

  As soon as Rishyashringa arrived, a horse of the noblest bloodline was chosen for the sacrifice, and he blessed it.

  The prayers continued for weeks, and then a magic spring came to Kosala. The trees were full of soft new leaves, the Sarayu with sweet water, and Dasaratha went to the innocent sage and said, “Muni, the time has come.”