Ramanavami Spl: Essay series by Sri.Bannanje Govindacharya -2

[Guest guest]

nAtha mOhayatA khalAnakhilAstvayA khalu maithilI

naiva naiva viyOginI guruyOginI sthirayOginI|

ujjagAvidamabjabhUH shapathEna tE kathayan kathAH

rAma rAma ramApatE ramatAM manastvayi mE sadA||

 

 

The second part of the essay “saNNapAtragaLa doDDa koDuge” by pUjya Sri. Bannanje Govindacharya analyses the role of manthare in the Ramayana. Would the Ramayana have continued without this evil lady? The smallness of small people is the cause of big incidents in the world. A few people become big because of a large number of small ones. Manthare is a good example for this.

 

“manthareya matsara mattu muttina sara”...a writing that explores the mode of the very nature of the soul...

 

Courtesy: Sri. Kaddi Raghuttamachar and Sri. Dilip Sundar

 

Regards,

Dilip

 

jayatu kOdaMDarAma jayatu dasharatharAma

jayatu sitArAma jayatu raghurAma|| jayatu jayatu||

[Guest guest]

||rAma rAma ramApate ramatAM manastvayi me sadA||Here is the English translation of “manthareya matsara mattu muttina sara” by Dr. P.R.Mukund.Regards,

Dilip

The Jealous & the Jewels- The Story of

Manthara

By pUjya Shri Bannanje

Govindacharya

Translated to English by P. R.

Mukund

 

 

Another small role in Ramayana

belongs to Manthara.

Such are the quirks of history.

Major events are initiated by the pettiness of the pitiful. Little drops of

water in the mountain get transformed to major rivers down in the plains. Many

ordinary ones make a few great. Manthara is a prime example of this.

Manthara was a foreigner from

the kingdom of Kekaya. She had known Kaikeyi from

childhood. Matter of fact, she was Kaikey’s nanny. When Kaikeyi got married,

Manthara accompanied her to Ayodhya as a servant.

All her affection was on the

place she left behind, the place she thought was her home, on Kaikeyi who she

had raised, and on Kaikeyi’s son, Bharata. She never felt at home either in

Ayodhya or among its people. Well, it is natural to long for your hometown,

isn’t it? Farther one moves, stronger the attraction.

You know, it is not easy for a

common woman to rise above this. If she could not relate to the saying

“swadesho bhuvanatrayam”, it is not her fault. Then why is everyone putting her

down? I am not saying that we should all go and praise her. After all, what she

did was not praiseworthy. But can we underestimate her contributions, whether

it was intentional or not? She truly was a Manthara (one who churns). She was

the one who gave the whisk that churned the cream of Ramayana and came out with

the butter.

Can Ramayana exist without

Manthara? Rama and Seeta got married and lived happily ever after in Ayodhya.

Can that be Ramayana? Balakanda would have been the end. Manthara was the one

responsible for the rest of Ramayana.

Ramachandra going to the

forest, killing Khara and his fourteen thousand strong army, abduction of

Seeta, meeting Sugriva, Hanumantha leaping to Lanka, Rama going to Lanka and

slaying Ravana – all of these stem from Manthara’s petty scheming, right? The

usefulness of entire Ramayana can be traced back to Manthara.

How can we ever forget this

evil woman who was responsible for bringing out the greatness of the Lord’s

incarnation? It was her negativity that brought out Rama’s positive perfection.

How can one find out the genius of a doctor in a land where nobody is sick?

Wow! What a great contribution Manthara has made.

The seed was sown long back.

When Ramachandra was but a mere toddler, everyone was naturally enchanted by

the cute baby. All said and done, Manthara had a motherly heart as well. She

too fell in love with the baby. She wanted to hold the baby in her arms. She

reached out to Him. But this Puppeteer went ahead and set the stage for the act

to follow. He refused to go to her. But, Manthara would not give up. She

forcefully picked up the child. But Rama threw a tantrum, kicking her and got

down.

Kids

pick fights. Grown-ups actually fight. Kids quickly forget and unite. Grown-ups

never forget and turn it into enmity. Kids, due to this nature, show greatness.

The grown-ups exhibit their pettiness. Nothing different here! Manthara never

forgot the kicks of Ramachandra’s tiny feet. It became a flame that burnt

endlessly within. She swore that she would teach this boy a lesson he would

never forget. When news of Ramachandra’s coronation came, she poisoned

Kaikeyi’s mind. She sighed in relief when Rama went away to the forest. She

thought she won.

When the sages learnt that Rama

had come to the forest, they too sighed in relief. They were jubilant that

Manthara’s pettiness had led to the salvation of the world. This is manthara’s

Ramayana.

Actually, the story goes back

even further. It was Chaturmukha Brahma who started all this. This is how the

story goes: The devates started churning the ocean. All sorts of things started

coming out. The poison came out before the nectar. Alakshmi came before

Lakshmi, the older sister was called Jyeshtaalakshmi. She married Kali. Lakshmi

came out later, and nectar came. The nectar became the asset of the devates.

Kali’s consort Alakshmi did not

keep quiet. She started scheming. That is her nature. She wanted to become an

Apsara and join the devates. She wanted to be immortal. And so, she started a

penance. As a result, she got a boon and became an Apsara called Dundubhi. But

this is just in passing. She had to go back to her natural plight. So,

Chaturmukha called her and said “Look, why don’t you take birth on earth during

Rama’s incarnation? You should take the responsibility of sending Rama to the

forest. You will then attain salvation?”

Dundubhi was ecstatic. If Rama

can be shunted to the forest and denied the kingdom, there is salvation. I win.

 

But, a fox can burn its body

with stripes, but cannot become a tiger. It can only howl and not roar. Even

though Alakshmi became an Apsara, the road to the manifestation of evil nature

was beckoning.

Alakshmi who had become

Dundubhi came on earth as Manthara. She stopped Rama’s coronation. She

proclaimed that none could stop salvation.

When the news of Rama’s

coronation came, and Kaikeyi gave her garland of pearls to Manthara, it looked

stupid to Manthara. The jewel looked like trash to the jealous. Who needs this

gift that can be an obstruction to salvation?

But she never figured out the

cleverness of Chaturmukha. When she figured it out, it was too late. Brahma’s

words came true. But her salvation was downward mobility.

The whole world benefitted from

her jealousy. But she did not! She did not go back as Apsara. The colorful

layer of the boon evaporated, exposing her true colors. She became Alakshmi.

She plunged into darkness for having hated the Lord. Is that not her true

destination?

Even though she was sacrificed at the

altar of Brahma’s wrath, Valmiki cannot be mad at her. After all, was she not

the one who embellished his poetry with the jewels?

***************On Mon, Mar 22, 2010 at 11:08 PM, Dilip Rathnakar <diliprathnakar wrote:

 

---------- Forwarded message ----------Dilip Rathnakar <diliprathnakar

Sun, Mar 21, 2010 at 5:24 PMRamanavami Spl: Essay series by Sri.Bannanje Govindacharya -2MadhwaYuvaParishat , , SUMADHWASEVA

Cc: Raghoothamachar Kaddi <raghoothamacharkaddi, Dilip S <dileepaha

 

nAtha mOhayatA khalAnakhilAstvayA khalu maithilI

naiva naiva viyOginI guruyOginI sthirayOginI|

ujjagAvidamabjabhUH shapathEna tE kathayan kathAH

rAma rAma ramApatE ramatAM manastvayi mE sadA||

 

 

The second part of the essay “saNNapAtragaLa doDDa koDuge” by pUjya Sri. Bannanje Govindacharya analyses the role of manthare in the Ramayana. Would the Ramayana have continued without this evil lady? The smallness of small people is the cause of big incidents in the world. A few people become big because of a large number of small ones. Manthare is a good example for this.

 

“manthareya matsara mattu muttina sara”...a writing that explores the mode of the very nature of the soul...

 

Courtesy: Sri. Kaddi Raghuttamachar and Sri. Dilip Sundar

 

Regards,

Dilip

 

jayatu kOdaMDarAma jayatu dasharatharAma

jayatu sitArAma jayatu raghurAma|| jayatu jayatu||

-- P.R. Mukund, Ph.D.President & CEONanoArk Corporation125 Tech Park DriveRochester, NY 14623Phone: (585) 424-2765, ext. 18e-mail: prmukund

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