Here's a story behind mahatva (importance) of Shiva's bow for choosing the right king for Sita.
Shiva, the supreme tapasvi, had destroyed his hunger. So he sat atop a mountain of stone covered with snow, where no vegetation grew. Nature, taking the form of Shakti, said to him, 'Hunger distinguishes creatures alive from one which aren't. If you have no hunger, you should be called 'shava' (corpse)
Shiva : 'A human can outgrow the need for food through tapasya. That is distinguishing feature of humanity.'
Shakti: 'When tapasya is done without yagna, solitude thrives, no relationships are established, society collapses'
Shiva: 'When yagna is done without tapasya, we exploit other people's hunger to satisfy our own. Thus a corrupt society comes into being'.
Tapasya is like the shaft of the bow. Yagna is like string of the bow. Individually, both are incomplete. To create a bow, the shaft has to bend and string has to become taut. Shiva and Shakti created a bow which joined YAGNA and TAPASYA. This is a symbol of all relationship, man and woman, king and kingdom. Thus from this conversation came a bow 'PINAKA'.
||Too loose, the bow's useless. Too tight, the bow will break ||
He who could string this bow would be perfect king.
PS: Rama was a mere prince at the time of swayamwar and hence wasn't able to string the bow. This is because he bent it too much than it was required, and hence the bow broke.
According to one version of Ramayana, he looked at Sita while he was stringing the shaft of the bow. That moment, his concentration was lost for a moment and that was the moment when he bent the shaft too much.
Shiva seeing all this said, "He isn't perfect now. He still needs to practice detachment". Hence all was followed by 14 years of exile so that Rama could attain the detachment which was necessary for him to be a King.
**This information is inspired from Devdutt Pattanaik's book named 'Sita'. All the readers are invited for discussion in case they have to add on or they disagree
Shiva, the supreme tapasvi, had destroyed his hunger. So he sat atop a mountain of stone covered with snow, where no vegetation grew. Nature, taking the form of Shakti, said to him, 'Hunger distinguishes creatures alive from one which aren't. If you have no hunger, you should be called 'shava' (corpse)
Shiva : 'A human can outgrow the need for food through tapasya. That is distinguishing feature of humanity.'
Shakti: 'When tapasya is done without yagna, solitude thrives, no relationships are established, society collapses'
Shiva: 'When yagna is done without tapasya, we exploit other people's hunger to satisfy our own. Thus a corrupt society comes into being'.
Tapasya is like the shaft of the bow. Yagna is like string of the bow. Individually, both are incomplete. To create a bow, the shaft has to bend and string has to become taut. Shiva and Shakti created a bow which joined YAGNA and TAPASYA. This is a symbol of all relationship, man and woman, king and kingdom. Thus from this conversation came a bow 'PINAKA'.
||Too loose, the bow's useless. Too tight, the bow will break ||
He who could string this bow would be perfect king.
PS: Rama was a mere prince at the time of swayamwar and hence wasn't able to string the bow. This is because he bent it too much than it was required, and hence the bow broke.
According to one version of Ramayana, he looked at Sita while he was stringing the shaft of the bow. That moment, his concentration was lost for a moment and that was the moment when he bent the shaft too much.
Shiva seeing all this said, "He isn't perfect now. He still needs to practice detachment". Hence all was followed by 14 years of exile so that Rama could attain the detachment which was necessary for him to be a King.
**This information is inspired from Devdutt Pattanaik's book named 'Sita'. All the readers are invited for discussion in case they have to add on or they disagree
Wow! this is very nice! thanks for this article
ReplyDeletethanks :)
DeleteYou should read Abhyuday by Narendra Kohli. It is a gripping read if you want to read something in Hindi.
ReplyDeleteAlso, the given opinion/explanation is something I can never get my head around, is it fair for a king to detach from his household duties towards own wife and children to serve the kingdom fair and just? Isn't the family the first social unit of any nation? In pursuit of the fairness and idealism, he set up a patriarchal culture across the kingdom to put the question of women's chastity and character at a public discourse instead of that remaining in the intimate exchange of the mutual relationship. Rama as a king and as a man had a lot of flaws, I think he is plagued more with the vanity of his own character than justness of the rule. It was the same syndrome Bhishma suffered in later ages. Women/marriage and celibacy seems to be in the center of these complex moral dilemmas.