19 Apr 2013
[Shri Rama Navami Day] The life history of Rama was written even before His birth and was propagated during His life time through Kusha and Lava by the sage Valmiki. The life history of Krishna was written by sage Vyasa after His death only and was not propagated during His life time. What is the reason, which is based on the difference between Rama and Krishna? The main reason is that Rama always behaved as an ideal human being and Krishna mostly behaved as the unimaginable God. People can tolerate even God behaving as perfect human being before their eyes. But, they can never tolerate a human being behaving like God before their eyes. The most powerful human quality is jealousy. In fact, when Krishna behaved like God, most of the people criticized Him. A human incarnation can mix with humanity only through its behavior of a normal human being. Mostly Krishna exposed His divine behavior in His childhood through frequent miracles. At the same time, He behaved as a bad person also by exhibiting bad qualities, which served as antidote to neutralize the exposed divinity. Of course, Gopikas, being the learned sages, have surpassed the human jealousy and also the effect of the antidote. The miracles performed by the Lord, which are the unimaginable events, preached the sages that God is unimaginable. These sages could not realize till then that the absolute God is unimaginable. They always investigated the true nature of the original God through severe penance. Since the Lord was exposed to the sages only in that village called Brindavanam, such message was perfectly relevant to that specific context. Later on, the Lord behaved like an ordinary human being by participating in the routine rituals, which are various forms of worship of God existing externally. The Lord performed severe penance to please Lord Shiva for getting a son. Again, at the time of preaching the Gita, Krishna behaved as God.
In all these contexts of behavior as God, we must understand that the God component in the human incarnation alone is responding. Such situations are very rare and highly specific like the atmosphere of sages. Even Arjuna was a sage called Nara Rushi. If you leave such highly specific contexts, any human incarnation will behave as an ordinary human being only to give guidance to the humanity. Otherwise, the humanity misinterprets the behavior of God in the light of Advaita Philosophy. If the human incarnation performs a miracle, people always are misled. Some people exhibit artificial devotion to solve their personal problems by misusing this supernatural power. Hence, the miracle does not develop the real devotion. The devils also exhibit such artificial devotion during penance done for achieving the boons. The other type of the people wants to become the very source of miracles by becoming God. You can compare this type to the demons, who claim themselves as God after achieving the powers. The first type is comparable to the people, who enjoy the golden egg laid down every day by the duck. The second type can be compared to the people, who want to cut the stomach of the duck for snatching the entire gold. Both these ways result in the downfall of devotees, if the human incarnation behaves like God and exhibits miracles. The aim of the human incarnation is to guide the devotees and give proper direction in their spiritual path.
Shri Rama is the human incarnation in full spirit of this concept. Shri Rama is called as the human incarnation that came strictly to guide the humanity (Aadarsha Maanushaavatara). Shri Krishna is the human incarnation that came to exhibit miracles denoting the unimaginable nature of the absolute God (Leela Maanushaavatara). Shri Rama never said that He is God. Instead, He told that He is an ordinary human being born to Dasaratha (Aaatmanam Maanusham…). His behavior was an example for the behavior of every human being in this world. His every action was strictly in the normal line of humanity within the natural limits so that every human being will follow that in practice. He never performed any miracle and was subjected to severe problems and difficulties. He prayed the Lord situated externally for solving His problems and never used the unimaginable power of the unimaginable God existing in Him. When He had to kill Ravana, He prayed for the blessing from the deity, Sun (Aditya Hridayam). He worshipped Lord Shiva externally to get rid of the sin in killing Ravana. He received the miraculous weapons from the sage Vishwamitra. He behaved like a perfect ignorant human being by running after the golden deer without knowing the plot of Ravana.
He performed a miracle by converting the stone into woman called Ahalya. But, here also the analysis shows that Rama did not perform any miracle. The Sage Gowtama gave curse to his wife to become stone. The miraculous power in this event is from the power of penance of Gowtama. He gave the solution also that the stone will become the woman back, when the foot of Rama touches it. The miraculous power of the sage, worked in the conversion of woman to stone can also work in the reverse conversion also. Therefore, the solution came from the power of the sage and not from the power of Rama. If Gowtama said that somebody else will make the reverse conversion, it would have happened so. The power of the sage is primary and the foot of Rama is secondary instrument. You can give some credit to Rama saying that since Rama is a good person, the conversion was justified. But, the conversion would have happened to any other good person also if mentioned by the sage. Therefore, the reason for the conversion is the power of the sage and not the goodness of the person. Hence, this miracle can be totally attributed to the sage only and not to Rama. Even though the unimaginable God present in Rama performed a miracle, Rama has taken sufficient care to see that the fact is hidden. Rama always tried to interpret such a hidden miracle as a result of His prayer to the external God. If Rama proved that the miracle happened due to the God in Him, everybody will take that God is in him and try to do the miracle. To avoid this, external exposure was totally different by linking the miracle to the prayer to the external God. In such case only, everybody will pray the external God begging for the miracle. The Gita says that people always imitate the great person (Yadyadaacharati Sreshthah…) and therefore, the great person always should act carefully in view of the imitating public (Loka sangrahamevaapi). Hence, any human incarnation generally controls the exhibition of divine power for the sake of the welfare of the devoted public except on very few occasions of specific contexts. The trend of Krishna was also the same if you analyze His life history carefully. Without knowing these intricate implications, the devotees are always anxious for the exhibition of miracles and pester the human incarnations for the same.
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