MAHABHARATA SERIES BOOK#2: The Seeds of War (Mba) (29 page)

‘Yes, yes,’ she said. ‘I understand. But what if I told you there might be a way to achieve both things at once.’

‘Both things?’ Bhishma was puzzled. ‘I fail to follow your meaning, mother.’

‘The ideal situation of asking a Puru himself to further the Puru dynasty legitimately, and resorting to the time-honoured tradition of asking a brahmin to sire a child upon a widowed wife.’

‘Yes,’ he replied. ‘That is what we are discussing. Since the first option is not possible, we are considering the second…’

‘Yes, but what if I told you there may be a way to do both. By calling upon a Puru of the same bloodline as us who also happens to be a brahmin possessed of all the auspicious qualities one would seek.’

Bhishma stared at her. ‘How is that possible? There are no Puru brahmins! I am the sole Puru male and I am a kshatriya.’

She paced a few times, revealing her anxiety. ‘Son, what I am about to tell you is a secret I was forced to keep from your father as well. I regret keeping such a secret but I had no choice at the time. I feared that it might deplete his store of happiness and make him sorrowful. He already had so much sadness in his life, I had no desire to risk endangering the joyful companionship we enjoyed together. I thought in time I would tell him…But then we ran out of time.’

He frowned, sensing that she needed something from him…acceptance? Understanding? Forgiveness? A combination of all the above, perhaps? ‘I understand…And I do not mind. My father is no more. You need have no regrets and feel no guilt at keeping this secret. Whatever it is, I will not judge you for it nor blame you. It is not a son’s place to do so anyway.’

She sighed deeply as if achieving some great release. ‘Thank you, my son. In that case, I shall tell you my secret. I have a son by a previous union.’

He looked at her, unsure how to react. He decided to say nothing. 

She went on. ‘It was no mere dalliance, I assure you. The great sage Parashara was a passenger on my boat and he grew amorous and was overcome with a powerful lust for me…’

She told him the story of her first relationship and of the birth of her son. 

‘Krishna Dweipayana,’ Bhishma repeated the name slowly. ‘Better known as Vyasa for his brilliant work collating and re-organizing the Vedas. Of course I have heard of him. He is a great mind and a renowned scholar of the Vedas. They say his gift for poetry and composition is unparalleled. I have long sought to engage him as a court poet but he is dedicated to pursuing his own course and seeks no patrons. The world eagerly awaits his division of the body of Vedic lore into three or four parts once he is done. They say his system of rearrangement is most inspired and ingenious.’

She was pleased to hear such high praises for her son from the lips of Bhishma. ‘He is my son,’ she said proudly. ‘Although I have not seen him even once since I gave birth to him, he gave me the power to summon him at will at any time. I have but to think of him and he shall arrive here instantly.’

Bhishma mused on this extraordinary revelation. ‘He is most appropriate. It would be our great fortune for the House of Puru to have a brahmin of his stature and immense qualities further our line. And since he is your son, and you are Shantanu’s widow, therefore he is my brother, and the brother of Chitrangada and Vichitravirya as well. Therefore, since Vichitravirya is dead, he may legitimately cohabit with his brother’s wives and produce offspring. Even if he were not a brahmin…’

‘But he is,’ Satyavati exclaimed. ‘And being a brahmin, he is celibate! Hence there is no fear that he will engender other progeny who might lay claim to the throne of Hastinapura either. This shall be the sole exception and only on my request.’

Bhishma rubbed his beard briskly as he did at times when arriving at a solution to some long-frustrating dilemma. ‘It is an excellent solution, mother! You must summon your son Vyasa at once. I can find no fault with this plan.’ He frowned, as if remembering something, then added, ‘except that I must offer one caution…’

‘What, my son?’

‘There is one risk involved with asking brahmins to produce progeny. It is also part of the record of itihasa. Brahmins are notorious for being easily offended and for cursing or inflicting conditions upon those who offend them. We must take great care that this does not happen.’ He added quickly, ‘This has nothing to do with our calling your son to do the task. It applies to any brahmin.’

She nodded, understanding. ‘Tell me, what is it?’

3

In ancient times, Bhishma said to Satyavati, there was a great sage named Utathya. He had a wife named Mamata and they loved each other deeply. Now, Utathya’s younger brother was the sage Brihaspati, who is known to us as the famous guru to the devas, preceptor of the gods. Brihaspati coveted his brother’s wife and was filled with desire for her. He wooed her with great eloquence and passion. But she spurned his advances saying that she was already pregnant with his brother’s child. Undaunted, Brihaspati made love to her and spilt his semen inside her. Utathya’s child, though still an infant in the womb, had already mastered the Vedas and Vedangas. When his uncle’s semen attempted to enter his mother’s womb, he complained aloud, saying ‘There is no room for your seed here, I was here first. You have unnecessarily wasted your seed.’ He spoke at the exact moment of climax, spoiling Brihaspati’s pleasure. 

Brihaspati was angered by this reply. ‘Little one, because you spoke at an inappropriate moment and ruined my pleasure, therefore I curse you to be blind.’

Thereafter, Utathya and Mamata’s son was born blind. He grew up to the Rishi Dirghatama. In time, he fathered many illustrious sons of his own, starting with the famous Gautama. 

But in time, Gautama and his other sons grew greedy and avaricious. They felt their father was a burden and sought to be rid of the responsibility of caring for him. Deluded by maya, they sought to commit the terrible crime of patricide. Binding their blind father to a log of wood they threw him into the rivers of the Ganga, leaving the rushing waters to do the rest. But Rishi Dirghatama did not drown and die as they expected. He floated down the length of the mighty river, passing many kingdoms and surviving even in that condition. While he was floating by, he was seen by a king named Bali, who was a great follower of dharma. Bali was troubled because his wife was unable to bear sons and his line was at risk of ending. When he saw the blind sage tied to the timber, he felt as if the gods themselves had offered him a solution. For he recognized Dirghatama from a previous encounter and had great reverence for the rishi. Wading out into the river, he risked his life to save the floating sage. Untying him and bringing him to solid land, he beseeched him, ‘Great one, surely you have been sent to eliminate my anxiety. Grant me the blessing of fathering sons who are knowledgeable in dharma and artha.’ Rishi Dirghatama was happy at being saved and readily agreed. 

But when King Bali told his wife Sudeshna his intentions, she was repulsed. Rishi Dirghatama was old, blind and cantankerous. She had no desire to cohabit with him, however urgent the need for heirs. She sent her daiimaa, a Sudra, instead. Rishi Dirghatama blessed the daiimaa with his seed time and again, fathering eleven sons upon her over time. The eldest of these sons was named Kakshivat and he was a handsome boy with many fine qualities. Seeing him, King Bali assumed he was the son of his wife Sudeshna. ‘No,’ said Dirghatama to the King’s surprise. ‘Your queen refused me and sent me her wet nurse instead. It is by that Sudra daiimaa that I have fathered these eleven sons.’ It was evident from Dirghatama’s tone and manner that he was deeply offended by the queen’s refusal and resented her greatly. 

Bali pacified the rishi’s anger and persuaded him to give the queen one more chance. This time, he personally ensured that Sudeshna went to the rishi. The blind sage felt the queen’s limbs carefully, pressing them hard enough to draw tears from her eyes. But she had been warned by her husband not to object to anything the sage said or did and kept her silence. Pleased by her silent acceptance, the rishi said, ‘You will have a great and powerful son, who will always be truthful.’ Thus was born the rajarshi Anga from Sudeshna. 

4

Bhishma finished his recounting and cautioned Satyavati, ‘Therefore you must ensure that the queens Ambika and Ambalika are well prepared and wholly willing to accept the procreator who comes to them. They must not offend him in any way, or he may well curse or inflict some condition upon their progeny.’

Satyavati understood. ‘I shall see to it.’

She then left Bhishma’s chambers and secluded herself in her own palace. Meditating, she thought of the day she had cohabited with Parashara and in a rush, the memories coalesced into actual events. She experienced every detail of that day all over again, the fog that enshrouded them during their act of coition, the departure of the sage, her rowing back to the island, her giving birth to an infant who grew from a babe to a full-grown adult male within the space of an hour, the tall, dark, fierce and proud Krishna standing before her and joining his palms in greeting to his mother. She recalled his last words to her: ‘Maatr, at any time if you have need of me, you need but think of me and I shall arrive before you instantly. Whatever the purpose, do not hesitate to call on me.’ She recalled her thinking at the time that this extraordinary message indicated her own conviction that their bond was an unusual one that would serve some greater purpose in time. And she knew now that this was that purpose, the reason for which she now wished to summon him. 

As she thought these things, she saw an image of Krishna himself. He was seated on a cloth beneath a banyan tree in his ashram, reading a scroll and thinking deeply. She knew that he was reading through the Vedas and separating individual shlokas and rcaas into separate volumes and sections. She hesitated to interrupt his brilliant work. 

But Krishna himself sensed her presence and opened his eyes. Even across the physical distance that separated them he was able to see her as clearly as if he sat only yards away in the same chamber. 

‘Maatr, do you have need of my services?’

‘Yes, my son, I do,’ she heard herself reply. Her voice sounded strange for though she spoke here in her chamber in the palace, yet her words resounded in that distant forest ashram where Krishna sat. 

Krishna smiled and rose to his feet. With a single step he covered the distance from his ashram in the forest into her chamber. 

Satyavati opened her eyes. 

There, before her, stood her son, much as the he had appeared the day he was born. Tall, black of complexion as she herself, fierce of visage, and with the knobbly bony limbs of an austere penitent who devoted his days to meditation and self-deprivation. 

His palms were joined in respectful greeting. He touched her feet and took her blessings. ‘Maatr, command me. How may I serve you?’

Her throat was choked with emotion. ‘My son! First come and let me embrace you. That is my first command!’

She embraced him warmly, tears spilling onto his back as she unleashed the dam of pent up emotions she had kept hidden in her heart all these many years. Her son! And she had not seen him even once in all his life, since the day she had given birth to him. She was flooded with feelings of guilt and self-recrimination. 

But he reassured her. ‘Do not blame yourself, mother. I have had a good life. I am content.’ 

This made her cry even more copiously. But finally her tears subsided and she was able to explain to him why she had summoned him here. 

He listened carefully to the full account as he fetched water and washed her face of the residue of the tears. 

‘I shall do as you ask, mother,’ he replied when she had finished speaking. ‘I shall produce sons as magnificent as Varuna and Mitra. You have my word.’

She was overjoyed. She had never expected him to agree so readily and was thrilled at his acquisance. 

‘I shall explain some vows and rituals they must follow,’ he said. ‘They must observe these strictly and without deviating for a full year. When the year is over, I shall return and do as you ask.’

She was dismayed at this response. ‘A full year? But my son. The kingdom could well be in disarray by then. Already we are hearing reports of unrest and conspiracy. We must act soon. Can you not forego the observance of vows and cause them to conceive at the earliest?’

He thought for a moment then said, ‘Indeed I can make them conceive this very day if you wish. For it is a propitious time, I sense, and if I cohabit with them now, then all the signs point to their bearing great sons who will further your lineage. Bid them prepare to receive me at midnight. I shall come directly to their chambers.’

Satyavati thought rapidly. It was a sign of great fortune that the very day on which she summoned Vyasa was suitable for the act of conception. She took that to mean that she must ensure the deed was done at once, rather than risk waiting for the next suitable time. ‘Very well, then,’ she said, ‘I shall go and prepare them.’

Krishna nodded. ‘But you understand that I am not bathed. As a hermit I live in this manner, unwashed, clad in rags, my beard and hair wild and unkempt. My own natural appearance is not too pleasing to women as well. I fear your daughters in law may not welcome me to their beds in this condition.’

Satyavati said, ‘I shall make sure they do. Have no doubt. When you arrive in their chambers at midnight, they shall be ready to receive you.’