Ramayana · Jatayu, Kabandha, and Shabari

About 115 min read · 19,404 words

He lay asleep on the branch of his tree when the piteous cry reached his ears. The moment his eyes opened, Jatayu, king of vultures and lord of all birds, looked up into the sky and saw Ravana, and in his lap the princess of Videha, Sita. Vast as a mountain peak, sharp of beak, this greatest of birds kept his place on the tree and began to speak fair words to Ravana. Here the episode opens in which one aged bird takes his stand alone against the ten-headed king, and behind it runs the long, breaking, scattered saga of Rama’s search for Sita.

Jatayu’s plea and his challenge

Jatayu tried first to reason with him. “O Dashagriva, lord of ten heads,” he said, “I stand on the ancient and eternal road of dharma, and I am bound to truth. Brother, do not set yourself in this hour, before my eyes, to a deed the world will curse. I am Jatayu, king of vultures, of great might, sovereign of all birds. And the woman you would carry away is Sita, the lawful wife of Rama, son of Dasharatha. Rama is master of the whole world, the equal of Indra and Varuna, devoted to the good of every living thing. O delight of the line of Pulastya, how can a king who stands firm on virtue lay his hand on another man’s wife?”

He pressed on. “A wise man does not knowingly do the thing for which others will revile him. The wives of others are to be guarded from a stranger’s touch exactly as one’s own wife is guarded. O jewel among the rakshasas, though you are sinful by nature and unsteady of mind, lordship has come to you, the way an aerial car, meant for the virtuous, might somehow fall to a man of wicked deeds. A king embodies dharma, a king embodies desire, a king is the highest treasury of all riches. Good and evil alike have their root in the king and flow out from him. When Rama has done no wrong in your kingdom or your city, why do you wrong him?”

“If Khara, who overstepped his bounds on the pretext of wiping away Shurpanakha’s tears, was killed in Janasthana by Rama of unwearied action, what was Rama’s fault in that, for which you carry off his wife? Release the princess of Videha at once, before Rama turns on you the dreadful eye that becomes fire and burns you as Indra’s thunderbolt burned the demon Vritra. You have tied a poisonous snake in the fold of your garment and do not know it. You do not see the noose of Death already set around your neck.”

Then the old vulture laid down both his lineage and his vow. “O Ravana, sixty thousand years have passed since I was born, and through all that time I have held this throne of the birds, come down to me from my fathers and forefathers. I am old, and you are young, armed with bow and arrows, sheathed in mail, mounted on a chariot. Yet you shall not carry the princess of Videha away in safety while I watch. Prowler of the night, so long as I draw breath you shall by no means bear off Sita, the lotus-eyed queen so dear to Rama. What is dear to the great-souled Rama and to the late king Dasharatha I must do, even at the cost of my life. Halt, halt, Dashagriva. If you are a hero, then fight. This very day I will knock you from your chariot as a fruit is broken from its stalk. Prowler of the night, I will give you the hospitality of battle, to the full measure of my strength.”

The key to this (sixty thousand years): Valmiki keeps offering spans of time that lie beyond human sense of the years. This number sets Jatayu before us as a creature old as an age, a witness to the whole tradition of right conduct, so that his sacrifice carries the weight of a whole lineage of dharma making its stand, far more than the fall of a single bird.

The gist: Jatayu first tries to stop Ravana with the logic of a king’s dharma and the sanctity of another man’s wife, then names himself and throws down the challenge of battle. One aged bird, weaker in strength but unshaken in his loyalty to dharma, plants himself square in the path of the lord of Lanka.

The fierce battle of vulture and rakshasa

Pierced by these words, his eyes red with fury, wearing earrings of refined gold, the rakshasa king Ravana lost all patience and rushed upon Jatayu, sovereign of the winged. The unbroken exchange of blows that ran between the two warriors was tumultuous, like two storm-driven clouds colliding in the sky. It was a marvel, like the clash of two great winged mountains.

Ravana rained on the mighty king of vultures a storm of Nalikas, Narachas, and sharp-pointed Vikarnis, three kinds of arrow. Jatayu endured the whole net of them and, with his feet and their keen talons, tore wound after wound in Ravana’s body. Then in anger the ten-headed monster seized ten dreadful arrows, each like the rod of Death, and loosed them with his full strength, riddling the bird. Wrapped in that hail, Jatayu looked like a bird huddled in its nest.

But the blazing lord of birds shook off that net of arrows with his wings and broke Ravana’s great bow with his feet. Ravana took up a second bow and poured out arrows by the hundred and thousand. Jatayu shattered even the mail that shone like fire, struck down the swift mules with their fiend-faced heads sheathed in golden armor, and smashed to splinters that great war-chariot with its triple-bamboo yoke, a car that went wherever its rider wished, its frame patterned with steps of gems. He hurled down with a rush the canopy bright as the full moon, whisks and all, and the rakshasas who held them. Then, with his beak, he tore the great head clean off the charioteer.

Bow broken, chariot broken, horses and driver slain, Ravana dropped to the ground with the princess of Videha crushed in his arms. Seeing him fallen there, robbed of his car, every living being cried “Well done, well done” and hailed the king of vultures. But Ravana caught hold of Maithili again, and, seeing the lord of birds worn out by age, rose once more in delight into the sky.

Then the king of vultures sprang up once more and barred Ravana’s path. “O Ravana of little sense,” he said, “you carry off this wife of Rama, whose arrows fall like the thunderbolt, and you do it surely for the ruin of all the rakshasas. With your friends and kinsmen, your ministers, your army, and your household, you are drinking this poisoned draught as a thirsty man drinks water. Bound in the noose of Death, where will you go to be free, like a fish that has swallowed hook and bait together? A deed condemned by the world, such as you have done, is the path of thieves, not of heroes. Ravana, if you are a hero, halt and fight. Struck down by my hands you shall lie on the earth as your brother Khara did.” So saying, the powerful Jatayu swooped down on the ten-headed monster’s back.

With his sharp talons he tore Ravana on every side, as a rider mounted on an elephant pricks it with his goad. He drove his beak into the demon’s back and tore out his hair. Wounded again and again, the rakshasa trembled with rage, his lips quivering. He pressed Sita hard against his left side and struck at Jatayu with the flat of his hand. Jatayu dodged the blow and with his beak cut away all ten of Ravana’s left arms, but where the severed arms had been, fresh arms sprang up at once, like serpents rising from an anthill.

Then Ravana let go of Sita and beat the king of vultures down with his fists and feet. For an hour the two warriors of matchless prowess fought their terrible fight. In the end Ravana drew his sword and lopped off the wings, the feet, and the flanks of Jatayu, who was struggling in Rama’s cause. With his wings shorn away, the great vulture, whose life was now short, fell to the earth, soaked in his own blood. Seeing him fallen there, blood-stained, Sita ran to him as she would run to one of her own kin. When the lord of Lanka saw Jatayu on the ground, his white breast like a spent forest fire, his body like a dark cloud, he let the bird lie and seized the moon-faced Sita once more, carrying off the weeping woman.

The gist: In one hour of savage fighting Jatayu destroys Ravana’s bow, mail, chariot, mules, charioteer, and even his ten arms, yet in the end, his wings cut away by the sword, he falls blood-soaked to the ground. His loyalty outlasts his strength, and alone he makes the last effort to stop the lord of Lanka.

Ravana carries Sita off by the sky-road

Seeing the king of vultures wounded, the full-moon-faced Sita, stricken with grief, cried out and lamented, calling on Rama. “O Rama, dreams and the calls of birds are always a sign of what is to come in a man’s joy and sorrow. O Kakutstha, surely you do not know this great danger that has fallen on you, this carrying-off of mine, though the deer and the birds cry it out as they turn toward the unlucky quarter. Here, by my ill fortune, lies that bird Jatayu who came out of pity to save me, wounded on the ground.” So weeping, crying “Rama, Rama, Lakshmana,” Sita was seized by the hair and lifted into the sky.

When the princess of Videha was thus taken by force, the whole world, moving and unmoving, lost its measure and sank into deep darkness. The wind did not blow, the sun lost its light. Brahma, seeing Sita in Ravana’s hand with his divine sight, said, “Our purpose is accomplished.” The great seers who dwelt in the Dandaka forest were pained to see her seized, yet gladdened too, for they knew Ravana’s ruin was now near of its own accord.

Crying “Rama, Rama” and “Lakshmana,” Sita was borne higher and higher by the lord of the rakshasas. In her ornaments of refined gold and her robe of yellow silk, the princess shone like a streak of lightning. Her yellow garment, streaming in the wind, made Ravana glow as a mountain glows when fire climbs it. Yet without Rama her clear face did not shine, no more than a lotus torn from its stalk or the moon risen by day.

From her blessed face a fragrance fell over Ravana like coppery, sweet-scented petals of a lotus. In the lap of the dark-bodied Ravana, the gold-hued princess of Mithila shone like a golden saddle-cloth cinched to a blue elephant. As Sita was carried away, a rain of flowers fell from her hair on every side toward the earth, but the speed of Ravana’s flight carried the same flowers back onto him again. A jeweled anklet slipped from her foot and fell to the ground, flashing like a ring of lightning. Her fire-colored ornaments dropped away one by one, ringing as they fell, like fading stars. A string of pearls loosed from her breast seemed like the Ganga descending from the sky.

A sub-tale: The trees, shaken by the gust of her flight, seemed to say to Sita with their upper branches, “Do not be afraid.” Lakes with wilted lotuses and frightened fish seemed to mourn for a disheartened friend. Lions, tigers, deer, and birds ran in anger after the shadow of Sita. Mountains, their waterfalls like streaming tears and their peaks like lifted arms, seemed to cry out. Here Valmiki makes all of nature a witness and a fellow mourner, as if the abduction of Sita had broken the very balance of creation.

“Dharma is undone, so where will truth stand now? Simplicity and pity are gone as well, when Ravana carries off Sita, the wife of Rama.” So all beings wailed in their crowds. Even the fawns wept with piteous faces. The limbs of the forest deities shook with fear. For his own ruin Ravana bore away that steadfast woman, her hair loosened, the mark on her forehead rubbed away, calling in a sweet voice “Lakshmana, Rama” and looking again and again toward the earth. Cut off from her own people, seeing neither Rama nor Lakshmana, Maithili of the lovely teeth and clear smile was pressed down under the weight of fear, her face gone pale.

The gist: At the moment of the abduction all of nature is drowned in grief, and from Brahma down to the forest deities every power reads the sign of Ravana’s ruin. Flying by the sky-road, Ravana carries off Sita, wilted like a lotus without Rama, toward his own end.

Sita’s rebuke of Ravana

Seeing the fearful-eyed Ravana flying through the sky, the daughter of Janaka, in her great peril, her eyes red with anger and weeping, spoke to him through her bitter tears. “Vile Ravana, are you not ashamed of this shameful deed, to find me alone and steal me and flee like a coward? It was you, evil soul, who by the deceit of that phantom deer drew my husband far away, so that you could carry me off. And the old king of vultures, my father-in-law’s friend, who rose to save me, him too you struck down.”

“Lowest of the rakshasas, your great valor showed itself only in this, that you won me by hiding, not by announcing your name and fighting. Vile one, are you not ashamed to carry off a woman, and another man’s wife at that, and in a lonely place where there was no protector? Shame on the courage you boasted of. Shame on a deed that brings a stain upon your line. You fly so fast now, but what will it profit you? Halt for one hour and you will not return alive. The moment you come within the sight of those two princes, you cannot live an hour longer, army and all.”

“Clearly you are seeing trees of gold, which is the sign of death. Soon you will look on the dreadful Vaitarani river running with blood, and the Asipatravana with leaves like sword-blades, and the Shalmali tree with its flowers of refined gold and thorns of iron. Having wronged the great-souled Rama, you will not live long, though you drink poison itself, pitiless one. You are bound in the unfailing noose of Death, Ravana. Where will you find refuge from the wrath of my great-souled husband? Rama, who slew fourteen thousand rakshasas, skilled in every weapon and strong, why would he not strike you down with his keen arrows?”

Speaking these and other hard words, filled with fear and grief, the princess of Videha wept piteously in Ravana’s lap. But the sinner, though a tremor ran through his body, went on carrying off the young woman as she struggled and sought again and again to break free.

The key to this (Vaitarani, Asipatravana, Shalmali): these are three well-known places in the imagined geography of hell. The Vaitarani is a river of flowing blood, the Asipatravana a forest with leaves like sword-edges, and the Shalmali a tree with thorns of iron. Sita tells Ravana that he is now moving straight toward them, that his end and his descent into hell are certain.

The gist: Even in her fear Sita does not fall silent. She names Ravana coward, thief, and a man caught in the noose of Death, warns him of the unfailing strength of Rama, and, struggling though she is, does not let go of the fire of her dharma.

Ornaments dropped among the monkeys, and the entry into Lanka

Finding no rescuer as she was carried away, Sita looked down and saw five great monkeys seated on a mountain peak. Into the midst of these hale, noble monkeys the large-eyed Sita let fall her shining silk upper garment, gold-bright, and her fine ornaments, in the hope that if these monkeys ever met Rama they could give him word of the abduction. She wrapped the jewels in the cloth and dropped them among them. In his agitation Ravana did not notice what she had done. The tawny-eyed lords of the monkeys watched with unblinking eyes, as if in wonder and pity, the weeping Sita go by.

Crossing over Pampa, Ravana bore the weeping Maithili on toward the city of Lanka. In his great delight he held his own death in his lap, like a sharp-fanged, deadly serpent. Like an arrow loosed from a bow, he left behind him forest, river, mountain, and lake. He passed even over the boundless ocean, home of crocodiles and sea-monsters. At that time, seeing the daughter of Videha carried off, the waves of the sea grew still, and the fish and the great serpents froze with fear. In the sky the Charanas and Siddhas cried out, “O Dashagriva, this abduction of Sita is the very end of Ravana.”

Entering Lanka, Ravana passed through the city with its well-laid broad roads and its crowded gates into his own inner apartments. There he set down Sita, drowned in grief and confusion, as the demon Maya lays aside his own sorcery. Then he gave his order to a company of dreadful demonesses. “See that no man or woman without leave sets eyes on Sita. Whatever she wishes, pearls, gems, gold, robes, ornaments, let it be given to her at that very moment by my command. Any rakshasi who, knowingly or unknowingly, speaks an unkind word to her, her life will not be dear to her long.”

Having given this order, and thinking over what must be done next, Ravana came out of the inner apartments and summoned eight mighty flesh-eating rakshasas. Deluded by the boon of Brahma, and praising their strength and valor, he said to them, “Arm yourselves with every kind of weapon and go at once to that Janasthana which was once the home of Khara, and whose houses Rama has now laid waste. Settle there in that empty Janasthana, trusting to your own manhood and strength, throwing all fear far from you. My Khara and Dushana, with their army, were killed there by Rama’s arrows, and from this a rare wrath and a bitter enmity toward Rama have risen in me. I mean to pay off that enmity against my great foe. Until I have killed the slayer of Khara and Dushana, sleep will not come to me, as it will not come to a poor man until he wins wealth. While you stay in Janasthana, keep sending me true reports of what Rama is doing. Let all the night-rangers go carefully and always seek the means of Rama’s death. I have often seen your strength on the field of battle, and that is why I appoint you there.”

Receiving these dear and weighty words, bowing to Ravana, the eight rakshasas left Lanka and set out toward Janasthana with their bodies made invisible. Having won Sita, having penned her within the walls of the inner apartments, having set a bitter enmity toward Rama, Ravana, who made people weep with his cruel deeds, began in his ignorance to feel himself happy.

A sub-tale: Sita’s dropping of her ornaments and garment among the monkeys is a fine, quiet turn in the story, whose knot is untied only much later. These five monkeys were seated on a mountain peak, and this very sign of direction becomes the link that will one day bring Rama to Kishkindha and the monkey host of Sugriva. The clear-headed act of a frightened woman leaves behind the first direct witness of the whole search to come.

The gist: Sita drops her ornaments among the monkeys and leaves behind a thread for the search to come. Ravana crosses the ocean, reaches Lanka, sets Sita in the inner apartments, and posts eight spy-rakshasas in Janasthana against Rama, laying with his own hands the foundation of his end.

Ravana’s temptation and Sita’s refusal

Having sent off the eight strong rakshasas, Ravana, in his confusion of mind, thought his work already done. Pierced by the arrows of desire, restless to see Sita, he went into his beautiful inner apartments. There, among the rakshasis, he saw Sita, her face wet with tears, bowed under the weight of grief, like a boat sinking in the waves, or a doe cut off from her herd and ringed by hounds. Her face lowered, helpless and pitiable in her sorrow, he began by force to show her his palace, splendid as the mansion of a god.

The palace, ringing with the sound of divine drums and decked with gold, stood on pillars of ivory, gold, crystal, and silver, inlaid with diamond and lapis. It was peopled by a thousand women, filled with birds of every kind, set with jewels of every kind. Up a stairway painted in gold Ravana led her. He showed the grief-drowned Sita floors patterned in coral and gem, stepped wells and tanks, and pools ringed with flowers of many kinds.

When he had shown her the whole palace, the sinner, wishing to win her, said, “Sita, apart from the aged and the infant night-rangers, there are thirty-two crore rakshasas in my kingdom. Of all these demons of terrible deeds I am the lord, and a thousand of them stand ready at my command alone. All this realm of mine, and my very life, rest in you, O large-eyed one. You are dearer to me than my own breath. Be the mistress of my many excellent wives, be my beloved queen. Take my good counsel, for what will you gain by thinking otherwise? Have mercy on me, who am tormented by desire.”

“This Lanka of a hundred yojanas, girdled by the ocean, not even the gods with Indra, nor the demons, could take by force. Among gods, yakshas, gandharvas, or seers I do not see one equal to me in prowess. What will you do with Rama, robbed of his kingdom, wretched, an ascetic who goes on foot, a man of little strength? Accept me, Sita. I am the husband worthy of you. Youth is fleeting, timid one. Take your delight here with me. Do not so much as bring into your mind the thought of seeing Rama again. What power has he even to reach this place, even in thought?”

“The wind that streams through the sky cannot be bound with ropes, nor can the clear flames of blazing fire be caught. In all three worlds there is none who could tear you by force from the guard of my arms. Whatever ill deed of a former birth was yours has been spent in your exile in the forest. Now enjoy here the fruit of your merit. Share with me all these divine perfumes, garlands, and choice ornaments. The car called Pushpaka that belongs to my brother Kubera, bright as the sun, swift as thought, I won in battle. In it you will roam with me wherever you please.”

While Ravana spoke this, Sita covered her moon-like face with the end of her garment and shed slow tears. Her luster dimmed by care, dwelling on Rama, plainly distressed, she was addressed by the hero Ravana again. “Videha’s daughter, let go the shame that keeps you, the fear of breaking the bond, of accepting another when you have a husband. Lady, the love-tie you form with me even the seers have sanctioned, naming it the marriage of the rakshasas. I press these soft feet of yours upon my heads. Have mercy on me soon. I am your slave, in your power. Know this, that Ravana bows his head in salutation to no woman.” So saying, the ten-headed one settled it in his mind, “Now she is mine,” though he had already fallen under the power of Death.

The key to this (the marriage of the rakshasas): the Gita Press note here makes it plain that Ravana is twisting the words of the scriptures. The license for a forced marriage-by-capture is granted by the scriptures only for an unwed maiden, never for a woman already married to another. Ravana’s “reading of dharma” is itself the proof of his lawlessness. This point of interpretation comes from the classical commentary, not directly from the flow of the story.

The gist: Ravana tries to lure Sita by displaying his wealth, his strength, and his near-immortality, and even bends the scriptures to his own side. Sita covers her face and weeps in silence, and in his delusion Ravana believes he has won.

Sita’s unshakable answer, and the Ashoka grove

Addressed in this way, the princess of Videha, worn thin by grief, set a single blade of grass between herself and Ravana and answered without fear. “There was a king, Dasharatha, firm as a bridge across the flood of dharma, true to his word, famed throughout the world. His son Rama, a man of dharma, known in all three worlds, long-armed and large-eyed, is my husband and the deity I worship. Born in the line of Ikshvaku, lion-shouldered, of great splendor, Rama with his brother Lakshmana will take your life.”

“If you had used force on me before them, you would be lying dead in battle like Khara of Janasthana. The dreadful, mighty rakshasas you have sent will all be as weak before Rama as venomless serpents before Garuda. The golden arrows loosed from his bow will cut through your body as the waves of the Ganga cut through the bank. My husband of great splendor, with his brother Lakshmana beside him, has set a bitter enmity and will not leave you alive, though you were beyond the reach of demons and gods. A sacrificial altar, made holy by the mantras of brahmins, cannot be trampled by an outcaste. In the same way I, the steadfast, ever-dharmic wife of Rama, cannot be touched by you, lowest of sinful rakshasas.”

“A royal swan-hen who plays among lotus-beds with her royal swan, how could she so much as look at a water-crow standing among the reeds? This body is without feeling. Bind it or have it killed, rakshasa. Neither this body nor this life is worth guarding to me. But I will not let a stain be laid upon me in the eyes of the world.” So saying these very hard words in her anger, Janaki fell silent. Hearing words that made his hair stand on end, Ravana answered with a threat. “Maithili, hear me. I give you twelve months’ time. Fair-smiling one, if within this term you do not accept me of your own will, my cooks will cut you into pieces for my morning meal.”

Speaking these harsh words, Ravana, who made his enemies weep, turned in his anger to the rakshasis who guarded her. “Hideous, dreadful demonesses, eaters of flesh and blood, humble her pride at once.” At his command those terrible demonesses folded their hands and ringed Maithili about. Then Ravana, as though tearing the earth with his feet, said to those grim-faced rakshasis, “Take Maithili into the midst of the Ashoka grove. There, ringing her about, guard her in secret. With harsh threats and then with sweet words, all of you together, bring her under control as a wild she-elephant is tamed.”

At his command the rakshasis led Maithili into the Ashoka grove, filled with wishing-trees of every kind, with flowers and fruits of every kind, peopled by birds forever in their mating-joy. The daughter of Janaka, grief working in every limb, became like a doe fallen among tigresses. Under the endless threatening of the ugly-eyed rakshasis she found no peace there. Remembering her dear husband and her brother-in-law Lakshmana, wracked by fear and grief, she fainted, like a doe caught in a snare.

A sub-tale: At this very point the Gita Press edition gives an interpolated canto, on which the classical commentators wrote no comment. In it, at Brahma’s command, Indra brings the goddess of Sleep with him, comes to Lanka, puts the rakshasis to sleep, and gives Sita a divine payasa (a milk-and-rice pudding) that will keep hunger and thirst from her for years. Sita first asks for proof of Indra’s identity, that his feet do not touch the ground and his eyes do not blink, then offers the food in her heart to her husband and to Lakshmana before she takes it. This passage is a lovely interlude in the main story, yet the tradition does not treat it as a necessary part of the original text.

The gist: From behind a blade of grass Sita holds up to Ravana the mirror of dharma and of the world’s judgment, and with the images of the swan-hen and the water-crow she rejects him. Ravana threatens her with the term of twelve months and sends her to the Ashoka grove, where, under the threatening of the rakshasis, she faints while remembering Rama and Lakshmana.

Rama’s return, and his reproach to Lakshmana

Meanwhile Rama, having killed the shape-shifting rakshasa Maricha in his deer-form, turned back quickly toward the path to the hermitage. Restless to see Maithili, hurrying homeward, he heard behind him a jackal howl in a dreadful voice. Alarmed by that hair-raising cry, Rama thought within himself, “The way this jackal is crying, it seems to mean some evil. Is Sita well? Have the rakshasas not eaten her? If Maricha cried out in a mimicry of my voice and Lakshmana heard it, then Sita would have sent him to me that very moment. Then she would be left alone, and because of Janasthana my enmity with the rakshasas already runs deep.”

Many dreadful omens showed themselves that day. Thinking these thoughts, hearing the jackal’s cry, the self-possessed Rama turned toward the hermitage. As he came back to Janasthana, remembering with dread his being drawn off by the deer-form of Maricha, the deer and birds around him, their faces wretched, kept him on their left and cried out in dreadful voices. Seeing these grim omens, Rama turned swiftly toward his hermitage.

Then he saw Lakshmana coming toward him, his brightness gone. A little way off the weary, stricken Lakshmana met the weary, sorrowing Rama. Seeing Lakshmana come away, leaving Sita alone in a lonely forest thick with rakshasas, Rama began to rebuke him. Taking his brother’s left hand, he spoke words that were pitiful and hard, but in the end for his good. “Lakshmana, you have done a blameworthy thing, coming away here and leaving Sita, who should have been guarded, alone. Gentle one, will she be well? Hero, I fear the forest-roving rakshasas have hidden the daughter of Janaka somewhere, or devoured her, for only ill omens crowd before me.”

“Best of men, shall we find Sita alive? The way the herds of deer, the jackals, and the birds cry out in dreadful voices, their faces turned toward the sun-lit quarter, makes me doubt that the princess is safe. This rakshasa Maricha, who lured me far away in the shape of a deer, showed his true rakshasa form only as he died on my arrow, and cried out, ‘Ah, Lakshmana, I am killed.’ My mind is grieved and joyless, and my left eye is throbbing. Beyond doubt, Lakshmana, Sita is not in the hermitage. She has been carried off, or killed, or is somewhere on the road.”

Thinking all this as he looked at Lakshmana, Rama went on toward Janasthana with him. Worn by hunger, thirst, and weariness, his face dry, downcast Rama reached the hermitage and, finding it empty, sank still deeper into despair. Going into his hermitage, searching the places where Sita had played, saying “Here is the very spot,” his hair standing on end, he was seized with grief.

The gist: After killing Maricha, Rama on his way back is filled by the omens and the jackal’s cry with foreboding of evil. Seeing Lakshmana returning alone, he rebukes him for leaving Sita unguarded, and, finding the hermitage empty, his mind fills with the fear that she has been carried off.

Rama and Lakshmana speak, and the secret of the deer-form Maricha

Seeing Lakshmana returning from the hermitage, Rama, meeting him midway on the road, asked in sorrow, “Why have you come away and left Maithili, in the forest where she was entrusted to my trust and yours? Lakshmana, the moment I saw you come away without Maithili, my mind was troubled by the fear of some great evil. When I saw you from afar on the road, without Sita, my left eye, my arm, and my heart began to throb.”

Sunk deeper in grief by these words, the good Lakshmana said to the sorrowing Rama, “I did not come away of my own will. I was driven to your side by her own harsh words. A sharp cry of ‘Ah Lakshmana, save me,’ seeming to be in your voice, fell on Maithili’s ears. Hearing that anguished cry, weeping and afraid out of her love for you, she said to me again and again, ‘Go, go quickly.’ I reassured her, saying, ‘I see no rakshasa who could put Rama in fear. Be easy. That is not his voice, but another’s. Would the noble one, who protects even the gods, ever cry a low and shameful “help me”? Someone has taken his voice by trickery and cried “Lakshmana, save me.” Do not be troubled, be at peace. In all three worlds there is no man, none born or yet to be born, who could defeat Rama in battle, not even Indra and the gods.’”

“But the princess of Videha, her mind clouded, shed tears and said this cruel thing to me: ‘You have set on me an utterly sinful hope, that with your brother dead you will have me, but you shall never have me. By some secret pact with Bharata you follow behind Rama, and that is why, even at his loud cry, you do not run to him. You are a hidden enemy, walking with me and watching for the chance against Rama.’ Stung by these words, my eyes red, my lips trembling, I came away from the hermitage.”

Confounded by his own anguish, Rama said, “Gentle one, coming away and leaving her was indeed a wrong you did. Knowing well that I am able to drive off the rakshasas, you came away over Maithili’s angry words. It was not pleasing to me that you should abandon Maithili for the harsh words of an angry woman. Driven by Sita, you gave way to anger and did not keep my command, and this was in every way wrong. That very rakshasa, who lured me from the hermitage in the shape of a deer, lies there pierced by my arrow. When I drew the bow full and struck him with a deadly shaft, he cast off the deer-shape and appeared as a rakshasa decked in ornaments, and in an anguished voice, mimicking mine, he cried that piteous cry that carried far, and for which you came away and left Maithili.”

The gist: Lakshmana explains that Sita’s harsh, unjust accusation forced him to leave the hermitage. Rama uncovers the secret, that the anguished cry was the trickery of Maricha in his deer-form, and that Lakshmana’s leaving Sita alone became the very opening the rakshasas needed.

Rama questions the trees and the beasts about Sita

As Rama returned to the hermitage, his lower left eyelid began to throb again and again, he himself stumbled, and a tremor ran through his body. Seeing ill omen after ill omen, he asked in spite of himself, “Will Sita be well?” And when he saw the empty hut he grew more distraught still. Downcast, he found the leaf-hut without Sita and stripped of grace, like a lotus-pond withered in winter.

Seeing the hut forsaken by the forest deities, its flowers wilted, its deer and birds restless, its deerskins and kusha-grass scattered, its seats overturned, he lamented again and again. “The timid Sita has been carried off, or devoured, or lost on the road, or hidden somewhere in play, or gone into the forest. She has gone to gather flowers and fruit, or to the lotus-tank, or down to the river for water.” Though he sought her hard, he did not find his beloved, and the glorious Rama, his eyes red with grief, began to look like a madman.

Drowned in a sea of the mire of grief, Rama wandered from tree to tree, from mountain to river and stream, and lamented. He spoke to the trees. “Kadamba, my beloved loved the kadamba flower. Have you seen her? Bilva, if you have seen the soft Sita of the bilva-shaped breasts, robed in yellow silk, then tell me. Arjuna, tell me whether the tender daughter of Janaka, who loved the arjuna flower, is alive or not. This kakubha tree surely knows Maithili of the kadamba-smooth thighs. Tilaka, you must know her who loved the tilaka flower that the bees sing over. Ashoka, remover of sorrow, show me my beloved and quickly make good your name, for I am struck down with grief.”

“Tala, if you have seen Sita of the breasts like ripe tala-fruit, give me word of that fair-limbed one. Jambu, if you have seen my beloved of the gold-bright luster, then speak without fear. Karnikara, you are in full bloom today and shining in great beauty. If you have seen the good woman who loved the karnikara, then tell me.” Going from tree to tree, to the mango, the nipa, the sal, the jackfruit, the kurava, the dhava, the pomegranate, the bakula, the punnaga, the sandal, and the ketaka, and questioning them, Rama wandered the forest like a madman.

He questioned the beasts as well. “Deer, do you know Maithili of the fawn-like eyes? She would be with the does, my beloved who looked like a doe. Great elephant, if you have seen Sita of the thighs smooth as an elephant’s trunk, then tell me. Tiger, if you have seen the moon-faced Maithili, my beloved, tell me without fear, for you have nothing to fear from me.” Then, as if he saw Sita before him, he said, “Lotus-eyed one, why do you run? You have been seen. Why do you hide behind the trees and not answer me? Stay, lovely one. Have you no pity for me? You are not so fond of jest as this. Why then this scorn? You are known by your yellow silk. Even as you fled you were seen. If any love is left in you, then stop.”

Then, as the delusion lifted, he said, “Either that fair-smiling one is not here at all, or she has perhaps been killed, for she would not so scorn me in my distress. It is clear that flesh-eating rakshasas have cut my girl, parted from me, limb from limb, and devoured her. That face like the full moon, with its lovely teeth and lips and its fair earrings, has been swallowed. That soft, champak-hued neck, made for a necklace, has been eaten. Those arms soft as young leaves, with their bangles and armlets, trembling with fear, have been eaten. Though she had many kinsmen, she was devoured by rakshasas like a woman left by her companions on the road.” “Ah, long-armed Lakshmana, do you see my beloved anywhere? Ah beloved, ah gentle one, where have you gone? Ah Sita,” so lamenting again and again, Rama wandered forest after forest, now leaping up in a rush, now whirling like a dust-storm. Even after searching the whole vast forest, not letting go of hope, he gave himself again to a great effort in the search for his beloved.

The gist: Not finding Sita, Rama wanders like a madman, questioning trees, beasts, and even Sita herself as if she stood before him. Here Valmiki carries the grief of separation past the human bounds, where the patience of a king and hero breaks and turns into the uncontrolled crying of a man who has lost the one he loves.

Rama’s lament, and Lakshmana’s consolation

Seeing the empty hermitage-ground, the deserted leaf-hut, and the scattered seats, and casting his eyes all around and still not finding Sita, Rama lifted his fine arms and cried out to Lakshmana. “Lakshmana, where is the princess of Videha? In what direction has she gone from here? Son of Sumitra, who has carried her off or devoured her? Sita, if you wish to jest behind a tree, then let that jest be enough now, come to me in my sorrow. Sita, the fearless fawns you used to play with sit lost in thought, their eyes full of tears, without you.”

“Without Sita I will not live, Lakshmana. In the other world my father will look at me and say, ‘You took a vow and were sent to the forest, and yet you have come back before the term was over. Shame on you, slave to your desire, ignoble, false of word.’ Where are you going, lovely one, leaving me helpless, worn with grief, wretched, my hopes broken, as glory leaves a crooked man? Do not leave me, slender-waisted one. Without you I will give up my life.” So lamenting, restless for the sight of Sita, not finding the daughter of Janaka, Rama sank like an elephant mired in a great swamp.

Then Lakshmana, wishing his good, said, “O wise one, do not despair. Make the effort with me. Hero, this great mountain is graced with many caverns. Maithili loved to roam the forest and would grow wild with delight in it. It may be she has gone into the woods, to some blossoming lotus-pond, or to a river with its fish and reeds, or she is hiding somewhere to frighten us. Best of men, the daughter of Videha may be crouched somewhere to test our skill in the search and her own. Come, let us search for her quickly. Kakutstha, if you think it fit, do not sink your mind in grief.”

Steadied by this word spoken in love, Rama joined Lakshmana in the search. The two sons of Dasharatha combed forest, mountain, river, and lake, searching the slopes, the rocks, and the peaks of the Prasravana mountain in full, but they did not find Sita. When he had searched the mountain on every side, Rama said, “Son of Sumitra, I cannot see the good princess of Videha anywhere on this mountain.” Then Lakshmana, tormented with sorrow, said to his brilliant brother, “Great-minded one, you will surely find Maithili, the daughter of Janaka, as the mighty-armed Vishnu bound Bali and won back this earth.”

Even at this word Rama, his mind darkened by anguish, said in a wretched voice, “I have searched the whole forest, the blossoming lotus-ponds, and this mountain with its many caverns and streams, but I cannot see the princess of Videha, dearer to me than my own breath.” So lamenting, worn thin by Sita’s loss, distraught with grief, Rama for a while lost all hold on himself. His limbs slackened, his mind gone, all but senseless, wretched and stricken, he sat down drawing long, hot breaths. Sighing again and again, the lotus-eyed Rama, choked with tears, cried “Ah beloved” over and over. Then the grief-stricken Lakshmana, with folded hands, in many ways comforted his dear brother, but Rama, taking no heed of the words that fell from Lakshmana’s lips, not seeing his beloved Sita, lamented on and on.

The key to this (Vamana and Bali): Lakshmana points to the story of Vishnu’s Vamana avatar, in which Vamana bound King Bali and returned the three worlds to Indra. The sense is that as Vishnu won back the lost kingdom, so Rama will surely regain Sita. This consolation is an attempt to turn the search from despair toward hope.

The gist: Rama speaks even of giving up his life without Sita, while Lakshmana holds him up with courage and the example of Vamana. The two brothers comb forest, mountain, and lake, but when Sita is not found Rama’s patience breaks again and again.

Rama’s deep lament, and Lakshmana’s words of patience

Not seeing Sita, yet seeing her as if she stood before him, the dharmic, long-armed, lotus-eyed Rama, tormented by love, began to lament, his words made hard by sobbing. “Beloved, you who so love flowers, you hide your body among the ashoka branches and only deepen my grief. Lady, even hidden by the plantain tree, your thighs soft as its stem still show; you cannot conceal them. Gentle one, you sit laughing in the karnikara grove, but let that laughter be enough now, it gives me pain. Such jest does not become the hermitage, though your nature is fond of jest. Come back, large-eyed one, your hut is empty.”

Then, the delusion lifting, he said to Lakshmana, “It is clear that Sita has been eaten by the rakshasas or carried off, for she does not come to me as I lament. Lakshmana, these herds of deer with their tear-filled eyes seem to say that the lady has been devoured by the rakshasas. Ah my noble one, where have you gone? Ah good woman of the lovely color. Ah Kaikeyi, today your wish is fulfilled. I set out with Sita and come back without her. How shall I now enter my own empty inner apartments? People will call me weak and heartless. My cowardice too will be laid bare by the loss of Sita. When my exile is over and I ask King Janaka, lord of Mithila, after his welfare, how shall I meet his eyes?”

“Even heaven is empty to me without her. Lakshmana, leave me in the forest and go back to lovely Ayodhya. Without her I cannot live at all. Embrace Bharata close and say to him in my name, ‘Rule the earth by Rama’s command.’ Slayer of foes, salute my mothers Kaikeyi, Sumitra, and Kausalya fittingly in my name, and guard them with care. Tell my mother Kausalya in full of this ruin of Sita, and of my own, which is soon to come.” So the wretched Rama lamented on, and Lakshmana too, his face dry with fear, grew utterly distressed.

Robbed of his beloved, stricken by grief and confusion, the prince Rama, casting his brother too into despair, sank again into a fiercer despair. Drawing hot breaths, drowned in grief, he spoke words fit to sorrow over to the sorrowing Lakshmana. “There is no man on this earth so ill-fated as I, over whom grief upon grief comes unbroken, tearing my heart and mind. Surely in a former birth I did evil deeds again and again, whose ripening has burst upon me all at once, so that I pass from one grief into the next. The loss of my kingdom, parting from my kin, the death of my father, separation from my mothers, all these, when I dwell on them, swell the flood of my grief the higher, Lakshmana.”

“When I reached the forest, all the pain of the body’s hardship was quieted by Sita’s nearness, and now, with Sita gone, it has flared up again, as a fire blazes up when wood is thrown on it. My timid noble one, carried off by force through the sky, surely cried out again and again in shrill, broken tones of fear, she who spoke so sweetly. Her round breasts, worthy of the finest red sandal, would be smeared with mire and blood, and still my body does not fall to pieces. Like the moon in the mouth of Rahu, my beloved’s face, framed in curling hair, sweet of speech, fallen into the power of the rakshasas, shines no more. Her lovely neck, made for a necklace, they must have cut in some lonely place and drunk her blood.”

“Cut off from me, dragged through a lonely forest and ringed by rakshasas, she must have cried like a poor osprey. Lakshmana, sitting beside me on this rock, Sita, smiling sweetly, used to talk with you of many things. This Godavari, best of rivers, was ever her favorite haunt. Perhaps she went there, but she never goes alone. Lotus-faced, lotus-eyed, she may have gone to gather lotuses, but that too is wrong, for she never goes near the lotuses without me. Perhaps she went to the woods with their blossoming trees, but when she is alone she is very much afraid.”

Then he called upon the sun and the wind. “Sun, you who know all that the world does and leaves undone, witness of true and false deeds, tell me, struck down by grief, where my beloved has gone or been carried. Wind, in all three worlds there is nothing hidden from you. Tell me whether Sita, the guardian of my line, is dead, carried off, or on the road.”

As Rama lamented thus, helpless, all but out of his senses, the just and generous Lakshmana spoke words fit for the hour. “Let go grief now and take up patience. Bring back your zeal for the search. A man of zeal does not lose heart even in the hardest tasks.” Even at this word of the fierce-valored Lakshmana, Rama, stricken by separation from Sita, took no heed, lost his patience, and sank once more into a great sorrow.

A sub-tale: Rama’s questioning of the sun and the wind is more than lament. It carries the sign of an ancient belief, that the sun is the witness of all the deeds of the world and that the wind, being everywhere, knows everything. When a man drowned in grief gets no answer from any human being, he calls on the powers of nature themselves as his witnesses. Further on in the story this very Godavari, these very directions, will become the means of giving Rama a thread to Sita.

The gist: Rama’s lament reaches its peak, where he bears at once the whole weight of his griefs, from the loss of the kingdom to the loss of Sita, and asks even the sun and the wind for word of his beloved. Even Lakshmana’s words of patience cannot steady him at once, and he sinks again into a deep sorrow.

Godavari kept silent, and the deer pointed south

Rama said to Lakshmana that he should go quickly to the river Godavari and see whether Sita had gone there to gather lotuses. At his word Lakshmana went to that lovely river, saw its many fair landings, and came back saying that at no landing was she to be seen, and that though he had called her by name she had not heard his call. “Rama, I do not know to what state she has come, she who by her mere presence would drive away all sorrow.”

Hearing Lakshmana’s words, Rama, distracted with grief, went himself to the Godavari and said, “Where is Sita?” But the creatures he had questioned before did not tell Rama that Ravana, who deserved death, had carried Sita off, and the Godavari too kept silent on the matter. Then the elements begged the river to give him word of his beloved, yet even at the grieving Rama’s questioning the Godavari said nothing about Sita. Remembering the terrible form and deeds of the evil-souled Ravana, the river, out of fear, said nothing at all about Sita. So the tradition tells it.

Losing hope of any word of Sita from the river, Rama, worn thin by her loss, said to Lakshmana, “Gentle one, this Godavari too gives no answer. Lakshmana, when I meet Janaka and the mother of Videha’s daughter, how shall I tell them, without her, this unwelcome news? Robbed of my kingdom, living in the forest on its fruits and roots, she took away all my sorrow. Where has the daughter of Videha gone? Cut off from my kin, and now seeing the daughter of Videha no more, my nights, lying awake, will grow very long. If only Sita could be found, I would live as a servant even on the Mandakini, in Janasthana, and on this Prasravana mountain.”

Just then Rama saw that the great deer were looking at him again and again, as if they wished to say something. Reading their signs, in a voice choked with tears, he said, “Where is Sita?” and began to read the meaning in their eyes. At the prince’s question the deer all rose up at once, lifted their eyes toward the sky, and turned their heads to the south. In this way they gave the sign that Sita had been carried off to the southern quarter, by the sky-road. Then, looking toward the very path by which Ravana had borne Maithili away, they went on bellowing. Lakshmana understood all their signs, which were as clear as speech.

The key to this (places): Janasthana is that part of the Dandaka forest where Rama, Lakshmana, and Sita had their leaf-hut, and where Khara and Dushana were destroyed. The Prasravana mountain is the one where the springs run (prasravana means the water of a spring), and the Mandakini is the nearby river. It was from here that Ravana carried Sita off toward the south-west by the sky-road, to Lanka.

Flower-signs and the wreckage of battle: the fire of Rama’s wrath

Lakshmana said to his elder brother that since, at his question, the deer had risen up all at once and pointed toward the earth and the southern quarter, the two of them should take this south-westerly way, the quarter over which the rakshasas hold sway under their guardian Nirriti. Rama said only, “Very well,” and, with his eyes fixed on the ground, set off behind Lakshmana toward the south.

Talking together as they went, the two brothers saw a track of flowers scattered on the ground. Seeing the fall of blossoms lying on the earth, Rama said to the grieving Lakshmana, “I know these flowers. These are the very flowers I gave to Sita in the forest, which she bound into her hair. I believe the sun, the wind, and the glorious mother Earth kept these flowers from wilting to do me a kindness.”

Then the dharmic Rama spoke to that mountain full of springs, “King of mountains, have you seen in some lovely corner of this forest a young woman, fair in every limb, parted from me?” Getting no answer, in his anger Rama challenged the mountain as a lion challenges some small deer, “Show me Sita of the golden color and golden limbs, or I will grind all your peaks to dust.” At Rama’s threat the mountain seemed to hint of Sita, yet it did not show her to him. Then Rama said again to that mass of rock, “Burned by the fire of my arrows you will be reduced to ashes, stripped on every side of grass, tree, and leaf, and made unfit to dwell in.” And turning to Lakshmana he said, “If the Godavari does not tell me today where the moon-faced Sita is, I will dry up this river too.” So in his fury Rama looked at the river as if he would burn it with his blazing gaze.

Just then Rama saw marked on the earth the huge footprint of a rakshasa, and the footprints of Sita running this way and that, frightened as the rakshasa pursued her and eager to reach Rama. He saw too a broken bow, a quiver, and a chariot shattered into pieces. His heart in turmoil, Rama said to Lakshmana, “Look, here lie the golden fragments of Sita’s ornaments and flowers of every kind, scattered about. The whole surface of the earth shines all around as if with grains of gold, and is covered with drops of blood, more here, less there. I believe, Lakshmana, that shape-shifting rakshasas cut the daughter of Videha to pieces, shared her among themselves, and devoured her. On this very spot two rakshasas fought a savage battle over Sita.”

Rama went on, “Gentle one, whose is this fine great bow, set with pearls and gems? Whose is this golden mail, blazing like the morning sun and inlaid with lapis, lying broken on the ground? Whose is this hundred-ribbed parasol, hung with divine garlands, fallen with its staff snapped? Whose are these fiend-faced mules of dreadful form and huge body, sheathed in golden armor, slain in the fight? Whose is this splendid chariot, bright as blazing fire, with its war-banner, lying overturned and broken? Whose are these dreadful arrows, thick and long as a chariot-axle, their heads sheared off? And see, Lakshmana, two quivers full of arrows lie smashed. And here the charioteer lies dead, whip and reins still in his hands, and these are plainly the footprints of a male rakshasa.”

Then Rama said, “My enmity with these cruel-hearted, shape-shifting rakshasas has grown a hundredfold, and it will end only with their lives. The daughter of Videha has either been killed, or has died, or been devoured, and dharma itself could not guard Sita, carried off in that great forest. Lakshmana, when the daughter of Videha herself has been devoured or carried off, what creature in this world is able to do me any good? People take even the supreme, valiant Rudra, maker, protector, and destroyer of the worlds, for a weakling, if out of compassion he stands back and does not step into the affairs of the world. In the same way the king of the gods thinks me too, who am gentle, devoted to the world’s good, restrained, and full of pity, to be a man without power. See, Lakshmana, these very virtues have turned to faults in me. This very day, for the ruin of all beings and all rakshasas, my splendor will blaze forth, thrusting all these virtues into the background, like the sun risen at the world’s dissolution, blotting out the moonlight. Now neither yaksha, nor gandharva, nor pishacha, nor rakshasa, nor kinnara, nor man shall know any ease.”

Rama said, “See, Lakshmana, the sky will now fill with my weapons and arrows. Today I will halt with my arrows the movement of all who range the three worlds. I will bind the three worlds fast to the work of Time, so that the planets stop, the moon is covered, fire and wind are undone, the sun’s brightness dims, the mountain peaks are ground to dust, the pools dry up, tree and creeper and shrub are torn out, and the oceans run dry. If the gods, through whose negligence my wife was carried off by the rakshasas, do not give Sita back to me exactly as she was, they will see my might this very day. From my bowstring the net of arrows will thicken the sky so that no bird can fly. Today the gods will see the power of these barbless arrows that go far, driven by my rage and my resentment. When my wrath destroys the three worlds, neither gods, nor demons, nor pishachas, nor rakshasas will be left. If the gods with authority do not return Sita, whether she has been killed or has died, and do not hand my beloved daughter of Videha back to me in that state, I will destroy the whole of the three worlds with all that moves and stands still, and I will go on burning them all with my arrows until I see her.”

Saying this, his eyes coppery with rage, his lips trembling, Rama tightened his bark garment and deerskin and bound up the mass of his matted hair. In that hour the wise Rama, so wrathful, had the very look that Rudra had of old when he destroyed Tripura. Then, taking the bow from Lakshmana, gripping it hard in his fist, and drawing from the quiver a dreadful, blazing arrow like a venomous serpent, the glorious Rama, conqueror of enemy cities, set it to the string and, wrathful as the fire at the world’s dissolution, said, “As old age, death, Time, and Fate are ever inescapable for all beings, so I too, filled with wrath, am beyond doubt inescapable. If the gods do not today return to me Maithili Sita of the lovely teeth, faultless, exactly as before, then I will overturn the whole world, with its gods, gandharvas, men, and nagas, and its mountains too.”

The key to this (a concept): Tripura is the set of three cities (three forts of gold, silver, and iron built in the sky, the middle air, and the earth) that the demon Maya made, and which Rudra, or Shiva, burned to ashes with a single arrow. Rama’s wrathful figure is likened to that same world-destroying Rudra.

The gist: The Godavari gave no word of Sita, but the deer pointed south. Going that way, Rama and Lakshmana find Sita’s fallen flowers, her footprints, and the wreckage of the Jatayu-Ravana battle: a broken bow, a parasol, a chariot, slain mules, and a dead charioteer. Taking Sita for devoured or carried off, Rama rises in a wrath that would destroy the worlds and sets himself to ruin the whole of the three worlds.

Lakshmana’s consoling words: do not slay all the worlds for one man’s crime

At that moment, seeing Rama, worn thin by Sita’s loss, ready like the fire at the world’s dissolution to destroy the worlds, looking again and again at his drawn bowstring, drawing deep breaths, eager to burn creation, in a rage of a kind never seen before, Lakshmana folded his hands and, his mouth dry, spoke this word.

Lakshmana said, “Until now you have been gentle, restrained, and devoted to the good of all beings. You should not, under the sway of anger, cast off your own nature. As beauty dwells in the moon, brightness in the sun, motion in the wind, and forbearance in the earth, so supreme glory dwells forever and surely in you. It is not fitting for you to destroy all the worlds for the crime of one man. I will surely find out whose war-chariot this is, and who broke it, and why, with its yoke, parasol, whisks, and all its gear. This ground, cut by hooves and wheels and wet with drops of blood, looks most terrible, from which I judge that a battle took place here. Yet it seems the struggle of a single charioteer, not of two, O best of speakers.”

Lakshmana said that he saw here no footprints of a large army. “For the sake of one man you should not destroy the worlds, for lords of the earth are kings who punish justly, who are gentle and calm, and you have always been the protector and the highest refuge of all beings. Raghava, who would count it right to destroy or lose your wife? The rivers, oceans, mountains, gods, gandharvas, and demons are as unable to do you wrong as a righteous priest is unable to wrong the man consecrated for a sacrifice. King, it is the one who carried off Sita whom you should seek out. Taking me with you, bow in hand, and making the great seers your helpers, we will search, with a steady mind, the oceans, the mountains, the forests, the many dreadful caves, the many lotus-lakes, and the worlds of gods and gandharvas, until we find the one who carried off your wife. If the king of the gods does not return your wife by gentle means, lord of Kosala, then you may take the fitting measure.”

Lakshmana said at the last, “Lord of men, if by good conduct, by conciliation, by humility, and by right policy you cannot win Sita back, then with a storm of golden-winged arrows like the thunderbolt of the great Indra, uproot the worlds.”

The key to this (a concept): The four means of statecraft are named here in order: sama (persuasion and reconciliation), dana or the courtesy of good conduct, bheda (division), and last of all danda (the use of force). Lakshmana’s argument is exactly this, that force is the final means. First let reason and justice seek out the enemy. To destroy all the worlds would be an injustice to blameless beings.

The gist: Lakshmana turns Rama, ready in his wrath to burn the worlds, back toward reason. To destroy blameless worlds for one criminal would be an injustice. First find the criminal, then by justice and by the proper means try to win Sita back. Force is the last resort.

Lakshmana’s words of patience: to whom does adversity not come

Having comforted for a while Rama, scorched by grief, lamenting like one without a protector, filled with deep confusion and heavy of heart, Lakshmana, son of Sumitra, tenderly pressed his brother’s feet and reasoned with him in these words.

Lakshmana said, “By great austerity, by vows and fasts, and by the great rite of the son-seeking sacrifice, King Dasharatha obtained you, as the gods obtained nectar. Bound to the world by your virtues alone, the king, at his parting from you, attained godhood, as we heard from the lips of Bharata. If you cannot endure this sorrow that has come, what other man of common sort and little strength will bear it? Best of men, take patience. To what living being do adversities not come? Like fire they touch a man and in a moment pass away. If in your grief you burn all the worlds with your splendor, where will your suffering people find peace?”

Lakshmana gave his examples. “This touch of sorrow is natural to human beings. Yayati, son of Nahusha, reached by his meritorious deeds the very heaven of Indra, and yet even there the ruin of a fall from heaven, brought on by his own indiscretion, touched him. The hundred sons of the great seer Vasishtha, our father’s family priest, were born in a single day, and in a single day Vishvamitra killed them all. Even this Earth, mother of the world, saluted by all people, is seen to tremble, lord of Kosala. Even the mighty sun and moon, the two eyes of the world, on whom everything rests and who are the two forms of dharma, come to eclipse. The greatest of beings and the very gods are under the sway of fate. How much more, then, embodied creatures? Even among Indra and the gods, right policy and wrong are known to bear fruit as joy and sorrow, and so you should not grieve.”

Lakshmana said, “Whether Sita is dead or has been carried off by someone, valiant Raghava, you should not grieve like an ordinary man. Those like you, who see all things, are never, even in the greatest crises, given over to grief, and stay unmoved in their vision. Weigh with your reason what is right and what is not, for the wise know good and evil well. There are certain acts whose merits and faults are not known without the scriptures, and which, being impermanent, are not accomplished without action, and once done their welcome or unwelcome fruit must certainly be borne.”

Lakshmana said humbly, “Hero, it is you yourself who have taught me all this many times before. What could even Brihaspati himself teach you? Your understanding is hard for the gods to fathom. I only wish to wake the wisdom in you that grief has, as it were, put to sleep. Best of the Ikshvakus, remembering your divine and your human prowess, make the effort to destroy your enemies. Bull among men, what purpose of yours is served by the ruin of all? Best of men, weigh it well with your reason, and, finding out that one sinful enemy, uproot him alone.”

A sub-tale (a tradition): Among Lakshmana’s examples are two famous tales. Yayati, son of Nahusha, rose by his merit to live in heaven with Indra, but was cast down from there by his own pride and folly. The hundred sons of Vasishtha were slain in a single day by the enmity of Vishvamitra. These are told to show that even gods and great seers had to bear adversity, and so it is the dharma of a patient man to rise above grief.

The gist: Lakshmana teaches Rama patience. Adversity comes to every being, even to gods and great seers, and it passes. With the examples of Yayati and Vasishtha’s sons he wakes the reason that grief has smothered in Rama, and moves him to seek out and punish the one criminal, Ravana, alone.

Meeting the wounded Jatayu: Rama’s lament

Though Rama was the elder, he was able to take the essence of what was said, and at Lakshmana’s reasoning he accepted his beautifully worded and most precious counsel. Curbing his risen anger and leaning on his wonderful bow, Rama said to Lakshmana, “Child, what shall we do, and where shall we go? By what means may we see Sita in this forest? Consider it.”

To the anguished Rama, Lakshmana said, “You should search this very Janasthana, which is full of many rakshasas and set with trees and creepers of every kind. Here are mountain-fastnesses, ravines, and caverns, many dreadful caves filled with herds of beasts of many kinds, dwellings of kinnaras and mansions of gandharvas. Search all these with me, diligently. Men of understanding and greatness like you are not shaken in adversity, any more than the mountains are shaken by the blasts of the wind.” At Lakshmana’s word Rama, in his anger, set to his bow a dreadful arrow named Kshura and, with Lakshmana, began to range that whole forest.

Then they saw, fallen to the earth, drenched in blood, looking like a mountain peak, the great Jatayu. Seeing the vulture like a hill-peak, Rama said to Lakshmana, “Beyond doubt this bird has devoured Sita, the daughter of Videha. Clearly this is some rakshasa in the shape of a vulture, ranging the forest. Having eaten the large-eyed Sita, it lies here at its ease. I will kill it with my blazing, straight-flying, dreadful arrows.” So saying, setting the Kshura arrow to his bow, Rama rushed at the bird as though shaking the earth to its ocean-bounds.

Then the bird, vomiting blood with foam, said in a most piteous voice to Rama, son of Dasharatha, “Long-lived one, the goddess whom you seek in this great forest as one seeks a life-giving herb, both she and my life, Ravana has taken. Raghava, that goddess, parted from you and from Lakshmana, was carried off before my eyes by the mighty Ravana. Lord, I came to Sita’s rescue, and in the battle that followed Ravana’s chariot and parasol were smashed and fell to the ground. This is his broken bow, these are his shattered arrows, and, Rama, this is his war-chariot that I broke in the fight. Here lies his charioteer, killed by the blows of my wings. Weary at last, and Ravana with his sword cut off both my wings and, taking Sita, flew into the sky. I am already killed at the hands of the rakshasa. You should not kill me.”

Learning this dear news of Sita, Rama let his great bow fall, embraced the king of vultures, and, with Lakshmana, lost all hold on himself, sank to the ground, and wept. Though he was of the firmest mind, tormented now by a double grief, he lamented with Lakshmana. Seeing the vulture lying alone on that narrow track, drawing long breaths again and again, the sorrowing Rama said to Lakshmana, “My kingdom is lost, I have dwelt in the forest, Sita is gone, and now this bird too is dying. Such is my ill fortune, that it could burn even the fire that burns all things. If today, to comfort myself, I were to set out to cross even the brimming ocean, that lord of rivers too would dry up before my ill fortune. In this whole world of moving and unmoving things there is none so unlucky as I, before whom this great net of calamity has fallen. This friend of my father, the mighty king of vultures, lies struck down on the ground by my reversal of fortune.”

Saying this again and again, showing him a love as for a father, Rama with Lakshmana stroked Jatayu over and over. Embracing that king of vultures with his wings shorn away, drenched in blood, and saying, “Where has Maithili gone?” Rama sank down upon the earth.

The key to this (a concept): Jatayu was a friend of King Dasharatha, and for this reason Rama holds him as a father. The Kshura is the keen arrow whose head was edged like a razor, and that is where its name comes from.

The gist: Rama first takes the wounded Jatayu for a Sita-devouring rakshasa and is ready to kill him, but Jatayu tells him that Ravana carried Sita off and cut away his wings and struck him down. Learning this, Rama’s wrath turns to grief, and he holds Jatayu as a father, embracing him and lamenting.

Jatayu’s last words, and his cremation

Seeing the vulture struck down to the earth by the rakshasa Ravana, Rama said to Lakshmana, who bore a friendly spirit toward all beings, “Striving in my interest, killed in the fight by the rakshasa, this bird is surely giving up his life for my sake alone. Lakshmana, the life in Jatayu’s body is very faint, and he is slowly growing speechless as he gazes on us in his weakness.” Then, turning to Jatayu, he said, “Jatayu, if you can speak once more, then tell me of Sita, and of your own killing. May all be well with you. Why did Ravana carry off my noble one, and what wrong of mine did he see, that he bore away my beloved? Best of birds, how did that moon-lovely face look, and what did Sita say at that time? Dear uncle, how mighty is the rakshasa, of what form, what are his deeds, and where is his dwelling? Tell me, who ask you.”

Fondly looking on Rama, who lamented like one without a protector, the dharmic Jatayu said in a faltering voice, “By the aid of a vast sorcery that raised a storm and cloudy weather and wind, the evil-souled rakshasa king Ravana carried off Sita. Cutting away my wings when I was weary, dear one, the night-ranger departed toward the south, taking Sita. Raghava, my senses grow dull and my sight is turning. I see trees of gold with their tops covered in usira grass. In the hour in which Ravana carried Sita away, the owner of a lost thing swiftly wins it back again. That was the hour called Vinda, but Ravana did not know it. Having carried off your beloved Sita, the daughter of Janaka, the rakshasa king Ravana will soon perish, like a fish that has swallowed a hook. You should not grieve over the daughter of Janaka. Killing him on the field of battle, you will soon be happy with the daughter of Videha.”

Undeluded, and even as he died answering Rama, blood with flecks of flesh began to flow from the vulture’s mouth. He said, “That Ravana is the very son of the sage Vishrava and the half-brother of Kubera,” and so saying the king of birds gave up his life, so hard to keep. As Rama went on saying, “Speak, speak,” his palms joined out of reverence for his father’s friend, the vulture’s life left his body and rose to the sky. Setting his head on the ground, stretching out his feet, and throwing his body back, Jatayu sank down upon the earth.

Seeing that coppery-eyed vulture, lifeless, huge as a mountain, Rama, weighed down by many sorrows, said to Lakshmana, “For many years this bird lived at ease in this Dandaka forest, the home of the rakshasas, and here he has laid down his body. A bird who lived many years and flourished for a long age lies killed today. Truly Time is hard to overcome. See, Lakshmana, this vulture who did me a kindness has been killed for my sake, killed at the hands of the mighty Ravana as he came to Sita’s rescue. Forsaking the ancestral kingdom of the vultures, this king of birds gave up his life for me. Lakshmana, dharma-abiding, valiant, and refuge-worthy good souls are found everywhere, even among creatures born in the sub-human forms. Scorcher of foes, the loss of Sita does not gnaw at me so much as the ruin of this vulture for my sake. This king of birds is worthy of my worship and honor, exactly as my father, the glorious and most illustrious King Dasharatha. Lakshmana, bring wood. I will make fire by attrition, for I wish to cremate this king of vultures, who died for my sake. I will lay the lord of the bird-world on the pyre and cremate this bird killed at the hands of the rakshasa.”

Then, turning to the vulture, Rama said, “Great-souled king of vultures, by my leave go to the highest worlds. By my rite attain the destiny of those given to sacrifice, of those who keep the sacred fire all their lives, of those who never retreat from the field of battle, and of those who make gifts of land.” So saying, laying the king of birds on the pyre that Lakshmana had made and kindled, the dharmic Rama, sorrowing though he was, cremated him as one would cremate a kinsman. Then, going deep into the forest with Lakshmana and digging out the bulky roots called Maharohi, Rama spread the ground with holy kusha-grass. Tearing out the pulp of the Maharohi roots and kneading it into balls, the illustrious Rama offered those balls to the soul of the dead bird on the lovely ground overspread with green kusha. Then, going to the bank of the river Godavari, the two brothers bathed and offered water to the king of vultures according to the ordinance of the scriptures. And Rama recited too, in a low voice, those holy texts sacred to the manes that the brahmins prescribe for the ascent of a dead mortal’s spirit to heaven.

So, having done the exceedingly difficult and glorious deed of trying to save Sita from Ravana, killed in battle and given the last rites by Rama, who was as good as a great seer, the king of vultures attained the holy destiny that is for the soul’s blessedness. Having offered water to the vulture and set their minds at rest about Jatayu, focusing their thought on the recovery of Sita, the two princes went on into the forest, like Vishnu and Indra.

The key to this (a concept): Jatayu gave the parentage of Ravana: he is the son of the sage Vishrava and the half-brother of Kubera, whose other name is Vaishravana. The hour called Vinda was the auspicious time about which the tradition says that a thing lost in it is soon regained. Ravana was ignorant of this, and so Jatayu gave the sign of Sita’s recovery.

The gist: In his last breaths Jatayu gives Ravana’s parentage (son of Vishrava, brother of Kubera) and the sign of Sita’s recovery, then gives up his life. Rama, holding him as a father, performs the cremation, the offering of the funeral balls, and the water-rite according to the ordinance, and the king of vultures wins a holy destiny. Then the two brothers go on in the search for Sita.

The punishment of Ayomukhi, and the grip of Kabandha

Having offered water to Jatayu, searching the forest for Sita, the two Raghavas moved on toward the south-west. Bearing bow, sword, and arrows, the two sons of Ikshvaku went that way and reached an untrodden track, blocked with many shrubs, trees, and creepers, covered on every side, hard to pass, dense, and dreadful to look at. Passing it swiftly, they left that vast and most fearful forest behind them and went on toward the south.

Going two yojanas beyond Janasthana, the two mighty Raghavas entered the dense Krauncha forest, which looked like a mass of clouds and seemed joyous on every side, filled with lovely flowers of many colors, herds of beasts, and birds. Searching for Sita, weary, halting here and there, they roamed the forest. Then, going two yojanas eastward, crossing the Krauncha forest, and seeing on the way the hermitage of the sage Matanga, the two brothers saw the dreadful forest beside it, full of many fearful beasts and birds and thick with dense trees. There, near a cave in the mountain deep as Patala and forever wrapped in darkness, they saw a fierce-faced rakshasi. She was a source of terror to the weak, loathsome and dreadful to look on, with a long belly and sharp teeth, grim, hard of skin, fearful, tall, her hair loose, devouring the fearful beasts.

That rakshasi came up to Lakshmana, who was walking ahead of his elder brother, and, saying, “Come, let us make love,” seized him by the arm. Embracing the son of Sumitra, she said, “I am Ayomukhi by name. You have come to me, and you please me. Valiant lord, through this long life you will sport with me on the mountain-fastnesses and the river-banks.” At this Lakshmana in anger drew his sword and cut off her ears, nose, and breasts. Her ears and nose cut away, the grim rakshasi screamed in a harsh voice and fled as she had come.

When she had gone, the two brothers, forcing their way through the dense forest, reached an impenetrable wood. Then the pure, virtuous, courageous Lakshmana of great energy folded his hands and said to his brilliant brother, “My arm is throbbing hard, my mind is troubled, and I see, for the most part, signs of ill. Therefore, noble one, be on your guard and heed my word. These signs tell my mind at once of a danger close at hand. This most dreadful bird, called Vanjulaka, is crying out as if to proclaim our victory in the fight to come.”

While the two brothers were vigorously searching that whole forest, a great sound arose, as if it rent the forest, as if the forest were caught in a storm, and that sound seemed to fill the whole wood. Seeking the cause of the sound, sword in hand, Rama with his younger brother Lakshmana saw a rakshasa of vast body and broad chest. The two princes drew near the rakshasa who stood before them. That huge rakshasa was a mere trunk, without head or neck, and his mouth was in his belly. He was covered with sharp, bristling hair, tall as a great mountain, dark-blue in color, dreadful, with a voice like thunder. In the middle of his chest, in a forehead there, was a single eye, huge, long, tawny, and terrible, blazing like a flame of fire, fringed with great lashes, and he kept licking again and again his huge mouth set with great teeth.

He was devouring dreadful bears, lions, and other beasts and birds. Spreading out his two fearful arms, each a full yojana in reach, seizing with his hands bears, deer, and birds of every kind, dragging and flinging away many leaders of herds, he stood blocking the path of the two brothers. Falling back a distance of a kos, they looked on that great, cruel, dreadful Kabandha, ringed by his own arms and most terrible to behold by his very shape. Stretching his vast arms out to their full length, the mighty-armed one caught both Raghavas together by force and squeezed them in his grip. Though they bore sword and stout bow, and were of keen splendor and great strength, when the rakshasa dragged them they were made helpless.

There, by his firmness, the heroic Rama was not troubled at all, but by his boyish nature and his feeling of helplessness Lakshmana was distressed. Despondent, Lakshmana said to Rama, “Hero, see me fallen helpless into the rakshasa’s power. Offer me alone to this demon as a sacrifice of a living being and, Raghava, escape at your convenience. This is my belief, that you will soon find the daughter of Videha, and, winning the kingdom of your fathers and seated on the throne, Rama, you should always remember me there.” At this Rama said to Lakshmana, “Hero, do not fear in vain. Men like you never despair.”

Meanwhile the cruel, mighty-armed Kabandha, the foremost of demons, said to the two brothers, “Who are you, with shoulders like a bull’s, bearing great swords and bows? Having reached this dreadful region, by the will of fate you have fallen within my sight. Tell me what your business here is and for what you have come. Lakshmana, you and I, both of us, are clouded by adversity, see. The control of fate over all beings is no burden to it. Caught in the grip of Time, even the brave and the strong and those skilled in arms on the battlefield scatter like dams of sand.”

Hearing his words, Rama said to Lakshmana, whose mouth was going dry, “A calamity harder than the hardest, threatening to end our lives, has fallen on us without our having recovered our beloved, O truly valiant Lakshmana. We suffered the crisis of separation from Sita, more painful than the loss of the kingdom and the exile, and now this disaster that would end our very lives. Lakshmana, the power of Time over all beings is supreme. Tiger among men, look at yourself and at me, clouded by adversity. The control of fate over all beings is no burden to it.” So saying, the firm and truly valiant, glorious, mighty Rama, son of Dasharatha, seeing Lakshmana look so wretched, then steadied his own mind by himself.

The key to this (numbers, a modern equivalent): The yojana is the Vedic and Puranic measure of distance, roughly 12 to 15 kilometers by a rough reckoning. Kabandha’s arms are given as a yojana each, an immense reach that shows the vastness of his demon frame. Janasthana to the Krauncha forest is set at two yojanas, and from there to Matanga’s hermitage at another two.

The gist: Moving south, Rama and Lakshmana cut off the ears, nose, and breasts of the rakshasi Ayomukhi, and then fall into the grip of the arms of the vast Kabandha, headless and neckless, with a mouth in his belly and a single eye. Lakshmana is distraught, but Rama steadies his own mind with patience.

Kabandha’s arms are cut off, and his welcome

Seeing the two brothers standing caught in the noose of his arms, Kabandha said, “Best of warriors, why do you stand still even as you see me racked with hunger? By the will of fate you have been set apart for my food, and you have lost your wits.” Hearing this, filled with indignation and set on a deed of valor, Lakshmana gave Rama timely and useful counsel. “This vile rakshasa has seized us at once without cause, so let us cut off his great arms quickly with our swords. This huge rakshasa, whose whole prowess lies in his arms, is dreadful. Having conquered men, he now means to devour us. King, the slaughter of unarmed and defenseless people, like sacrificial beasts led to the altar, is a shameful thing for a lord of the earth, Raghava.”

Hearing what the two said, the angry rakshasa opened his dreadful mouth and made ready to devour them. Then the two Raghavas, who knew time and place, in great joy, set themselves to cut his arms from his shoulders with their very swords. Rama, standing on the right, cut his right arm without any check, and the heroic Lakshmana, on the left, cut his left. His arms cut away, the mighty-armed rakshasa fell, roaring like a cloud, making sky and earth and the quarters ring. Bathed in a flood of blood, the demon, seeing his arms cut away, humbled now, asked those heroes, “Who are you?”

Then the auspicious, mighty Lakshmana gave him the introduction of Rama. “This is the son of Dasharatha, of the line of Ikshvaku, known to men by the name of Rama, and know me as his younger brother Lakshmana. When his stepmother Kaikeyi stopped his consecration on the royal throne of Ayodhya, Rama, sent to the forest, roamed the great Dandaka wood with his wife and with me. As this prince of godlike power dwelt in a lonely forest, a rakshasa carried off his wife, and it is he whom we came here seeking. And who are you, and why do you roll about the forest without a head, a mere trunk with broken thighs and a blazing mouth in your chest?”

At this Kabandha, in delight, remembering the assurance Indra had given him, said, “Tigers among men, you are welcome. By good fortune I look on you. By good fortune you have cut away these arms of mine, which were a noose about my neck. Tiger among men, now hear how this deformed shape came to me through my own lack of restraint. I will tell it to you truly.”

The gist: At Lakshmana’s suggestion the two brothers cut off both of Kabandha’s arms with their swords. As he falls, Kabandha asks who they are, and Lakshmana gives him the introduction of Rama and Lakshmana and the tale of Sita’s abduction. Kabandha, suddenly delighted, greets them and makes ready to tell his own story.

Kabandha’s tale: the curse, Indra’s thunderbolt, and the promise of help

Kabandha said, “Long-armed Rama, in a former age my form was beyond thought, famed through all three worlds, endowed with great strength and prowess, like the body of the sun, the moon, and Indra. Taking on this vast, world-terrifying rakshasa shape, Rama, I used to roam here and there and frighten the seers who dwelt in the forest. At that time I angered a great seer named Sthulashira. He was gathering the produce of the forest of many kinds when I terrified him in this very shape. Seeing me, that seer laid on me a dreadful curse, saying, ‘Let this cruel and reprehensible shape be yours forever.’ When I begged him that this curse, called forth by my own offense, might come to an end, he said, ‘When Rama cuts off both your arms and cremates you in a lonely forest, then you will regain your own vast, blessed shape, adorned with splendor.’ Know me, Lakshmana, to be by origin a son of Danu.”

Kabandha went on, “This rakshasa shape came to me on a battlefield through the wrath of Indra, in this way. I propitiated Brahma with fierce austerity, and he granted me a long life, and then pride touched me. I thought, ‘I have won a long life, what will Indra do to me?’ and, trusting to that thought, I challenged Indra in battle. By the hundred-edged thunderbolt hurled from his hand, my thighs and my head were driven into my very body. Though I begged him, he did not send me to the abode of Yama, saying, ‘Let Brahma’s boon of long life hold true.’ I asked, ‘With my thighs, head, and mouth driven into my body by the thunderbolt, how then shall I live so long a time without food?’ Then Indra made my arms a yojana in length and set in my belly a mouth with sharp teeth. With these long arms I gather in and eat the lions, leopards, deer, and tigers of this forest on every side. Indra told me, ‘When Rama and Lakshmana cut off your arms in battle, then you will go to heaven.’”

Kabandha said, “With this thought, best of kings, in this body I have sought to seize whatever I saw in this forest, believing it might be Rama, thinking, ‘Rama will surely come within my grip.’ Raghava, may good attend you, you are that very Rama, and I can be killed by none but you, as the great seer Sthulashira truly said. Bull among men, cremated by the fire of you both, I will do you good by my counsel, and will point out to you a friend as well.”

At this the dharmic Rama said, with Lakshmana looking on, “When I had gone out of Janasthana with my brother Lakshmana, Ravana carried off my illustrious wife Sita at his ease. I know only the name of the rakshasa, not his form, nor his dwelling, nor his power. Stricken with grief, wandering here and there like men without protectors, we deserve your compassion, for you are one who does good. Bringing dry wood broken by elephants, hero, we will throw you into a great pit and cremate you, and at the time of your cremation tell us of Sita, who carried her off and where he has kept her.”

At this the eloquent son of Danu gave Rama an excellent answer. “I have no divine knowledge, nor do I know Maithili. But when I have regained my native form, after the cremation, I will point out to you the one who can give you the true whereabouts of Sita. Without the cremation, lord, so long as I am in this form, I have not the power to know that mighty rakshasa who carried off your Sita. By the fault of the curse my great supersensuous knowledge has been lost, and by my own deed I have come to this world-condemned shape. Therefore, Rama, before the sun’s weary horses set, throw me into a pit and cremate me with due rite. When I am cremated, great hero, I will point out to you the one who knows the whereabouts of that rakshasa. Raghava, you should make friendship with that person of just conduct, and he will help you. Nothing in all three worlds is unknown to him, for by some cause he has in the past traveled through all the worlds.”

A sub-tale (a tradition): Kabandha was by origin a son of Danu, a danava, wonderfully beautiful and strong. For two reasons he came to this monstrous shape: by the curse of the seer Sthulashira, and by the thunderbolt of Indra, which drove his head and thighs into his trunk. Because of the boon of long life he had won from Brahma, he did not die, and so Indra gave him long arms and a mouth in his belly for feeding himself. Cremation at the hands of Rama and Lakshmana was the appointed path of his release.

The gist: Kabandha tells his story: by the curse of Sthulashira and the thunderbolt of Indra he came to this monstrous shape, but his release at the hands of Rama and Lakshmana was ordained. He begs to be cremated and promises that, regaining his true form afterward, he will point out a just friend to help in the search for Sita.

The release of Kabandha: counsel of friendship with Sugriva

At his words the two valiant princes carried Kabandha into a mountain cavern, laid him on wood, and set fire to it. Lakshmana kindled the pyre on every side with great blazing torches, and it began to burn fast all around. The fire slowly consumed the vast, fat-filled body of Kabandha, which, as it burned, looked like a great ball of clarified butter. Then, shaking off the pyre, the mighty Kabandha rose up swiftly like a smokeless flame, clad in spotless raiment and a divine garland. Radiant, in clean clothes, in the highest delight, wearing ornaments on all his limbs, he flew up in a rush from the pyre.

Seated in a shining car yoked with swans, a car that grants glory, lighting all ten quarters with his radiance, Kabandha, of great splendor, standing in the sky, said to Rama, “Raghava, listen, and I will tell you how you will truly find Sita. Rama, there are in the world six means of policy, by which kings, taking thought, accomplish everything. He who has reached the extremity of adversity is served by one who is himself in a like state. Rama, you and Lakshmana, robbed of your kingdom and its comforts, are in the extremity of adversity, and by this same adverse fortune the crisis of your wife’s abduction has come upon you.”

Kabandha said, “Best of friends, you should therefore make just such a friend as is in an adverse state like your own, for even after much thought I see no accomplishment for you without a friend. Listen, and I will tell you of such a one. There is a monkey named Sugriva, driven out by his angry brother Vali, the son of Indra. That self-possessed hero dwells on the excellent Rishyamuka mountain, graced by the shore of the Pampa lake, with four other monkeys. That lord of monkeys is of great prowess, splendid, of boundless luster, true to his word, humble, patient, wise, great, skilled, bold, brilliant, and of great strength and valor, exiled by his own great-souled brother for the sake of the kingdom. Rama, he will be your helper and friend in the search for Sita, so do not sink your mind in grief. What is to be will be, and here it cannot be made otherwise. Best of the Ikshvakus, Time is hard to overcome.”

Kabandha said, “Hero, go quickly from here to the mighty Sugriva, and this very day, going to him, make him swiftly your friend. Make friendship with him before the witness of fire, so that you may be forever without enmity, and never hold the monkey-lord Sugriva in contempt. He is grateful, able to change his form at will, and strong, and he wants a helper, and you two are able to accomplish what he wishes. Whether his own purpose is served or not, he will surely do your work. He is the son of Riksharajas and the true-born son of the sun-god, and out of his enmity with Vali he roams the shore of Pampa in fear of attack. Raghava, laying aside your weapons as a sign of friendship, make that best of monkeys, who dwells on Rishyamuka, your friend with an oath on truth. That elephant among monkeys, by his cleverness, knows every haunt in the world of the flesh-eating rakshasas, and nothing in the world is unknown to him.”

Kabandha said, “Scorcher of foes, as far as the light of the thousand-rayed sun reaches, so far will he, with the monkeys, search the rivers, the great mountains, the mountain-fastnesses, and the caverns, and find out where your wife is. He will send monkeys of vast body into the quarters and seek out Maithili Sita, grieving in her separation from you, in the house of Ravana. Whether your beloved Maithili is on the peak of Mount Meru or in the depths of Patala, that best of monkeys will enter the house of Ravana, destroy the rakshasas, and give her back to you.”

The key to this (a concept): The six means of policy are the six qualities of statecraft: alliance, war, marching, halting, dividing one’s forces, and seeking protection, by which kings accomplish their aims. Kabandha’s point is that only those in a like adversity are one another’s true helpers, and so he counsels the kingdom-robbed Rama to make friendship with the kingdom-robbed Sugriva.

The gist: Released by the cremation, Kabandha appears in a divine form on a swan-drawn car and tells Rama the means to recover Sita: make friendship, before the witness of fire, with the kingdom-robbed monkey Sugriva who dwells on Rishyamuka, and he will send monkeys into the quarters and find Sita out.

Kabandha shows the way: Pampa, the Matanga forest, and Shabari’s ashram

Having told him the means of the search for Sita, the shrewd Kabandha spoke again these meaningful words. “Rama, this is the auspicious way, keeping to the western quarter, where these blossoming, mind-charming trees appear. These are jambu, priyala, jackfruit, banyan, plaksha, tinduka, peepul, karnikara, mango, and other trees, dhava, nagakesara, tilaka, naktamala, blue ashokas, kadambas, blossoming karaviras, agnimukhya, ashoka, red sandalwood, and mandara. Climbing them, or bending their branches by force to the ground, and eating their nectar-like fruit, go on. Kakutstha, crossing that blossoming, fruiting forest, you will reach another forest, like the Nandana grove of heaven, where, as in the land of Uttarakuru, the trees bear fruit in all seasons and drip honey.”

Kabandha said, “There all the seasons dwell together, as in the Chaitraratha grove. Those trees, bowed under the weight of their fruit and bearing great boughs, look like clouds and mountains and spread their grace on every side. Climbing them or bending their branches to the ground, Lakshmana will give you their nectar-like fruit. Roving over the finest mountains, wandering from hill to hill and wood to wood, heroes, you will reach the lotus-pond called Pampa, free of gravel, with level banks and no duck-weed.”

Kabandha said, “Rama, its rocky bed forms sand, and it is ever graced with lotuses and water-lilies. Swans, ducks, krauncas, and ospreys swimming on its water call in sweet tones, Raghava, and, knowing nothing of slaughter, they do not fear men when they see them. On the shore of that Pampa you two will eat those birds, plump as balls of butter, and the lovely fish called Rohita, Vakratunda, and Nalamina, which Lakshmana, out of his devotion to you, will roast on the heads of his arrows, strip of skin and thorn, and lovingly give you. Then Lakshmana will take up in a lotus-leaf the water of the Pampa, fragrant with lotuses, pleasantly cool, clear, and sparkling like silver and crystal, and give it to you to drink. Roving at dusk, Lakshmana will show you the stout forest monkeys who sleep in caves, who come to the shore of Pampa in longing for water and bellow like bulls. Seeing the blossoming trees and the pleasant water of Pampa, Rama, you will cast off grief. In that forest the tilaka and naktamala are full of flowers, and the lotuses and water-lilies of the lake are in bloom. This lake is beyond the reach of men, and so no man plucks and wears those flowers.”

Kabandha said, “The flowers of that region neither fade nor fall, Raghava. Formerly there lived there the great seers, pupils of the sage Matanga, who were well composed. As those seers, carrying the fruit and roots of the forest for their teacher, grew weary under the load, the drops of sweat that fell swiftly from their bodies to the ground turned in that moment, by the power of their austerity, into flowers. Sprung of those drops of sweat, these flowers never die, Raghava. Even after they have departed, their female attendant, an ascetic woman named Shabari, is seen to this day, long-lived, O Kakutstha.”

Kabandha said, “Godlike Rama, ever firm in dharma and saluted by all the world, only after seeing you will that woman ascend to heaven, Rama. After that, Kakutstha, on the western shore of Pampa you will see the former hermitage-site of Matanga, incomparable and hidden, inaccessible to men. By the power of that sage Matanga elephants cannot enter there, and that forest is famed by the name of Matangavana, joy of the race of Raghu. In that forest like the Nandana grove, like a heavenly wood, full of birds of many kinds, you will roam happily, Rama.”

Kabandha went on, “To the east of Pampa is the noble Rishyamuka mountain, its trees ever in blossom, most steep of ascent, guarded by young elephants, which Brahma of old specially made. A man who sleeps on the peak of that mountain and lays his hands on a treasure in a dream wins it when he wakes, Rama. But he who climbs that mountain with crooked conduct and sinful deeds, the rakshasas seize him in his very sleep and kill him. The great trumpeting of the young elephants sporting in Pampa, who belong to the hermitage of Matanga, is heard even on that mountain, Rama. Wet with streams of ruddy ichor, cloud-colored, ardor-filled great elephants roam there in a herd, apart from other herds.”

Kabandha said, “Drinking the clear, pleasant, lovely water of the lake, fragrant with every kind of scent, the wild elephants, sated, go back into the forests. Seeing the bears with their blue, soft, shining coats, the leopards, and the ruru deer, unconquered by man, come fearlessly near, you will cast off grief. On that mountain, Kakutstha, a great cave shines, hard to enter because its mouth is blocked with a rock. At the eastern door of that cave there is a great, lovely, deep pool of cool water, rich in roots and fruits and ringed by trees of many kinds. In that very cave the dharmic Sugriva dwells with the other monkeys, and sometimes he stays on the peak of that mountain too.” Having instructed the two princes in this way, the mighty Kabandha, wearing a garland and shining with a splendor like the sun’s, blazed in the sky. To the highly blessed Kabandha, who stayed a while in the sky to take his leave, the two princes, ready for their journey, standing near him, said, “Now go.” And he too said to them, “Go, for the accomplishment of your purpose.” Having regained his native form, showing the way to Rishyamuka, his eyes fixed on Rama, girded with glory, radiant in every limb, Kabandha, standing in the sky, said to Rama, “Make friendship with Sugriva,” and then, in great delight, taking leave of the two, went at once away.

The key to this (places): Pampa is a lovely lotus-lake, on whose western shore stands the old hermitage of the sage Matanga (now the home of Shabari), and to the east the Rishyamuka mountain, where Sugriva stays hidden in fear of Vali. Matangavana is the name of the forest where, by the power of Matanga’s austerity, elephants cannot enter. Uttarakuru and Chaitraratha (the pleasure-grove of Kubera) are the standards of heavenly abundance.

The gist: The divine Kabandha shows Rama the western way: the blossoming, fruiting forests, the Pampa lake, the hermitage of Matanga where the ascetic Shabari waits for the sight of Rama, and the Rishyamuka mountain to the east where Sugriva dwells. Giving his last counsel of friendship with Sugriva, he vanishes into the sky.

Shabari’s hospitality, and her divine departure

Taking the path that Kabandha had shown, keeping to the western quarter, the two sons of the best of kings went on toward the forest of Pampa. Gazing at the trees that grew in clusters on the mountain rocks, dripping honey, laden with fruit and flower, they went on toward their meeting with Sugriva. Passing a night on a mountain-plateau, the two Raghavas reached the western shore of Pampa, and there they saw the lovely hermitage of Shabari. Reaching that most delightful hermitage, ringed by many trees, looking all around, the two brothers went up to Shabari.

Seeing the two of them, Shabari, who had attained perfection, rose with folded hands and clasped the feet of Rama and the wise Lakshmana. She offered, according to the ordinance, water to bathe their feet, water to rinse their mouths, and every form of hospitality. Then Rama said to that ascetic woman, firm in dharma, “Have the impediments to your austerity been conquered? Is your asceticism growing, lady whose wealth is austerity? Have you won control of anger and of your diet? Have your vows been fulfilled, has your mind found peace, and, sweet of speech, has your service of your teachers borne fruit?”

At Rama’s question the aged, perfected ascetic Shabari, honored among the perfected, stood before Rama and said, “Today, by the sight of you, the fruition of my austerities has come to me. Today my birth is fulfilled and my elders are well honored. Today my austerity has borne fruit and heaven too will be mine, for you, best of gods, best of men, have been worshipped by me. Gentle one, giver of honor, by your gentle eyes I am made pure, and by your grace, subduer of foes, I will go to the imperishable worlds. When you reached Chitrakuta, the seers whom I served, the pupils of the sage Matanga, ascended from this place to the divine world in cars of matchless splendor. Those righteous, highly blessed great seers said to me, ‘Rama will come to this most holy hermitage of yours. Receive him with Lakshmana as your guests, and seeing him you will go to the imperishable worlds.’”

Shabari said, “At the word of those highly blessed ones, best of men, I gathered for you the produce of every kind that grows on the shore of Pampa.” At this the dharmic Rama said to Shabari, who was ever admitted to divine wisdom, “If you think it fit, I wish to see with my own eyes the power of your great-souled teachers, of which I heard from Kabandha.” Hearing this, Shabari showed the two brothers round that vast forest and said, “See, this forest, dark as a rainy cloud, full of beasts and birds, is famed by the name of Matangavana, joy of the race of Raghu. Here dwelt my teachers of purified soul, great in splendor, who poured oblations with the mantras into the fire-altar hallowed by mantras, and offered up their own bodies, consecrated by the Gayatri.”

Shabari said, “This is the western altar, Pratyaksthali, where my honored seers, their hands shaking with old age and the toil of austerity, offered worship with flowers to the gods. By the power of their austerity this altar still shines with a matchless luster, lighting all the quarters, best of the Raghus. When, worn feeble by the toil of their fasts, they could no longer make the journey to the seven oceans, then by their mere thought the seven oceans gathered here, look at them. The bark garments they spread out have not dried up to this day, joy of the Raghus. And the garlands they made with flowers, blue water-lilies among them, in their service of the gods, have not faded to this day.”

Shabari said, “The whole forest has been seen, and what was worth hearing you have heard, and so I wish, with your leave, to give up this body. I wish to go to those seers of purified soul, to whom this hermitage belongs and whose servant I have been.” Hearing this most pious word of Shabari, Rama with Lakshmana felt a matchless joy and said, “Wonderful.” Then Rama said to Shabari of the austere vows, “Blessed lady, I have been well honored by you. Now go happily as you wish.”

At this word, wearing matted locks, clad in bark and black deerskin, with Rama’s leave, Shabari offered herself into the fire, and, like a blazing flame, she rose to heaven itself, so the tradition tells it. Adorned with celestial ornaments, wearing a celestial garland and unguent, clad in celestial raiment, she became fair to look on there, lighting that region like lightning flashing from a cloud. Where those virtuous great seers took their delight, that holy place Shabari attained by her own deep concentration of soul.

A sub-tale (a tradition): Shabari was the attendant of the great seers, the pupils of the sage Matanga, who at their departure for heaven told her to wait until Rama came, for the sight of Rama was the doorway to her perfection in austerity and her ascent to heaven. In the hermitage the marks of those seers’ austerity live to this day: the bark garments that never dry, the garlands that never fade, and the seven oceans gathered by their mere thought.

The gist: The long-waiting ascetic Shabari receives Rama with hospitality, shows him the Matanga forest and the marks of her teachers’ austerity, and then, with Rama’s leave, offers herself into the fire and departs in a divine form to heaven.

Toward Pampa: Rama’s lament and the search for Sugriva

When Shabari had gone to heaven in her own splendor, Rama, with his brother Lakshmana, reflected on the power of those great-souled seers. Pondering that power, the dharmic Rama said to the ever-helpful, single-minded Lakshmana, “Gentle one, I have seen the hermitage of those seers of perfected soul, full of many wonders, where deer and tigers live without fear and birds of many kinds dwell. Lakshmana, we have bathed with due rite in the holy waters of the seven oceans that gird the earth, brought here by them in a miniature form, and we have offered water to the manes. Our ill fortune has been undone and blessing is at hand, and so, Lakshmana, my mind is now very glad. Tiger among men, there will be some good sign in my heart, and so come, let us go to the lovely Pampa.”

Rama said, “Not very far from here is seen that Rishyamuka mountain, where the dharmic Sugriva, son of the sun-god, ever afraid of Vali, dwells with four monkeys. I am eager to see that bull among monkeys, Sugriva, for my work of the search for Sita depends on him.” At these words of the heroic Rama, Lakshmana said, “Come, let us go there quickly, for my mind too is eager to reach it.” Then that lord, the king, coming out of the hermitage, looking at the forest full of flowers and great trees on every side, came with Lakshmana to Pampa.

That vast forest rang with lapwings, peacocks, woodpeckers, parrots, and many other birds. Reaching the shore of the lake, Rama saw Pampa adorned with tilaka, bijapura, banyan, and shukla trees, with blossoming karavira and full-flowered punnaga trees, with thickets of malati and kunda, with bhandira and nicula trees, and with ashoka, saptaparna, kataka, atimukta, and many other trees, like a young woman decked for beauty. The splendid Rama, son of Dasharatha, seeing that Pampa with Lakshmana, began to lament.

Rama said, “On its shore is that very Rishyamuka mountain, adorned with minerals and with trees of wondrous flowers, where the great-souled son of Riksharajas, the mighty Sugriva, dwells. Bull among men, go to Sugriva, king of monkeys.” So the truly valiant Rama said again to Lakshmana, “Without Sita, Lakshmana, how is it possible for me to live?” So saying, sorely tormented by love, his mind fixed on Sita alone, Rama, giving voice to that supreme grief, entered helplessly the lovely lotus-lake Pampa.

Going on, gazing at the forest, Rama saw Pampa, with its lovely woodland, full of birds of many kinds, and entered it with Lakshmana. The water of that lake was full of lotuses, and its banks were narrowed by lovely groves. Its crystal-clear water was covered with lotuses and its bed spread with soft sand. Full of crocodiles and turtles, adorned with the trees on its banks, ringed with creepers, it seemed like a woman surrounded by her friends. Frequented by kinnaras, nagas, gandharvas, yakshas, and rakshasas, spread over with trees and creepers of many kinds, it was a lovely store of cool water. Coppery with its rose-pink lotuses, white with its clusters of water-lilies, and blue with its blue lotuses, it looked like a many-colored carpet. Full of blue lotuses and water-lilies, of saugandhika flowers, ringed by blossoming mango-groves, and ringing with the cries of peacocks, that Pampa was most lovely.

The key to this (a concept): The pupils of the sage Matanga had, by their mere thought, invited the seven oceans in a miniature form into their hermitage-shrine. It is in that holy shrine-water that Rama, by bathing and offering to the manes, feels his ill fortune undone. The epithets “son of Anshuman” and “son of the sun” for Sugriva mark his being begotten by the sun-god (the true-born son of Surya from the wife of Riksharajas).

The gist: Feeling the sign of good fortune after bathing and offering in the shrine-water of Shabari’s teachers, Rama and Lakshmana move on toward the Pampa lake. The loveliness of Pampa deepens Rama’s grief at his separation from Sita, and yet he is eager to meet Sugriva on Rishyamuka, for the search for Sita now depends on him. Here Valmiki’s Aranyakanda is complete.

Source: Srimad Valmiki Ramayana, Aranyakanda, Cantos 50-75 (Gita Press, Gorakhpur).