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MAHABHARAT BLOG#1

The oldest member of the Kuru clan that has the most to do with MAHABHARAT is BHISHMA.

Let’s understand why Bhishma became Bhishma.

Story before Bhishma was born:

The Kuru clan had now Shantanu as the king. Mahabhisha (past life Shantanu) was sent back on earth by Brahma when Mahabhisha was in his court for a yagna.

Once, after becoming the king of Hastinapur, Shantanu went for hunting. There near the banks of the river Ganga, he saw a beautiful girl and fell in love with her and asked the girl to marry him. She was Ganga.

Ganga had a condition: Shantanu should not ask her the reasons behind any of her actions.

He agreed and they got married.

They had their first son. Having a son was an important thing in those days because the kingdom had to be passed to the son. But Ganga took to the new born baby and drowned it in the river. Shantanu was shocked. He lost an heir. The future king had been drowned. He wanted to ask Ganga why did she do that, but was not allowed to.

They gave birth to 6 other children which were drowned by Ganga in the river. Shantanu was helpless, he couldn’t bear this but had to.

They had their 8^th child. Just as the child was born Ganga took the baby and was going to the bank of the river. Shantanu sensed this and stopped her from drowning the 8^th heir of the Kuru clan and asked “Why are you doing this?”

Ganga said, “You have broken the condition. I am going back to the heaven taking this child with me. He will come back here when he has learnt the art of ruling the kingdom.”

She reminded Shantanu that Ganga was also cursed by Brahma in the same Yagna as Mahabhisha (past life Shantanu) and was sent back to the earth as a punishment.

The 8^th child was Devavrata.

Some years later:

Shantanu was walking on the bank of river Ganga. He saw a young man sitting aside the banks. The young man was Devavrata but he couldn’t recognize him because he had seen Devavrata only for few minutes after his birth.

Ganga was asked to show him his son. Ganga appeared with Devavrata and asked Shantanu to take him to Hastinapur.

Devavrata had learnt from all the great teachers on the earth and he was the man no one could defeat.

Shantanu coronated Devavrata and he was declared as the King.

One day Shantanu went to the forest for hunting with his men. He there saw Satyawati who was an adopted daughter of a fisherman.

Shantanu went to the fisherman and asked to marry Satyawati. The fisherman had a condition: the King of Hastinapur should be the son of Shantanu and Satyawati.

Shantanu again was on spot. He had coronated Devavrata. How could he not let the kingdom ruled by the greatest warrior on the planet? He had thrown himself in a well full of sorrow.

Devavrata noticed this. His father was a changed man. The ever-charming face didn’t smile. Devavrat had to do something. He asked everyone in the court about Shantanu and got to know the condition put in front of Shantanu.

Devavrat went to Satyawati’s father and told him that he will leave the throne for his father.

The fisherman said, ”What if you have your child and one of them becomes the king?”

Devavrat took the vow of not marrying to anyone.

The fisherman said, ”What if you have a child without marriage?”

Devavrat took another vow. He will live a celibate life.

These were the vows that no man on earth could take. Bheeshma means fierce. The vow that Devavrat took were fierce. So then he was called Bhishma for ever.

GYAAN:

#1 Whatever happened in Bhishma’s life was not in HIS control. The situations were such that he had to take fierce vows. Whatever happens to him in his life has to do with his vow. Including his death.

What is needed to be taken from this story is EMPATHY. We in the world we are living right now have to learn to empathize.

We are not judging whatever happens in the story as RIGHT or WRONG. But everything has a reason and we have to empathize.

#2 Whatever Ganga did to their 7 children has a reason. It is for you to find out.

FIND OUT. THINK.

Your definition of RIGHT and WRONG will change. Something that may be wrong for you may be right for someone else and vice versa. There is no “THE” truth. It is “YOUR” truth and “MY” truth.

STAY SAFE. PEACE.