Some wise words from Ravan (Part-2)

Let me try to critically examine each of these questions and share my thoughts:

1. Why and how these great words of wisdom from an anti-hero character like Ravan?

2. Why Ravan chose to pursue his battle with Lord Sri Ram despite seemingly recognizing the cause of his agony?

3. What is the message from this episode to common people like us who are still bound to worldly matter and relations?

There could have been multiple reasons why these great words could have been spoken by Ravana’s character. While Ram is personification of compliance to Dharma and better placed to preach the kartavya (or duties) of a human being, Ravana is probably better placed to explain the ill effects of ‘Moha’, the obsession and ‘Lobha’, the greed due to his experiential knowledge.

The consistent trait of Ravan has always been to leverage his strength, devotion to fulfill his greed or obsession. He chased away his own relative Kubera and occupied the Lanka, obsessed by its beauty and wealth. He dared to seek mother Parvathi for himself when Lord Siva and Parvathi transcended to give him a boon. He stooped to steal Sita in the absence of Lord Sriram obsessed by her beauty and charm. His knowledge of Veda’s and scriptures did not prevent him from performing deeds prohibited by those very scriptures.

Ravan is very much attached to the material world and addicted to sensual pleasures (as evident from what Hanuma observed in his palace while searching for Mother Sita). His material attachments have further strengthened his ignorance. The dark clouds of ignorance have totally covered the Sun of knowledge in his intellect (Chit akasa). Similar to a drunkard / drug addict cannot control his actions despite knowledge of ill effects of consumption of alcohol or drugs; he totally abdicated efforts to restrain himself. Extension of same analogy can further explain his preaching.

How is Ravan trying to leverage his knowledge? He is trying to leverage his holy knowledge to console his wife so that she allows him to proceed to the battle field. He further corroborates that he has resorted to heinous deed to liberate himself from the material world. The same knowledge of Lord Rama as Vishnu has led the two brothers Ravan and Vibhishan in two opposite directions. Vibhishan has pursued being righteous and sought Rama’s shelter knowing him as Vishnu. Ravan unable to control his material passion, tried to justify his battle with Lord Rama in the name of liberation. He simply could not overcome his ego, fear of having to lead a life of servitude to Lord Rama and personal grief due to material attachments (of losing brother Kumbhkarna and son Meghanadh in the war).

In my opinion, the message for the faithful is three fold:

• The knowledge without its rightful application is hazardous and not beneficial. The application of knowledge and compliance to rules is equally important to knowledge itself.

• Niyama or control of material senses is important to remain on the path of righteousness. The straying from this path can lead to vicious circle of addiction and finally annihilate the knowledge.

• The ultimate success and glory lies in the very fact of acceptance to dharma and being humble (as in the case of Vibhishan) where as False Ego and false justification of wrong deeds can only lead to destruction (as in the case of Ravan)

We may be bothered by the fact that Ravan getting liberated and his unison with Lord Rama. It was clarified by Narada in verse 83-87 of Sarga 11.

For common men like me, the analogy of coal burning in fire helps. The material body is left dead (similar to ash), where as soul unites with super soul (similar to the calorific value or internal energy of coal adds on to energy of fire itself). After the union, we cannot distinguish source of each calorie of energy.

Some wise words from Ravan (Part-1)

I was reading the Yuddha Kand of Adhyatma Ramayan and I came across the following words from Ravan to his wife Mandodari (Sarg 10, Stanza 37-40) , when he was about to leave to battle field for his final battle with Lord Sri Ram. I was completely amazed and taken aback for few moments by the choice of words and the treasure of knowledge hidden in these four stanzas.

Context:

Ravan tries to console his wife before leaving to battle field. Ravan and Mandodari , are very certain about the results of the war (as evident from next few stanzas from same chapter / sarga). Mandodari is grief stricken and wants to persuade Ravan to return Sita to Lord Sri Ram and seek his shelter.

Ignorance will give rise to Grief. Grief destroys the Knowledge. Due ignorance, one assumes oneself as the physical body without realizing the inner soul and it gives rise to ‘Ego’. (Stanza 37)

Ravan tries to explain the cause or origin of Mandodari’s grief. The origin of grief lies in ignorance. What is she ignorant about? She is ignorant about herself.
Very true, if we are knowledgeable about our true identity, where is the scope for grief? The soul can neither be created nor be destroyed. There is nothing that we can lose when there is nothing which is separate from us. When we are ignorant about ourselves, and assume ourselves to be the bodies that we dwell, we think we are different from others. The false identity (ego) gives rise to possessiveness and we tend to give more importance to the needs of the false identity. It leads us to compete with ourselves and try to steal which is our own even before we steal it.
The grief which originated from our ignorance of our true identity is further leading us to the path of ignorance. How? By destroying the knowledge about what is ours by focusing on materialistic things (that have no soul or no significance).

Attachment to the body ties oneself to spouse and children (and other relationships in the materialistic world), which further gives rise to sensual feelings such as ‘Joy’, ‘Sorrow’, ‘Fear’, ‘Anger’, ‘Greed’, ‘obsession’. (Stanza 38)

The false identity binds us to the illusionary world of relationships.
We forget that

• We are the super soul dwelling in each body as a soul
• We are the ‘chaithanya’, the prime force in each body

Or in other words we forget about ‘Tatvamasi’
Thus the ignorance and grief form a mutually sustaining cycle. The by-products are the sensual feelings such as Joy, Sorrow, Fear, Anger, Greed and Obsession. These further feed grief and ignorance.

Birth, Death and Disease etc are born from Ignorance alone. The soul cannot be destroyed. It is pure. It is different than nature. It is unattached. (Stanza 39)

How do we break the cycle of ignorance which manages to cause constant grief? Ignorance can be broken by Knowledge alone (like the way light eliminates the darkness)
Which Knowledge eliminates the ignorance? We are ignorant about our true identity. Hence the knowledge of true identity eliminates the ignorance. What is our true identity? It is the soul and its nature. If we can realize and perceive the true identity, we stop identifying ourselves as the body in which we are dwelling. If we are the body in which we are living, we need not be concerned by what happens to the body. i.e. We need not be concerned about the birth, death and disease to the body. By the extension of same argument, we need not be worried about the material relations attached to the body.
What are the attributes of soul?
If our true identity is soul, not the body, then how does the soul look like? This stanza says further explains:
1. It is pure.
The soul is pure means the soul does not have any external or separate elements ingrained with in itself. The soul is pure when the soul is full of soul and nothing else. (From our knowledge of material sciences)
2. It is different than nature
Nature always has qualifying attributes, form and can be felt and seen. By saying soul is different than nature it cannot be felt or seen. It does not have a well defined shape size or form.
3. It is unattached i.e. it is not attached to worldly activities and it always remain unattached in its pure form

The soul has the form of bliss. It is filled with knowledge. It is devoid of any feelings and emotions. There is no attachment or detachment to the TRUE form. (Stanza 40)

In this stanza, while talking about the soul, he invariably refers to Sat Chit and Ananda words. If we were to attribute any form to soul, then it is in the form of Ananda, the eternal bliss. The form is filled with knowledge. The knowledge and the bliss are conjugal words that cannot be separated. Where there is no TRUE knowledge, there is no eternal bliss, and where there is knowledge, there is always the eternal bliss. To this true form, there cannot be any attachment (or detachment) because if there is any attachment or detachment since these lead to unhappiness.

These four stanzas from Ravan to his wife encapsulate the crux of spiritual knowledge. It led to a lot of questions swarming my mind.

Some of these questions were

1. Why and how these great words of wisdom from an anti-hero character like Ravan?
2. Why Ravan chose to pursue his battle with Lord Sri Ram despite seemingly recognizing the cause of his agony?
3. What is the message from this episode to common people like us who are still bound to worldly matter and relations?

I will try to answer these in my next post.