In the previous episode, we had witnessed Arjuna commencing his intense “Tapas” towards Bhagawan Shiva, as Indra instructs him to do so. Initially, we had witnessed Sage Vyaasa once again providing his divine “Anugraha” to the Paandavas in terms of the important “Prati-Smriti-Vidya” Mantra. He initially gives the Mantra to Yudishtra, and as instructed by Sage Vyaasa, Yudishtra passes on the Mantra to Arjuna, who in turn undertakes an intense “Tapas” towards Indra, who in turn guides him to focus on Bhagawan Shiva and continue the “Tapas” further. As Arjuna is doing so, all the Maharishis started getting scared that Arjuna may go for an important position in the “Svarga Lokha” and they collectively represent their concern to Bhagawan Shiva. However, Bhagawan Shiva downplays their concerns as He gets ready to meet Arjuna in person. But now, the question is whether Bhagawan Shiva is directly going to appear in front of Arjuna, or in a disguised form. This is going to be an interesting accord, and in today’s episode, let us witness what conspired between Arjuna and Bhagawan Shiva.
Moving on thus, as Arjuna’s penance is increasing in terms of intensity by the minute, Bhagawan Shiva decides to hurry and make His way to meet Arjuna as quickly as possible. However, as all of us anticipated since yesterday, Bhagawan Shiva does not appear in front of Arjua in His true form. Instead, He takes a disguised form of a hunter and comes down. Arjuna is still under deep penance. At this moment, a wild boar tries to attack Arjuna. Realizing this all of a sudden, Arjuna quickly manages himself and takes his bow, locks an arrow towards it and releases it. Precisely at the same time, the “hunter” (Bhagawan Shiva disguised) is also taking a shot at the wild boar and both the arrows travel together to hit the animal. As the arrows hit the boar, it falls on the ground dead!
As this happens, Arjuna is surprised as to who is the person releasing another arrow at precisely the same time! He looks around and finds this “hunter” standing there. Arjuna immediately goes near that “hunter” and asks him thus, “Who are you? What are you doing here? Are you the person who released an arrow precisely at the same time when I did?” As Arjuna asks thus, the “hunter” replies back thus, “Oh Arjuna! Yes! It was me who took a potshot at the boar at the same time when you did! In fact, it was only because of my arrow you were saved! Else, you would have become history by now!” As Arjuna heard this from the “hunter”, his ego immediately came in the middle! He replies back to the “hunter” thus, “Oh hunter! Who are you to save me? You do not know who I am! Nobody has dared to come in front of me with such narratives! I’m a great warrior myself and I know how to safeguard from any enemy’s attack! This animal is afterall one amongst a hundred enemies that I would have seen in my life till now!”
As the “hunter” listens to Arjuna’s boasting and ranting, he starts to laugh within himself! Readers should not forget at this point in time that this so-called “hunter” is none other than Bhagawan Shiva Himself! Bhagawan Shiva thinks within Himself thus, “Oh wow! Look at the ego of this fellow! Bhagawan Krishna has been trying so hard to teach him the truth behind life, and he doesn’t seem to understand even a bit of what Bhagawan is trying to teach!” Such is our attitude as well! If something good happens to us, we would immediately jump in to take all the credit for it, don’t we? However, if something goes wrong, what do we do? We comfortably put the blame on Bhagawan thus, “Oh! This thing went wrong because Bhagawan did not want me to be successful!” 🙂 However, when we tasted success earlier, didn’t this same Bhagawan play a role then? However, we would at this moment proclaim thus, “Oh! I was successful in this mission because of my hard work and effort! It was solely my dedicated work that brought about this success!” This is our typical human mentality and this is exactly what Arjuna is also having here!
However, as Arjuna rants thus, Bhagwan Shiva once again makes a tall claim – “Oh Arjuna! You’re wrong! It is my arrow that saved you! You do not have any role in this!” As Bhagawan Shiva tells thus, Arjuna is in no mood to relent! A huge “war of words” breaks out between the two of them, which ends up ultimately in a big fight! The war between the two of them goes on for days together as both of them are unwilling to relent! So for today, let us understand up to this point wherein Arjuna and Bhagawan Shiva are engrossed in their battle! Let them be so till tomorrow’s episode and we shall witness what happens further! Stay tuned for an interesting and absorbing accord tomorrow! 🙂
The Indian Dharma 