Week 10 Reading Diary cont: Shiva

Shiva by Edmund Charles Cox (1887).

Shiva and Brahma get in a disagreement and Brahma sentences Shiva to the wilderness to live without shelter until he is deemed free of blame. It said that he must withstand the heat, the cold, hunger, and thirst. His wife Uma accompanies him through this harsh journey, but not without getting a few words in about it. Several times Uma asks Shiva if they can find shelter, but each time he explains that he does not have the means of obtaining shelter and that they will just have to wait it out. However, he does eventually tell her that they will be covered by a cloud that will shield them from the rain. This happens shortly after he says it will. He is then pardoned for his actions and he and Uma are able to settle down in a house in the mountains. Then the king of death steals Uma from Shiva and he is filled with sadness. Vishnu feels bad for Shiva and seeks to make him feel better. He allows Uma to be reborn and she grows up to be the most beautiful woman in all of the land. She has to prove that she is worthy of being with Shiva, but after many long tests she succeeds. The leader of the Asuras drove the gods out of their places and claimed himself ruler of heaven and earth. The part of this story where Shiva and Uma are in the woods without shelter could easily be put into a modern day setting in which a wife is unhappy with what her husband has provided her with.

Shiva Street Art Ron Mader Flickr

Week 10 Reading Diary: Krishna Under the Ocean

How Krishna Went Under the Ocean by Edmund Charles Cox (1887).

In this story Krishna and Balaram learn all the sciences that are known to man in less than a week. That is amazing! I can’t imagine how useful that would be to have the capacity to cover and retain all of that material so quickly. In return their teacher only wants his son back who was swallowed by a beast in the ocean. Krishna has learned to love their teacher for teaching him practically everything he knows so he takes this situation personally. He approaches the ocean with anger and demands to have the boy returned to his father. The ocean is frightened of him, but will not help because it did not take the boy. It tells him that a dragon named Shankhasur who resides in a shell at the bottom of the ocean took him. Therefor, Krishna walks straight into the ocean to find the beast that had taken the boy. He finds Shankhasur and cuts off his head. Then he rips open his stomach, but to his surprise the boy is not there. He keeps the shell of the beast and turns it into a weapon, then continues his search. He then heads to the city of the angel of death. Whenever king Yam, the ruler of the city, saw Krishna coming he fetched the boy and presented him to Krishna immediately. He pleaded for forgiveness and Krishna pardones him. He returns to his teacher with the boy and then returns home. This is an awesome story that could be altered in so many ways, but my favorite idea is to change it from a narrator style to either letters or a diary entry written by Krishna. 

Vishnu Under the Ocean from Wikipedia

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Week 9 Storytelling: Vishnu's Karma

There once was a Danava (species of supernatural giants) king who was known to be more generous and loving than any other. His name was King Bali. Before he came along kings had used their power to conquer everything they possibly could, but this was not the way of King Bali. King Bali won the love of the people as well as the gods by accommodating the needs of everyone under his rule. He could do no wrong. The gods and goddesses of heaven even began to pack up and leave so that they could move to the King Bali’s kingdom.

The amount of attention and praise that King Bali was getting began to wear on Indra, the ruler of heaven and the gods. He no longer held power. This pushed him so far that he went the throne of Vishnu to pray to him.

“Vishnu, nobody praises me anymore. I no longer possess the power I used to because of King Bali’s greatness. Everyone loves him more than me. Please let me retire and hand my position as ruler of heaven and earth over to King Bali.”

Vishnu responds.

“Indra, a man of the earth cannot be the ruler of heaven. I will not allow such a thing to happen. I will, however, fix this problem and give you back your reign. I am going to earth to be born as a child, and I will trick King Bali into a making a mistake. When all of the heavens and earth see him fail they will once again worship you and ask for your forgiveness.”

Vishnu incarnates himself in the womb of a woman so that he may be born into the world as a boy. When he grows to be a toddler he decides it is time to set things straight. He approaches the king in the king’s court one day as many of the citizens do to ask him for a favor.

“Will you grant me the amount of land that can be covered by my three steps?”

“Boy, you can wish for anything that you desire. What you request will do you no good.”

“That is all that I ask for. Will you give me what I ask for?”

At this point the king's righthand man realized that this was the powerful Vishnu and warned King Bali against accepting this request. The king in disbelief told the boy he would give him the land. Taking matters into his own hands, the righthand man snuck off and crawled inside the holy water pot to cover the spout so that no water could escape. It is required for the holy water to be poured in order for the deed to be official. No matter how hard they tried, nobody could get the water to come out. Therefore, Vishnu’s plan was ruined and he spent the rest of his life on earth as a mortal unable to return to heaven. King Bali continued to rule happily and Indra remained powerless in heaven.

Vishnu with Indra on Wikimedia Commons

Author's Note:

The original story is basically the same as my story up until the end. It has King Bali falling into Vishnu’s trap. When the holy water fails to come out of the pot, Vishnu suggests that the king clean out the spout with Kusha grass. The king does so and without knowing pokes his righthand man in the eye and blinds him. The pain causes the man to flee. Then the water is poured. Vishnu then takes his true form and covers the earth with one foot and heaven with the other. He asks the king what he will give him for his third foot and Bali tells him to put it on his own head. He is then sent to the infernal regions.

I decided to use the “twist the ending” storytelling style because I did not agree with the way the original story ended. King Bali was a great ruler and had the whole world and heaven running smoothly in the eyes of all but one. I thought the story would be better with a happy ending. In my story the kings righthand man successfully plugs the holy water pot so that his wish to Vishnu cannot be successfully granted. This way he does not lose his life and Vishnu and Indra suffer for plotting against him.


Bibliography: The Danava King by Manmatha Dutt (1893).

Week 9 Reading Diary cont: The Danava King

Gleanings from Indian Classics: Tales by Manmatha Dutt (1893).


The Danava King was my favorite story from the second half of this weeks reading. I really enjoy learning about royalty and the different ways people have lead their people throughout history. This story tells about how king Bali was arguably the best king every in just about every way. He won over the gods as well as the people he ruled. Everyone under his rule was so pleased that masses of people began to move from their homes to come under his rule. People even started to worship him instead of the gods. Indra finds himself in a bind because he does not know how to stop this. He can’t wage war because he is not being beat by war. Indra prays to Vishnu to let him retire and let king Bali take his place as ruler of heaven. Vsihnu refuses him of this and takes matters into his own hands. Vishnu incarnates himself as a boy on earth. He then goes to king Bali and asks for land that can be covered by his three feet. The king refuses nobody, therefor he agrees to these terms even after being warned against this. Vishnu reveals himself and covers the heavens and earth with his feet. King Bali was then sent to the infernal regions. This would be a cool story to rewrite so that king Bali overcomes Vishnu. I’m brainstorming on the best way to do that, but at least the story will have a happy ending that way because king Bali has done no wrong.

Vamana Page from Wikipedia

Week 9 Reading Diary: Battle of Gods and Demons

Gleanings from Indian Classics: Tales by Manmatha Dutt (1893). 

I really enjoyed the Battle of Gods and Demons section of this reading; it was right up my alley. It discusses the never ending struggle between the gods and demons. At first the gods proved to have the upper hand in this conflict as they cheated the demons out of their share of the ocean. This enabled them to become stronger than the demons and easily overcome them at first. Eventually the demons grew stronger and were able to steel women and children from heaven. In particular, one gods wife who was stolen resulted in the gods waging war on the demons again by meeting them on their own territory. This did not go well for the gods because some of the demons had been made invincible. The gods retreated back to heaven, but the demons followed and conquered them their scattering the gods every which way. I obviously side with the gods rather than the demons usually, but in this particular story the gods seemed to have started everything. It is very ungodly like to lie to someone else. There are a lot of things I could do to this story in order to give it my own twist. I could reverse the roles of the gods and demons because it seems more likely that the demons would do something like that. I could also tell the battles differently to make them more vivid and exciting. There are a lot of character in the story, which allows a lot of room for changing who they are and what they do.

War in Heaven Page from Wikipedia

 

Storytelling for Week 7: Yashoda's Diary

Dear diary,

The weirdest thing happened today. A beautiful woman asked to come into our house and nurse Krishna. I would usually not allow this as I am skeptical of strangers, but somehow I found myself permitting her to do so. Just after beginning to nurse him she started screaming. I rushed to relieve her of Krishna’s clench, but she died before I was able to help. Then she changed form into a giant beast whose limbs stretched every which way. I don’t really understand all of this, but I thank the gods for keeping my baby boy safe.

Dear diary,

It has been a couple weeks since I last wrote. Today I placed Krishna under Nanda’s wagon so that he might sleep in the shade. A little while later I heard a loud crash from outside. The weight of all the pots and pans in the wagon must have made the wood give out. By the time Nanda and I reached the mess I was almost in tears. I looked up to see Krishna laughing from beneath the pile of metal. I am so thankful my baby has survived another accident. The gods must really favor him.

Dear diary,

Only two days have passed since I last feared for Krishna’s life. This morning a terrible windstorm blew through our town and made a huge mess of the houses and farms. When the winds died down I realized that Krishna was no longer in the house. Once again tears began to fill my eyes. A little while later Nanda and some of the neighbors found him a mile away laughing on the chest of a dead giant. He seems to fear nothing. I’m not sure if he killed this creature too or if the dead beast was swept into the storm like Krishna and they simply landed together. Either way I am starting to think that all of this is more than him just having a knack for finding trouble. His brother isn't always doing crazy things like this. Could my baby be cursed?

Dear diary,

Three months have passed since the windstorm and I am thankful to say I have not feared for Krishna’s life since, but that doesn’t mean weird things have stopped happening. This kid is definitely special. Today I attempted to tie him up to our grinding stone with a cord after he ruined a large amount of the butter I had just made. However, I could not get the cord around his waist no matter how many lengths of it I tied together. This didn’t make any sense to me. Then, he tied the cord around himself! I just don’t even know what to say. How could he have done it when I couldn’t? Why would he do it? Then I returned to churning butter. When I looked back Krishna and the grinding stone were gone. I found him near the edge of the woods in the back yard dragging the stone across the ground. It took three horses and a dozen neighbors to move that thing into our yard. I swear if Krishna is not a god himself, then he has the blood of one running through his veins.

Dear diary,

Today my eyes were truly opened. All the questions that I have about Krishna were answered. He came clean to me and opened his mouth. When I looked inside I saw the most beautiful sights I had ever seen in my life. I saw all of the oceans and the whole universe. It was all too much to bear and I fainted. I woke up in Krishna's arms. In the end it doesn't change the way I see him. He is still just my baby boy and I love him the same way I always have.

Krishna Killing Putana

Author's Notes:

The original story includes a lot more events and details about the childhood of Krishna than I included. It also mentions his brother Balarama a few times. The story is told from a narrator’s point of view.

I left out Balarama and took out some of the content for the purpose of keeping the story shorter. I wanted to focus on the events that would have really stuck out to Yashoda. I used the diary writing style for my version of the story because I believe this gives us the best view of what someone is thinking. I think this is because we are willing to be most open with ourselves and the point of a diary is to be able to recall events and how we felt during them as if they were happening again. I wrote Yashoda’s thoughts and reactions as if she were a normal mother today instead of a mother back in these times. Yashoda probably would not actually have been as surprised by the things in this story as I wrote her to be because these supernatural events are very common in these stories.

I chose this picture of Krishna killing Putana because it is one of the key events in the story. This is where Yashoda first sees the mystery of Krishna’s power start to emerge.

Bibliography: Shri Krishna of Dwarka and Other Stories by C. A. Kincaid (1920).

Week 7 Reading Diary continued: Sambara and Jarasandha's Deaths

Shri Krishna of Dwarka and Other Stories by C. A. Kincaid (1920).

I really enjoy stories about karma and I feel that the following story is a perfect example of it. The mighty demon Sambara disguises himself so that he can steal the six day old Pradyumna from his parents. He then tosses the baby into the ocean and goes about his way. Pradyumna is swallowed by a great fish, which is then caught by a fisherman. That fisherman sells the fish to Sambara’s wife to be eaten. When she cuts the fish open she finds the baby and raises him to kill her evil husband. This is a long chain of coincidences or maybe fate that ends up biting Sambara in the butt. I would like to tell this story from Pradyumna’s point of view. I could either use the letters home writing style I used before or do a journal entry style.

I love all of the fights that are told in these stories. Thank goodness they continue to happen one after another. Krishna needs help defeating Jarasandha whom he has failed to defeat before. He takes Arjuna and Bhima to Magadha where Jarasandha rules discguised as Brahmins. It is there that Bhima and Jarasandha wrestle for hours in front of a crowd. Eventually Bhima lifts Jarasandha in the air and throws him to the ground, which breaks his back. These are all of the details given about this fight. I would like to tell the fight with more imagination and context. Maybe adding some dialogue to give the feeling of being at the fight.

Bhima Slays Jarasandha