Ramayana & Mahabharata
रामायणम् · महाभारतम्
Two epics that refuse to make dharma simple: every character, including the gods, does something indefensible.
The Ramayana is Valmiki's story of Rama, exiled on the eve of his coronation because his father gave a promise, and of Sita, Hanuman and Ravana. Read as wisdom rather than story it is an unsparing examination of what promises cost, of duty pursued past the point of decency, and of loyalty under impossible conditions. The Mahabharata is ten times longer than the Iliad and Odyssey combined, and underneath its succession war it is the most morally complicated document in world literature: every character does something indefensible, and the text refuses to resolve it. Its greatest passages are not the battles but the arguments about what dharma even means when every option is wrong. Kamban's Tamil Ramayana and Villiputhurar's Tamil Bharatam are the versions most Tamils know.
अहन्यहनि भूतानि गच्छन्तीह यमालयम् ।
शेषाः स्थावरमिच्छन्ति किमाश्चर्यमतः परम् ॥
śeṣāḥ sthāvaram icchanti kim āścaryam ataḥ param
Day after day, creatures go to the house of Death; those that remain wish to live forever. What is more wonderful than this?
The Yaksha asks Yudhishthira: what is the greatest wonder? This is the answer. Compare kural 336 and Marcus Aurelius 4.17.
न तत्परस्य संदध्यात्प्रतिकूलं यदात्मनः ।
na tat parasya saṁdadhyāt pratikūlaṁ yad ātmanaḥDo not do to another what you would find harmful to yourself. This, in brief, is dharma.
The Golden Rule. Matthew 7:12 and the Analects say it too; the Mahabharata says it is the whole of dharma in brief.
Reason is inconclusive; the scriptures contradict one another; the truth lies hidden in a cave. The path is the one the great have walked.
Yudhishthira's answer to “what is the path?” It is why this library is organised around masters and not only around texts.
सकृदेव प्रपन्नाय तवास्मीति च याचते ।
अभयं सर्वभूतेभ्यो ददाम्येतद्व्रतं मम ॥
abhayaṁ sarva-bhūtebhyo dadāmy etad vratam mama
To one who comes to me even once and says “I am yours,” I give safety from all beings. This is my vow.
Said of Vibhishana, Ravana's brother. The verse the whole tradition of refuge rests on; Shirdi Sai Baba's assurances echo it.
- Ganguli's complete Mahabharata, 1883–96 (public domain) ↗
- Griffith's Ramayana in verse, 1870–74 ↗
- Kamba Ramayanam — Project Madurai ↗
Where the translation is marked “Aumidhra”, the English is our own plain rendering from the original, made with the public-domain translations above as reference. Where a translator is named, the wording is theirs.
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