Mahabharata

MAHĀBHĀRATA. – The M., “the great epic of the Bharatiḍi,” is not only the longest epic poem in world literature, Hinduism (v.). Digressions on mythological, religious, moral, and juridical subjects; philosophical doctrines; recollections of historical events and popular tales are skilfully inserted into the epic narrative, which, stripped of its ancillary parts, could be reduced to a quarter of its present length. Nevertheless, the one hundred thousand stanzas attributed to the poem by tradition is an excessive number. Not even the “textus ornatior,” represented by the Southern recension, reaches this extent; the editio princeps (Calcutta 1863) comprises 89,603 stanzas, and the critical edition of Poona, which has reached fasc. XVI, will contain approximately 82,000.

Two brothers, belonging to the dynasty of the Bharatiḍi, Dhṛtarāṣṭra and Pāṇḍu, inherited the territory approximately extending between the upper Ganges and the Sūṭudrī (Sutlej), whose capital was Hastināpura. Dhṛtarāṣṭra, born blind, could not reign; power therefore remained entrusted to Pāṇḍu until his premature death, which compelled Dhṛtarāṣṭra to assume the reins of government. Pāṇḍu had left five sons, called, after their father, Panduiḍi; Dhṛtarāṣṭra had one hundred sons, called Kuruiḍi, that is, descendants of Kuru, a celebrated ancestor who had also given his name to the territory (Kuruṣṭra). Educated at court and instructed in the handling of weapons together with their cousins, the Panduiḍi soon surpassed them in strength and valour, to the great displeasure of the envious Duryodhana, the eldest of the Kuruiḍi. It happened that Arjuna, the second of the Panduiḍi, taking part in a tournament proclaimed by King Drupada to marry his daughter Draupadī to the most valiant archer, won the contest. And since the Panduiḍi had agreed that every precious thing should be possessed by them in common, Draupadī became the wife of the five brothers. After the marriage, Dhṛtarāṣṭra, desirous of living in peace with his nephews, assigned them half the kingdom, and the Panduiḍi moved to Indraprastha (Indarpat) on the Yamunā, near modern Delhi. But Duryodhana, who was seeking a means of ridding himself of his hated cousins and recovering the lost territory, having extracted the consent of the weak Dhṛtarāṣṭra, had

Yudhiṣṭhira invited to play dice with Śakuni, once and then a second time. Śakuni represented the Kuruiḍi, Yudhiṣṭhira the Panduiḍi, and the stake in the second game was the voluntary exile of the defeated party for a period of thirteen years, together with the temporary cession of the kingdom to the victor. Yudhiṣṭhira lost and sought refuge in the Kamyaka forest with his brothers and wife. When the thirteen-year exile had ended, the Panduiḍi asked Dhṛtarāṣṭra for the peaceful restoration of their portion of the kingdom, but Duryodhana, once again prevailing upon his father, replied that they would not restore even as much land as could be covered by the point of a needle. Both sides resorted to arms, and the clash took place on the plains of Kuruṣṭra, where the Panduiḍi and Kuruiḍi fought, together with their allies, a battle lasting eighteen days, in which the Kuruiḍi were defeated. At the beginning of the combat, Kṛṣṇa, cousin and ally of the Panduiḍi, who was driving Arjuna’s war chariot, seeing the hero’s dejection—for he wished to give up fighting so as not to kill his relatives—comforted him with the celebrated theodicy known as the Bhagavadgītā (v.). Victory, however, did not benefit the victors, who, attacked treacherously at night, were almost destroyed. Yudhiṣṭhira survived with his brothers, governed the kingdom wisely for thirty-six years, and was then taken up into heaven, where his kinsmen had already preceded him.

Ferdinando Belloni Filippi