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SriRangaSri List Archive: Message 00062 Dec 2004

 
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SRIMATHE RAMANUJAYA NAMAHA.

Sri Vasudevan swamy has contradicted my earlier mail
at two places and interestingly (perhaps from my point
of view), those two  explanations were given by the
translators. 
They are as follows:

--- "M.G.Vasudevan" <mgv@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> 
> JASN: 1. One occurs in Sundara khandam when Hanauman
> was witnessing Ravana's outburst against Sita when
> she refused to budge. His wife Dhanyamalini pacified
> him and brought him back to his palace. Later when
> Hanuman recounted this incident to fellow vanaras on
> his return, he said that Mandodhari pacified Ravana.
> This is not seen as a mix-up nor of something to
> doubt the veracity of the incident that occurred,
> but as a proof that Ravana's patta-mahishi too was
> present when he visited Sita. Both Mandodhari and
> Dhanyamalini (who were accompanied with scores of
> other wives of Ravana) seemed to have persuaded
> Ravana to retire to his place. The mention of one at
> one sarga and the other at another sarga, does not
> negate the presence of both at the time of
> incidence.
> 
> MGV: -- Sargam 22 slokam 39 sundhara kandam says
> dhaanyamaalinee.
> mandhodharee says sargam 58 slokam 77 
> 
> See sargam 58 slokam 76 -
> maithilE hanthum aarabdha: sthreebhi: haha krutham
> thadhaa
> SthreeNaam madhyaath samuthpathya thasya bhaaryaa
> dhuraathmana: 76
> varaa mandhodharee naama thaya prathishEdhitha:  
> 
> here, hanumaan's describing what he has seen as
> raavaNan being consoled by dhaanya maalinee or
> mandhOdharee cannot be considered as a valid
> argument. For hanumaan already has demerits in
> estimating 'who is who' among ladies - for he
> mistook mandhodharee as seethaa while searching in
> raavaNan's antha:puram. That too, as he claims here
> sthreenaam madhyaath - when 'among a collection of
> ladies' he is bound to miscalculate who is who. 
> 
> So, in my opinion this point of smt jaisree does not
> hold water. ---MGV  


jasn:- Infact the sargam 22 wherein it is said that
Dhanya malini pacified Ravana, is the version of the
Kavi.It is as how valmiki narrates. Later in sargam
58, the narration is as how it is by Hanuman. There is
a possibility that Hanuman made a 'mis calculation'.
But in my opinion, if it is so, the Kavi would have
mentioned that mistaking Dhanya malini for Mandodhari,
Hanuman said so. Why I think in these lines is that
for one who is the Pattamahishi, it is going out of
her way to accompany her husband who is going to
intimidate Sita. It certainly makes a difference to
her personality if she had accompanied or not
accompanied him. From her state of my mind and how she
has viewed the abduction act of her husband from what
she says on the death of Ravana, it is difficult to
digest that she had accompanied Ravana to Ashoka vana
on that night. But that she had, is due to her virtue
to obey her husband's words and due to the fact that
she could not initially believe that a man had killed
him and that her doubts arose after Hanuman's visit to
Sita (from her narration on Ravana's death). 

If she had not actually accompanied him and if Hanuman
had made the mistaken understanding of the identity,
Valmiki would have certainly made it known that she,
as one with highest notions on the admissability of
such an offence (abduction) did not accompany Ravana
but Hanuman had no way of knowing that.(Mandodhari had
come down from the pedastal in having accompanied him
- a reason why the Kavi didnot think it fit to talk
about it. If she had not accompanied him, somewhere
the Kavi would have made it known that she, the
virtuous who averred the abduction, said or did such
and such a thing.)This perhaps was the reason why I
found the information as I have given originally (that
both of them had accompanied him though the mention
had been made separately in two sargas) as a bracketed
explanation in the  Tamil translation of Sundhara
khandam by Sri U.Ve. C.R. Srinivasa iyengar
(1867-1936) published by The Little Flower Company in
1962. The entire translation was for the first time
brought in print many years after his death, with the
help of his son. Therefore the note on the two being
present must have come from the original palm-leaf
scripts and must have found mention as could have
existed in pravachanas that came down through
generations.

Another point I wish to state is that Hanuman
initially mistakes Mandodhari for Sita - based on
rupam only. But thinking on Gunas, he convinces
himself that it is not Sita. The rupam, the jewellery
and other accessories of a pattamahishi used to be
distinctly  different from other wives. Hanuman could
not have missed the differences.

Another point I wish to state on this topic is that by
harping on this we are actually going away from the
original issue on Varuna's connection which Sri
Vasudevan has clarified in this  mail. Thanks to him.
I brought in the above discrepancy to convince
ourselves that whatever description and the difference
we might perceive in Valmiki Ramayana need to be
viewed as facts. Any difference is perhaps due to  the
Kavi's way of talking in crisp terms or to generate
more interest in the reader.
 
The second issue:-

JASN wrote: When the chance came he didn't want to
lose it - however otherwise convinced he might be
about the pathi-vradha nature of Sita. Because when he
told her that he was going to take her, he addressed
her 'varavarNinI' - (a term used to exemplary women
who are extremely devoted to the husband) and
ridiculed Rama that he was not a match even to his
finger!!

 MGV: bhoothir vaa thvam varaarOhE rathir vaa svaira
chaariNee || 3-46-17 Actually the addressing is
'varaarOhE', and the attribute of the addressee is a
beautiful woman. This is one among the group of:
varaarOhaa, mathtta kaasinee, uththamaa, vara varNinee
- amara kosam - 2-4-436 [chapter 2]. Again this
addressing is repeated vasoonaam vaa varaarOhE
dhevathaa prathibhaasi mE | na iha gachChanthi
gandharvaa na dhEvaa na cha kinnaraa: || 3-46-28 

Jasn replies:- I dared to use this part ,  (I, with
limited knowledge of Sanskrit) for substantiating
further (that knowingly well that Sita would not
budge, Ravana tried to intimidate her) only on reading
the meaning as given by translator, Sri A.V.
Narasimhachari in his 1926 edition of Ramayana. He has
quoted a verse in grantha letters as pramana which
says that the one whose body parts (samastha
avayangaL) are hot in cold season and are cold (sukha
sheethaLAm) in summer and who is extremely devoted to
her husband (perhaps due to this her body temperature
changes accordingly ?this interpretation mine) is
known as Vara varNini. Just preceding to this, Ravana
tells Sita that like Urvashi, who initially refused
Pururavas but later lamented for having refused him,
she too would come to him voluntarily some day. So
saying he addresses her as ?VaravarNini in the next
verse and tells her that Rama is no match for even his
finger. Therefore fear not him and obtain me. In my
opinion, the insertion of this name does not fit the
context, unless otherwise Ravana is convinced that
Sita can never be intimidated. This occurs in sarga 48
in Aranya khandam.
 
>From www.valmikiramayana.net:-

a.ngulyaa na samo raamo mama yuddhe sa maanuSaH |
tava bhaagyen sa.mpraaptam bhajasva varavar.hNini ||
3-48-19

19. anvaya/word-order: maanuSaH+saH+raamaH= [mere]
human, he, that Rama; yuddhe= in war;
mama+angulyaa+na+samaH= my, finger, not, equal to;
varavarNini= oh, richly, colourful lady; tava+
bhaagyen + sampraaptam+bhajasva= by your, serendipity
[good fortune,] chanced, you honour [me.]

"He that Rama is merely a human, and in war he equals
me not by my finger... oh, richly colourful lady, and
I chanced here merely by your serendipity, thus you
honour me [and my desire to possess you..." [Thus
Ravana spoke to Seetha.] [3-48-19]

Comment: 'Serendipity' is the faculty of making happy
and unexpected discoveries by accident... coined by
Horace Walpole [1754] after The Three Princes of
Serendip [now Sri Lanka,] a fairy tale, so as a
Lankan, let Ravana also say so. 

Ravana, the devotee is saying: yuddhe 'in war...'
yasya angulyaaH samaH ko api na asti 'whose, finger,
equalling, whoever, even, not, there...' yaH saH
raamaH ' who, he, is Rama... or, Vishnu Himself...'
maanuSaH 'humanly incarnate...' tam 'him, such a
Rama...' mama bhaagyena 'by my, fortune...'
sampraaptam 'let that Rama arrive [in Lanka...]'
bhajasva 'him, that Rama, you hold him in honour...' 

"In battlefield none can match that Rama even by his
little finger, for He is none other Vishnu, and such a
Vishnu chanced here in the human incarnation as Rama,
and let fortune betide me and let that Rama arrive in
my Lanka, and you be instrumental to his arrival, then
you may hold that Rama in high honour... for all this
first you come with me..." Maheshvara Tiirtha.

Jasn:- In the above version, VaravarNini is meant as
?richly, colourful?. The meaning as given by Sri A.V.
naradsimhachar has already been furnished by me. Note
that the direct reading of ?sampraaptam bhajasva
varavarNini? seems  to fall in line with the
explanation given by Sri A.V.Narasimhachari. I leave
it to the pundits to clarify.


PS: My mail attempting  to answer the two questions
was not meant to  offend any one. That mail addresses
the  two questions raised in the bow?s story ?10 and
attempts to find answers.

Regards,
Jayasree saranathan




                
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