Bhagvat16- A typical day in Krishna’s life!

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Krishna has left behind his naughty childhood days. And also, the playful youthful days. He is a mature person now, married and also with several children. Though he was not the King, for all practical purposes, he worked like the representative of aging King Ugrasena – his maternal grand father.

Have you ever wondered how a King or Prime minister or President of a country spends his typical day? Here is a short snap shot that Vyasa provides.

Krishna’s day starts very early, two hours before the Sun rise. This is called Brahmi Muhurta and is considered to be very auspicious. Religious people make it a point to get up at that time. It is the time when the birds start chirping and probably some cocks start crowing. It is the time when the mind is fresh and conducive to any modulation. It is the time when a studious student is expected to get up. Well, I am talking about those days when there was no internet and other distractions that kept people awake till late in the night ;-)

When describing this typical daily routine, Vyasa becomes a bit mischievous. He says that the wives of Krishna who were asleep hugging Krishna, would start cursing the chirping birds and even the gentle morning breeze, since they are reluctant to let go of him. They can’t think of separating from Krishna even for a moment.

But Krishna is a disciplined person. He gets up from the bed. He washes his hands, feet. Cleanses his teeth and so on. He sips water as part of the morning ritual. Then he sits for meditation! Krishna is God himself. Who is he meditating on? Krishna, though is himself an incarnation of God, he is in a human form. So, like a typical human being, Krishna meditates on that God who is formless and beyond all limits.

After meditation, Krishna takes bath. Several religious rituals follow after the bath. Krishna performs the Sandhya Vandana – a daily prayer to twilight Gods. He offers water libations to Gods, sages and his departed ancestors with water in his cupped palms. He also performs mandatory daily fire ritual.

After these morning rituals, Krishna honors leaned Brahmins. He gives them generous gifts. He also bows down to all his elders and exchanges pleasantries with his friends and also his queens. He probably takes breakfast too with them ;-)

Now is the time for his official duty.

Krishna’s charioteer brings his chariot. Krishna mounts the chariot by holding the hands of the charioteer. He is accompanied by his close associates, namely Saatyaki and Uddhava. He casts bewitching smiles at his queens who are bashfully peeping through the windows of their palaces, reluctantly bidding him short farewell.

After a while, Krishna reaches the royal assembly hall called Sudharma. All the members of his royal assembly are already waiting for him there. Krishna goes and occupies a high seat reserved for him.

The day starts with some lighter moments. Court jesters provide all kinds of humorous amusements. Accomplished dancers – both men and women perform their respective shows. The bards start singling and playing their musical instruments. The Brahmin scholars start chanting Vedic Mantras, creating auspicious environs.

As the day progresses, there are subjects who may come to Krishna with their problems and seek his help. Maybe they would come for resolution of conflicts between them. Krishna entertains each of them with great love and care. Occasionally, there are visitors from outside the Kingdom. They could be emissaries of other Kings. May be even from far-off lands seeking Krishna’s help.

It was one such day….

There was a visitor from a distant land. He was totally a stranger who had never come before. After taking due permission from Krishna, the guards ushered him to Krishna’s presence. He had come from North eastern part of India. The visitor politely bowed down to Krishna. He appeared like a messenger since he carried a written message from someone.

The message was a call for help from the Kings who had been kept as hostages by the wicked Jarasandha – the ruler of Magadha. We have already talked about this wicked man. He was the father-in-law of Kamsa – Krishna’s maternal uncle. He had attacked Krishna and his people several times and finally Krishna had to leave Mathura to protect his people.

Jarasandha was a very ambitious person with great thirst for power. He wanted to rule over the entire world. There are many ways of doing it.

In ancient India, rulers who are expansionists generally avoided bloodshed. They would often conduct some Vedic ritual such as Ashvamedha or Raja suya, and invite all other Kings. There would be a tacit understanding that whoever joins the ritual willingly, accepts the supremacy of the King who conducted the ritual.

The King who conducted such a ritual had no intention to encroach on their Kingdom nor to subdue them. It was mostly a friendly understanding of accepting the other as the superior. Once such an acceptance is achieved, the expansionist King would remain only as a ceremonial emperor, and the other Kings continued as they were earlier and enjoyed their freedom to rule their respective Kingdoms. It was a decent way of asserting superiority without any war or bloodshed.

But Jarasandha was no decent person. He wanted to rule the world by any means. Being a wicked person, he was not easily accepted by all the Kings as superior. So, there was resistance. Many Kings refused to abide by Jarasandha’s dictates. But Jarasandha was not prepared to give-up. He forcibly captured all those Kings and kept them as hostages and pressurized them to accept his superiority.

The present messenger to Krishna’s court was from these Kings whom Jarasandha had kept as prisoners. They were seeking Krishna’s help to free them from Jarasandha.

While the messenger had just finished his message to Krishna, Narada, our good old divine sage, unexpectedly arrived there. He too had some news.

Yudhishthira, the newly coronated King of Indraprastha too had expansionist ideas. But his ways were different. He wanted to conduct a Vedic Ritual called Rajasuya. He had invited all other Kings to that ritual. He had sent a word through Narada, inviting Krishna to the ritual.

Yudhishthira was the eldest son of Kunti – Krishna’s paternal aunt. After a lot of haggling, the blind King Dhritarastra of Hastinapur had finally agreed to divide the kingdom and make Yudhishthira – his own nephew, the King of Indraprasta – a formerly deserted place. It was totally unfair since the entire Kingdom rightfully belonged to Yudhishthira since his father Pandu ruled over it before he died. But Dhritarastra was not only physically blind but was also blinded with the over attachment for his son Duryodhana.

Now Krishna had two tasks – free the Kings kept hostage by Jarasandha, and attend the Rajasuya ritual conducted by his own cousin Yudhishthira. Krishna is averse to waging a war with Jarasandha since that would result in massive bloodshed.

How does Krishna handle this situation? Let us discuss that in the next episode.

 

 

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A series discussing story of Krishna, based on the Indian scripture Bhagavata Purana. © Dr. King, Swami Satyapriya 2022