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Sudarsana and Kartavirya Arjuna

From the Bhakti List Archives

Mani Varadarajan • August 14, 2001 


Furthering our discussion of Sri Sudarsana Chakra as
the sankalpa-Sakti of Bhagavaan, Sri Bharat sent this
followup email detailing what Sri Rangapriya Swami 
graciously told him:

   Re: KArtavIryArjuna:
   
   Sri SudarSana once became proud and thought that since
   he was the Mind and Sankalpa parts of the Lord the latter
   was totally in his grasp.Since the Lord is the Mind behind
   the Mind itself He knew his thoughts instantly and told him,
   "if you want to test your theory,take birth will ALL your
   power and I'll confront you only as an "AvESa AvatAra"
   and let's see what happens."
   
   Accordingly he was born as KArtavIrya the king of
   MAhishmati.Due to his innate goodness and power
   he he ruled the kingdom with total justice.Since he
   was the principle of the Mind itself he knew the instant
   any of his subjects had an evil thought and promptly
   appeared before him to prevent it.He was so powerful
   he once captured Ravana and tied him up as a "ten-
   headed-insect" on his child's cradle as a plaything for
   him.
   
   Unfortunately Pride being his weakness he fell foul
   of Rshi Jamadgni,killed him and thus made the
   Lord enter the Rshi's son Parasurama as an AvESa
   AvatAra and was nullified.
   
   But he has his uses.He has got the power to locate
   for his devotees things they have lost.As the SAstra
   says-
   
   
   Swami said that this is literally true and quoted
   various instances.

To this, I asked:

 > Dear Maama,
 > 
 > Thank you for the detailed writeup of what Swami conveyed.
 > I have a rather naive question I hope you don't mind answering.
 > Since Sri Sudarsana Alvan is a nitya-sUri, how can we speak
 > of him getting puffed up with pride? 
 > 
 > Mani
 > 
 
Sri Bharat replied:

   Right.I asked Swami just the same question.He explained:
   
   If he doesn't leave Parampadam he has no problem.He doesn't even
   have consciousness of his separate self since he is immersed in
   the Lord.But if he comes into Prakriti Mandala as part of his
   Kainkarya he may get influenced sometimes,as happened to
   Garutman also.Sometimes the Lord Himself (being HrshIkESa)
   may influence his mind (as He did to Arjuna)to point a moral for
   the benefit of humanity.Even these cases (as in the present
   instance) end up only to further glorify the Lord Himself.Hence
   they also come within His Leela and the SEshabhUta's
   Kainkarya.So there is no harm done to anyone.

   Sri EmberumAnAr TiruvaDigaLE SaeraNam!

--------------------------------------------------------------
           - SrImate rAmAnujAya namaH -
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