This painting depicts a father, carrying his baby through a nasty storm with a majestic snake hovering over them. Looks a bit, rather very odd. Doesn’t it? You see just the painting. I know the story. The story is of a person of unbeatable strength, intelligence, power, kindness, and so many noble qualities that many people today worship him, consider his name to be Holy. This is the story of Lord Krishna.
First let me tell you about the two people here. The Hindu religion is full of stories about Krishna, an Avatar of the Lord Vishnu, who is sort of a caretaker of the universe. He promised to return in one of his Avatars whenever there was an uprising of unspeakable evil. So, Krishna the boy, was born in a prison, to a princess called Devaki, who was imprisoned by her own brother Kansa,the King of Mathura, because of the prophecy that rang out of the skies on her wedding day, the voice that said that her eighth son, would be the end of the evil Kansa. So Kansa made sure to kill all of his sister’s children as soon as they were born. It seemed like Krishna’s life was in grave danger too. Little did anybody know that the Gods had other plans.
Krishna grew up with Yasoda. How this was managed is interesting. Devaki’s husband Vasudev, had a friend Nanda in the neighbouring land of Gokul. The Lord came to him in a dream and instructed him to take the baby Krishna as soon as he is born, to Nanda’s house across the river Yamuna and leave him there by a sleeping Yasoda and take her baby back to the prison. Yasoda had a daughter, also an Avatar, of the Goddess Shakti who took a human form so that this plan could be carried out.
The day when Krishna was born, which is celebrated as Janamashtmi in the present age, was the day when a legend was to be born. There were winds, there was rain, it seemed like all the elements of nature were overwhelmed. Then, just as the clock struck twelve in the night, Krishna was born to a joyous, yet tired Devaki. Vasudev had to take his baby to safety. Krishna was a radiant baby, his smile was pure glee to look at, and as if by miracle, the prison guards were asleep at the birth of Krishna. Vasudev and Devaki managed to get the keys and Vasudev took away Krishna before the guards woke up. Devaki was a sad mother, her baby was to be taken away from her, she had no idea of when he would return, whether he would recognize his mother, what would he be like as a child,but her worst fear was, what if he loves Yasoda too much to come back to her?
Vasudev carried Krishna in his arms through the raging storm and the river Yamuna was flooding, as if it wanted to touch the baby. Then, Sheshanaag appeared. It was pouring heavily from the skies. Sheshnaag is the multi-headed snake, hovering over Vasudev and Krishna. Sheshanaag is the companion of the Lord Vishnu, serving him as his bed, whose Avatar, Lord Krishna would have to suffer the storm if not for Sheshnaag shielding him.
There is much more to Lord Krishna’s story, there are great lessons to be learnt from his life and from his work The Gita, more than possibly I could write about. I hope to share what I learnt from him, later. The first that I learnt from here is that sometimes, greatness is born out of terrible circumstances.
Painted In Words 