Time we shed some light on Krishna.
Who was Krishna?
My research is conducted almost entirely through the means of Google, which may not be the best way, but it serves. (As I have stated previously I do welcome comments and criticisms that help in sharpening the discussion.)
According to Wikipedia (now quoting), “Krishna is a major deity in Hinduism. He is worshiped as the eighth avatar of Vishnu and also as the supreme God (Svayam Bhagavan) in his own right. He is the god of protection, compassion, tenderness, and love and is one of the most popular and widely revered among Indian divinities. Krishna’s birthday is celebrated every year by Hindus on Krishna Janmashtami according to the lunisolar Hindu calendar, which falls in late August or early September of the Gregorian calendar.”
Pardon me if my engineering mind starts analyzing straightway. “A major deity” throws the door open for other deities. From a general knowledge of Hinduism, we know that there are many deities – millions of them in fact. Since one of the inherent attributes of god is that he/ she is omnipotent, we are looking at a situation that simply cannot be. Added to that is the adjective “supreme” to god. So do we understand that there is a supreme god – here Krishna – and the rest are all “under-guards” (they have them in some trains). What about Rama? Won’t he be wroth?
Also, please note Krishna is said to be the eighth avatar of Vishnu. If Krishna is one of the most popular, what is the status of Vishnu then, appearing at the head of the lineage? A lesser god? Where does he fit in? Paramahansa Yogananda is on record as saying Krishna is the most beloved of Hindu gods. Does it not leave the rest of them out in the cold?
The Wikipedia further discloses that (quoting again, except for parenthetical remarks) “Hindu literature portrays Krishna in various perspectives: a god-child, a prankster, a model lover, a divine hero, and as the universal supreme being. His iconography reflects these legends, and shows him in different stages of his life, such as an infant eating butter (that is alright, but stealing is a different game altogether punishable by a spank), a young boy playing a flute, a young man with Radha or surrounded by women devotees (again harmless but hiding their clothes while they bathe and asking them to appear nude before him one by one with hands raised may not be a morally elevated pursuit; the current laws on sexual rectitude would also be very interested in such behaviour), or a friendly charioteer giving counsel to Arjuna.”
To be sure all of Krishna’s dubious pranks are invested with deep metaphorical significance by the Bakths. Recently I watched a video of two scholars at pain to defend the action of Krishna in the matter of “hiding gopika’s clothes” with the facile explanation that it was done in innocence as he was pre-teen at that time and was only about 12 or so. Since we are perforce in a comparative mode in this series, my mind wandered to Jesus at this very stage and came up with the story of Jesus in the temple: “they found him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions.47 Everyone who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers” (Luke 2: 46-47). And young Jesus met questions about his behaviour with “Why were you searching for me?…Didn’t you know I had to be in my Father’s house?”(Luke 2:49), Father of course meaning God, the Father.
mmm…Just saying
And when you seek answers for the time line of Krishna, you come across dates some 3000 years BCE with his life span put at around 125 years. So he died? But didn’t we see he was worshiped as supreme god?
Questions, questions.
What about Mahabharata?
Turning to Wikipedia again, “traditionally the authorship of the Mahābhārata is attributed to Vyāsa. There have been many attempts to unravel its historical growth and compositional layers. The bulk of the Mahābhārata was probably compiled between the 3rd century BCE and the 3rd century CE, with the oldest preserved parts not much older than around 400 BCE. The original events related by the epic probably fall between the 9th and 8th centuries BCE. The text probably reached its final form by the early Gupta period (c. 4th century CE).”
As one can readily see, there is a disagreement of dates between Krishna’s life span and the dateline of “original” events related by the epic. Further, there seems to be some difficulty as well regarding the important aspect of Krishna’s life as a “friendly charioteer giving counsel to Arjuna”. To quote one document: “historically on the brink of such a horrendous war as war as that related in the Mahabharata, it is most unlikely that, as the Gita depicts, Krishna and Arjuna would draw their chariot into the open field between the two opposing armies at Kurukshetra and there engage in an extensive discourse on yoga. While many of the chief events and persons in the compendious Mahabharata indeed have their basis in historical fact, their poetic presentation in the epic has been arranged conveniently and meaningfully (and wonderfully condensed in the Bhagavad Gita portion) for the primary purpose of setting forth the essence of India’s Sanatana Dharma, Eternal Religion”.
Moreover, ” by means of astronomical phenomena such as eclipses, solstices, positions of stars, and planetary conjunctions the dates proposed for the Kurukshetra war range from as early as 6000 B.C. to as recently as 500 B.C.—hardly a definite consensus!”
So it is not easy to accept the Mahabharata as an account of trued historical incidents. At best it is an adroitly woven epic with an attractive mix of the possibly real and the probably imaginary. It is better to accept it as such as a delightful mythological work. In that case we shouldn’t have to struggle to reconcile the irreconcilable.
Let us consider Krishna’s marital life. He is described to have had many unnamed junior wives. Their number is mentioned as 16,000 in Mahabharata (plus another 100 in some other literature). The wise king Solomon in the Bible is beaten hollow – with only 1000 women! I don’t know how it worked those days but I assume that “wife” would mean that some one with whom one has a conjugal relationship. So in the case of Krishna, at the rate of one a night, it will be 44 years before a woman gets to sleep with him a second time! Unless of course there was something like a voters queue lining up to his chamber all the time. He must have been a busy man indeed!
Things being so, I am surprised that Krishna found the time to meditate and practice Yoga. According to Swami Shree Yogi Satyam lecturing at one Khumb Mela, “Bhagavan Krishna has shown the path of self-realization and taught Kriyayoga meditation to all human beings. Bhagavan Krishna explained to Arjuna that in order to realize the ultimate Truth, one has to concentrate on self constantly and joyfully with the concept that God has become all”. Apart from the difficulty in chronology, I cannot figure out how Krishna managed to do it all, with the kind of demands on his time from human pursuits mentioned above.
What about Krishna’s teachings? Is there harmony between those and messages from the Bible? A broad answer will be: not always. Let me illustrate: one of the teachings in the Baghvad Gita says
You Are Born Empty-Handed, And You Will Leave This Mother Earth Empty-Handed
Job 1:21 in the Bible says:
Naked came I out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return thither
Bhagvad Gita:
A Mind Full Of Thoughts About Money Cannot Concentrate Nor Meditate
Whatever Has Happened Is Only For The Good Future. The Activities That Are Happening At Present Are Also For A Good Cause. The Happenings In The Future, They Are Also For A Good Future
I am afraid the Bible differs (Romans 8:28):
we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose
