The Ramcharitmanas 3

by Tulsidas

  Kaushalya: King Dasharath’s chief queen, and Ram’s mother.

  Kaustubh: A precious jewel, obtained at the churning of the ocean and worn by Vishnu upon his breast.

  Ketu: A comet or meteor, and the ninth of the planets; and in Vedic astronomy, the descending lunar node, represented by a dragon’s tail. He is personified in mythology as the lower half of the Danav, Rahu. See Rahu.

  Khar: A man-eating Rakshasa, the younger brother of Ravan; he was killed by Ram.

  Khasiya: A tribal, hill people of northern India.

  Kinnara: Literally, ‘What men?’ in Sanskrit; they are mythical beings with the body of a man and the head of a horse. They are singers and musicians, and live in the paradise of Kuber, the god of wealth, on Mt Kailash. According to some sources, they sprang from the toe of Brahma together with the Yakshas; but others say that they are the sons of Kashyap.

  kinshuk: A tree native to India. When in bloom, it is covered with a profusion of bright red, flame-coloured flowers. It is also known as the palash, the dhak, or the flame-of-the-forest.

  Kirat: A mountain tribe that lives by hunting; a man of that tribe.

  kodo: A kind of small grain (like millet), considered inferior to rice and usually eaten by the poor.

  kok; koki (f.): These birds are a symbol of love and fidelity. Legend says that they are doomed to spend every night apart because of a curse pronounced upon them by a sadhu. They spend the day together, but every night they must separate; the birds spend the night calling to each in sad and mournful tones. Since they can be together only during the day, the birds are full of joy in the light of the sun, and grow sorrowful in the light of the moon. They are also called chakravak birds, or chakwa (male) and chakwi (female). They are also identified with the rathang birds, the ruddy or Brahmany geese.

  kokil; koel: The black or Indian cuckoo. This bird is prominent in Indian poetry; its musical cry is supposed to inspire pleasing and tender emotions.

  Kol: A tribe that lives the hills and forests of central India; a man of that tribe.

  kos: A measure of distance, equivalent to about 2 miles.

  Koshal: A country on the Sarju river, with Avadh its capital city. This was the kingdom ruled by Dasharath, and later by Ram.

  Kshatriya: The second of the four castes of Hinduism. It is the regal or warrior caste.

  Kuber: The god of wealth, and the king of the Yakshas. He is also regent of the north, and the keeper of gold and silver, pearls and precious stones, and all the treasures of the earth. He is the son of Vishravas (the son of the sage Pulastya), and the half-brother of Ravan. His consort is called Yakshi. Kuber’s city is Alaka in the Himalayas, and his garden is on Mount Mandar, where he is waited upon by the Kinnaras. Some authorities place his abode on Mount Kailash, in a palace built by the divine architect, Vishvakarma. According to the Ramayana and Mahabharata, he once ruled in the city of Lanka, also built by Vishvakarma, and from which he was thrown out by Ravan. He is the owner of the self-moving flying chariot, Pushpak, given to him by Brahma. He is also the keeper of the nine Nidhis, nine treasures considered precious beyond compare. They are called padma or the lotus flower, maha-padma, sankha, makar, kachhapa, mukunda, kunda, nila, kharba. Their nature and purpose are not clearly defined. Each treasure is also personified as a spirit that is also the guardian of that particular treasure. These guardian spirits are worshipped by some tantrics. Kuber is represented as a fair-skinned man, deformed in body, with three legs and only eight teeth. His body is covered with jewelled ornaments. He receives no worship. He is also known as Dhanesh, ‘god of wealth’; Dhandhari, ‘holder of wealth’; and ‘Dhanad, ‘one who grants wealth, the munificent’.

  Kumbhakaran: A Rakshasa, the son of Vishravas (the son of the sage Pulastya), and brother of Ravan. As the result of a boon (or, as variously told, a curse) by Brahma, he slept for six months at a time and remained awake for only a single day.

  kush: A kind of grass used in sacrifices and rituals. It is also called darbh.

  Kushaketu: King Janak’s younger brother, the father of the princesses Mandavi and Shrutakirti. He is also known as Kushadhvaja.

  Lakshman: ‘Possessed of lucky signs or marks, fortunate, prosperous’; son of Dasharath and Sumitra, Ram’s younger brother and Shatrughna’s twin. For his mother, Sumitra, he is also called Saumitri, ‘Sumitra’s son’. He is often considered to be the incarnation of the celestial serpent, Sheshnag.

  Lakshmi: The goddess of wealth and beauty, Vishnu’s consort, and the mother of Kamdev, the god of love. According to the Ramayana, she sprang from the the froth of the ocean, in all her beauty, when it was churned by the gods and the Asurs. The Vishnu Purana says that she accompanied Vishnu in all his incarnations, and when Vishnu was born as Ram, she became Sita. She is also known as Shri; Indira; and Ramaa, ‘Ram’s consort’.

  Lanka: Ravan’s kingdom. Also known as Singhal.

  life, ends, fruits, rewards of: These are four: (i) kama or sensual pleasure; (ii) artha or wealth; (iii) dharma or religious merit; and (iv) moksha or nirvana, i.e., liberation from worldly existence and rebirth.

  life, four stages of: For traditional Hindus, life is divided into four stages: (i) Brahmacharya, the student life, spent in study and obedience to one’s guru; (ii) Grihastha, the stage of a householder, the married man living with his wife, and engaged in the ordinary duties of everyday life; (iii) Vanaprastha, the phase of a ‘forest-dweller’, who has discharged his duties in this world, and who, handing over his responsibilities to the next generation, has retired to the forest to devote himself to a life of simplicity and contemplation of the divine; and (iv) Sannyas, the period spent as a religious mendicant, who has renounced all worldly goods and desires and attained complete detachment from this material existence; freed from all forms and observances, he wanders about, subsisting only on alms, and striving for ultimate absorption into the divine.

  lila: Literally ‘play, sport, pastime’. In Hindu belief, all creation is the Lord’s lila, his sport or pastime.

  Madhav: Krishna (Vishnu) in his role as presiding deity of Prayag.

  Magh: The tenth month of the Hindu calendar, corresponding to January–February.

  Mahishasur: Literally, ‘the buffalo demon’, an Asur killed by the goddess Parvati in her form as Durga. Through intense austerities, he received a boon from Brahma and asked to be made immortal. Brahma refused the boon of immortality, but granted him the boon that no man would be able to kill him. The gods were powerless against him and were soundly defeated by him in battle. Then the goddess Parvati, who was Shiv’s Shakti, the feminine manifestation of Shiv’s cosmic energy, took on one of her fierce forms and killed him.

  Mai: A Daitya, the architect of the Asurs, as Vishvakarma was of the gods. He was the father of the demon Mayavi, and of Mandodari, Ravan’s wife.

  Maina: The wife of Himalaya, and the mother of Parvati.

  Mainak: A winged mountain.

  Makar: Makar (equivalent to Capricorn) is the tenth sign of the zodiac, and is represented by a water-animal with the body and tail of a fish, and the forelegs, neck and head of an antelope.

  Malaya, mountain range: One of the seven mountain ranges mentioned in the Puranas; they are supposedly the southernmost mountains of the Western Ghats in peninsular India. The mountains were famous for their sandal trees, which yielded the finest sandalwood in the world.

  Manas; Manas lake; Mansarovar: A freshwater lake in modern Tibet, at the foot of Mt Kailash, the abode of Shiv. The lake is sacred to Hindus, Buddhists and Jains, and an important place of pilgrimage for them.

  Mandakini: A sacred river that flowed by the hill of Chitrakut, where Ram and Sita spent part of their forest exile. It is also called Payasvini, ‘water-giving’. It is said that the river was brought down from heaven to Chitrakut by Anasuya, the wife of the sage Atri, in order to alleviate a drought.

  Mandar: The sacred mountain with which the ocean is said to have been churned by the gods and Asurs for the recovery of amrit an
d thirteen other precious things lost during the great flood.

  Mandavi: Sita’s cousin, the eldest daughter of Janak’s younger brother Kushadhvaj (Kushaketu); she was married to Bharat.

  Mandodari: The daughter of the Daitya Mai, she was Ravan’s favourite wife, and the mother of Meghnad.

  Manthara: Queen Kaikeyi’s hunch-backed bondswoman, who roused the queen’s jealousy and set her against Ram, which led to him being banished to the forest for fourteen years.

  Manu: From the root man, ‘to think’; this name belongs to fourteen mythological progenitors of mankind and rulers of the earth, each of whom rules for the period called a Manwantara (Manu-antara: the life or period of a Manu). There are fourteen Manwantaras in any kalpa. The gods, the seven great sages (Saptarishis) and Indra change from one Manwantara to another. The first of these Manus was Svayambhuva, who sprang from Swayambhu, the self-existent.

  Mar: The passion of love; personified, it is another name for Kamdev, the god of love.

  Marich; Marichi: A Rakshasa, son of Taraka; he was also one of Ravan’s ministers, and helped him to kidnap Sita from the forest hermitage.

  Maruts: Marut The storm gods. They are armed with thunderbolts and ride on the whirlwind and direct the storm. Many origins are assigned to them – they are the sons of Rudra, the sons or brothers of Indra, sons of the ocean, sons of the earth. Their number varies—according to one source they are twenty-nine in number, according to another, three times sixty; in the Ramcharitmanas, Tulsi says they are forty-nine in number. In the singular, Marut is also the god of the wind, and the presiding deity of the north-west quarter.

  Matali: Indra’s charioteer.

  maya; Maya: Illusion, deception; the unreality of worldly things; in Hindu belief, a deception dependent on the power of the Supreme Being, through which mankind believes in the existence of the world which is in fact mere illusion without reality. Personified, Maya is a woman, the consort of the Supreme Being, and the immediate operative cause of the creation. It also means magical or supernatural power, such as that possessed by the Rakshasa, Ravan.

  Meghnad: Literally, ‘the rumbling or thundering of clouds’; he was Ravan’s eldest son by his chief queen, Mandodari. When Ravan attacked Indra’s forces, Meghnad accompanied him and fought most valiantly. He used the power of invisibility given to him by Shiv to capture, tie up and carry off Indra to Lanka where he kept him a prisoner. The gods, led by Brahma, went to Lanka to secure Indra’s release, and Brahma gave Meghnad the title of ‘Indrajit’, ‘conqueror of Indra’. He is also called Arindam, ‘the destroyer of enemies’.

  Mekal: A part of the Vindhya mountain range, in which rise the headwaters and several tributaries of the Narmada river.

  Meru: A fabulous mountain in the centre of the earth, upon which is situated Swarga, Indra’s heaven, containing the cities of the gods. It is also known as Sumeru.

  Mithila: The capital city of Videha, the kingdom of King Janak; also known as Janakpur, or Janak’s city, Tirhut, and Terahuti.

  moksha: Ultimate freedom from birth and rebirth. There are four kinds of moksha possible: (i) living in the same world as the Supreme Being; (ii) living in close proximity to the Supreme Being; (iii) attaining a form similar to that of the Supreme Being; and (iv) complete union with the Supreme Being.

  mridang: A double drum, broader in the middle than at the ends.

  muni: A sage, a holy man who has attained almost divine status through penance and meditation. The term is also used as a title for the seven great Rishis and for other wise and learned men.

  Naga: A semi-divine being belonging to the serpent race, with a human face, the tale of a snake and the expanded neck of the cobra. The Nagas are said to have sprung from Kadru, one of the wives of the sage Kashyap, for the purpose of populating the underworld, Patal, where they rule in great splendour.

  Nahush: The son of Pururavas, and the father of Yayati; he came into conflict with the Brahmans. His story is told, with variations, in the Mahabharata and the Puranas. Nahush was a good and righteous king, and, through prayer and penance and sacred study, he acquired the sovereignty of the three worlds. Once, when Indra had temporarily gone into hiding (for having killed the demon Vritra, who was a Brahman), leaving his throne vacant, Nahush was chosen to reign in his stead. He ruled over the heavens wisely and well for many years, but as time went by, he became arrogant and haughty. One day, he caught sight of Shachi, Indra’s beautiful consort, and wanted her for himself. Shachi, known for her love and fidelity to Indra, was angered and distressed by his advances, and complained to the sage Brihaspati and sought his protection. The gods remonstrated with Nahush, but blinded by desire, he refused to listen to them, and insisted upon having Shachi as his consort. Brihaspati then advised Shachi to lay down a condition—that she would accept Nahush as her husband if he would come to her in a palanquin carried by sages. Nahush, who had lost all sense of propriety and was guided only by his stubborn desire to possess Shachi, agreed at once. He somehow convinced the rishis to carry him to Shachi on his shoulders. The sages were not very strong men, and walked slowly with frequent stops. The king grew impatient, and kicked the sage Agastya, who was one of the sages carrying him. The sage cried out in anger, ‘Fall, you serpent!’ and Nahush fell from his palanquin and turned into a huge python. Horrified, he begged Agastya to forgive him; relenting, Agastya put a limit on the curse, saying that he would regain his human form when he had learnt how to be a good king. According to one version of the story, he was released from his curse by the eldest Pandava, Yudhishthira, who lectured him on the qualities of a good king. Nahush, understanding these at last, was released from his serpent form and ascended to heaven.

  Nar and Narayan: Two ancient sages; twin sons of Dharma (Brahma’s son) and his wife Ahimsa (daughter of Daksh). The brothers are considered by some to be the fourth avatar of Vishnu.

  Narad: A Devarshi, or divine sage or saint akin to a demigod, to whom some of the hymns of the Rig-Veda are ascribed. Various sources have different accounts of his life. He is regarded as one of the four sons of Brahma, and one of the ten principal and original Munis or Rishis. He is also the inventor of the vina or lute and lord of the celestial musicians, the Gandharvas. He was also one of the great writers on law, the author of the Naradiya Dharmashastra. Later, he is connected to the legend of Krishna. He is also regarded as somewhat of a mischief-maker, causing frequent quarrels among the gods by bearing tales.

  Narmada: A sacred river, said to rise from the Mekal hills, and because of which the river is also known as ‘Mekal’s daughter’.

  Nimi: Son of Ikshvaku, and the founder of the dynasty of Mithila. According to the Vishnu Purana, he was cursed by the sage Vasishtha to lose his corporeal form, and in response, he pronounced the same curse upon the sage. Both then abandoned their bodily forms. Though Vasishtha took birth again, Nimi’s corpse was embalmed and preserved in death as he had been in life. The gods offered to restore him back to life, but Nimi refused, saying that the separation of the soul from the body was so painful that he did not want to have to experience it again. The gods respected his wishes, and instead, placed him in the eyes of every living creature, because of which their eyelids are always blinking. (A blink of the eye is called ‘nimish’.)

  nine poetic sentiments (navras): The nine poetic sentiments or moods are: erotic, humorous, compassionate, astonishing, frightening, peaceful, disgusting, wrathful and heroic.

  nirgun: Devoid of all qualities or properties, without attributes; the Supreme Being, who has no attributes of any kind.

  Nishad: A forest tribe who lived along the banks of the Ganga; their main occupation was hunting and fishing.

  Ocean of Milk: In Hindu cosmology, one of the seven seas surrounding directional space.

  ocean, churning of: One of the most well-known stories in Indian mythology; from this was produced, amongst other things, amrit, the nectar of immortality, and Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth and beauty. Once, Indra displeased the sage Durvasa, w
ho in his anger, cursed Indra that he and all the gods would lose their strength, energy and good fortune. Weakened by the sage’s curse, the gods were defeated in battle by the Asurs, who now gained control over the universe. In despair, the gods appealed to Vishnu. Vishnu directed them to churn the ocean and thus to obtain from it the nectar of immortality—this, if consumed, would restore to them their strength and power. The gods, rendered powerless by Durvasa’s curse, were unable to accomplish this task on their own, and on Vishnu’s advice, enlisted the Asurs to help them, agreeing to divide with them whatever was retrieved from the ocean. Vishnu assured the gods that he would make sure that the nectar of immortality would remain with the gods. The ocean was then churned, with Mount Mandar as the churning stick, and Sheshnag, the celestial serpent as the rope wound round it. The Asurs held the head of the serpent, and the gods the tail, and as they pulled back and forth on the serpent, Mount Mandar began to sink into the waters. So Vishnu took on the form of a kurma or tortoise (his second avatar), and slipping into the waters, supported Mount Mandar on his back. From the churning of the ocean were produced many precious objects, Lakshmi, precious gems, the horse Uchhaishravas, and a deadly poison (which Shiv swallowed and held in his throat). At last, there arose from the waters Dhanvantari (who became the physician of the gods), bearing in his hands the pot of amrit. The Asurs demanded their share of it, but Vishnu’s steed, Garud, grabbed the pot and flew away with it. Then Vishnu took on the form of the beautiful enchantress, Mohini, and distributed the amrit amongst the gods, who drank it and regained their strength. Only one of the Asurs, called Rahu, managed to drink some of the amrit, and though his head was cut off by Vishnu as punishment, he had already attained immortality and was thus placed amongst the stars. (See Rahu, and Vishnu—second avatar).