No Escaping Pain

“He had the best of qualities among saintly kings. In austerities he was equal to the great sages. Born in a family of great rulers, he was equal in strength to Indra.” (Hanuman, Valmiki Ramayana, Sundara Kand, 31.3)

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राजर्षीणां गुणश्रेष्ठस्तपसा चर्षिभि स्समः।
चक्रवर्तिकुले जातः पुरन्दरसमो बले।।

rājarṣīṇāṃ guṇaśreṣṭhastapasā carṣibhi ssamaḥ।
cakravartikule jātaḥ purandarasamo bale।।

“In my opinion, if you are a decent and honest person, someone who does not look to cheat others, who is conscious of right and wrong, you will find the Ramayana story appealing. You will relate to one or more of the characters.

“It is by far my favorite literary content. I cannot compare it to anything else. I guess that is why people consider it to be transcendental. The story is a history, and the events described transcend anything with which we have experience or familiarity.

“As I am now deep into adulthood, one of the characters I can really relate to is King Dasharatha. The leader of Ayodhya, he is pious in every way. Shri Hanuman gives a wonderful description of that leader’s qualifications. It makes sense that Vishnu chose Dasharatha as the father by birth, janma.

“As a father and someone who has to lead, who has to deal with different people always wanting something, who is on the receiving end of verbal abuse on a regular basis, I really feel for Dasharatha and what he had to go through. I get frustrated at times. Thinking about the way his life ended makes me upset.

“Why did he have to go through that? How could Kaikeyi put him through that ordeal? It doesn’t seem fair, at all. Dasharatha did everything right. He was always trying to please people. The thing that was most important to him in the world, the association of the beloved Rama, was exploited. It was as if everyone knew his weakness.

“By showing such affection for Rama, the eldest son, Dasharatha became vulnerable to such attacks. That makes sense if you are going after enemies, but why would someone take advantage of that against such a pious ruler? Why did he have to die from separation? I get it that there was a mistake committed earlier in his life. He was receiving the payback, if you will, of karma. But if anyone should be worthy of exemption from such reactions, it would be that celebrated leader of the Raghu dynasty.”

This is one of the difficult questions to resolve in the life experience. We do so many things right. We try to follow the pious path. We heed the instructions of elders. We respect authority. We follow the law. We are not malicious in our intent. We want to help others.

Given that frame of mind, bad things still happen to us. Sometimes, the suffering is tremendous. It is worse than anything we would wish on anyone else. We would never want our greatest enemies to go through such ordeals. We wonder what we did in the past to invite such misery.

Is this our reward for pious behavior? Do only the good die young? Do bad things only happen to good people? Do the evil and the wicked get to enjoy forever? Is it better to set aside religious principles? Should we behave like the animals, instead?

This is actually one of the underlying premises to the Bhagavad-gita conversation between Shri Krishna and Arjuna. It was a similar situation in that Arjuna had suffered so much. Due to being aligned with the side of dharma, choosing punya over papa, Arjuna, his brothers, and his mother were on the receiving end of harassment and lethal attacks rooted in evil.

मात्रा-स्पर्शास् तु कौन्तेय
शीतोष्ण-सुख-दुःख-दाः
आगमापायिनो ऽनित्यास्
तांस् तितिक्षस्व भारत

mātrā-sparśās tu kaunteya
śītoṣṇa-sukha-duḥkha-dāḥ
āgamāpāyino ‘nityās
tāṁs titikṣasva bhārata

“O son of Kunti, the nonpermanent appearance of happiness and distress, and their disappearance in due course, are like the appearance and disappearance of winter and summer seasons. They arise from sense perception, O scion of Bharata, and one must learn to tolerate them without being disturbed.” (Lord Krishna, Bhagavad-gita, 2.14)

Shri Krishna explains that happiness and distress occur as if on a cycle, like the way the seasons change. There is nothing we can do to stop the cold of winter. The spring season will be here soon enough, and after that the heat of summer.

Whether someone follows dharma or not, they will experience pain. Whether they are the most pious person or so degraded that they cannot see right from wrong, they will experience joy, elation, and excitement. This is simply the way of the life experience.

The worst thing that could happen to Dasharatha was that the association in that particular life ended. His existence did not change. He was not annihilated. Kaikeyi did not win through her vindictiveness. The king was neither shamed nor ruined. Others may have spoken negatively about him from time to time, based on their affection for Sita and Rama, but in following dharma until the end that celebrated ruler achieved the best conclusion to life that anyone can imagine.

In Closing:

No escaping pain,
For pious and sinful the same.

Like the seasons to change,
Distress and joy to attain.

Dasharatha the best ruler of all,
Father of Shri Rama to call.

While ruined by wife vindictive,
Still life’s end benedictive.