Morality!

 

Drona had implicit faith that Maharāj Yudhisthira would never lie, even to regain his kingdom, or for that matter, the entire three worlds

 

Sri Krsna had been very distressed the whole day, for He knew that Drona was capable of single-handedly annihilate the Pāndavās, along with their entire army. Standing at Yudhisthira’s side, Sri Krsna said: O King, if Drona puts his mind to it, he can exterminate your entire army in half a day. Therefore, in this exceedingly dangerous situation, it is better for you to lie than to tell the truth. It is not sinful to lie to save one’s own life, or the life of a king or a brahmana. Similarly, there is no sin involved in lying to a woman for the purpose of achieving her hand in marriage

 

Bhima urged: My dear brother, please take Sri Krsna’s advice, for Drona did not believe me when I declared that his son had been killed

 

Because Sri Krsna & Bhima prodded him in this way, Maharāj Yudhisthira considered himself forced into this situation by the unavoidable will of Destiny. Thus, he finally made up his mid to lie, although at heart he was afraid to do so. The king was very anxious to attain victory, and please Sri Krsna as well. After mustering his courage, he solemnly and distinctly said: O Preceptor, Asvattāma is indeed dead

 

In this statement, Maharāj Yudhisthira inaudibly inserted the words, “the elephant” after the word Asvattāma. Before Maharāj Yudhisthira gave this testimony, his chariot had remained “four-fingers” breadth off the ground throughout the entire war, but as soon as he told this lie, his chariot wheels immediately touched the earth

 

Actually, Maharāj Yudhisthira’s chariot wheels touched the ground because he did not implicitly follow Sri Krsna’s order. In spite of lying, Yudhisthira thought that he could maintain his vow of truthfulness by duplicitously adding “the elephant”. It is for this deviation from both material & spiritual truthfulness that he was punished

 

After hearing Maharāj Yudhisthira testimony, Drona gave way to despondency & lost practically all desire to continue fighting. Dhrishtadyumna could see how Drona was overwhelmed by lamentation and so he rushed impetuously at him while fixing a fierce arrow upon his celestial bow. When Drona saw this arrow, he considered that his final hour had arrived. Amazingly when the Preceptor tried to invoke his celestial weapons to counteract it, they failed to respond his command, for this is what happens when one is about to die

 

If Krsna directly tells to tell a lie, then there is some justification because what He says is the absolute truth. Krsna is the absolute truth & whatever He says is the truth. If Krsna says day is night & night is day, then it is like this only. If we say contrary to this, we are a liar, because we are relative, but Krsna is absolute-Param Satyam Dhimahi

 

Truth is whatever emanates from Krsna. Therefore, when Krsna told Yudhisthira to tell this lie he was requesting Yudhisthira to surrender even his own pride in being truthful for the sake of His service. Yudhisthira’s chariot never touched the ground because of his never telling a lie & his complete honourable morality throughout his life. But in this incident his chariot fell to the ground

 

Are we surrendered or do we have our own standards of morality? Thoughts?

#gameoflife