Ram’s journey, Ramayana, is an epic tale of a brave and handsome prince, who wins a beautiful bride, Sita, in a contest of many warriors, but soon ends up in exile. In the forest, where he leads the spartan life of a hunter gatherer, Sita is abducted by demon Ravan. Ram finally rescues his wife from the island of Lanka, with the help of an army of satyrs. He returns home as a victorious king and has been worshipped ever after in the image of the divine. That’s where the popular narrative ends.
But that’s not the complete story.
No matter what Valmiki’s actual intent and the purpose of his narrative about the primitive, if not primordial past, Ram’s relevance to India has survived to this day, repurposed to the needs of time, in over one hundred versions, and across several geographies, as far east as Thailand, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, and even Korea (where the Kim tribe of Busan claims descent from a princess of Ayodhya), bringing light to darkness; its latest version is James Cameron’s Hollywood magnum opus Avatar.
Early European scholars went beyond the definitive Valmiki epic crafted on the Narada narrative (read previous post). As with Siva, they identified Ram with the Greek god Dionysus who is believed to have come to India with an army of apes (some interpretations have it that Dionysus went to Greece from India), others with Bacchus who too, like Ram, was eulogized as a descendant of Sun. Greek legends suggest that Dionysus brought grape farming and winery to India.
Edward Moor, an early nineteenth century English mercenary who served in the Peshwa’s army in Pune, was also a chronicler of Indian divinities; his work The Pantheon of Gods, Sarv Deva Darshana was published in 1811. Moor held that “in unity of action, magnificence of imagery, and elegance of diction, Valmiki’s Ramayan far surpasses the elaborate work of Nonnus, in the forty-eight books entitled Dionsiaca.”
He went on to quote Sir William Jones’ the Asian Researchers to insist that the Peruvians, whose Incas claimed descent from the Sun, called their biggest festival Ramasitoa (just as Ramleela is the biggest Indian festival of good over evil).
Yet, above all this, the Ram Story that has endured the longest and amongst the largest number of people is Ramacharitmanas scripted by 16th century mystic-poet Tulsidas, who belonged to the Ramananda sampradaya, the largest monastic congregation of the Indians. Ram Bhakti, that is devotion to Ram, was made into a movement in northern India by the 14th century mendicant Sri Ramanandacharya (1330-1380), who in turn, was an adherent of the Visishtadvaita school of Vedanta philosopher Sri Ramanujacharya (1017-1137 CE).
Originally known as Rambola (Ram spoke) Shukl, Tulsidas means basil (tulsi) and servant or slave (das), therefore devoted to the green leaf of the basil plant, that is a symbol of Hari-Hara, that is Visnu. The blue light of the sun (ram) and the plough (sita) gives birth to the green plant.
At the height of Islamic invasion of India in the wake of Babur’s conquest, Tulsidas (1532-1623), an austere Brahman priest from the Hindi heartland crafted the Ram story in the local Avadhi dialect to restore belief and confidence among a vanquished subject race identified as Hindus, bringing unquestionable devotional faith of the bhakti movement to narrate the epic tale of good over evil in the just war of Ram and his devoted minion, the undying and brave monkey Hanuman. So profound was the work of Tulsidas that it reached a larger audience than the complete works of his contemporary poet and playwright William Shakespeare in England. His Rama story continues to be re-enacted to this day in the Ramleela utsav across vast swathes of the Gangetic hinterland during Dussehra.
This is possibly why his work has been globally acknowledged among front ranking world literature.
Sir George Abraham Gierson (1851-1941), an Irish administrator and linguist in British India, called Tulsidas “the greatest leader of the people after the Buddha [Wikipedia].”
Another Irish Indologist, historian, curator and member of the Indian Civil Service, Arthur Vincent Smith (1843-1920) called him the greatest saint of his age, and even greater than his contemporary Emperor Akbar. This, when Akbar’s vizier and court poet Abdul Rahim Khan-i-khanan (1556-1627 CE), also a contemporary of Tulsidas, wrote, “The immaculate Ramcharitmanas is the breath of life of saints. It is similar to the Vedas for the Hindus, and it is the Qu’ran manifest for the Muslims.”
Rahim’s words were echoed by the ageless 20th century yogi Deoraha Baba (believed to be of the Ramanujacharya-Ramanandacharya school of Vedantists), one of the foremost early proponents of the Ram Mandir in Ayodhya. He said Isvara himself is Ram, Ramchandra is the moon god born of the sun. Rama and Chandra make for Qamar-ur-Rahman. For Ram alone is the dayalu-kripalu rahman. This Ram is compassionate.
Deoraha baba went on to pay the highest tribute to Tulsidas when he said all that was needed for the contemporary Hindu was to imbibe the devotion of Tulsidas. Ramchandra’s name, he said, has the taraka mantra (the glistening chant of lustre): ramo ramaye namah, that is, Ram alone worships Ram, that one God. There is no other. And that alone is the truth. The word taraka means the divine star (tara + ka) and the eye; it also means the crossing and the ferryman. The taraka mantra, then is also the chant of deliverance, making Ram the ferryman of the soul to freedom from rebirth. The role of the ferryman or the psychopomp is not to judge the deceased, but to simply navigate him to the far side of the river of life. Which is why pallbearers across the Hindi heartland chant ram naam satya hai (Ram’s name alone is true) en route to the cremation ground. The Baba elaborated that the taraka mantra is derived from the roots of two maha (great) mantra (chants). The first is the eight-lettered astaaksara, au ma - na mo - na ra ya na (Aum namo Narayana). The second is the five-lettered pancaksara, na ma - si va ya (Nama Sivaya).
Siva, the baba said, whispers the Ram mantra in the ears of all those who breathe their last at his abode in Varanasi, the great river crossing, and therefore, pilgrimage of the Hindus, where the soul is believed to be transported to the far end of the Universe to submerge in the invisible point of cosmic consciousness.
Ram, he said, is the sound of the divine, where ra is the soul spirit and ma the body of the being. It is such a name that in chanting it or in contemplating on it or even upon its twang reaching the ear, man’s internal practice gets transformed into his external persona. Ram, that is ra and ma, is also the twang of the bowstring. This twang of the bow is the foundation of Ram dhun: Sri Ram jai Ram jai-jai Ram, Jai Ram Sri Ram jai-jai Ram. With every twang, the pundits said, the soul becomes this body, and the body becomes the spirit. “Conjunction of the two brings together the body and the spirit, their separation rips apart the spirit from the body.”
Ram, said Deoraha baba, is the hidden factor, not the transactional, that intoxicates the practitioner, the yogi, which is why the effort should never wane in chanting the name of Ram, for Ram is the soul with 'r' itself symbolic of Ram, 'a' the akara, the form, symbolic of Sita, and 'm' is manas or mind that is Laksman.
The baba also interpreted the Ram story from the karma perspective. Ramayana, he said, is the story of the end of desire. Every creature, he said, cannot fulfil their desires, for every desire comes with a price. “You will certainly pay the price.” Even the desires of Dasaratha were not fulfilled.
In the Rama narrative, Ram, that means the blue light of both wisdom and destruction, also means mara or death. One version of the Ramayana has it that Valmiki, originally a bandit and murderer, could not pronounce the name of Ram and was taught by Narada to chant ma-ra-ma-ra-ma-ra-ma (death-death-death) to get the name off his tongue. Ram was born in the house of desire, where Dasaratha’s 10 chariots were metaphors for his insatiable lust, as were his mirror opposite Ravana’s 10 heads, that raised the din of craving.
Because of his unquenchable desires, Dasarath extinguished the light of wisdom from his own house, and died in sorrow. Ravana’s ceaseless desires brought sorrow to others and invited the light of death that eventually consumed him. And so, death born in the house of desire overcame death in exile.
Ram, the baba said, is the soul of Indian civilisation. “The complete energy or soul force of the nation resides in Ram.” He cannot be confined to being the son of Dasarath the king of Ayodhya or his social conduct. The blue flame of death that is Ram alone is Krsna, it is also Vishnu, it alone is Siva. That blue flame alone is lightning. And that flash is present in every pot that makes the mind. This is why every moving and unmoving object in this Universe is a reflection of that Ram, said the baba.
And that flame is eternal. “It has been there before Ram, before Ayodhya.”
It has been there before any temple or vihara, any synagogue or church, any masjid or gurudwara.
This is why Ayodhya, the birthplace of Ram, is lighted up with lamps every Diwali in the illusion of Ram. Ram is the flame that illuminates the soul of each creature. It lights up every heart. That light is the seed of life. The lightship (diya) of Diwali carries that seed of life. When you plant the seed, its light is carried by the flower, that is pushpak. The flower then is the lightship of life. And that lightship is Ramayana, the vehicle of Ram. That is how Valmiki, the author of Ramayan adored Ram as the reflection of Visnu, whose poison, vis, was purified by Siva. Deoraha baba held that in the Ramayana story, the seed of Visnu was planted as Ram to satisfy the desire of the gods for immense innate strength and resilience.
The glory of the blue flame is infinitely larger than that of the visible expanse of the Universe. Hence the glory of Ram is above all. He is the destructive power of the ultraviolet ray. Hence, the need to weave the illusion of Ram.
Deoraha baba believed that this world is a mesh of lights. This illusion is the shadow play or leela of Ram, in which Ram’s wedding with Sita is a metaphor, where the four brides (Sita and her three sisters) are compared with the four states of consciousness, jagrat (awake), svapna (dream), susupti (dreamless sleep), and turiya (awareness), and the four grooms (Ram and his three brothers) are the four presiding divinities, visva (universe, body), taijasva (warmth, radiance), prajna (knowledge), and Brahma (the ultimate). The pairings of jagrat and visva, taijasva and svapna, prajna and susupti, and turiya and Brahma reside in the mind of the jiva (the living, breathing creature). In these pairings, Sita is maya (the illusion), the inseparable energy of Ram, which is to say that the illusion is inseparable from light. Ramleela, therefore, is shadow play, in which maya, that controls the entire Universe, makes appearance with two faces: vidya (knowledge), the cause of creation and liberation of jiva; and avidya (ignorance) the cause of illusion and bondage of jiva.
This bondage is what makes the average householder a trader in religious profit. His concern, the baba said, is more with the hide (cha ma ra, chamra) than the light of knowledge (rama). This world is draped in skin that we all understand, said the baba, and trade through life. Sitting in this tent of hide, we don’t seek to understand Ram; all our rituals relate to 'cham' making us hide merchants: “We take the dead body out of our home to light the funeral pyre, next we bring a dead body home to roast a meal.”
This is what Valmiki taught in his ballad of Ram to Luv and Kush the sons of Sita. Ever since, Ram has been the soul of Indian culture.
Adapted from Valmiki, The Ramayana by Arshia Sattar
© Shubhrangshu Roy, DEATHSHIP: Readings from The Ramayana, 2024