The Great Golden Sacrifice of the Mahabharata

by Maggi Lidchi Grassi

“He loved two people in his life. You and Ashwatthama. That is where his heart is if there is any left. You are a child, Arjuna.”

  “I am his child. That is why I cannot do this to him. It is monstrous.”

  “It is also the only way to snatch his heart back from the dark force. He is its plaything.”

  I remembered when we were in exile that the wise men had foreseen that Dronacharya would be seized by demons. Still I could not speak. “Can you not tell a lie to save the world?” The world depended on a human heart? Mine was not free enough. I knew that if I faced my guru with a·lie he would see it in my eyes and hear it in my voice. I told Krishna my thought. He understood the silent question.

  “I cannot, he calls me the king of lies; it will have no meaning if I do it.” Eldest was no match for Ashwatthama. It would make no sense to say that he had killed him. Bheema was the one who might have.

  Like a child, Bheema stared round-eyed at us. He could kill Dronacharya more happily than lie to him. There seemed to be no way to do it until it was decided that Bheema slaughter a splendid elephant I had named Ashwatthama for the way it took little jumps when it walked. Bheema had hardly killed the elephant when we heard the sound of whining once again. It was the sound that I heard in my inner ear the day my acharya gave me the astra.

  Now there came a sudden hush, a silence, as though the world had lost consciousness, never to wake again. It was worse than total blackness; nothing existed anymore. There was a heaviness that stopped the blood and stayed the heart. I looked at Gandiva with complete indifference. My thoughts slid in like snails and left a slimy confusion. My feet felt heavy; the bottom of the earth was calling and would suck us in and rush us down headlong. We felt an inner quickening as though a monster had stirred. The beat became insistent. Nothing but death would satisfy it. Destruction was upon us. I understood the Brahmastra. It betrayed the will and heart. Its message was that nothing mattered. No one can explain the Brahmastra. There are things you have to live if you will know their meaning. It had no knowledge of beginnings. There were no seeds in it but only dissolution and the end of hope.

  Krishna shook me. “It is the earth’s destruction.” The veins around his temples pushed against his skin. I saw him look like that only once again when Abhimanyu’s son lay lifeless.

  “If the All-Creator does not fight to save his world, why should I?”

  Krishna struck my face and said: “It is not yours to throw away. You have the astra to protect the world. Get up and fight, Arjuna.” Something circled overhead. It was the shapeless monster dwindling. The gift of fear returned to me.

  “You have the power, Krishna. Only you.”

  “You are Nara.” With the sounding of this appellation, something stirred in me. Without my thought, the astra left me.

  The astras were two shadows that took shape. Like wrestlers, they circled and came closer. Then they locked. I waited for explosions but the shadows vanished. Conches blew alarm and everybody ran. But where could one go? A rain of fire-sparks fell everywhere. Earth sighed beneath our feet. The world was saved, we thought.

  But Dronacharya had not finished. By mid-morning, the demon of destruction loosed more astras which I answered. After that my power waned. I said to Krishna that we could not last till midday.

  “We have not come to perish.” His words struck me again. He was the seed of life itself. There was a power in this declaration which repelled death.

  There were no astras for a while. Under truce, we called our guru to no man’s land. He came alone to seal his destiny, saying his charioteer was like Arjuna and liked to sleep.

  Bheema and Eldest made their way to him with dragging steps. We lagged behind, afraid that Bheema could not play the part. In the event, once he had rattled off his words, some spirit of invention took him and while Dronacharya peered at him, his eyelids creased in pain, Bheema danced before him, chanting: “I killed Ashwatthama. I killed Ashwatthama.”

  I was poised to reach for my quiver, but Krishna war right. We had killed our guru with the lie. Eldest called out to Bheema that we had not come to gloat but to ask forgiveness. It could not have been more convincing had we been a troupe of mimes.

  Suddenly, our guru’s fury flared, scorching his grief. “Bheema always was an oaf,” and he looked at Eldest, saying, “Krishna is the king of lies.” By now there was deep silence amongst us. The dead were waiting to be moved. Birds of prey circled in the sky and their cries of hunger called for our attention. “But even he cannot make you lie to me about this.” Krishna looked impassively at Eldest. They grappled for his soul. Which Dharma would he choose? Dronacharya’s gaze swept through us and stopped at me. His eyes had come to life again. They were a hawk’s intent on finding us. “Arjuna, I shall not ask you. Between us, there was only Truth.” That was his parting gift to me. Tears saved me from betraying Krishna. Dronacharya’s eyes went back to Eldest. “My life rests in your hands, Yudhishthira. I will not move from here if Bheema has killed Ashwatthama.” A pause was shot into the silence like an astra showering silence. I marvel still when I remember Eldest’s voice, subdued and shamed into a murmur.

  “He did, Acharya. Ashwatthama is dead.” What Krishna told him was the truth for Eldest. That was his only Dharma now.

  “We seek forgiveness of our guru,” and he knelt and took the dust from Dronacharya’s feet. There was such an open dignity about him that not only did our acharya believe him, but I was confused too. Was he really dead then?

  Dronacharya put his bow down carefully and touched it lightly once. He did pradakshina to it and coming close he offered me his back; I unslung his quiver. He closed his eyes and turned his palms to heaven. We watched in silence. Sanjaya saw the gods speak to him. Then a sudden fury shook him but they told him to surrender, that he was using astras in a way they did not sanction. They told him he had lived his term of life.

  What I saw was my guru about to leave the mind and body which had taught me everything. We watched as he embraced the russet horses. He set out kusha grass, arranged himself on it, and sat in meditation. I went and touched the dust before his feet and put it to my eyes. He opened his and touched my head. “I die a Brahmin’s death though it was not foretold.” These last words were for me.

  Satyaki, the twins, and Bheema did obeisance. I saw that he was far away already. Some guardian spirit must have waited many years to take him back when he was ready. Then Dhrishtadyumna bent before him. He put his hand out softly as a cat puts out a paw, then grabbed our guru’s topknot at the same time as his sword flew up. I yelled: “No! Take him prisoner!” But my body lent weight to Dhrishtadyumna’s sword arm and Dronacharya’s head tumbled face down onto my feet. I stared at it, while Dhrishtadyumna picked it up and swung it to and fro for everyone to see. He looked into my face as Bheema shouted. “Sadhu, take your cursed astras with you.”

  “We shall honour all our oaths like this,” cried Dhrishtadyumna. “Arjuna shall kill Karna, Bheema shall kill Duryodhana as I have killed this Brahmin.” He tossed the head away. I felt the sudden blow of life cut off, my body had been parry to it. I felt a violence and a chaos, and sensed Dronacharya’s spirit returning in anger. In me the anger turned to anguish. I took the head between my hands and spoke to my acharya until I felt his spirit stilled.

  I straightened Dronacharya’s body on the kusha grass and placed the head, still warm, above the neck and bound them with my angavastra. I drew another silken cloth over his face. There is no way to cleanse the site where you have killed your guru, yet I took clean earth and covered the blood-soaked ground. I looked for water in my chariot and chanting holy names I sprinkled it on the fresh earth and on Dronacharya too. My guru was silent now, but the world under my feet was angry and pressed against them. The russet horses shifted uneasily, arching their necks, the little discs and bells chinking and chiming around them. I knew the ground would cry out its outrage for centuries to come to those who walked here. And suddenly I thought: Ashwatthama, Ashwatthama, my friend! Forgive
us.

  “Ashwatthama! The astras.”

  When they found Dronacharya, the Kauravas fled, not knowing who their leader was. The Kaurava strength was broken but rejoicing was beyond me. This was butchery, not battle.

  I tried to see my guru’s face as it had been. But what I saw was Dhrishtadyumna’s jewelled and powerful hand clutching his topknot, clutching the hair of the small face intent on reaching heaven. Had the Brahmin in him surfaced? Had he departed chanting hymns? Had Yama smiled at him when he pulled the noose?

  He now knew things which no disciple asked about. How many, many questions he had answered! He had never refused. But the way that Yama found for him, I too would someday have to find alone to follow him.

  There everyone who is born follows.

  Each on his own path.

  I said the hymn for him.

  To this pasture that shall not be taken from us.

  Assume again a body bright with glory.

  Krishna and Sahadeva were attending to a wounded horse.

  The rest of us were sitting or lying, stunned by Dronacharya’s death and on the edge of madness from the effect of the astras and a lack of sleep. We waited in the royal tent for the Kauravas to name a leader. Dhrishtadyumna’s eyes sought mine but I avoided them: he was Draupadi’s brother and in a war the generals cannot fall out. So I swallowed my anger twice, but when I could no more I hurled the anger that I felt for him like a mace at Eldest.

  “You lied.” Even as I uttered the words, they returned to me; he had suffered more than I had. Yet having begun, I could not stop myself, and Krishna was not there to stop me. “Eldest, could you not see that Dronacharya asked his question of you, the soul of Truth, because he knew you would not lie to him?” I felt a surge of blood invade my head. “It is not Dhrishtadyumna who killed him, it is you who killed him. You robbed him of his weapons. Dronacharya loved us with a father’s love. We murdered him. This is not an act of Dharmaraj. This monstrous lie destroys all that we fight for. And it is you we fight for, to put you on the throne because you are our Dharma.” I wonder that Bheema let me get this far. I saw his face cloud from the moment I began. He was before me in two strides and thrust his face towards mine. His eyes were red.

  “How dare you speak to Eldest thus?” he growled. “How dare you?” I thought he would hit me. “You talk like a false sage. We are Kshatriyas. What is the matter with you? Are you some crazy Brahmin or a Kshatriya? A Kshatriya has duties and this is war. Our swords are made for cutting necks, not firewood. Must I teach you this? Your words are nauseating, Arjuna. You preach Dharma to us. You must be drunk or grief has made you mad. And to think I let you stop me when I tried to kill Duhshasana at the dice game. I too was mad.” He hit his forehead with his fist. “Mad, mad, mad,” he said between his teeth and stamped round in circles to come back to me again. He shook his fist in my face and ground his knuckles into my forehead. “You are the cause of the war. If I had killed him then and there it would have stopped before they could torment us. It is because Eldest is the soul of Dharma that he wore deerskin for twelve years in the forest. And why?” He was yelling now, his mouth wide open as when he tore through battle shouting his name. “I will tell you why,” he hissed into my face, “because people like Shakuni cheated him of his kingdom. Perhaps in all your new-found humility you will say that it was a noble thing to do. After your insane accusation you cannot say anything that will surprise me. Eldest performed the rajasuya and all the kings of the world did obeisance to him. But on the whim of that other madman, our cousin Duryodhana, he had to spend a year as a courtier—courtier, mind you!—to Virata, waiting for tidbits from me, the cook. If he never uttered a word of complaint, what are you whining about now? Even when Virata threw dice into his face he said nothing. There never was such a dharmic and long-suffering man. When the whole world calls him Dharmaraj, why do you, who knows his virtue, turn on him like a mad dog?” Eldest rose to draw him back. “No, Eldest, let me speak, I have been silent long enough.”

  My anger was not spent. Words burst out of me. “When Eldest speaks of virtue, he is Dharmaraj and the soul of virtue. When I speak of Dharma and Adharma I am a false sage. All right, let it pass. But while you carry on like this no one seems to realize what forces we have unleashed.” I felt the silence shifting to consider this.

  “Has Sahadeva prepared your horoscope?” sneered Bheema.

  “Ashwatthama has the Narayanastra, all our armies could be burnt up like a bale of cotton. Ashwatthama and Kripacharya have always spoken up for us. In the normal course of war our guru’s son would never use this against us. I know Ashwatthama. He has a Brahmin’s hold upon himself. But now…what would you do? What would you do, Bheema, if someone cut the head of Eldest while he meditated and threw it to the ground, the head that held loving thoughts for you and all its human plans?” He stared at me in angry disbelief. There is no mantra to recall some words.

  He came to me again and thrust his face so close to mine I felt the rage in his hot breath. “Are we women, Arjuna? Have we to sit and shiver in our tents in case Ashwatthama knows mantras?” He threw his arms out and thrust his chest forward, “Let him send his astras, let him send his Narayanastra or Paranarayanastra. Here we are.” He turned his head and spat: “Be careful, Arjuna. You are insulting all of us and my dearest friend. He is the brother of Draupadi who suffered everything with us. You teach us loyalty? And where is yours, with us or with our enemies? Do you remember the dice game? The reason that I did not kill Duryodhana, Duhshasana, and Shakuni was that you said to me, you hissed it in my ear, that it would drive a wedge between us. How they would love it if they heard you now. How they would rub their hands and lick their lips. Your memory is destroyed, your mind is addled. Eldest does not simply live by Dharma. He is Dharma. He is the most compassionate king on earth. When Duryodhana, our gem of a cousin, came to mock us in the Dvaitavana forest, who was it that sent us to rescue him from the Gandharvas? Who has earned himself the name of Ajatashatru, ‘he without enemy?’ I cannot understand you. We thought you were the noblest and the most intelligent of us. Everybody did. Everybody loves the curly-haired Arjuna. He is everybody’s hero and everybody’s darling.” Bheema threw his arms out. “But on this battlefield…” he pounded one fist into the other, “your nobility stinks. You have turned into a madman. You have lost your Kshatriyahood. Are you not just pretending to fight?” He saw my eyes and stopped me with his palm. His voice changed, “You know what Karna said to me when I challenged him yesterday? He said I was a glutton and an idiot and everybody heard him. He said I ate too much and that my place was in the kitchen!” Bheema’s veins stood out like drawn bowstrings on his neck and temples, his face and eyes were full of blood. “Arjuna, I tell you one thing, when this war is over, no one is going to be left who can remind me that I wore a cook’s apron and that Eldest had to keep awake all night to play dice in the kingdom of another king. Nobody is going to tell the twins that they belong inside a stable. You know the jokes they make at your expense. I hate your inconstancy and I spit on it!”

  Seeing me alone, Satyaki came to my side to take the brunt with me. “We used to think that Eldest was too mild. Inside he is of steel. He said that after thirteen years he would avenge us and he has never wavered.” Shrutakirti was looking at his feet. I felt Draupadi’s sons and Shikhandin pulling away. Satyaki sat closer to me.

  His presence drove Bheema wild. He started shouting and throwing his arms about. “You promised to avenge the insults. What promises did you not make to Draupadi? You love only your enemies: the men who murdered Abhimanyu. We have lost Ghatotkacha. I tell you, there is one thing that kept me sane all those years in exile when I scaled stones over the lake, each one a part of my hatred that killed an enemy. It was the certainty of wiping out the insult to Draupadi. When we were refugeseekers her father made us kings again. Her brother commands our armies for us. Apologize to Dhrishtadyumna. Take the dust from his feet. I put my foot on your humility.”

  Sat
yaki pressed my arm down, and I realized that my hand had jerked. “And as for fear of Ashwatthama, well, I have no fear. Let them sit and tremble who wish to. I shall go out and fight his astras.” Dhrishtadyumna came towards us and put an arm around Bheema. I faced them both now.

  “Arjuna,” he said, “I have had to remind myself that you are Draupadi’s husband. I have also had to make an effort to remember your love for Dronacharya. But some things stand outside of love. Be dispassionate. You praise your guru. He was a Brahmin. Assisting at and performing sacrifices—those are a Brahmin’s duties. A Brahmin must be a teacher, a teacher of the Vedas, a teacher of spiritual knowledge. He must himself continuously study. He may give gifts and accept them. But he may not conquer kingdoms. A king does not do what Dronacharya did when he took half my father’s kingdom. It is the Dharma of a king to accept tribute once he conquers, not claim the territory as his own.” He roared. “This Brahmin humiliated my father, his childhood friend. This Drona was a vengeful man. He spent his life dreaming of vengeance. Do you think the love he lavished on you was not part of it? He trained you as a man trains leopards or elephants to kill his enemies. It is not only because he was my father’s foe I speak like this. Neither is it because of what he allowed to happen at the dice game to the sister who shared a womb with me. It is not because he fought on the side of the Kauravas. Greatfather did all these things. But he believed in Dharma. He lived his Dharma like Yudhishthira. As long as men have memories his life will speak to them. Your guru did not live his Dharma. He taught, but not the Vedas. His sacrifice was Abhimanyu, not offered to the gods but offered to Duryodhana, on the altar of his demonic pride. The essence of the man was pride and cruelty. He did not hate Abhimanyu. A few sharp words from Duryodhana, that weak and wilful man, could make him kill your son, could make him force his men to fight all night. They ran to us in thousands. Did you not hear deserters say, “Our leader is an elephant gone berserk. He does not know the meaning of compassion.” Greatfather would not have fought like this. I killed this man to save so many more.”