Halfway into The Mahabharata we come to the part that often stands alone, The Bhagavad Gita. This represents a sea change for the epic. Up till now, the work has been mostly narrative with moral and spiritual matters occasionally interpolated. Now we have Krishna explaining duty to the unexpectedly quailing Arjuna. Krishna has always been understood as a god, but in human aspect. In this section he reveals himself in his terrifying god aspect. The imagery seems fit for Revelation—i. e. crazy ass—and the vision of Krishna in full godhead doesn’t exactly calm Arjuna. Eventually Arjuna comes around.
Earlier the Pandava brothers finished out their exile by hiring themselves incognito to one of the million kings in the area. Arjuna, greatest warrior in the world, chooses to be a eunuch dancing master in the ladies quarters. Bhima huge and Hulk-like becomes the king’s cook. He also teaches wrestling. At one point the brothers come upon their enemies the Kauravas. Bhima immediately wants to find a tree he can tear from the ground to wield as a weapon. “Bhima smash,” you can imagine him saying. Wise Yudhisthira convinces him of more diplomatic measures.
The account of the battle itself lacks the precision of the Iliad. Millions seem gathered on the field of Kurukshetra. In the Iliad Homer tallies the number of ships each Greek brought to Troy, supplying thereby a plausible guess at the size of the battle. The Pandavas and Kauravas each gathered allies to help supply requisite cannon fodder. It was quite the gathering.
When I first read the Gita, I was taken aback that Krishna scolded Arjuna for not wanting to kill these his cousins. Being of the warrior class, he has a duty to fight. That duty tangled with such pointless devastation doesn’t reconcile easily for me. The terms within the epic keep death fluid. The five Pandava brothers were earlier killed by Vishnu, I think. It was just a lesson, they were returned to life. All is foretold anyway.
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