​Tragic Hero – Life Lessons from Karna – Princeton University

Talk at Princeton University with H G Govinda Pr, Co-Temple President, ISKCON Chowpatty

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
good evening everyone welcome thank you so much for being here my name is Vinish Chander and I have the honor and the privilege and the pleasure to direct the program at Princeton University now entering its ninth year believe it or not so I see some familiar faces who have been with us from the very beginning and time certainly does fly but we are in our ninth year of the Hindu life program here at Princeton and this evening’s event is a very special one and I am going to keep my introductory remarks as brief as I can I could of course give very long introductions these are very esteemed guest speakers but I want to save as much time as possible for them to enlighten us and provoke thought with their wisdom and their teachings a few housekeeping items many of you have already discovered but there are restrooms nearby so if you just go down the hall I believe we might still have some tea and snacks left over so please don’t be shy about that if there are you can always avail yourself of those there is a sign in sheet that I believe is going around can someone raise your hand yeah so please do make sure that you sign in even if you already receive emails from the Hindu life program it helps us to get a better sense of who’s here and how we can better serve you so it is really important so please do sign in also many of you know I did not major in linguistics as a student I am not a Sanskritist please don’t make me decipher your email address by putting it in like Sanskrit or hieroglyphics or pictograms or something please write the email address legibly so that we are sending emails to the right address and we are keeping in touch with you as we love to do final quick housekeeping note before I introduce our esteemed speakers at the back of the room there are some flyers and for those of you who are either undergrad students or graduate students here at Princeton I apologize to everyone else I don’t mean to exclude but there are two programs there are two weekly study groups that are just for students here and they are a Bhagavad Gita study group which meets on Wednesdays and there is a card in the back about that and then there is a Vedanta study group which meets on Sunday evenings and which is for students and recent grads and there is a beautiful flyer like so in the back as well so please grab those your students on your way out and please do check out those study groups without further ado this evening we are honored to have with us two very special guest speakers both from Mumbai India Govinda Das has studied under the renowned bhakti yoga teacher His Holiness Raghunath Swami Maharaj for more than three decades marking him as one of the Swami’s senior most and well respected disciples Govinda accepted the vows of a monk in Hinduism’s Vaishnava tradition in 1987 and since that time has helped to lead the Radha Gopinath Ashram in Chowpatty Mumbai India under Govinda’s capable and people centered leadership that project has grown tremendously from a small one room temple into a bustling community with thousands of members schools, charitable hospitals and medical camps and eco-villages a sought after speaker, Govinda conducts leadership seminars, community development workshops and values education seminars especially for Hindu youth and young adults He has written a number of books conveying the ongoing relevance of Hinduism’s sacred teachings to the contemporary issues facing us all.
Most relevant to our topic tonight, his latest book is called Karna on Trial Chaitanya Charan is also a monk, a teacher a blogger and the author of more than 15 books After earning his undergraduate degree in electronics and telecommunications and after working as a software engineer in a prominent multinational software corporation and after exploring the possibility of graduate study and side note, he secured a 2350 out of 2400 on his GRE exams gaining him the top rank in all of Maharashtra India But after all of this, Chaitanya Charan felt inspired to dedicate his life to the cause of sharing spiritual wisdom as is found in the Bhagavad Gita particularly among students and young adults He is the author of the world’s only Gita daily feature GitaDaily.com where he offers a 300 word inspirational reflection on a verse from the Bhagavad Gita every day. His articles have been published in many national newspapers including Indian Express the Economic Times and the Times of India Please, let us share our appreciation for and give a very warm Princeton welcome to Govinda Das and Chaitanya Charan Just when you thought you were done with me Govinda has requested that I give a little background of the subject of the context I know we have quite a diverse audience some of you may be familiar if I might put you on the spot just by a show of hands how many of you are familiar with the Mahabharata as a text? I’m not going to ask how many of you have read it cover to cover because it is the world’s longest epic but we have a good number of folks who are familiar with the text So this evening what we’re exploring is perhaps one of the most fascinating if not problematic characters in the Mahabharata battle or in the Mahabharata story and this is the character of Karna and what we hope to do this evening is explore how this character of Karna who in some ways is often considered the tragic hero of the Mahabharata some people say the unsung hero but I think as we’ll see a tragic hero is probably a more apt term the tragic hero of the Mahabharata a character that so many of us almost instinctively relate to sympathize with he’s a character that practically as we’ll hear some episodes from his life practically from the beginning of his life was dealt a very bad hand of cards so to speak practically from his birth he was in some ways really the recipient of misfortune and as such throughout the Mahabharata this is something that Karna himself is keenly aware of and often laments in the text and it’s something that we as readers often sympathize with we may feel like we’ve also been dealt this bad hand of cards this bad deal and so we sympathize with Karna and we say even up till the end Karna’s really this figure that could have really been the hero of the whole Mahabharata and instead spoiler alert ends up dying a very sad tragic death on the battlefield and this exploration has often led people to really question the Mahabharata as a text as a whole so we’re going to invite Govinda Prabhu Govinda Das and Chaitanya Charan Das to explore the lessons that we can pull out because it’s so natural to identify with Karna that how can we use this identification, how can we use this natural sympathy we have for this character to learn about lessons that we can apply in our own life and if Karna is indeed a tragic hero, then I would like to begin our exploration by asking this question what makes him a tragic hero? What is the cause of his tragedy? Or more appropriately perhaps, who is the cause of Karna’s tragedy? So with that I’d love to turn it over to Govinda and Chaitanya Charan I welcome all of you Am I audible to everyone behind? I thank Vinit for arranging this program inviting us and I thank all of you also for participating today even and Karna was the character that I personally connected with the most when I first saw the Mahabharata I heard Mahabharata stories from my parents, from my grandparents then I saw the Mahabharata depicted on TV and during that time Karna was born as a hero in a royal family but he was not recognized as such because of his mother giving him birth before her marriage so she entrusted him to destiny’s will and he was raised by a family which was known as a charioteer’s family so in pre-modern societies people were often defined to a large extent by their births so although Karna was a Kshatriya as the technical word is in the Vedic context he was a warrior, he was born in a warrior family but he was always called as a charioteer’s son and that label hurt him a lot so he was called as a Suta or a Sutaputra Suta is a charioteer, Sutaputra is the son of a charioteer so the reason I connected with him was that all of us, we have problems, we have limitations which we have to face in our life but there are some problems which we can do something about there are some problems which we seem to be helpless in dealing with so for Karna he was always labelled as a Sutaputra and I connected with him because soon after I was born I got polio, I had a physical handicap so some of the students in my school used to tease me as a cripple so now at that time the label hurt because I was helpless about it and so I could sympathize with Karna because he was helpless about the birth that he had got and at that time one is in a very emotionally vulnerable situation because we want the world to accept us as we are rather than expecting us to change something which is not in our power to change and when we don’t get that acceptance as we are most of the time and suddenly we find someone who accepts us we get so overwhelmed by that acceptance that we become blind to the faults of that person if that person has any faults and unfortunately this is what happened to Karna Karna became a great archer and he when his Arjuna who is the person to whom the Bhagavad Gita was spoken so Arjuna and the other students of the greatest martial teacher of that time, Drona, they were all exhibiting their skills and when they were exhibiting their skills Arjuna excelled everyone else in archery and then Karna came over there and he said I will equal all that Arjuna has done and he asked do you have the permission to exhibit my skills now at one level this act was like an act of gate crashing now suppose say there is some say Princeton has a say a department for acting and there are graduates of Princeton University are in a convocation ceremony exhibiting their acting skills and then somebody who is not a Princeton graduate he comes and says I will excel your best student well I will equal or excel your best student well there are forums for that but at the convocation ceremony in Princeton that is not the forum for that so Karna just came in over there because he had that he had that need that craving to be recognized and this was the academy where the best warriors were being trained so when he gate crashed like this the organizers graciously allowed him to exhibit his skills and he equaled Arjuna in every way and then when everybody was astonished he felt that this could be an opportunity to further prove his mettle and so he said I would like to challenge Arjuna for a duel now this itself was taking things a bit too far because as I said he was an outsider over there but then at that time his antecedents were naturally asked who are you? where do you come from? naturally anybody comes in you would see their skills but you also know where you got trained from so then he said a duel can only be among equals so at that time he was asked he ok who are your parents? because one way to know a person’s antecedents is by their lineage so at that time his head drooped down and when it was obvious that he did not have a royal lineage so at that time the Mahabharata is actually a conflict between two sets of cousins the Pandavas among whom Arjuna is the foremost archer and Kauravas who are headed by Duryodhana now Duryodhana was a very insecure person himself and the little back story I’ll have to give the Pandavas had gone away actually when their father had retired and then the Pandavas had been born in the forest so in the meanwhile Duryodhana was born in the palace and he was groomed to be the heir and that’s why he had a sense of entitlement I am going to be the heir and when the Pandavas came back because their father died in an unfortunate accident then now there was some sort of uncertainty who would become the next heir because the Pandavas, the eldest among them Yudhishthira was older than Duryodhana in age and whereas Duryodhana was brash and arrogant Yudhishthira was courteous and gentle and he soon won the hearts of everyone so Duryodhana had that insecurity that I am always being threatened by the Pandavas the Pandavas never pursued him as a competitor, they were ready to live in peace but he wanted to have his superiority established and he saw that, he felt that I am good enough among the Pandavas Yudhishthira was virtuous but he was not a very formidable warrior among the Pandavas the two main warriors were Bhima and Arjuna Bhima was a great mace fighter and Duryodhana felt that I can deal with him but as far as Arjuna was concerned he did not have any match and when he saw Karna he felt this is my opportunity Karna will be my foil for Arjuna and he immediately grabbed that opportunity and he gave a speech that actually seemed very egalitarian but it was very calculated politically calculated he said just look at the caliber of Karna how can he have not be having a royal lineage and if you consider the lineage is what is important then I will make him a king right now and I will bestow him a kingdom and right there in front of everyone he made Karna the king of an empire of a kingdom named Angam now for Karna when he was at, this was a moment of turbulent emotions for Karna because he had just proved his equality to the greatest archer this could have been a moment of great glory but then immediately he has been disqualified because of his lineage and then he had come hoping to get some recognition as a great warrior and suddenly he was enthroned as a king, he was overwhelmed he was overwhelmed he was extremely grateful and Duryodhana was a good politician politics is all about making connections so he when he was offered the crown at that time he became overwhelmed with tears in his eyes he said Duryodhana you saved my honour, you have given me such great honour, how can I repay you so Duryodhana also knew how to pull at the strings of people’s hearts he said I don’t want anything except your friendship what he wanted was his archery skills to counter Arjuna but when he said that I don’t want anything except your friendship, Karna was overwhelmed and they embraced each other and from this point onwards Karna in a sense gave up his life for Duryodhana and as later events would reveal Duryodhana had quite a strong malicious streak within him which grew further and further these cousins were just children barely at the age of 10 he had organised a whole conspiracy to have his cousin Bhima poisoned somehow Bhima had survived so at that emotionally vulnerable position when Duryodhana offered him the help Karna, whatever virtue he had, whatever intelligence he had, all that got eclipsed by a overwhelming sense of gratitude to Duryodhana now there are two points here which I’ll conclude and then I’ll hand over the dialogues to go into that first is when Duryodhana gave the kingdom to Karna, it was not his kingdom to give because he was not the king he was just a prince and he was not even the heir apparent he had not been enthroned to become the next king so he did not have the authority to give a kingdom at all, but when he did it presumptuously, the Pandavas also went along with it because they saw it as a matter of the family’s honour like one member, if our family promises something, we cannot rescind the promise we cannot challenge the promise so the Pandavas, although at one level Duryodhana was very generous in giving Karna the kingdom but at another level it is like if I come and tell you that I give this hall in charity to you it doesn’t belong to me, who am I to give it so Duryodhana was in one sense like that, he did not have any claim on the kingdom, he did that and the Pandavas went along with that, so it was not that Duryodhana was especially charitable because it was not his charity to give and secondly, at this point he felt vindicated in his rivalry towards Arjuna he had a natural rivalry with Arjuna because both of them were great archers but that rivalry became reinforced with a sense of enmity rivalry is you can have two tennis players who are rivals but they can be friends afterwards it’s not that they are conspiring to kill each other off the field to win the match so where it was a rivalry, because of the enmity between Duryodhana and the Pandavas and Karna totally siding with Duryodhana from this point, they became enemies and that enmity led him to do atrocious things in future it was going through this Thank you Chaitanya sir so before we get into Karna basically Mahabharata is considered as, Mahabharata is synonymous to life it talks about life it’s a collection of events so many events happen in our lives, it’s a collection of events and every event is connected to people, characters right no events happen without people around us things around us so therefore there are hundreds of characters in Mahabharata and Karna happens to be one such character one of the subject I was discussing with Vinit was, you know people sympathize with Karna but do they identify sympathizing with Karna and identifying that I want to be like him is different because identification involves success and failure sympathizing is that you see from, you know I feel for him, but do I want to be like him unfortunately Karna with all skills unlimited qualifications good values good characters also he experienced repeated failure in his life, I remember in India there is a huge emotional connect to Karna, if there is an election between Parth, Arjun and Karna, you know like hypothetical election if you have Arjuna will lose his deposit also actually you know because I do lot of seminars on Mahabharata when I wrote this book on Karna on trial one very religious person he came to me he said come on you know this is unfair as if he is Karna he felt very bad that I am talking about certain events of Karna’s life, so therefore Karna represents certain character, certain concepts, he is a personality but he also represents certain inner concepts, again Mahabharata talks about Mahabharata says now people always discuss who is right and who is wrong sometime people define Dharma is synonymous to right or good and sometime people define Adharma synonymous to bad and evil but actually Dharma is not synonymous to good, Adharma is not synonymous to bad good is one aspect of Dharma but it is not complete in itself, for example you know we share this stories to ideally lot of children in schools in India you go to villages, you know one of the greatest evil for people to grow is because men’s addiction to repeated drinking to the extent where they beat up their children they take away the wealth of their wives, their ornaments because they are addicted and because of that there is no prosperity, they don’t grow so their two brothers twins, they were raised in such surrounding they grew up very nicely, they grew up not very nicely they grew up and eventually one became very good very good means he became educated he got a very good job, he became very responsible and other continued the legacy of his father so somebody asked them how is that you know you are so nice and the young boy who had grown up he said what do you expect after having such a father, the emotions, the statement you know you can feel that this emotion was what do you expect after having such a father that was the statement and this man went and asked another son, brother of his he said why are you like this you are drinking, spoiling your life, he made the same statement with same emotions he said what do you expect after having such a father therefore events in our life do not change the statements do not change, even the feelings don’t change what changes is how do we translate our statement, our emotions and our event and that is what differentiates Karna from other characters in the Mahabharata its very interesting therefore Dharma is not about whether it is good or bad if you now analyze the young man who became prosperous was it good that his father was drunkard if you ask the other guys was it good that his father was a drunkard or a bad that his father was a drunkard therefore good and bad is extremely relative and therefore when people debate discuss, argue have a great conflict and if you just google about Karna you will find how people abuse each other even though Karna has gone back you know has a great friendship with Arjuna in the heavenly world that’s what the Mahabharata explains but we will keep fighting about his life and therefore sympathy is like a drug sympathy does not allow us to grow and specially when you sympathize with somebody and give them some lullabies, some toffee some things then what happens they become addicted to that and unfortunately Karna was used by many people to get their things done that is what Chaitanya Charan was mentioning very nicely it was not that Duryodhana of course Duryodhana was a politician what role, what game, what cards he played was naturally right card for a politician to play after all a politician thinks about his own growth and whoever supports him to grow he will naturally make him his ally right he did that but Karna failed to recognize this aspect that I should not look for sympathy I should look for opportunity I should not look for charity but I should look for a facility within that difficult situation also if you take for that matter Krishna was also born in a very difficult and challenging situation he was born in the prison house and immediately after his birth was adapted by somebody else adaption is it good or bad again therefore dharma is very subtle therefore unless we understand the concept of dharma this whole concept of good and bad, good and bad, good and bad is very challenging I will conclude with another example then I will ask him to speak you know I tell this story to kids like in India if you come to the train stations I am from Bombay I remember one New Yorker came to Bombay and we asked him do you want to travel in a local train oh I am a New Yorker it’s ok it’s easy for me he didn’t realize what Bombay train means so when he got into Bombay local train rush hours he said oh this is not like New York this is unique specialty of Bombay right he could understand it is not New York it’s Bombay traffic so difficult so there are lot of trains moving around and we always tell this story there is a motorman is driving and suddenly he sees that seven children are playing on one track where the train is supposed to go it’s a junction and there is another track where he can go there is no problem and only two kids are playing so going on a train going on a track where seven kids are playing it’s a legitimate legal proper track where everyday you fly so now the question for a motorman is where should he drive if he drives over truth because driving on a regular track is like you are following the rules and regulation but rules and regulation will kill seven children and if you drive over compassion track you know choice between killing seven children or killing two children which one should he choose the immediate answer children give I will put on break on the train they create a third option which does not exist in life sometime the third option does not exist but that exists in our mind it’s a myth right because if you put a break then you have to tell you can’t put a break because if you put a break then you kill more people not two not seven three hundred people right so when you say okay they will say most of the time they will say you know if they are not idealistic no they will say no I will drive over a track where only two kids are playing so that I can save seven children but the logic does not stop there what if those seven children unfortunately become terrorist therefore what is good and bad is very relative therefore dharma is extremely sensitive, extremely fluid therefore Chanakya very interestingly he says when you rise in the morning he says you should read Mahabharat he doesn’t say Mahabharat he says Pratadhyutaprasangan early morning one should hear about gambling because Mahabharat is all about gambling gambling is one event but actually what is Mahabharat Mahabharat is all about making choices you only have the power you only have the you know what control you have is to make choice and if you can make choices based upon dharma then there is some chances that those choices will lead to create a legacy of dharma and that is what Karna in one sense for whatever reason he was not able to access to the principle of dharma rather he got stuck into right and wrong victim and sympathy thank you so I will talk about the choices that were made especially during the gambling match just before that a bit back flash that Karna he was born in unprivileged background a charioteer’s son but actually life is never fair whoever it may be life always gives a rod to someone or the other even the Pandavas although they were born in a royal family their father passed away when they were young and just with their mother at that time they were thrust into a situation where they had a malicious cousin who wanted to kill them who tried to poison them who tried to burn them alive and even after that they had a guardian uncle who was attached so attached to his son that he was blind to the difficulties that his nephews were going through so everybody gets a rod in what we do with what life offers us that is what is important I will contrast in the incident of Draupadi’s robing about the choices that Karna made and the choices that Draupadi made so the Pandavas became the emperors of the world after performing the Rajasuya Yajna and then after that Duryodhana was very envious on seeing their prosperity and he decided that they are too powerful for me to defeat militarily so let me defeat them by gambling and he had them come for a gambling match now Yudhishthir is a conflicted character on one side he knows the dangers of gambling at the same time he is attracted to gambling so the part of him says no I don’t want to gamble, why should we gamble but when he is invited he accepts that he sees that as a instruction from his father figure his uncle who treats him as father and then as the gambling match goes on now it’s actually a rigged match why? because gambling match has to be between two people who are playing so it has to be between Duryodhana and Yudhishthir but Duryodhana he arranges for Shakuni to play now it’s like suppose there is a wrestling match between two amateur wrestlers and that’s how it is invited you bill everyone it’s billed as a match between these two amateur wrestlers and one of the amateur wrestlers right at the time of the match when everybody is assembled he gets a professional wrestler vote fight with him and if this other wrestler says this is not fair then this person says if you are afraid you need not fight now it becomes very difficult for this amateur it’s unfair but if he insists on it being unfair he is now being labelled as a coward so that was the card which Duryodhana played when Yudhishthir protested he cannot be playing on your behalf Shakuni can’t be playing if you are afraid you needn’t play so Yudhishthir he felt his Kshatriya honour impunged by this and he started playing and as he started playing one by one by one he started losing things and eventually he was desperately hoping that at least one thing I will win and then I will be able to redeem this disaster he could see what the disaster was happening and when nothing was there he started he gambled his own brothers and eventually he gambled himself and then when nothing was left he gambled his wife Draupadi now here also it’s significant that some people say that how could a husband have gambled his wife it’s true, how could he have but at the same time we see that he gambled her after he had gambled himself after he had gambled all his property in that sense he did not treat her like any other property not like his horses, his chariot, his jewels his weapons, no after he had lost himself that means she was more dear to him than himself but then when he gambled her and he lost her also and then Draupadi she was just in her inner chambers and she had just been celebrating in a sense because she was the queen of the first king who was the emperor of the world and she had some idea that something might go wrong but the extent of the catastrophe that came was completely inconceivable and she was told that she is being summoned into the royal assembly by the by the because she has been lost and now she has to be like a slave for the Kauravas she said how could he even how did Yudhishthir gamble me did he have nothing else to gamble no he lost everything now Draupadi exhibits great intelligence over him and she catches on she says if Yudhishthir had gambled and lost himself then how could he have gambled me if he was not his own master how was he my master to gamble and this is actually technicality but when you are thinking you hold on to straw so that’s what she does over here and then she sends the messenger back and the messenger is sent back by Duryodhana saying tell her to come and ask herself he said that you know I am in a state of unrest right now I cannot come then he says Dushyasana Duryodhana’s brother and he drags her he says you are our slave and whatever condition you are in you should come to us he drags her by the hair very insulting and then she again repeats her question and unfortunately all the elders over there they get caught in the technicality yes they are unable to answer the question yes sometimes what happens people get caught in the details and they forget the essential principle the principle of the law is to protect so now here a woman is being dishonored in public and unfortunately nobody stops and curiously enough at this particular point one of the Kaurava brothers Vikarna he stops his conscience becomes activated and he says this is unjust and he says this whole gambling match is rigged he gives a series of reasons Yudhishthira gambled because he was forced to this gambling match is rigged because Shaguni fought instead of Duryodhana and Duryodhana got carried away by the mania of gambling and when that happens when people get carried away by the mania of activities such as gambling or womanizing or animal hunting or intoxication then they do things which should not be taken very seriously he says I feel this whole match is null and void and everything that Pandavas have lost should be given back and actually everybody in the assembly applauds but one person rises in anger and that is Karna and Karna says Vikarna you are just a child what do you know when all these elders are silent do you presume that you know better than them well he is presuming that he knows better than them when they are all silent but he says that actually nobody forced Yudhishthira to gamble and now is the most offensive thing he says that Draupadi as far as her being dishonored she is already married five men so she is a prostitute and because she is a prostitute even if she is a single cloth or no cloth whatever we want we can do with her what is her honor Pandavas are boiling with burning with rage and this is completely uncalled for totally uncalled for and then it is he who suggests that let now she is our slave let us disrobe her Now Kshatriya the Sanskrit word Kshatriya Kshatriya one who protects others from hurt so Dukarna had the competence of a Kshatriya but unfortunately he lacked the character of a Kshatriya competence means he had the skills to fight but character means he should be able to he should protect others here unfortunately he was exploiting a helpless woman and now at this particular point just before this happened when Draupadi was asking this question that you know if could Yudhisthira have gambled me so Duryodhana tried to play husband against wife and he said oh Draupadi if you say that Dharmaraj Yudhisthira did adharma by gambling you then I will return everything to you so now for a wife she was practically disowning her husband now her husband had done wrong and later on in the forest she castigates him strongly but here in public she refuses to fall for the bait and she says that those who decided that this gambling match itself was right those who instructed him to play this gambling match let them decide whether it is right or wrong so literally Draupadi is a victim over here and she is a victim in a far greater sense than Karna ever was but what does she do she still doesn’t berate anyone she asks what is dharma over here and she stays by her loved ones and eventually when Karna suggests that let her be disrobed so Dushyasan comes and tries to disrobe her and this goes on and on trying to disrobe her but Krishna miraculously arranges for her saree to become endless and Draupadi’s honor is at that time protected and at the end of it all when things go just far beyond the head at that time Dhritarashtra recognizes all the Pandavas they get infuriated till now it has been a threat to their life it has been a conflict but now when their wife is dishonored a line is crossed and all the Pandavas take vows, Bhima takes a vow that I will I will kill Duryodhana, I will kill Dushyasan Dushyasan I will try to disrobe Duryodhana and here Duryodhana exposes his thigh inviting her in an openly lurid gesture to come and be with him, Draupadi so at that time when they all take this fierce vow Arjuna takes a vow to kill Karna so at that time Dhritarashtra realizes that things have gone too far and then coming to his senses he says oh Pandavas, oh Draupadi I just called this match for fun now things have gone too far so let’s stop it all and I will ask you for whatever you want you can ask, I will give it to you she says just give my husband their freedom and give them their weapons and he says with their weapons they will be able to get everything so in her words also there is a threat over there so Dhritarashtra realizes, he says I am not satisfied please ask for something more he says he says first ask for Yudhishtira’s freedom she asks for then she asks for her remaining husband then she says ask for their weapons also then finally Dhritarashtra when she refuses to ask for too much Dhritarashtra gives everything back to them says please live in peace and if I and my wife Gandhari have done any good for them good for you, please remember that and try to give up your animosity towards my sons now at this point things could have been saved although it was very hurting things could have been saved but Karna still couldn’t resist the temptation to have a cheap shot and what was the cheap shot? oh as the warriors were walking oh look at these heroes they were saved by a woman they were saved by a woman now actually throughout this incident if you look at I cannot go into the full incident over here but in terms of outlines actually Draupadi is the victim in this incident but overall as we see it is Draupadi’s character that shines the brightest she is the person who remembers Dharma, she reminds others of Dharma and she inspires Krishna to come and rescue, intervene and she is the person who saves the day and unfortunately Karna emerges the darkest he who takes the gambling match from a match between two parties to a assault on the honour of a woman both by words and by actions and later on Karna regrets this later on when he meets Bhishma he tells that what I did on that day was terrible my desire was to please Duryodhana I didn’t want to please him so I spoke and did things which I regret so again it brings us to the same point that in his emotionally vulnerable situation when Duryodhana obligated him to himself Karna lost his sense of right or wrong and that’s how he ended up doing atrociously wrong things so actually if somebody does something good for us naturally we will be grateful for them but we also have to be aware of what we are doing for them and he got carried away and the result of it was he was sometimes Duryodhana manipulated him and sometimes he himself did things which were grievously wrong so actually our friends we have to be careful of whom we accept as our friends and by accepting Duryodhana uncritically as a friend not just accepting as a friend by devoting himself totally to just the pleasure of Duryodhana our Karna lost all his sense of ethics and morality and he emerged as a character who was wronged by his birth but who did a grievous wrong over him and the consequences of that wrong eventually manifested in the Kurukshetra war so we all get a rod in life but as they say if life gives you a lemon make a lemonade but unfortunately Karna when he got a rod in he just hung on to that and then he made grievously wrong choices later on in his life Mahabharata says that Karna’s mistake was his misdirected loyalty his loyalty was there but it was a misdirected loyalty so on this note I request going through to continue the conclusion is you know in every situation there is a facility to grow in fact it is the the Karma theory Karma is not the theory which talks about binding principle but it talks about empowering principle to understand the diagnosis and then actually deal from there so Karna’s past was kind of negative one but the past can influence the present and impact the future but the past can never bind us from growing very interesting to understand Gita talks about it so Krishna comes to Karna’s life in a very crucial moment Krishna came as a peacemaker to Hastinapur and what a deal you know if you are a shrewd politician you know Krishna told Duryodhana he said give the Pandavas five village that’s all five village but Duryodhana was not a shrewd he was a stubborn he said five village he said no not even a space where you can place the needle he said I am not going to give that much so Krishna said ok no problem then Krishna calls for Karna why because you know Krishna is very expert to understand you know what makes Duryodhana so confident about this war it was not his own power not about Bheeshmadev because Bheeshmadev had told Duryodhana very clearly I will fight every day for you but I will never kill the five Pandavas the war was not against the soldiers the war was against the Pandavas so Bheeshma was redundant Dronacharya also told that no I will fight strong but I will not kill the Pandavas but there was one person whom he had trusted so much who was that? Karna he had determined to kill the Pandavas and then therefore Krishna came to Karna and he told this spoke very nicely and if you study this part of the Mahabharata actually Karna exhibits great awareness about Dharma he was Dharma sensitive in regards to information but transforming that information into action was the problem somebody said you know to know tomato as a fruit is an information but not putting in a fruit salad is a wisdom so Karna beautifully he speaks to Krishna so nicely about what is Dharma and he talks about what would happen in the war based upon his information his gut feeling he said I can tell you Krishna that we are going to lose this battle Duryodhana is going to lose this battle he says Duryodhana is not a good friend he is a traitor he does not respect his superiors he does not respect his friends he does not respect his teachers and Krishna gives lot of legalities moralities to Karna saying that you know what Karna you are the eldest brother of the Pandavas and from certain Samhitas you are entitled to be the king of Hastinapur and it is not that Krishna was the one who revealed Karna that he is the son of Kunti he knew beforehand he said I know about it some people write in their books you know Karna was you know emotionally brainwashed by Krishna and therefore Karna became less effective when he was fighting the war no he knew before so Krishna said you can be the king now this is how Dharma and someone who is representing Dharma Krishna in the Mahabharata you know is considered as incarnation comes to this world to establish Dharma and what is establishing Dharma means giving opportunity to everybody to grow from whatever background we have it does not matter what background we have we could be criminals and we could be pious we could be less competent or we could be less confident but everybody can get an opportunity and this was the greatest opportunity Karna had and what was the opportunity and why was the opportunity it was not the temptation which Krishna was offering it was not the post it was not the position rather the whole reason was Karna if you come on the side of the Pandavas Yudhishthira will accept you as the king and since Duryodhana is your friend he will also be happy both ways it will be win-win solution the original Stephen Coe’s principle the war will stop can you imagine is it a temptation sometime people say oh Krishna is very crooked very shrewd how could you do this tempt Karna he is so loyal friend he is destroying his friendship you know people become emotional emotion does not help the society build even if it is a strategy even if Krishna is shrewd but that is going to help stop such a big war why not do it very simple principle and Krishna did not tell Karna you quit your mother because he had the background of handling both the mothers he was very nice to his step mother Yashoda he was very nice to his mother Devaki and he was very nice to his another mother who gave him poison Putana right when Krishna is departing from this world some writers write you know usually you call for very dear people in your life he called for his mother in India if you get hurt you know people say Amma Aai you know right you remember your mother so Krishna called for his mother they said three mothers came Yashoda came Devaki came and Putana also came he can handle so many mothers so Krishna never told Karna that you give up your step mother for the sake of your real mother he could have had both the mothers and what did Karna do Karna basically rejected this opportunity he said Krishna no he said for me friendship with Duryodhana is the greatest thing this is called as narrow mindedness seeing from a very narrow perspective loyalty at the cost of growth of society is not Dharma and what did Duryodhana say he said my dear Krishna even if you offer this kingdom to me I know very much Yudhishthir Maharaj my younger brother will be more than happy to hear about my relationship to him but if you give that kingdom to me I will give it to Duryodhana Krishna said you have to leave this world you don’t deserve to be in this world that was the time Krishna resolved that after giving you such an opportunity you are still rejecting it so war was about to start and suddenly there was a conflict between Bhishma and Karna right because Bhishma was telling you know it was a pre poll you know nowadays America is full of you know action pre poll who is going to win the election so there was a pre poll survey Duryodhana was asking who is the best warrior then Bhishma was talking about everybody when it came to Karna and Ashwathama, Ashwathama was the son of Dronacharya, great warrior so he said Ashwathama is less than half a warrior then Duryodhana was shocked to hear that he is son of Dronacharya how could be half a warrior so he said because this man even though he is given a benediction of having a long life still he fears for life therefore he is half a warrior Ashwathama did not say anything Dronacharya did not say anything because it was a fact then came to Karna and Bhishma they said Karna because Karna was expecting that I will be glorified I am so great, I am the disciple of Bhargava I got this great vijay you know so Bhishma said he is less than a half warrior when Bhishma said this to Karna Karna couldn’t take it, one bad thing about Karna he was not able to translate events in life for his favor he always translated events of his life for his disfavor when he heard this news from Bhishma he became very angry he said how dare you say like this you can’t offend me like this, if I fight with you on your side under you all the credit will go to you, the credit will not come to you, not come to me therefore Bhishma listen to me Duryodhana listen to me till Bhishma is going to live I am not going to fight for this war so this was the friendship of Karna he did not ask Duryodhana should I continue to fight for Bhishma under his guidance he said let your commander in chief die then I will come inside so that was the beginning of conflict in their party your own man is not willing to fight and is praying that my commander in chief dies then I will fight then Krishna came to him again just see how Krishna you can call him opportunistic but rather Krishna is opportunity giver he came to Karna he said my dear Karna I heard that you are not going to fight on behalf of the Kauravas why don’t you fight on behalf of the Pandavas at least till Bhishma is there laughing now you can see from so many different perspective every time I have read this part people say come on Krishna is you know as bad as Shakuni you know always playing all this kind of tricks but if you see Krishna as a teacher as a coach he always looks for an opportunity to be a very good take this opportunity and grow in life but Karna rejected that opportunity and therefore on the battlefield of Kurukshetra Arjuna when he became very sympathetic for Karna one of the greatest quality of Karna is to draw attention from people you know draw sympathy of people including Arjuna, Arjuna stood there motionless he said no he is down his wheels have been stuck in the soil I can’t kill him and Krishna said Arjuna no he deserves death now that part of the Mahabharata when you see Krishna speaking to Karna he is very brutal and ruthless if you see from that perspective it’s evil it’s bad but it is Dharma and therefore Mahabharata concludes in the Karna episode you know Karna knew Dharma but unfortunately he was not able to implement Dharma in his day to day life therefore he remained an unfortunate character therefore people will sympathize with him but rarely you find people naming their child as Karna they always name their child Arjuna even the greatest cricketer for those Indians you know or for Americans if you know about India’s madness about cricket they call cricket is our religion and Sachin is our God there was a great cricketer called Sachin Tendulkar so even Sachin Tendulkar named his son as Arjuna not Karna yes yes not Karna so I’ll stop here with this understanding thank you very much for your kind attention thank you both so much I think at this point we do have a little bit of time I appreciate everyone’s patience I know some of you may have other engagements to get to and that’s definitely fine but if we can maybe have just a few minutes of question and answer if folks want to ask specific questions those of you who are more familiar with the text if there are specific episodes you’d like to ask about or controversial points that arise please feel free to ask questions at this point I know we have some faculty members here too if you weren’t I don’t have a specific question it’s more like a confirmation or clarification question I was really intrigued by the flyer that you sent us because tragic hero and a phrase that has hero was written in small letters and with a question mark so my question is about the question mark it seems like you were saying that Karna’s story is tragic but he was not a hero and with that question mark so I just wanted to get that confirmation a more explicit confirmation is that what you are saying? good question so was Karna not a hero or was he a tragic hero? well tragedy is there because of his flaws but was he a hero? was he a hero? yeah it’s a very straight question we just believe that we don’t have much time there are he certainly had heroic qualities he was expert archer he was also a faithful friend he was also very charitable along with that whatever qualities we have how we use them is important and how we use them is a matter of decisions so the time when Krishna came to Karna to invite him to come on the Pandavas side he stuck with Duryodhana and he said I have given my word of honour to Duryodhana and I will stick there I am going to fight for him at this point actually he had a choice between a word of honour and a life of honour it’s good to stick to one’s words to give a provocative example you know in Pakistan in Afghanistan there are many poor children who are often fed and sheltered by jihadi groups now suppose a child is on the verge of starvation at that time some people come and offer him facilities, food and everything he says I am so grateful to you I will give myself to you but eventually if he comes to know that these are terrorists and they are going to kill innocent people they are going to make me a part of their scheme to kill innocent people should he continue his gratitude at that time he says I have my word of honour I have promised them that I will serve you but when a bigger picture emerges at that time if that person sticks to that that’s not just a small wrong choice, it’s a serious wrong choice so on Karna’s side, one side was the word of honour he had given his word of honour but the other side was a life of honour he himself knew that Duryodhana was vicious sometimes some people say that oh the morality of who was really bad and who was really good is not clear because everybody did bad I will come to that point a little later but at this point when Krishna has come the Pandavas have not done anything wrong nothing wrong, Kauravas have tried to kill them repeatedly, Kauravas have dishonoured their wife and Karna also admits Duryodhana is lacking in virtue so at this point he has a choice between a life of honour and a word of honour, unfortunately he chooses the word of honour so that is a serious mistake on his part so he is a hero but he chose to be on the side of a woman and another aspect of his tragedy is that eventually when he dies when Krishna when Arjuna kills him when he is off his chariot not ready to fight so at this point if we just look at that incident in isolation it appears as if he was a victim of fate and he was unfairly killed but if we look at the complete picture just before the war started Dusha, the commander of the Kauravas he came and told that you know please fight according to virtue, remember the codes of war and fight according to those codes so now the commander of the Pandavas thought, Kauravas are the persons who have violated virtue so many times so why are they reminding us he said, of course we are going to stick to the war codes but if you violate the war codes, we won’t hold ourselves back now actually the specific way in which Karna was killed that was he was off his chariot and he was weaponless at that time he was shot the Kauravas themselves did that three times before this incident on the thirteenth day Abhimanyu was in a similar situation and it was not just one warrior six warriors versus one warrior Arjuna was weaponless Abhimanyu was weaponless Abhimanyu was chariotless and Karna was one of the members who attacked him at that time on the fourteenth day Arjuna took a vow that I am going to kill Jaidrath who is responsible for Abhimanyu’s death and Arjuna went way into the Kaurava army at one particular point Krishna told Arjuna that your horses have got exhausted now you need to rest them, you need to feed them so Arjuna using his mystic powers created a lake with grass over there and then Krishna appreciated and took the horses in the chariot over there Arjuna got on the chariot at that time Arjuna did not cry foul I am on the ground, don’t shoot me now what did Arjuna do? Arjuna kept fighting the warriors were actually coming from all sides but Arjuna was expertly swinging around and to come towards Arjuna hit a wall of arrows so again the Kauravas did not stick to the Kshatriya code on the seventeenth day itself when Karna and Arjuna were fighting at one particular point Karna shot an arrow and that arrow was charged with a snake weapon and that weapon was meant to kill Arjuna so Karna shot it at the head at the neck rather his charioteer told him shoot it at the chest why shoot at the chest? even if you miss at the bottom it will hit the stomach, that is also fatal if you miss slightly up, it will go to the head that is also fatal but Karna had this wanted to have some flair in what he was doing just like suppose there is a cricket match that is getting over you just need one run or two runs to win the match and the batsman thinks I will hit a sixer and hitting a sixer he gets clean bowled and he loses the match so Karna shot the arrow at the neck he shot the arrow at the neck Krishna saw what was happening now Arjuna had different strategies when arrows would come sometimes he would counter the arrows sometimes he would just let the arrows hit he would trust that his armor was strong enough to take the arrows he did not recognize that this arrow was so dangerous but Krishna recognized what Krishna did? Krishna forcefully brought his foot down on the side of the chariot and when he brought the foot down the chariot went under the ground when the chariot went under the ground so Krishna, Arjuna also went lower and then the arrow that was meant to hit his neck that hit his crown and he lost his crown but his life was saved now after this the chariot had gone down now Krishna had to get off the chariot drag the chariot physically out and then again resume the fight during this time also Karna kept fighting and Arjuna did not say stop fighting wait till my chariot, I am more genius so actually what Karna did and what the Kauravas did the same coin Krishna paid them back so his heroism was that he did have archery skills he did have virtuous qualities but his tragedy was that all this was lost under his misdirected royalty so yes he definitely is a hero in the sense that he had virtuous qualities but his tragedy is that he made wrong choices so it is not just that he was a victim of fate yes we could say his birth was a victim of fate but eventually when he died it was a victim of his own choices rather than a victim of fate does that answer your question? thank you yeah please so you had mentioned beautifully about Draupadi and Karna’s dharma so I have watched the scene where Draupadi wins the Pandavas and still I am able to convince myself it is dharma because Arjun actually won the swayamvar so Arjun should have married her I know the scene in the background what her mother said so how can you what is your perception on this marriage of Draupadi married all the five so therefore again is it right or wrong exactly so therefore if you go back to the background of the story just before that just to add Karna, straight question Prabhuji answered a little he was trying to be nice to him I think he is more like a character he was in a character role which we think Mahabharata is like like our Bollywood film he was not the hero so I actually never thought he was the hero I was already convinced I just wanted to get its information actually it is easier to recognize Dushyasan and Duryodhana but to recognize Karna as a villain is very difficult very difficult extremely difficult but they cause greatest damage to the society because they sound good they sound nice they attract lot of sympathy but their decisions cause lot of violence to the society one decision if he had made ok I accept even though some people will misunderstand me but at least it will help the society grow he didn’t do that he could have been a king and made Pandavas happy and the Kurus also happy but he didn’t choose to do that so your question about Draupadi marrying five husbands there is one aspect in Mahabharata which is called as Daiva the concept of Daiva in the Gita there is always a conflict among special Indians they say India’s problem is we have depended too much on God our first prime minister said the problem of India is our temples he said therefore I want to build new temples our industries there is no problem in industries we are not at the cost of undermining minimizing the concept of faith and without recognizing the background of how Dharma and Artha they are actually always in harmony Dharma should not destroy Artha whatever Dharma we practice that should not make us poverty stricken and Artha should not make us you know become less with Dharma so harmonize between the two so this is the theme of Gita and another beautiful theme of Gita is how Daiva and Endeavor they are harmonized if you say you know I need to depend on Daiva but without Endeavor you don’t experience Daiva but only when they are without Daiva will not happen they are harmonized so Krishna explained there are five factors for success one is Endeavor second is right instrument to Endeavor third is place to Endeavor fourth is our involvement and fifth is Daiva 20% Daiva is there 80% is our efforts but Daiva is an important factor so Vyasadeva becomes a Daiva player in the Mahabharata so much before they came into Drupada’s kingdom Vyasadeva came and told Yudhishthira Maharaj he said there is a situation in your life like how the science of astrology is there which talks about ok be careful because your nakshatra is this your graha is this it is not a conclusive science it is an indicative science it is not talking about certainty but it is talking about what could happen so people follow astrology when nothing works people go to astrology or before everything works either way people go to astrology so Vyasadeva told Yudhishthira Maharaj in your life there is something very unique which has never happened before he said what is that he said you are all going to marry one woman much before Yudhishthira Maharaj actually came to the place of Drupada and when this incident happened Kunti was simply an instrument it is not that because she said therefore they married and when the Pandavas married Draupadi again Vyasadeva came he reconfirmed Narada Muni came, he reconfirmed and then Drupada got to know Drishtadyumna got to know that our sister is married to five men, they were shocked how could this happen, Drupada came and he said how could you do this to our daughter then Vyasadeva took him aside he told you know what this is a very exceptional incident now therefore what Mahabharata says what happened you have no control but what do you do with what happened that is important therefore it was supposed to happen in her destiny it should not become a legacy and it has never become a legacy and therefore another interesting thing Draupadi even though such a great, she is considered as the personification of goddess of fortune but nobody names their daughter as Draupadi nobody can handle that name it’s only she alone so that is how Mahabharata talks about also I guess maybe we should be relating to a different with different kind of sensibilities nowadays in comparison to when Mahabharata was created and what kind of value would be associated in that epic but I personally really like Draupadi’s character, I feel like she propels the plot in Mahabharata because if she was only Arjuna’s wife the Mahabharata would have not gone on the path as a plot she is the actually she is the catalyst for uniting the diversity she is the unifying factor because five Pandavas are completely different Yudhishthira Maharaj is like Mahatma Gandhi Bhima is like Bhagat Singh and Arjuna is like another character so they are all very different amongst each other there is no harmony in their qualities but what harmonizes is Draupadi without Draupadi she is the heart of Mahabharata thank you let’s stop here although our speakers are kind enough to be with us for a little bit longer so if anyone has any questions or would like to get some clarification you can speak to them one on one also because Mahabharata is so vast you will probably have questions that we won’t get to tonight, even one on one but have no fear because you can take some of this home with you, so we have some books we have books by both of our speakers so we’ve got three here from Chaitanya Charan and we’ve got two here from Govinda including Hot Off The Presses Karna On Trial so you can hear in a little bit more detail especially some of the episodes we didn’t get a chance to I’d ask them just to touch on a couple of key episodes but actually there is so much more there so I really invite you to take advantage of this opportunity, this is like Krishna coming giving an opportunity to Karna so they’ve come and given us this opportunity so please take it, there are books out here and you can see Govinda Govindaji is here and he is helping with some of the book selling and he’ll let you know about how to take these home with you there’s a table right out there also if you haven’t already done so please make sure you do sign in so we know who you are and we can keep you connected to these events and please do continue to let us know how we can better serve you with the Hindu Life Program we’re so happy you’re all here and we just want to once again express our gratitude to all of you for coming out and of course to our very special guest speaker