2. Those 18 Days – Pandavas’ Counter-Surge – Avoiding Overconfidence – Mahabharata Wisdom

Podcast:

Video:

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Hare Krishna. Welcome to the.
Second day of those 18 days. Where. We will discuss about.
What happened on the second day of the Kurukshetra war. And what we can learn from it. The first day.
Was very bad for the. Pandavas. Bhishma was unstoppable.
And he wreaked havoc. In the. Pandava camp.
On the second day. The Pandavas decided to form a. Crown chair formation. That is a particular military formation.
Which they hope. Will be able to resist. Bhishma’s aggression.
And. They strategize. Dhristadyumna was their commander.
Dhristadyumna discussed with Yudhishthira, Arjuna. And the next day. They march forward.
Confident with their new strategy. And then. This is a huge battlefield.
The battlefield was several miles in width. And far more. Miles in length.
So different warriors. Would engage. With different warriors in different places.
So if we compare it to a sports match. It’s not like. Say.
Cricket. The action is happening at one place. But you could say it’s like a tennis match.
Where. It’s like a one tennis team. Playing with another tennis team.
And there are different courts. And each court one player is playing. So.
Like that. There were many different warriors. Fighting with each other at different fronts.
And. Duryodhana had been delighted. With the victory that he had got on the previous day.
And he was confident. That within a few days. We will win.
Led by Bhishma. We will crush the Kauravas, the Pandavas. And.
He. Goaded, incited Bhishma. The great work that you did today.
Completed today. That you did yesterday. Completed today.
And Bhishma charged forward. And he fought with such ferocity. That again.
The Pandava soldiers started. Fleeing in. Dismay and despair.
Bhishma was unstoppable. Whichever warrior came in front of him. He was just mauled over.
And seeing this. Seeing him unstoppable. Arjuna decided.
To charge toward Bhishma. That had been a topic of discussion. In the previous evening’s meetings.
That Arjuna had been reluctant. To fight with Bhishma. But this time he knew.
There was no stopping. And especially seeing how Bhishma was fighting. Arjuna started fighting and attacking fiercely.
And as Arjuna started. Charging toward Bhishma. Then several other warriors.
Came on the Kaurava side to help Bhishma. And Duryodhana. And Shalya.
And other warriors came over there. And on the Pandava side also. Several warriors came to assist Arjuna.
And as the fight moved forward. Arjuna overall. Started overpowering.
All the Kaurava warriors assisting. Bhishma. And he beat them all back.
And started attacking Bhishma fiercely. Bhishma was fighting. But Arjuna kept charging forward.
He stunned Bhishma. And then he charged forward. And started wreaking havoc in the Pandava camp.
In the Kaurava camp rather. And then. As this was happening.
Duryodhana seeing the devastation. In his army. He charged up to Bhishma.
And he said. Oh Grandfather. Can you not see.
How Arjuna is moving through my army. Like a farmer might harvest crops. Please stop him.
Please protect us. Bhishma. Looked at Duryodhana.
With angry and sorrowful eyes. He says. Fight upon a Kshatriya’s duty.
He really had no heart to fight with Arjuna. He had his chariot turned around. And he charged towards Arjuna.
And Arjuna and Bhishma. Kept fighting with each other. So Arjuna had already wreaked havoc.
In the Kaurava camp. And as they kept fighting. Fighting.
Fighting. It was like a stalemate between the two of them. Elsewhere.
Dhrishtadyumna. Knowing that he had taken a vow. To bring down Drona.
Charged towards him. And Dhrishtadyumna tried various means. To overpower Drona.
Drona was expert. And he countered. All of the weapons.
Of Dhrishtadyumna. Dhrishtadyumna took various celestial weapons. And he attacked Drona.
And Drona used his own celestial weapons. To stop them. Dhrishtadyumna tried again and again.
When Dhrishtadyumna had been born. He had born with a prophecy. That he would be.
The cause of the death of Drona. And in terms of. Sheer skill.
Dhrishtadyumna was no match for Drona. But in terms of this confidence. That conviction.
That he would be victorious. That was what powered Dhrishtadyumna on and on. And although Drona held him.
Held off all his attacks. Dhrishtadyumna kept attacking. But again here also there was a stalemate.
The day’s major fight. Was between Bhima. And the Kaurava forces.
And the first day was Bhishma’s day. The second day. Turned out to be Bhima’s day.
Bhima was killed in various weapons. Normally when the warriors would assemble. They would all have their chariots.
And from the chariots. They would fight with bows and arrows. But on special occasions.
They could use other weapons also. Every warrior knew. Basic fighting with various weapons.
And they were specialized in particular weapons. So Bhima. When he would normally enter into the war field.
Although he celebrated for his mace fighting. He was a good archer also. And he would normally.
Normally fight from a chariot. And if he got close to a particular opponent. Then he would take up his mace.
And he would jump and fight with the mace. So on this day. With Bhishma engaged elsewhere.
And Drona engaged elsewhere. The two key protectors of the Kauravas. Were already engaged.
And Bhima took this opportunity. And charged upon the Kaurava forces. And started destroying them.
Seeing this devastation being caused. Now Duryodhana was engaged with Bhishma. Trying to protect Bhishma.
From those who were assisting Arjuna. Satyaki and others. So seeing this.
The Kalinga ruler. Ketumat came forward. To stop Bhishma.
To stop Bhima rather. There were no other prominent warriors there. To stop Bhima.
And also another king. King Shatayush. The king of the Nishadas came forward.
And both these kings. Shatayush and Ketumat. Were fearless and powerful.
And they charged toward. Bhima with their huge armies. Bhima countered both of them.
And started destroying their forces. Although they fought heroically. Bhima’s charge was impossible to resist.
And Bhima was destroying their forces. And overwhelming them by his attack. Even his archery skills.
And his sheer anger with which he was fighting. Bhima especially had been the most wounded. Emotionally.
By the insult that had happened to Draupadi. He was the most bellicose. Among the Pandavas.
And living silently for 13 years in the forest. Including one year incognito had been unbearably painful for him. And now all his anger came out.
It was not that those who are great devotees. They don’t feel anger. Anger is a natural and even a desirable response to injustice.
It is how anger is expressed. Anger, when there is anger or outrage on seeing something which is very bad. Then that can activate us.
That can energize us. And that can empower us in a way few other things can. But the challenge is to keep anger regulated.
To not give in to arbitrary or excessive displays of anger. But to channel that anger in constructive action. So Bhima was driven by this anger.
And his anger had been waiting in his psyche. In his heart for years as the Pandavas had waited for their exile to get over. And now he came forward.
All that anger he was channeling it constructively. He was not letting it become destructive. He was not fighting arbitrarily excessively.
He had waited for the right time for the Kurukshetra war to start. And now was his opportunity. So with whatever opportunity he had.
Bringing out all his anger and he was just unstoppable. He overpowered the two kings of Kalinga and the Nishadha kings. And at that time Shakradev was the son of the Kalinga king Ketumat.
He came forward to fight. And he was also powerful. He showered enormous number of arrows on Bhima.
Bhima countered all those arrows. And as Bhima started getting more and more angry. Arrows were not enough for him to vent out his anger.
There is arrows you shoot from a distance. And there is like contact fighting. Where you use a bow or a sword.
You use a mace or a sword. To actually physically come in contact. Through those weapons with the opponents.
And he wanted to use that. To do that as he was fighting. As the combined attack of various opponents.
Ketumat, Shakradev. As it started destroying his chariot and his charioteer. Charioteer got wounded.
His charioteer was destroyed. Bhima jumped off his chariot. And initially he was still using his bow and arrow.
But now he started using a sword. And with that sword. He just swinging around.
And countering whatever arrows were coming toward him. He used his formidable prowess. To charge upon Shakradev.
And destroy him. And he gave out a roar. His roar was filled with so much anger.
So much fury. That it struck terror in the hearts of the watching Kaurava soldiers. Seeing Shakradev killed by Bhima.
His brother. Who was another son of Ketumat. This was Bhanumat.
He charged forward. Bhanumat was a huge elephant. And he was charging towards Bhima.
Who was chariotless. He had a sword. And there were various warriors attacking him from different sides.
He was just swinging his sword round and round. And he was countering all the arrows that were coming toward him. If any arrow came and hit him.
His body was like adamant. He just managed to tolerate all the wounds that came upon him. With his own strength of will power.
And with his armour. And when he saw this giant elephant. And the warrior atop the elephant.
Charging toward him. Bhima did the most stunning of things. His opponent expected him to flee.
Giant elephant is charging. What would normally anybody do? Just flee in fear. But Bhima decided to do something utterly unexpected.
And stunningly dare devilish. Instead of turning away. He just started running straight toward the elephant.
And everybody on the battlefield was just shocked. Flummoxed. What is he doing? Even the elephant and the elephant warrior.
What is this person doing? He was running straight toward the elephant. And he got a momentum as he was running toward the elephant. And as they came close.
He just leapt up. And the attack was so unexpected. That Bhanumadh was utterly unprepared.
Bhima just charged up right up to Bhanumadh. And brought his sword down. And he just cut Bhanumadh’s body into two parts.
And he fell on the ground. And as now Bhima was on the elephant. And he just quickly turned around.
When the elephant had seen Bhima move up. He had tried to move his trunk up. To try to stop Bhima from going up.
And wanted to catch him. But Bhima had just been too fast. In one swift move.
He had finished off the king. And in another quick move. He turned around.
And the elephant’s trunk was still raised up. One forceful lop. He cut off the trunk of the elephant.
And the elephant screamed in pain. And as the elephant fell. Severely wounded.
Bhima leapt off. And gave a huge scary roar. Of victory.
So fierce was his attack. That now. Not only was he roaring fiercely.
Not only was he fighting forcefully. This was a stupendous display of skill and strength. Wherein a warrior without any chariot.
Had within moments. Destroyed both elephant and elephant warrior. The cowherd was wondering.
How can we even fight against such an enemy? Terrified. And the Kalinga soldiers started fleeing. Ketumad somehow tried to get all of them together.
To get them to stop and watch. To stop and aid in fighting. But none of them had the courage.
So at that time. The Kalinga king Ketumad himself charged toward Bhima. And seeing him charging.
Some of his warriors got some courage. And they started fighting. And Bhima just marched forward.
Blowing through whoever came in his way. And within a short while. He just devastated the entire remaining army.
Of Kalinga. So the Nishadas marched forward. Shatayush and Ketumad.
Both were attacking Bhima. Along with their armies. But Bhima just fought.
Forcefully and fearlessly. And he brought down. Within a few moments.
He brought down Shatayush. And then he neutralized Ketumad. And he roared in victory.
As the day moved toward twilight. It became clear that the cowherd had been badly battered. While their major warriors.
Had been held in a stalemate. Bhishma and Drona had been held in a stalemate. By Arjuna and Dhristadyumna.
Bhima had wreaked havoc. And in that way. That evening when Duryodhana.
Assembled in his camp. He was dazed. He was shocked.
He was disbelieving. How could this have happened? How had the tables turned so severely in just one day? Yesterday he had been. Celebrating his victory.
And thinking that within just a few days. The war would be over. In fact, he had expected.
That Bhishma might finish the war on that day. And far from finishing the war. He was reeling under.
The consequences of a brutal defeat. At the hands of Bhima. So this is the nature of life.
This is the nature of war. And of life at large. Yesterday’s laurels.
Do not count today. Every day is a new battle. Every day is a new fight.
And. Yesterday’s victory. Doesn’t provide a victory today.
One cannot become complacent. We all have to be vigilant. It’s like just.
If it’s a sports match. A batsman may be batting very well. And the batsman may have hit.
Maybe two successive boundaries. Or two successive sixes on the previous balls. But that doesn’t mean the next ball.
The batsman is going to hit well. It just takes one ball to get out. So the previous successes.
Don’t guarantee today’s success. Of course, the skills and the values. That we have learned.
To gain our previous successes. And. Whatever we have learned from those successes.
Those can help us to face today’s battles. But. Today’s battle has to be fought today.
Using the lessons of yesterday. But they have to be fought today. And if we fail to fight today’s battles today.
If we don’t fight well. We will lose. So Duryodhana had become complacent.
After the first day’s battle. And he paid a heavy price. Far from.
Him being able to. Tout his victory. He had to lick his wounds.
And think what had happened. So for all of us. Life goes through ups and downs.
There are difficulties. Some days we may feel low. We are all facing an inner war.
Against our own mind’s moods. And sometimes the mind’s moods work positively. Sometimes they don’t work positively for us.
But whatever happens. We persevere. Sometimes we succeed.
Sometimes we fail. But if we stay committed. If we stay competent.
If we stay determined. We can go through the phases of failure. Without becoming disheartened.
And we can go through the phases of success. Without becoming complacent. And we can persevere.
Towards the ultimate success. That. The reversal and fortune that Duryodhana experienced.
And the lesson of. Avoiding complacency and arrogance. And over confidence.
And knowing that we need to be vigilant and competent. That is the lesson we can draw. From the second day of the Kurukshetra war.
Thank you very much. Hare Krishna.