Wasn’t Hanuman’s anger in burning Lanka excessive?
Answer Podcast
Transcript
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Question Did Hanuman get excessively angry when he burnt Lanka? Was it due to excessive anger? Answer No. In war, an important strategy is intimidation. That if one party shows its prowess more and more, then the other party’s excessive aggressiveness or unwarranted, unrealistic optimism can be checked.
And their bellicoseness, their hunger for war can be minimized. So, when Hanuman went to Lanka, his primary mission was to locate Sita to convey Ram’s message to her and take her message to Ram. Along with that, since he had already done the stupendous feat of flying across the ocean and penetrating into the highly protected castle of Lanka, Hanuman decided to do some further reconnaissance.
And therein, reconnaissance meant he didn’t just want to understand the military positions of the various armies, of the various forces of Ravana, but also he wanted to understand their strength. So, first, he created disruption in the gardens and he had Ravana’s forces come one by one and he bested some of his best warriors there, till Indrajit’s Brahmastra caught him. And then, when Hanuman’s tail was set on fire, at that time, Hanuman saw that Ravana was so insolent that he was not going to listen.
But Hanuman wanted to create terror in the hearts of the rest of the Rakshasas, so that they would not be in favor of a war against Ram and they might have some dissuading effect on Ravana. And that is why he took that burnt tail and he went around creating rampage in Lanka. So, suddenly he was angry because Sita had been abducted, because Ram had been dishonored and Hanuman as Ram’s representative also had been dishonored when his tail had been burnt.
But his primary purpose was to create fear in the minds of the Rakshasas, thereby by which they might be more amicable to a peaceful resolution which Ram would offer later. So, it was not due to excessive anger, it was a part of his anger itself and his burning of Lanka were a part of strategy of intimidation which could possibly have prevented far greater destruction later when a full scale war took place.