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LORD JAGANNATH AS SRIKRISHNA
P R
I Y A T A M A
( THE
DEAREST )
I never let anybody know that I knew her
nor did I give anyone a chance to suspect that I was familiar to her lest
someone might misconstrue it. The only reason is that not only the entire
temple, but the whole of Purusottamakshetra
(Puri) was aware that she married ar a very late age. The wayward boys
made sarcastic remarks at her, the woman exchanged derisive looks. The adults
and the old gave ludicrous smiles. To speak in a nutshell, the atmosphere was
totally polluted with her presence in the temple.
Our acquaintance has been very long. She
was fourty years older than I. She was no way connected to me – neither by
blood nor by any relationship, nor was she known through our association at any
walk of life. Our relationship had a dramatic beginning. I used to sit just
nearby where she sat regularly in the ‘Jagamohan’ of the temple of Goddess
Lakshmi. Every evening she used to pray there, sat in meditation with closed
eyes. When she opened her eyes, I almost fell in her notice and this was a
regular occurance. The estrangement between us gradually melted and one day I
marked that she looked at me with a smile. After a few days she initiated with
a well-meaning enquiry, “Are you fine, my boy ?” I gave a cordial reply.
We sat together every evening and in
such a pious ambiance our relationship grew stronger. If I went out on some
work and did not go to the temple, she remembered me very much. I also felt the
same at the particular time in the evening wherever I was. Closing my eyes, I
recollected the ennobling experience of our daily meeting. I enjoyed the moment
when she opened her eyes slowly after meditation and asked me with a smile,
“Are you okay ?” It was followed with my affirmative reply. I got utmost
satisfaction with the reminiscences. As I grew familiar, I started addressing
her ‘Maa’ (Mother). She also treated me as her son. Sometimes she asked, “Are
you hungry ? You look pale and withered.”
After listening to my explanation she
said, “Leave it, it’s all childish. Many things happen in conjugal life. Does
anybody ever come to this place with a morose face, without taking anything ?
Besides this, the daughter-in-law is too young. Because she told something out
of childish ignorance, you came away in pique ? The she brought “Mahaprasad”
from Ananda Bazar and fed me with her snow-white hand and said affectionately,
Swear today in the name of the sacred “Mahaprasad” that you would never come to
this place in empty stomach.” While taking the last morsel of food from her
hand, I swore “No, never.”
After finishing her meditation she went to
the ‘kirtan’ courtyard and paid her obeisance to a particular stone plate. I
marked everyday when she got up, her eyes were almost drenched wioth tears. She
became speechless for quite a long time. I looked at the stone. No writings were
visible. All of them had been erased with the roll of time. One day I asked her
about it boldly and came to know the whole of her past life from her reply.
“ Very often I used to come to this
temple with my father in my childhood – from the day I acquired the basic
knowledge of the world.” “Then you went to have a ‘darshan’ ( seeing the Lord )
of the deity. “ Suddenly she interrupted , “No, I did not see the deity on all
the days. If my father did not insist, if he did not lift me up over the wooden
cross-bar in the “Jagmohan’, I could not see the deity. The day I got a glimpse
of the Lord, I did not like His face at all, somehow a sense of fear crept in
me.”
While narrating her reminiscence it
seemed as if she suddenly became a child and uttered in a half-clear childish
tone, “Father went on chanting, looking at the black faced deity for hours
together – I enjoyed to see the monkeys moving inside the temple precinct. Days
passed. I grew up. I had gone to Puri with my father many a time. I was excited
to see the statues all around the temple walls without father’s notice. On some
days father marked me staring at those statues
(not meant for my age) with rapt attention. I was ashamed of being
noticed by him. Sometimes I bit my tongue. OIn being asked I candidly confessed
that I had not gone inside.
“ The I was given in marriage. I came to
the temple with him also twice or thrice.” I interrupted, “ only two to three
times.”
With a tearful smile, she continued, “It
was a very short period. Only one month after, the vermillion from my forehead
was erased and the bangles were taken out.”
On being questioned she heaved a sigh and
replied, “Yes, this stone is in my memory. He was very fond of sitting here. He
was able to see from here – three at a time Mahalakshmi, the Blue Wheel and
Satyanarayan. He used to say, I like this place very much. If I pass away
earlier, then install a stone here in my name.”
Her eyes were filled with tears. She
avoided my consolatory words and added, “No, no ..., it is not like that. I
felt a peculiar kind of pain after his death, after my bubble-like married
life. It seemed he came everyday in the midnight and called me to go to that
place and sit there. I followed him. He used to sit on that stone; he asked me
to sit and i obeyed. After a while he got up, moved towards the ‘Jagmohan’ and
we both saw the deity together. Suddenly I marked him walking towards the
‘Ratnasimhasana’ (Sanctum sanctorum). I cried, ‘don’t go, don’t go, ‘bhoga’
would be defiled’ – he never listened, but looked behind with a smile.
Amazingly, he would merge with Lord Jagannath. Next day in the midnight the
same thing recurred He asked, “Could you not understand anything ? Ok, let’s go
today.”
We both went together. He sat on the stone
for some time, got up and moved towards the ‘Jagmohan’ climbing up the seven
steps and then watched the ‘Arati’. Again he walked towards Lord JAGANNATH
without my notice and was lost in the holy body of the Lord. I returned home
all alone. When I was fast asleep at night, he appeared in the dream again and
asked, ‘Can’t you understand anything ? I replied in
the negative.
My language is quite inadequate to narrate
her strange story. Her serene beauty, the calm and cool, her affectionate voice
– all were unique indeed.
All in the temple held her with utmost
reverence for her catholicity of temper and generocity. But suddenly everything
changed; the lady of awe and adoration became the target of gossip and
sarcastic remarks. This happened one day when she came to the temple with
vermillion on the forehead and golden bangles on her hands. She became the hot
topic of discussion in the entire temple for the whole day. Then whispers,
whistling and unsavoury comments were the usual response of the illiterate and
uncultured public.
From that day I left my usual sitting
place in goddess Lakshmi’s temple just to avoid her. I felt ashamed to retain
my relationship with her. It was the incident of the same day last year. The de
ities were in ‘anashara’. The temple looked deserted. No sooner did I step in
to the ‘Jagmohan’, than my eyes fell on her; she was looking here and there in
gloom and depression. I was about to leave the place , avoiding her. She called
me, “ Hear me, my boy! I stopped. Tears rolled on her cheeks. I asked, “ What
happened ? Why do you cry ?”
“He is not well. I came for medicine,”
she replied.
I was terribly restless with a sense of
abhorrence for her. I looked all around carefully with the apprehension that somebody
might have noticed while talking to this depraved woman.
Suddenly she caught hold of my hands and
entreated, “Won’t you go to see him at least once ?”
I said, “ I have no time today, I shall
go later. I withdrew my hand forcibly from her. She held my lips and said,
“Don’t refuse, my boy, he was asking about you.”
“Not now, some time later. I don’t know
him, nor does he.”
“But he knows. He had told me about
your name and address, your village on the bank of a river. There is the shrine
of Lord Kunjabihari nearby your house.How beautiful is the face of Radharani
statue there! Is it not ?”
I was really wonder-struck. I had
never told her about my village. How could she knew ?
I followed her like an obedient child
to see her husband. She lived in a small but beautiful house at a little
distance from the temple. After reaching near the doorstep, she uttered in slow
voice, “ Do you hear, please open the door, look who has come. How do you feel
now ?”
I could not hear anything from inside.
But, while pushing open the door she said, “It was late to get the medicine
from the doctor. Besides, you also asked me to bring this person whenever I met
him. Did you take water dissolved with crystallized form of sugar?” When I
entered the house I saw somebody sleeping with his body fully covered. I felt a
little bit uncomfortable in the strange surrounding. She asked me to sit on the
chair beside the cot. She was taken aback when she moved her hand on the feet
of her husband, “Oh, so high temperature! Let me give the medicine. Oh, what
should I do ?”
I shrieked when I saw the sight of her
offering the medicine, taking it out from a knot on the edge of her worn cloth.
I began to entirely tremble.
She assured , “ You need not fear. He has
talked about you many a time. I shall tell everything. Let me give the
medicine.”
After administering the dose of medicine ,
she covered again the body of her husband. She brought out something after
inserting her hand into the covered cloth. It was a golden flute, I saw. With
utmost humility and reverence , she expressed her concern : “ I appealed to you
so much not to take unnecessary strain by playing on the flute. The temperature
of the body has gone up, you don’t listen to me.” Then she humbly touched the
flute to my head and also her head and kept it at the appropriate place, nicely
arranged.
Then she started talking to the void. I
now record here whatever I heard from one side.
Tomorrow you will be normal.I will again
bring this person to meet you. The day after tomorrow you will go on the
chariot. See, how grand is the decoration and drapery on the chariot !”
I saw a chariot in the corner of the
house with dazzling drapery and fine floral decorations.
She heard something again and asked me, “
Is the chariot of your Kunjabihari adorned like this every year ?”
I gave an affirmative reply. Then she
continued at the void........”You have not taken the whole of the diet.I am
giving whatever is left behind. You need not worry about it.” She took out a
mango from a stone pot and offered me. What a wonderful taste !
I was entangled in an illusion. Suddenly
she moved a little from her husband, lying on the bed, as if she has heard
something from him. Then she suggested,
“ Will you sit a little on the chair ! You must be feeling unwell by constantly
lying on the bed,.....okay.” She took out the cloth covered on her husband and
made him sit on a silver chair infront of me. This time it was a face to face
meeting. I was awe struck. Suddenly she responded after hearing something . “
No, he is not afraid.......Oh! the flute again you want.”
When she put the flute on the unfinished
hand of her husband, the entire house vibrated with a wonderful note.
Enthralled with music , she immediately fell at the feet of the
black-faced-deity (Lord JAGANNATH) seated on the silver chair.I also fell down
before her feet and prayed with tearful eyes, “ Oh Mother, forgive me.”
With a compassionate heart and graceful
look she raised me up and moved her tender merciful palm over my body.
Source : From the book "Lord Jagannath in the Stories of Experience"
Author: Sri Rabindra Narayan Mishra (in Oriya Language)
Translator : Sri Suman Mahapatra
(Permission of Sri R.N.Mishra taken to bring it to my Blog. )
SRIJAGANNATH TEMPLE at PURI
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