Sat Ma­haraj

Part 3

This month of May marks the 158th year of ar­rival of In­di­an in­den­tured im­mi­grants to T&T to sup­ply cheap labour to sug­ar es­tates.De­nied of ba­sic hu­man ne­ces­si­ties such as prop­er nu­tri­tion, health fa­cil­i­ties and ed­u­ca­tion, our an­ces­tors found so­lace and com­fort in their sa­cred text, the Ra­mayan writ­ten by Saint Tul­si­das.

The Ra­mayan is an ex­cep­tion­al work of lit­er­a­ture. One can list var­i­ous facets of lit­er­a­ture that are in­te­grat­ed in a sub­lime fash­ion in the Ra­mayan to in­crease the ef­fec­tive­ness of the stand­out mes­sages. Yet to tru­ly un­der­stand this syn­the­sis, re­quires the high­est un­der­stand­ing, analy­sis and ap­pre­ci­a­tion.

Tul­si­das, the au­thor of the Ra­mayan, speaks of his aim in this sa­cred text: "In ac­cord with all the Pu­ranas and dif­fer­ent sa­cred texts, and what have been record­ed, I, Tul­si, to grat­i­fy my own heart's de­sire, have com­posed these lays of Ra­goonath (Ram) in most choice and el­e­gant mod­ern speech."

Devo­tees and read­ers alike en­counter new mean­ings each time the Ra­mayan is read, re­cit­ed or lis­tened to. The sim­plic­i­ty of the lan­guage, the range of lit­er­ary de­vices, the de­pic­tion of a plat­form of scenes, emo­tions and sen­ti­ment, the se­lec­tion of ap­pro­pri­ate words and phras­es and the dra­mat­ic de­scrip­tions, all cre­ate an in­de­scrib­able ef­fect.

The en­gag­ing and at­trac­tive na­ture of the Ra­mayan, to all read­ers and devo­tees, is en­hanced be­cause they can iden­ti­fy with each mes­sage that is with­in their own knowl­edge and ex­pe­ri­ences. It is fit­ting there­fore, to ex­am­ine and give ex­am­ples of the use of de­vices in the Ra­mayan, and the pur­pose of their lit­er­ary us­age:

Metaphor 1: Para Akaa­ju La­gi Tanu Par­i­hara­heen

Ji­mi Hi­ma Upala Kr­ishee Dali Gara­heen

Evil men are like hail­stones. The evil-mind­ed even give up their bod­ies in harm­ing oth­ers as hail­stones. Af­ter de­stroy­ing the crops in the field, them­selves melt away. The evil do­ers are pre­pared to de­stroy them­selves in their at­tempts to de­stroy oth­ers.

Metaphor 2: Dhooma Ku­san­gati Kaarikha Hoee

Likhia Pu­raana Man­ju Masi Soee

"Due to evil as­so­ci­a­tion, smoke be­comes black soot and spoils every­thing. But the same soot, when con­tained in ink, is used in writ­ing the scrip­tures. The same soot com­bined with wa­ter, fire and wind forms clouds which give suc­cour to the world." Tul­si­das de­scribes how neg­a­tive ex­pe­ri­ence can be con­vert­ed in­to pos­i­tive ex­pe­ri­ences.

Sim­i­le: Kha­la Agha Agu­na Saad­hu Gu­na Gaa­ha

Ub­haya Apaara Udad­hi Av­a­gaa­haa.

"The tales of sins and vices of the wicked, on the one hand, and of the virtues and the vir­tu­ous, on the oth­er, are like bound­less and un­fath­omable oceans."In this sim­i­le, Tul­si­das is clar­i­fy­ing the de­struc­tion be­tween the good­ly souls and those with evil dis­po­si­tions. The bless­ings grant­ed to the vir­tu­ous are un­lim­it­ed, the pain suf­fered by evil do­ers is al­so un­lim­it­ed.

Al­lit­er­a­tion: Bhay­ou Ko­laa­hal Haya Gaya Gaa­je

By­oma Baraa­ta Baa­jane Baa­je

"There ex­ist­ed a din from hors­es neigh­ing, ele­phants trum­pet­ing and mu­sic play­ing both in the heav­ens and in the pro­ces­sion." The rep­e­ti­tion of 'b' and 'g' high­lights a va­ri­ety of mu­si­cal sounds.Ono­matopoeia: (use of words for rhetor­i­cal ef­fect) 'Kankana Kink­i­ni Noopu­ra Dhu­ni Suni

Ka­hat Lakhana Sana Ra­mu Hri­dayan Gani

Maanahun Madana Dun­dub­hee Deen­hee

Man­asaa Biswa Bi­jaya Kah Keen­hee

"Hear­ing the tin­kling of ban­gles, the small bells tied around the waist and the an­klets, Sri Ra­ma said to him­self, 'It seems as Kaamde­va (God of love) had sound­ed his dream to con­quer the uni­verse.'" It is easy to recog­nise the mu­sic sounds cre­at­ed by the rep­e­ti­tion of sounds.Dra­mat­ic De­scrip­tion: Tul­si­das' pow­er to cap­ture the in­ten­si­ty of the emo­tions of the in­hab­i­tants of Ay­o­d­hya when they heard the news of Lord Ra­ma's ex­ile, and the deep emo­tion­al im­pact of their grief is ex­pressed as fol­lows:

Na­gara Vyaapi Gai Baa­ta Su­teech­hee

Hu­a­ta Charhee Janu Sa­ba Tana Beech­hee

Suni Bhae Bikala Sakala Nara Naa­ree

Be­li Bita­pa Ji­mi Dekhi Davaa­ree.

"These bit­ter tid­ings spread as quick­ly through the city as the poi­son of a scor­pi­on's sting through the body. All men and women were shocked to hear of it and with­ered in grief, as trees and creep­ers dry­ing at the ap­proach of a for­est fire..."

The Ra­mayan pro­vides thou­sands of ex­am­ples of the bril­liance of Tul­si­das' abil­i­ty to de­scribe in minute de­tails scenes which il­lus­trate emo­tions. De­scrip­tions of the phys­i­cal en­vi­ron­ment, love, sen­ti­ment, pathos, hero­ism, hor­ror and re­pug­nance, won­der and hu­mour abound in Ra­mayan. It is in­deed a lit­er­ary tsuna­mi that skill­ful­ly in­te­grates var­i­ous lit­er­a­cy de­vices to de­liv­er im­pact.

The Ra­mayan con­tributes sig­nif­i­cant­ly to hu­man­i­ty in its ex­po­si­tion of eth­i­cal con­duct, and sets the high­est stan­dards and bench­marks to em­u­late. The Ra­mayan teach­es us how to con­duct our­selves in all spheres of ex­is­tence: sib­ling to sib­ling; chil­dren to par­ents; friend to friend; hus­band and wife to each oth­er; devo­tee to the lord; rulers and lead­ers to their fol­low­ers and oth­er re­la­tion­ships.

Lord Ra­ma em­bod­ies the high­est ideals of eth­i­cal con­duct in words, thoughts and deeds. This in­ter­ac­tion with devo­tees and foes alike en­ables every­one to un­der­stand ful­ly the na­ture, scope and ap­pli­ca­tion of eth­i­cal con­duct. Sri Ra­ma dis­charges all his du­ties based on eth­i­cal and moral prin­ci­ples and not on emo­tion­al at­tach­ment. He per­forms a hero­ic sac­ri­fice when faced with a choice be­tween love and du­ty.