Onam: remembering the demon king

While revering the erstwhile ruler of the land, we may be missing the message concealed in the festival

Maveli nadu vanidum kaalam

Manushyarellarum onnu poley…

(When Maveli ruled the land, all the people were [treated] as one)

This little ditty is one’s childhood memory of the festival of Onam, the mainstay of the south Indian state of Kerala. The week-long festival would see the people doing their best to convey an impression that all is well in the world, as this is the time, as legend has it, that Mahabali, the grandson of Prahlada and Asura king who ruled the three worlds equitably, would return to earth to see that his erstwhile subjects were living well.

The story goes that Mahabali conquered the three worlds — Deva Loka, Bhumi or Bhuloka, and Paatala, the last being his "native" kingdom. Having ejected the devas, he ruled the three worlds with a firm but just hand. The devas approached Lord Vishnu, who, in the form of a Brahmin boy Vamana, inveigles Mahabali into giving away the empire as a pious gift, in the process enraging his own guru, Shukracharya, by defying his advice.

Sociologists and anthropologists see in this the tyrannical oppression of lower classes by the Brahminical classes, and social inequality, and whatnot. This is one way of looking at it, and not wrong altogether, but we must look beyond the obvious, and latch on to the spiritual, the mystical message in the story.

THE NARRATIVE

Mahabali is the grandson of Prahlada, who was the sun of Asura king Hiranyakashipu, who also ruled the three worlds. And his was truly an oppressive and regressive regime, in which the Devas hid in terror, saints and rishis were forced into worshipping the king, and humans suffered wanton slaughter.

After his emancipation (by death) at the hands of Vishnu in the form of Narasimha, Prahlada ruled the three worlds. Over the ages, he gives up his kingdom and eventually serves as a vassal to other asura kings, the last being his own grandson, Bali, whom he also nurtures and mentors.

The story of Bali is not dissimilar to that of other Asura kings who ruled the three worlds, but there was none of the cruelty or wanton killing the was the feature of the regimes of, say, Hiranyakashipu, or later, Ravana.

The main flaw of Bali was pride/arrogance, which eventually leads him to scoff about Vishnu to Prahlada, enraging the latter, who was a staunch worshipper of Vishnu.

The lord, as Vamana, describes Bali’s conquest of the three worlds as driven by greed, snatching the possessions of another, and seeking a position or station beyond his due — ahead of the appropriate time.

Bali’s treatment at the hand of Lord Vishnu, too, is substantially different from the fate of Ravana and Hiranyakashipu. Though Bali fails to recognise the Vishnu in Vamana, he does stick to his own codes and principles, and cedes his all to the little Brahmin boy in fulfilment of a vow, of which he still had room to wriggle out. He ends up giving up the Deva Loka and Bhumi Loka, and when pressed, presents his head to Vamana. The gesture pleases Lord Vishnu, who names him emperor of the Sutala Loka, with suzerainty over the entire nether world, called Paatala, which has seven kingdoms including Sutala. Moreover, he stations himself as the guardian god of Sutala, and promises Bali the stature of Indra in a future earthly cycle.

Prahlada himself ascends to Vaikuntha, the abode of Lord Vishnu.

Paatala is said to be  beauteous beyond description, filled with jewels and wealth and luxuries of every kind — and why not, since it is built by such creators of illusion as Maya and Vishwakarma. The Puranas call the seven realms of Paatala “lower heavens”, more opulent than any other region of the universe, with a life of luxury and no disease, ageing or disease.

Paatala is not to be confused with Naraka — hell — which lies even below it.

This whole narrative, while apparently appearing to be celestial, refers to the visible physical world — because it is the perspective from which  we are looking at it.

Now, if we were to elevate our own point of view…

CHANGE IN PERSPECTIVE 

The three worlds are the three lines of the celestial triangle in a human body, with each triangle bearing a triad in its own right.

The upper triad is Deva Loka, the middle, Bhuloka and the nethermost, Paatala Loka.

The Asuras are supposed to reign in the Paatala, and devas in Deva Loka, and humans are supposed to worship the Devas and shun Asuras.

But the humans, nestled in between these two powerful beings, actually swing between the upper and lower worlds.

The ego that seeks to rise and conquer the three worlds through brute force, to reach a station for which it is not yet ready spiritually, brings with it the instrument of its fall — pride and arrogance. The main symptom of this is an inability to perceive God when He stands before the person — the absence of discernment, or the absence of reason from its throne.

The one that takes shelter in God, bows his head and accepts the will of God regardless of what he himself wants, such a person gains access to the higher world, beyond the Deva Loka — Vaikuntha, the seat of Lord Vishnu or, in mystical terms, the Second Logos.

The life-purpose of the asura is to get enlightened at the hands of Vishnu (in the current era and earth scheme) and ascend to the Deva Loka.

BEHIND THE SYMBOLISM

Simply put, a negative entity is transmuted by the heart centre and rises to the higher chakras. Without the transmutation, if the energy of the lower chakras rise to the head chakras, it causes the disciple/ego to fall due to pride and arrogance.

The constant contest between the upper and the lower chakras for the control of the ego, is what is symbolised by the Samudra Manthan, or the churning of the ocean (the ocean is none other than the astral plane or the individual’s solar plexus centre).

Every time, Vishnu comes to the aid of the world. In each instant, the lower beings take recourse to power to conquer the Deva Loka, and have to be humbled, their pride broken. Interestingly, the ego never sees this coming, despite the previous instances of this same drama playing out. Consistently, the ego refuses to learn from the lessons of another ego. It has to be a personal lesson, nothing less will do.

FALL FROM GRACE

Where this whole thing wobbles in the so-called Varna system of Hinduism, is the assumption that a person’s spiritual attainment is reflected in his so-called caste, his birth status. And along with this, the society takes away from those it deems “asuras” — the lower classes and castes — the dignity to life, any facility that may allow them to rise in terms of standard of living, nutrition, education, medical care … even funereal rights.

And this tells us the state of the human race: Overall, we are very much an Asura society, bereft of the light of god, uncontrollably attracted to things of physical, emotional and mental beauty — in other words, the glamour of consumerism.

HARSH LESSON, IGNORED

Summing up, man, rather than choose to yoke himself to the light of God, chooses to chain himself to glamour in a dark, grey world, mistaking it for reality.

Onam is a stark reminder of this grim reality. Ironical, then, that we celebrate it every year with contrived gaiety and large-scale consumerism. Missing the woods for the trees. But that is precisely the nature of glamour.