KRISHNA WHO RAN AWAY FROM BATTLE!
When I joined service in Gujarat I worked near
a famous pilgrimage town- Dakor. The God there was called Rana-Chod-rai,
meaning: the king who ran away from battle field. The idol was of Krishna. I
was wondering why this name to Krishna who taught Geeta to Arjuna to dissuade
him from running away from the battle field!
A photo of the Deity of Ranchor Raya, a form of Lord
Krishna who left the battlefield. This famous Deity is located in the town of
Dakor, Gujarat.
We all know that Bhagawat Geeta begins with
Krishna telling Arjuna not to run away from Kurukshetra battle field during
Mahabharata war. I wondered how and when he himself ran away from battlefield.
I got an interesting reply to this from a TV Program
which I wish to share with you.
As you know, Krishna fought with his uncle
Kamsa the wicked king of Mathura ,and
killed him to punish him for his cruel
deeds. The mighty Jaraasandha, another wicked king became very angry on Krishna
when his daughters who had married Kamsa became widows .Jaraasandha vowed to
avenge the death of his son-in law,Kamsa and came with a huge army and sieged Mathura . He vowed that he
would punish Krishna by defeating him in battle. But Krishna wanted to avoid
bloodshed and killing of a number of innocent soldiers in the battle. So he hid
himself inside the fort. After a long wait Jarasandha had to go back as no war
could take place. This siege of Mathura
was repeated 17 times. People of Mathura were put to a lot of difficulty
because of this frequent siege as they could not go out of their town.
Now, who is this Jaraasandha?
Brihadratha was a king of Maghada kingdom. He
had two wives. He ruled his kingdom for a number of years, and was getting old,
yet he had no children. So, he went to the forest and served a sage. The sage
was pleased and asked if he had any wish. When the king told of his desire to
have a child, the sage crated a fruit with his magical powers and gave him the
fruit ,telling that on eating the fruit his wife would give birth to a strong boy.
The king could not favour either of his two wives .So he cut the fruit into two
and gave one half to each. After a period of eager expectation, both the queens
gave birth, but to their horror, two separate halves of a child, each with one
hand one leg and half head and body. The king was very sad and reluctantly abandoned
the two halves in a forest. There, a daemon called Jaraa, wanted to eat the two
pieces of meat, She took the two halves and put them together to eat.
Immediately the two halves joined together and a strong boy emerged. She had no
heart to eat such a nice boy, and took him to the king. The king was overjoyed
to get back his son and named the child Jaraa-sandha i.e. joined by Jaraa .The boy
grew to become a very strong but wicked king of Maghada. Jarasandha captured a
number of kings and put them in prison,
But in the meanwhile, another cruel king’Kaala
Yavana’, an ally of Jarasandha, attacked Mathura
with a formidable army. This time
Krishna decided that people of Mathura were put to a lot of in convenience of
frequent attacks because of His presence and hence he should leave Mathura and
settle at a far off place. He left Mathura secretly and headed towards a new
Fort in the west coast-Dwaraka. When Kaala Yavana learnt of this, he abandoned
the siege of Mathura and went in pursuit of Krishna . That is
how Krishna left a battlefield!
Kaala Yavna caught up with Krishna at a lake
called Gomati, a little south of present day Ahmedabad. Seeing the Yavana pursuing
him, Krishna entered a deep and dark cave and
hid himself.
Tired after his assisting Gods in their war
with Asuras, Muchukunda a prince of Ikshwaku dynasty had been taking rest
sleeping in this dark cave. Kaalia yavana, pursuing Krishna ,
rushed into the cave and stumbled on the sleeping Muchukunda. When Muchukunda
opened his eyes in anger and saw the Yavana king, Kaala Yavana was burnt to
ashes. Thus another cruel king was also eliminated.
People of nearby Dakor village saw Lord Krishna
emerging out of the cave.They pleaded that He should remain with them. Krishna
stayed there for some time before proceeding to the new kingdom-Dwaraka.
Because they heard that Krishna was coming away from the besieged city- Mathura , they called him ‘Ran-Chod-Rai.!
This
is the Temple of Ran Chod Rai at Dakor on the bank of Gomati lake.
Let
me add an anecdote related to Dakor –suggested by a lady of Andhra who had
lived in Gujarat!
There
was a poor couple at Dakor,-Bodana and his wife, who were great devotees of
Lord Krishna of Dwaraka. They used to go by foot to Dwaraka every poornima day
(full-moon day) for Darshan of Krishna. But, now they had become old and it was
becoming very difficult to undertake the
journey.Lord Krishna came in Bodana’s dream and asked him to bring a
bullock-cart during his next visit to Dwaraka, so that He would come with them
to Dakor.! You can imagine their Joy and devotion.
Accordingly,
Bodana family went with bullock cart to
Dwaraka.and prayed to Lord Krishna with great devotion.When the Temple Priest
asked why he had brought a cart,this time, Bodana blurted out that Lord Krishna
would be accompanying him to Dakor!
As
usual, the priest closed, locked and sealed, the temple doors for the night.
Badana and his wife started out to Dakor, in their cart during the night, but
to their great joy they found Lord Krishns’s idol was already in the cart! .
Next morning when the priest opened the temple, he found the Idol missing
though the lock and seal were intact. He suspected that the idol could be with
Bodana and pursued him to Dakor.
The
Priest demanded that Bodana should give back the idol. When Bodana and the
entire village pleaded that Lord Krishna had willingly come to Dakor, there was
no question of returning, he insisted that Boda should give gold of the Idol’s
weight.A Scale with two pans was set
up,and Dwaraka Krishna’s Idol was kept in one pan .
Bodana was very poor and except for a tiny nose-ring
of his wife they had no gold to offer. A nose-ring is a precious and sacred
jewel for a lady, and normally no lady would be willing to part with it.But to
retain the Idol for Dakor where they could worship daily, Bodana’s wife came forward to give all
that they had- her nose-ring. The
moment the nose-ring was dropped into the pan, the scale tilted towards that
pan! The priest and all the devotees were greatly surprised at the miracle-
Lord Krishna of Dwaraka had indicated His will to be at Dakor!! It is said that some time later, the Priest
of Dwaraka.. found another idol of Krishna in the temple pond which was
installed in Dwaraka temple, for worship.
This proves that God is
obliging ( Bhakta-Adheena) to his
devotees!
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