IMMORTALITY

The Devas and Asuras were always at loggerheads with each other. While the opposition persisted on every matter, the tension between them only increased. The lordship of the three worlds was an exotic affair and they fought for each other’s rights. The two groups had the best preceptors under them. For the Devas, Brihaspathi took the lead order and Sukracharya for the Asuras. The two men of wisdom were the only bearers of judiciousness between the two parties.

The Asuras had an additional advantage in Sukracharya. He had mastered the art of bringing the dead back to life. The Asuras used this to their best advantage and took the chance of waging great battles against the Devas. Tired of such heinous tensions posed by the Asuras, the Devas devised a plan. They approached Kacha, the son of Brihaspati to please Sukracharya and learn the art of bringing the dead back to life from him. Kacha was intelligent and approached Sukracharya to accept him under his tutelage.

In the ancient times, enmity apart, the teachers believed in following the right moral code of conduct. Even though Kacha belonged to the clan of Devas and the son of his rival Brihaspathi, Sukracharya took him to be his disciple. Days had passed and so had months; Kacha was a very good pupil to his master. He followed all commands and never wavered from his teacher’s ordinance.

Kacha started growing very fond of his teacher’s daughter Devayani. The Asuras didn’t like the favoritism of their preceptor towards a Deva pupil. They had found out that Kacha had come only with the insight of learning the art of mastering death. One day, when Kacha set out to the forest with the cows, the Asuras attacked him, tore him up into pieces and fed his flesh to the dogs. A worried Devayani pleaded her father to see through his insight what had happened to Kacha. When he told her what had happened to Kacha, she began weeping. She wanted Kacha to come back at any cost. She pleaded her father to bring him back to life.

The second time again, the Asuras killed Kacha, burnt him and deposited the ashes in the sea. Again, Devayani insisted on bringing him back to life and the lovable father did so. Realizing that Sukracharya would bring him to life at any cost, the Asura army killed him again burnt him into ashes and mixed it into the wine of Sukracharya.

Sukracharya implied to Devayani that the Asuras were not happy with his association to Kacha and that they wouldn’t stop killing him over and over again. But Devayani was adamant. She wouldn’t listen to her preceptor father. Deciding to send Kacha away after the last time of bringing him out, Sukracharya recited the mantra of bringing the dead to life. But this time, a voice spoke from his stomach.

“Dear teacher, I am inside your stomach. I was mixed into the wine that you have consumed. I will reside here forever. I don’t insist you to bring me out,” Kacha said.

When Devayani understood what the Asuras had done to her lover, she wailed heavily. “I want you alive and so do I want Kacha back into my life. I cannot live without the two of you. The Asuras are so heinous that they have not thought wisely, but have ended you in a distasteful situation. But I cannot imagine a life without Kacha. You must do something,” she said.

Sukracharya thought for a while and declared to Kacha that he had won in the mission he had come for. He implored that his daughter was his dearest and that he couldn’t deny her of anything that she had asked for. He devised a plan of teaching the secret mantra to bring one back to life to Kacha. After Kacha tore open the intestines and came out, he would use it to bring his preceptor back to life.

Kacha was born again and as promised brought his preceptor Sukracharya back to life.

Devayani persuaded Kacha to marry her as she had truly fallen in love with him. She expressed that she had developed a great bond with him during his days of stay.

Kacha declared that since he was reborn from the body of his preceptor, he had become his mother and Devayani, his sister. Hence, it was against law to marry his own sister.

But Kacha was stubborn and stood firm on his decision. A lad of great virtue, the boy said that he could never waiver from the path of unrighteousness and that she accepts him as her brother. Devayani fought her way with him stating that he was the son of Brihaspathi and could never be her father’s son.

But the stern Kacha said, “It is in anger and misery that you speak so unwise. Allow me to go forward in my life. Your duty of taking care of your father rests completely on you.”

Kacha walked away from the hermitage of Sukracharya back to the abode of Indra.

Sukracharya was pleased with boy’s wise decision and consoled his daughter.

THROUGH THE LENS OF A GREAT AUTHOR WHO QUOTED THE FOLLOWING
LINES…

Virtue will desert the man who through lack of wisdom drinks wine.
He will be an object of scorn to all.

WRITTEN BY
DR ANITHA CHAKRAVARTHY SRIRAM.