Originally posted by: Poorabhforever
sorry for being ignornant but why should yudi be burdened by karna s death when he or arjun for that matter didnt even knew that he was their elder bro?? they were kept in dark from where i see they saw just a person from opposite team somebody who was great supporter of duri in all his doing and one of his wife s offenders why should a man be burdened by death of somebody who for him was always a member camp??
Originally posted by: Brahmaputra
What you said is right, but it is today's POV. In those days, it did matter. Moreover, they were royalties, not common people. Their status definitely depened on how common people saw them. It is still true, if we think about Princess Diana. In politics, no one can know what can be used against them. So to be on the safe side, they all try to pose themselves blemish-free even if there is no need to. We always see Mahabharata characters like us, but never as politicians who above everything had a status and public image to protect.
@all - Nice discussions. Very insightful thread. It would be nice to analyze different possibilities, alternatives about the great epic Mahabharata with different people.
@TM - Do you agree that Karna being Drona's student and a friend of Duryodhana's an effort on the part of composer or later editors to whitewash the Pandavas?
Originally posted by: Brahmaputra
So this is where we're supposed to discuss Jane Eyre' in 50 Shades of Grey' forum. 😆
@SweetRogue I think it is better to keep CE citations for only the most needed parts, in small quotes may be, not in big chunks. They might land in copyright violation as it is clearly stated in CE that we are not to use them without Debroy's & Penguin's permission.
Answer to your question. As I said earlier, this is a only cross examination of inconsistencies.
As far as we see in the book, the events related to Drona are - Drona lived close to Himalayas, learnt weapons from Parashurama, had a dispute with Drupada, came to HP, tricked the princes to get Bheeshma's attention, became their Guru, Karna came, Ekalavya was rejected, Drona denied Karna Brahmastra etc, Karna went to Parashurama, learnt it & returned, then we have Rangabhoomi events.
This means that Drona knew Karna before Rangabhoomi, as he was Drona's student.
Here is the problem.
1] Drona denied Ekalavya education as he was Nishada. He didn't accept Ekalavya as his student. From the order of different classes we saw in Manusmriti, Nishada was above Suta & was not even a pratiloma cast. When Drona denied education to Ekalavya, who was the prince of Nishadas, how did he accept Karna, who was technically still lower, and a low-born's son?
2] As stated in CE, in Rangabhoomi, when Karna comes, "Everyone in that assembly remained stationary and gazed at him steadfastly. They were filled with great curiosity and asked each other who he was. Had Karna been Drona's student, whether he later went to Parashurama by then or not, at least one person there would've recognised him and that alone would have prevented him from performing there. But no one did, not even Kripa who later questioned his birth. So no one there knew Karna before.
3] Again, CE says, "With Drona's permission, Karna, always eager to do battle and immensely strong, exhibited all that Partha had displayed before. Here Drona gave permission & Kripa didn't interfere. Because they didn't know he was a Suta putra. Had they known, they would not have allowed it.
4] Going by the book, it was difficult for anyone to miss Karna, not for his looks, but for his kavacha-kundala. Not even Kripa, who had been living in HP before Drona came, seem to recognize by that.
I think these are enough to prove that Drona had never seen Karna before. So it can be assumed that he never taught Karna anything.
A few more facts.
If we go by the ages in MB, Karna was quite elder to Yudhi. Yudhi came to HP when he was around 5 years, as we can assume from the course of events though no age is specified. Drona became a Guru after this only. Had Karna not began his education around 5 years, he would never have had the chance to learn, as it was customary for sons to follow their father's occupation as they grew up. So Karna must have begun learning long before Yudhi came to HP, when Drona still was not anyone's Guru.
Also, why should have Karna been sent to Drona, who was known to no one at that time and lived some 1500 km from Anga [Anga is in bihar now, Drona lived in today's uttarakhand], when the famous Parashurama lived some hundred kilometres away? [Mahendra parvata, where Parashurama lived, is the eastern end of Eastern Ghats]. Also, it is repeated many times that Karna was taught by Parashurama.
This is why I consider that Karna was not Drona's student. Karna is shown as his student possibly because the writers/editors/interpolators wanted to lessen the burden on Yudhi upon whose shoulders was the weight of killing his brother. So by showing Karna teaming up with Suyodhana since childhood and plotting against Pandavas, they wanted the readers to believe that it was not a bad thing to kill a brother who teamed up with wrong guys.
This is what I observed. Since it is based only on the facts found in the book, it will definitely change as I read more. So far, I haven't found anything that contradicted this observation.
comment:
p_commentcount