The personality of Krishna

Lord Krishna is among the most revered Gods amongst Hindus anywhere in the world.  There are numerous temples in India and outside and several organizations promoting devotion for Lord Krishna. While it is great to be a devotee of the Lord, I thought it will be worthwhile to pen down some of the unique facets of his personality, so that even non-believers could gain from an insight into his personality.

Aggressive goodness of Krishna

If we try to classify people in the world, they would fall into the following 4 broad categories:

1. Passively good
2. Passively bad
3. Aggressively bad
4. Aggressively good

The vast majority of us are passively good. We lead a normal life, not wishing to hurt anyone, but at the same time, not taking a stand to protest against something wrong. How often have we not told ourselves in situations where we know something is wrong, just to walk away from the scene, because we do not want to get involved?

The passively bad are those with bad intentions, those who keep scheming things, but it is all in their mind only. By themselves, they will not vent out their badness, until someone else lights a spark in them, at which point they take off and show their deep rooted bad nature.

The third set are the aggressively bad, who are bad basically and do not hesitate to aggressively pursue their bad intentions/desires to bad actions that can wreck others. We have enough examples of dictators and of the lunatic fringe in every group, which aggressively pushes its agenda on the vast passively good majority.

Finally, we have the aggressively good, who are basically good and will not hesitate to project their power to ensure that the aggressively bad are subdued.

Krishna falls into the last category of aggressively good.  Around his time, there were several despotic rulers in India like Kamsa and Jarasandha. Though there were other powerful men like Bhishma at that time, they belonged to the vast passively good people and they had done nothing to subdue the aggressively bad rulers. It was the aggressively good Krishna who employed a variety of tactics and ensured that the aggressively bad were subdued and the rule of law and righteousness prevailed.  The same was true during the Mahabharata war. The passively good Pandavas were subdued and humiliated by the aggressively bad, Kauravas.  It was Krishna in the role of the aggressively good mentor of the Pandavas, who helped to decisively defeat the aggressively bad, Kauravas.

Krishna as motivator and mentor

I have mentioned in an earlier blog about the beginning of the Mahabharata war and the despondency of Arjuna. Arjuna, the great Pandava warrior totally broke down when he saw that he had to fight against his own kith and kin in the great Kurukshetra war. He put down his bow and arrows, sat down and refused to fight. Luckily he had Krishna as his charioteer and mentor. Krishna understood the psychological state that Arjuna was in and took on the role of mentor and motivator. He told Arjuna about the essential nature of the soul and his duty as a warrior. Spread over about 700 verses of the Bhagwad Gita, Krishna instructed Arjuna about his essential duty to act as a warrior. The words of Krishna were so empowering that, at the end of the discourse, Arjuna took up his bow and arrows and vowed to vanquish the enemies. From a passively good person who shuddered to think about fighting his own relatives, Arjuna was made to realize his true purpose in life and over the next 18 days waged such a vigorous battle that the enemy was vanquished.

Even during the war, when the great warrior Bhishma looked unstoppable and was almost destroying the Pandava army which included Arjuna, it was Krishna who through a strategic maneuver, brought the half man-half woman, Shikandi to fight Bhishma. Bhishma had vowed never to fight anyone other than a man. Hiding behind Shikhandi, Arjuna’s sharp arrows felled the mighty Bhishma.  Similarly when the opposite commander, Drona appeared invincible, it was Krishna who suggested telling a “half-truth” that Drona’s son was killed. Overcome by emotion, when Drona put down his arms, he was killed.

Though it may sound that wrong tactics were used to win, Krishna being aggressively good knew that he had to use aggressive techniques to defeat the aggressively bad army facing Arjuna and his brothers. He motivated Arjuna and mentored him and his brothers so that they could win the war. Once the war was won and the aggressively bad enemy was defeated, Krishna helped the Pandavas consisting of Arjuna and his brothers to establish governance driven by righteousness.

Krishna as self-realized soul

On the battlefield of Kurukshetra, Krishna told the immortal Bhagwad Gita to Arjuna. This set of verses is probably the highest level of spiritual knowledge in the world. Krishna condensed the teachings in the various Upanishads into an easy to understand discourse for the benefit of Arjuna and to the whole world.  In this, primarily he covered about the essential nature of all us which is nothing but pure consciousness. He further expounded on our absolute necessity to act in this world without a desire for fruits of action as a means to attain the highest goal of spiritual oneness.

The humility of Krishna

When the Pandavas did the famous Rajasuya Yajna which would proclaim them as emperors, various people who had come to partake in the function were assigned different tasks. Krishna who was the most important guest or very very important person in today’s parlance also asked to be assigned a task. When the Pandavas refused to assign a task to him, he said that every person has to act and he did not want to be excused from working. Since all the tasks had been assigned by then, the only task remaining was the task of washing the feet of holy men who came to the function. Krishna willingly took on himself the job of washing the feet of people. Krishna, who was a king maker with vast amount of riches was such a humble person that he performed his duty of washing feet with the same reverence and respect as he would have done any other job.

Thus, whether we believe Krishna was God or not, the personality of Krishna has so many facets from which each of us could learn and benefit.