Reading Notes: The Ramayana Part B
Fearing that staying close to Ayodyha would inspire citizens to encourage him to return home, Rama and his group decided to move on. They set off towards Panchvati. During the journey, they met Jatayu, the Great Eagle. Jatayu was very close with Dasaratha and felt as a foster parent to Rama. He guided them to Panchvati. Once there, Lakshmana built them a hut; however, Rama still remembered his true reason for coming to Panchvati: to kill fiends and ultimately kill Ravana, the chief of the demons.
To start his task, Rama set out to the woods where he met a beautiful woman. He discovers that this woman is in fact Ravana's sister. She claims that she rejects evil and wants to help Rama. She asks him to marry her. He immediately denies this claiming that he cannot marry her because she is not high enough class. She replies that because of her mother's class, she is able to wed anyone. Kamavalli, the woman, then sees Sita and is jealous of her beauty. She does not know that Sita is Rama's wife and tries to convince Rama that Sita has used black magic to look beautiful. In fact, this woman has used black magic herself to look beautiful, as Kamavalli is actually a demon named Soorpanka, to try and seduce Rama.
Rama realizes this and teases Soorpanka so that she reveals her true nature. Rama then tells Soorpanka to leave. When she doesn't, Rama takes Sita back into their hut and shuts the door in Soorpanka's face. Soorpanka is so distraught with love that she shuts herself into a cave infested with deadly serpents and begins to hallucinate Rama. She leaves the cave to attempt to seduce Rama one last time. She lets Rama go to the river and stalks up to Sita to try and capture her. However, Lakshmana sees this and throws her to the ground. As she appeared to be a woman, he does not kill her; however, he cuts off her nose, ears, and breasts. Soorpanka makes one last attempt to receive Rama's love by telling him that if he marries her, no one will attack him. Rama dismisses her and tells her that the demons can come, as he plans on killing all of them.
Soorpanka then leaves and goes to her brother Kara, a warrior-demon. He sends his chiefs to go kill Rama and Lakshmana and bring him Sita. Soorpanka led the chiefs to Rama where he easily killed them all. Soorpanka returns to her brother. He then goes with an army of demons who are also easily killed. Rama has thus killed Kara and all of his allies. She then flees to go tell her brother Ravana.
Soorpanka tells Ravana everything that has happened, but Ravana is very intrigued by Sita. Ravana goes to his private house in the woods, as he is obsessing over Sita. Ravana changes the seasons and time of the world, throwing many into confusion. He decides that he must have Sita for himself. Ravana goes and finds Mareecha, Thataka's son that Rama shot to the sea, to ask him for help. Mareecha warns Ravana of Rama's power. Mareecha then reluctantly agrees to appear as a golden deer to lure out Sita for Ravana.
Sita sees the golden deer and begs Rama to retrieve it for her. Lakshmana begs Rama not to do so, as it is probably a trick, but Rama goes anyway. The golden deer lures Rama very far away. Rama realizes he has been tricked and shoots Mareecha, who calls out for help as the voice of Rama. Hearing the voice, Sita worries that Rama has been hurt. Lakshmana tries to calm her warning her that it is probably a trick, but she still worries. She threatens to throw herself into a fire, so Lakshmana goes to find Rama.
Ravana who had been waiting for Lakshmana to leave, takes the appearance of an old man and asks to be let in. Sita lets him in and gives him a seat. He tries to convince Sita that the asuras are actually not evil and very kind. She then makes a remark that disregards Ravana. Of course being enraged, Ravana loses his disguise and Sita becomes frightened. He then begs Sita for his love, but she warns him to leave as Rama will kill him. Since Ravana has a curse stating if he touches a woman without her consent that he will die, Ravana burrows underneath her and carries her to his chariot with the ground she had been standing on.
Sita curses at Ravana stating that he is not brave since he did not fight Rama. Ravana laughs at this. Jatayu, the eagle who was watching over Sita, then hurled himself at Ravana with all of his might. It was as if a mountain had hit the chariot. Jatayu tells Ravana to let Sita go. When Ravana declines, Jatayu begins to flap his wings creating a storm that paralyzed Ravana and his chariot. He then hit and tore with his whole body, beak, and claws with so much force that Ravana's ensign was torn, his crowns were knocked off, his royal canopy was in tatters, and the chariot was smashed. Eventually, Ravana chopped off Jatayu's wings with his sword called "Chandrahasa." Ravana then picked up Sita with the piece of ground beneath her and put her on his shoulder. He used his power of flight to return to his palace. Jatayu remained alive long enough to tell Rama and Lakshmana that Sita was okay, but he died before telling them where she went.
Bibliography: Narayan, R K, and Kampar. The Ramayana. New York, Penguin Books, 1972.
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