Ramayana

The Ramayana is an ancient Indian epic, composed sometime in the 5th century
BCE, about the exile and then return of Rama, prince of Ayodhya. It was
composed in Sanskrit by the sage Valmiki, who taught it to Rama's sons, the twins
Lava and Kush. At about 24000 verses, it is a rather long poem and, by tradition, is
known as the Adi Kavya (adi = original, first; kavya = poem). While the basic story
is about palace politics and battles with demon tribes, the narrative is interspersed
with philosophy, ethics, and notes on duty. While in that other Indian epic,
the Mahabharata, the characters are presented with all their human follies and
failings, the Ramayana leans more towards an ideal state of things: Rama is the
ideal son and king, Sita the ideal wife, Hanuman the ideal devotee, Lakshman and
Bharat the ideal brothers, and even Ravana, the demon villian, is not entirely
despicable.
The poem describes the royal birth of the god Rama in the kingdom
of Ayodhya (Oudh), his tutelage under the sage Vishvamitra, and his success in
bending Shiva’s mighty bow at the bridegroom tournament of Sita, the daughter of
King Janaka, thus winning her for his wife. After Rama is banished from his
position as heir to the kingdom through a palace intrigue, he retreats to the forest
with his wife and his favourite half-brother, Lakshmana, to spend 14 years in exile.
There Ravana, the demon-king of Lanka, carries off Sita to his capital while her
two protectors are busy pursuing a golden deer sent to the forest to mislead them.
Sita resolutely rejects Ravana’s attentions, and Rama and his brother set out to
rescue her. After numerous adventures, they enter into alliance with Sugriva, king
of the monkeys, and, with the assistance of the monkey-general Hanuman and
Ravana’s own brother, Vibhishana, they attack Lanka. Rama slays Ravana and
rescues Sita, who undergoes an ordeal by fire in order to clear herself of suspicions
of infidelity. When they return to Ayodhya, however, Rama learns that the people
still question the queen’s chastity, and he banishes her to the forest. There she
meets the sage Valmiki (the reputed author of the Ramayana) and at his hermitage
gives birth to Rama’s two sons. The family is reunited when the sons come of age,
but Sita, after again protesting her innocence, plunges into the earth, her mother,
who receives her and swallows her up.
The poem enjoys immense popularity in India, where its recitation is considered an
act of great merit. Little is known of Valmiki as a historical figure, though he is
described as having been a thief named Ratnakara prior to becoming a sage. Many
translations of the Ramayana into the vernacular languages are themselves works
of great literary artistry, including the Tamil version of Kampan,
the Bengali version of Krittibas, and the Hindi version, Ramcharitmanas,
of Tulsidas. Throughout North India the events of the poem are enacted in an
annual pageant, the Ram Lila, and in South India the two epics, the Ramayana and
the Mahabharata, make up the story repertoire of the kathakali dance-drama of
Malabar. The Ramayana was popular during the Mughal period (16th century), and
it was a favourite subject of Rajasthani and Pahari painters of the 17th and 18th
centuries.
The story also spread in various forms throughout Southeast
Asia (especially Cambodia, Indonesia, and Thailand), and its heroes, together with
the Pandava brothers of the Mahabharata, were also the heroes of traditional
Javanese-Balinese theatre, dance, and shadow plays. Incidents from
the Ramayana are carved in bas-relief on many Indonesian monuments—for
example, at Panataran in eastern Java.

Ravana
Ravana, in Hinduism, the 10-headed king of the demons (rakshasas). His
abduction of Sita and eventual defeat by her husband Rama are the central
incidents of the popular epic the Ramayana (“Rama’s Journey”). Ravana ruled in
the kingdom of Lanka (probably not the same place as modern Sri Lanka), from
which he had expelled his brother Kubera. The Ram Lila festival, an annual
pageant popular particularly in northern India, is climaxed with the defeat of
Ravana and the burning of huge effigies of the demons.

Ravana is described as having 10 heads and 20 arms and is vividly portrayed

in Rajasthani painting of incidents of the Ramayana, flying away with Sita,
fighting with Rama, and sitting with his demon councillors. In sculpture, a
favourite incident depicted is his shaking of Mount Kailas. Shiva stopped him by
pressing the mountain down with his toe, keeping him imprisoned beneath for
1,000 years. Notable examples of this representation can be seen at Ellora in
Maharashtra state and at Elephanta Island in Mumbai Harbour.

Glorification of Ravana is not unknown. In modern times, Tamil groups who

oppose what they believe to be the political domination of southern India by the
north view the story of Rama as an example of the Sanskritization and cultural
repression of the south and express their sympathy for Ravana and
their antipathy toward Rama.
Sita
Sita, (Sanskrit: “Furrow”) also called Janaki, in Hinduism, the consort of the
god Rama. Her abduction by the demon king Ravana and subsequent rescue are the
central incidents in the great Hindu epic Ramayana (“Rama’s Journey”).

Sita was raised by King Janaka; she was not his natural daughter but sprang from a
furrow when he was ploughing his field. Rama won her as his bride by
bending Shiva’s bow, and she accompanied her husband when he went into exile.
Though carried away to Lanka by Ravana, she kept herself chaste by concentrating
her heart on Rama throughout her long imprisonment. On her return
she asserted her purity and also proved it by voluntarily undergoing an ordeal by
fire. Rama, however, banished her to the forest in deference to public opinion.
There she gave birth to their two children, Kusha and Lava. After they reached
maturity and were acknowledged by Rama to be his sons, she called upon her
mother, Earth, to swallow her up.

Sita is worshipped as the incarnation of Lakshmi, the consort of Vishnu. Though

often regarded as the embodiment of wifely devotion and self-sacrifice, she is
critical of Rama at times, even in the earliest version of the Ramayana, and in
some of the later versions of the story she departs from the idealized, chaste image
of the earlier text. She is frequently depicted in Indian miniature paintings of
the Ramayana and in South Indian bronzes. These usually form a group, with
images of Rama, his brother Lakshmana, and his devotee, the monkey Hanuman.
The iconographic texts instruct the artist to show Sita looking at her husband with
supreme happiness.
Hanuman
Hanuman, in Hindu mythology, the monkey commander of the monkey army.
His exploits are narrated in the great Hindu Sanskrit poem the Ramayana (“Rama’s
Journey”).

While still a baby, Hanuman, the child of a nymph by the wind god, tried to fly up
and grab the Sun, which he mistook for a fruit. Indra, the king of the gods, struck
Hanuman with a thunderbolt on the jaw (hanu), thus inspiring the name. When
Hanuman continued to misbehave, powerful sages cursed him to forget his magic
powers, such as the ability to fly or to become infinitely large, until he was
reminded of them. Hanuman led the monkeys to help Rama,
an avatar (incarnation) of the god Vishnu, recover Rama’s wife, Sita, from
the demon Ravana, king of Lanka (likely not the present-day Sri Lanka). Having
been reminded of his powers by Jambavan, the king of the bears, Hanuman crossed
the strait between India and Lanka in one leap, despite the efforts of watery
demonesses to stop him by swallowing him or his shadow. He was discovered in
Lanka, and his tail was set on fire, but he used that fire to burn down Lanka.
Hanuman also flew to the Himalayas and returned with a mountain full of
medicinal herbs to restore the wounded in Rama’s army.

Hanuman is worshipped as a subsidiary figure in temples dedicated to Rama or

directly in shrines dedicated to Hanuman himself. The latter are generally thronged
by monkeys, who know that they cannot be mistreated there. In temples throughout
India, he appears in the form of a monkey with a red face who stands erect like a
human. For his service to Rama, Hanuman is upheld as a model for all human
devotion (bhakti).
Hanuman is also a popular figure among Buddhists in Central, Southeast, and East
Asia, and throughout those areas many temples have been erected for
his worship and districts of towns bear his name. Outside India, however, rather
different tales are told of him. Although steadfastly chaste in the Sanskrit tradition,
for instance, he has wives and children in other traditions. He has been identified
as the inspiration for the monkey hero of the great Chinese poem Xiyouji (“Journey
to the West”). In India Hanuman is revered by the nationalist Hindu
organization Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, and he has been depicted as a fierce
superhero in a popular series of comic books. The
Hanuman langur (Semnopithecus entellus), one of the most common Indian
monkeys, is named after the Ramayana character.