Bhishma

Prafulla Kumar Mohanty

Watching B.R. Chopra's Tele Mahabharat serial compulsorily during the pathless lockdown I was struck by one shot : Bhisma lying on a bed of arrows in a forlorn corner of the Kurukshetra battle field with countless bleeding zones in his white clad body.  A man whose bow's thunder sank the hearts of the high and mighty and melted all stubborn heroes to fearful cowardice before the murmur stopped, the same hero lay half awake on a bed of arrows! The man fortified with a boon from his father Shantanu to die as per his wish was still thinking of his motherland, Hastinapur, wishing to see its secure future before wishing his breath to cease! It was an imaginative shot bringing the irony home that life is not a biological process, what matters in life is the will to counter the unseen vicissitudes by wisdom and fortitude which ultimately betray man's sole purpose of life. This stately scene  in the sunless battlefield of life stands out as the ultimate worth of man. Even after a full life of dedication and service man fails and falls on the arrows shot by the very things he loved to protect.

 Arguably Bhishma was the tallest figure  in Aryabarta. He was invincible in archery. His own Guru Parshuram had to acknowledge defeat. He was godlike in his resolve  to rise above the worldly ties of family, power, royalty and other luxuries of life which accompany them. He took a vow not to marry and raise a family when  the father of Satyabati apprehended that his children may rival her daughter's  children to the throne of Hastinapur. But here one is tempted to ask the question: Should he have taken such a vow? Only to pave the way for his old father Shantanu to marry Satyabati which in any case was lustful to say the least why, should the Prince, the most suitable and rightful inheritor to the throne make  a sacrifice of his own future? A future which was made uncertain by the unholy and  unequal marriage between Shantanu and the daughter of the fisher king, Satyabati. Bhishma's personal sacrifice was not for any noble cause. It was a vain sacrifice for a weak willed man, the king of Hastinapur who could not make his divine wife Ganga a queen or a woman. Sacrifices are made to save lives, to speak out Truth, to reveal wisdom; but Bhishma's sacrifice was for his father's lust.  Was it not a deviation from the course of nature and also politics? In return, however, he was given a boon of Death by Self will. But what is the utility of wishful death for a  man who has alienated himself to a metaphysical level by his own volition only to watch life flow without his effective controlling hands and even mind?

He had given his word of honour to his father to protect the throne of Hastinapur and accept the person who sat on the throne as his king. But we may ask legitimately whether his understanding of his own commitment was clear. Throne is a symbol of royal authority and kingship is another symbol of power wielded by a person to protect and serve the people. If Bhishma  accepted the person sitting on the throne as his master, he has reduced himself to the state of a subject if not a slave. How then could he control and guide the Person on the Throne and by what powers?  The king was responsible for Hastinapur and Bhishma's vow to protect Hastinapur was lost in his obedience to the throne.

His vow is in a way  responsible for the moral corruption which the Rajmata Satyabati had to submit to in the name of saving the clan. Shantanu's two sons were physically weak ; perhaps that was the way of destiny's revenge on Shantanu's indiscretion. Satyabati invited her own rape- son  Vyasa, the great scholar and sage to mate with the widows of Bichitravirya which definitely flouted the moral codes of society. Bhishma became  a mere witness to the gradual decline and fall of all values. Blindness to reality and loss of natural virility set on the Hastinapur throne to which Bhishma's oath bound loyalty had to acquiesce in. Bhishma definitely had a throne - loyalty that was skewed. He never questioned the Barunabrata crime and conspiracy. He never could hold the integrity of the Hastinapur throne. The kingdom was divided between the cousins.  He was responsible  by his assent to the division of territory. Like Shakespeare's King Lear Bhishma too treated the 'earth' as family property. He allowed the dice game  in the Royal  Court of Hastinapur and unprotestingly sat through the inhuman sight of  the denuding Of Draupadi by Dussasana at Duryodhan's orders.  Had he raised his voice or calmly walked away from the court the Hastinapur Royal Court would have been  spared  the moral  accusations of history. And finally the Mahabharat war could have been avoided had Bhishma stayed neutral like Vidur . Bhishma's vows to protect the  throne have no significance as Bhishma failed to protect the values of the famed kuru clan. The throne is a lifeless material frame of authority but the symbol is more important than the substance. Bhishma tried to protect the substance at the expense of the symbolic majesty.

But history will pay its due tributes to this great helpless Hero. He had the right perceptions and also the right commitments. But never imposed his sense of order  on the chaotic minds around him. In short he did not walk away. He stayed in the rut and till the final moment was true to his convictions.

The final scene of his life is a loud statement of his true position in history. Bhishma's glory did not have a verticality: He lay horizontally oh a bed of arrows . But the angels and humans threw petals on the dying, bleeding body while his great soul was adored and admired by Time and its unending manifestations.