Divine Weapons and Tejas in the Two Indian Epics

Abstract

The divine weapons (divya astra) of the two Indian epics, the Mah ¯ abh ¯ arata and the R ¯ am ¯ ayan. a, play a central and ubiquitous role in the narratives. Nevertheless, the subject has been woefully neglected. With numerous gods and heroes, most of whom wield at least one divine weapon, the epics have produced the most vivid and rich examples of divine weapon combat, quests, and histories. The heroes' victories are achieved only with divine weapons. The battle scenes are replete with divine weapons and the carnage they produce. Arjuna travels to the remote Him¯ alayas to obtain divine weapons from´Sivafrom´ from´Siva, the four world guardians, and various other gods. R¯ ama obtains most of his divine arsenal from the divine sage Vasis. t. ha. Throughout both epics, histories of individual divine weapons are enumerated. It is within the epics that the divine weapons reach their most developed stage, while bringing to the foreground many beliefs and practices ancient Indians, especially the warriors, had about the world they lived in. In fact, in no other mythological corpus is the concept of divine weapons more developed and more complex than in the two Indian epics. Thus, without a proper understanding of the divine weapons the Indian epics cannot be fully appreciated. However, the divine weapons cannot be properly understood without a comprehensive examination of the concept of tejas or "fiery energy." Embedded within the mythology is a recurring set of principles that pertain to the nature of tejas. This set of principles relates directly to the nature and function of the divine weapons. Therefore, because tejas governs the way the divine weapons operate in the mythology, the primary aim of the following paper is to outline its "intrinsic laws" and to codify them systematically in a working model. To stress the point, this paper is primarily a study of the nature and function of divine weapons in the two Indian epics, yet, as the episodes will show, the concept of tejas is intrinsic and thus totally indispensable. The significance of tejas has been overlooked, and a coherent depiction of it is crucial for an understanding of the divine weapons of the Mah ¯ abh ¯ arata and the R ¯ am ¯ ayan. a. 1