Rama’s First Campaign

While Rama was still a Boy of 16, the famous yogi, Viswamitra, approached King Dasarath and asked that the Boy be allowed to travel on a military campaign against two Rakshasas who were attacking the hermitages of saintly persons, interrupting the performance of sacrifice. Why did the sage Viswamitra ask for the Boy Rama? Because no one was equal to Him, even though He was as yet untrained in the use of the principal weaponry, bow and arrow. After some hesitance by Dasarath, who was loathe to have his Son part for a dangerous mission, Rama Chandra went forth.

If we take military history as an evolution of progressively more deadly weapons, we may slight the figure of Rama, possessing no more than a bow and arrow. But the enemies of Rama were allowed no such miscalculation as to His ability to destroy. He stood before them like a hill of nuclear missiles. He discharged His feathered arrows in sheets which blotted out the blue of the sky and which entered the hearts of the enemy in unlimited numbers at incredible velocity. So we shouldn't think of Rama the Archer as quaint or dated. His bow, a gift from the demigod Indra, was a supreme Army and Air Force in itself. His arsenal included many varieties of deadly arrows, charmed by the Science of Mantra, or sound vibration. Once released, those arrows could not be turned back, no matter where the adversary fled for shelter.

In the final battle against Ravana, Lord Rama Chandra resorted to a nuclear weapon, the Brahmastra fire weapon, whose released heat is said to frighten the denizens of the uppermost planets of the material universe. And this Brahmastra, too, was a winged arrow affixed to a bowstring. "Among the weapon wielders, I am Rama," Lord Krishna says in The Gita. God is the greatest Warrior, and He possesses the means to release the ultimate weapon.

On this boyhood military campaign against "the Rovers of the Night," Rama discharged two wind weapons, killing one Rakshasa and landing the other a few thousand miles away in the ocean.

Viswamitra, being pleased with young Rama and Lakshman, narrated many wonderful things to them, about the Appearance of the Lord as the Dwarf Vamana, about the origin of the sacred River Ganges-and about a worshipable bow kept by King Janaka, the father of Sita. This Janaka is mentioned in The Bhagavad-gita as having attained perfection by carrying out his occupational duties as a Kshatriya King. Once, for his part in ameliorating the anger of Lord Shiva the Destroyer, Janaka was presented with a most formidable bow. The bow was so mighty, in fact, that no one could even bend it in order to string it. Janaka made offerings of flowers and prayers before the bow given him by Lord Shiva, acknowledging that the personality who could string the sacred bow must be an extraordinary power. In view of which, King Janaka offered the hand of his daughter Sita to the man who would come and bend the bow.

Sita, of course, had many suitors, and all failed to win her. Her dowry was valor. Of all chaste and beautiful young women, she was the topmost jewel, and was very dear to Janaka. Viswamitra brought Rama and Lakshman to Janaka's palace just to show them the bow given by Shiva. A large assembly of people were gathered to see the weapon, as Rama Chandra took it up in His hand, and asked Janaka, "What would you have Me do with it? Shall I string it now?"

"Yes," Janaka assented.

At once, Rama easily bent the bow until it cracked in two pieces, making a thundering explosion which rendered all present unconscious, except for Viswamitra, Rama and Lakshman! At that time the gods showered flowers from the sky upon Rama Chandra, and there was cheering in the heavens. King Janaka then agreed, with great pleasure, that his daughter should be married to the mighty Rama Chandra