dhanuryaagam

When sage Narada told Kamsa that the so called daughter of his cousin Devaki whom he unsuccessfully tried to kill by smashing on a rock was actually Yasoda's daughter and the boy growing with Yasoda in Gokulam was Devaki's eighth son Krishna, Kamsa was scared to death. He thanked Narada for the valuable information and with out realizing that Narada was opening the door to his own death, he called all the prominent members left in his army, like Chaanoora, Mushtika, Keshi, Shalan, Thoshalan, mahout of the ferocious elephant called Kuvalayapeedam etc and gave instructions to kill Krishna and and all His friends and well wishers .

Now Kamsa realized how the little boy of Gokulam could effortlessly kill all his assistants like Putana, Shakataasuran, Thrunaavarttham, Dhenukaasuran etc. He was nobody other than Lord Vishnu! Kamsa thought: "I will please Lord Shiva and may be His power can match Vishnu's power!"

He made announcement about an elaborate yaagam or yagnam called Dhanuryaagam or Bow- Sacrifice. This is usually done by kings to win over enemies and the yaagam is done to please Lord Shiva. In this yaagam, the endless power of Lord Shiva is invoked in to the bow. This increases the potency of the bow to that of the power of Lord Shiva and Kamsa planned to kill Krishna with the power of Lord Shiva.

Then Kamsa requests Akroora to invite Krishna, Balarama and His parents along with Gopaas for the Dhanuryaagam. It is interesting to note that even though Akroora agrees to go as a messenger to cheat the uncheatable Lord, he says one sentence to Kamsa:

"Prabho, even to fulfill one's God-forbidden desires, people take extreme actions and often meet with sorrows (or very rarely attains the wrong desire). But I will obey your command to go to Gokulam".

Of course in this case, Kamsa embraced death. Often ordinary people (like us) also knowingly pursue our actions to attain undesirable desires and undergo endless misery. Even if somebody reminds, "vinaashakaale vipareethabuddhi" pushes back our power of discrimination. Ravana also was advised by several people starting from Hanuman, Vibheeshanan and even his own beloved wife Mandodari. But nothing prevented him from going forward with his plans to kill Lord Rama.

What made Akroora think in the right direction? What made Vibheeshana think reasonably and take "sharanagathi" at Lord Rama's feet? It is bhakthi and only bhakthi or devotion of both these devotees inspired them to surrender at the Lord's feet.

May Bhagavaan give us bhakthi to annihilate all the negative energy emerging within us and bless us to surrender at His feet!