Ravana

A pregnant mother asked her daughter, “What do u want- A brother or a sister?
Daughter: Brother.
Mother: Like whom?
Daughter: Like RAVAN.
Mother: What the hell are you saying? Are you out of your mind?
Daughter: Why not Mom? He left all his Royal ship & Kingdom, all because his sister was disrespected. Even after picking up his enemy’s wife, he didn’t even touch her. Why wouldn’t I want to have a brother like him? What would I do with a brother like Ram who left his pregnant wife after listening to aDhobithough his wife always stood by his side like a shadow? After giving Agni Pareeksha and suffering 14 years of exile. Mom, you being a wife and sister to someone, until when will you keep on asking for a ‘Ram’ as your son?

If you are one of the egoistic type of religious person close the tab right now because you will just end up cursing me even if the things written in the post are logical and make sense!
Proceed to read only if  you are a free minded religious person or an atheist !



Rama was a Deva and Ravana a Rakshas is what we all know,but Rama is worshipped because the history shows that he won against Ravana,his being a Deva has nothing to do with it.
Deva and Asura(Rakshas) can be viewed just as two different societies having different lifestyle and ideals,each of the lifestyles and ideals having equally good points and bad points,its just because Deva won against Asura and people always wanted to believe that the Good always triumphs over Evil that they branded Deva's as good and Asura as the evil!

Conflict does not necessarily be between good and the evil it is due to differences in the system of life.

Let me defend Ravana..

A devout follower of Lord Shiva,he possessed immense knowledge of vedas and upanishads and was the author of Ravana Samhita - an astrological scripture narrated by lord shiva.

He was a master scholar in medicine, mathematics,astronomy, astrology . He has written many books  like "Arka Shastra" .  in arka shastra he has compiled every herb its usage and dosage revealing cures to some complex diseases. 

The  book "Kumara Tantraya" (Gynecology and Peadetric Medicine) which  reveals the treatments for infant diseases was written by him accepting  the request of his pregnant queen Mandodari. He has similarly written  many books on astrology and also created new  Raagas in Music , esp in  Sama Veda , our 4th veda. He was such an eloquent master that he  controlled Navagrahas (the nine "grahas" aspects of human astro system).

He  is said to be one of the greatest physicians who ever existed, and even  authored the book Arka Prakashaya. The Bisajjya Grantha and Nadi  Shasthra mentions that King Ravana and his grandfather Pulasthi Muni had  graced the world-famous medical conferences held in those ancient days  in Janasthan Pura near Pakistan. In Sri Lankan folk tales, it is said  that king Ravana treated both Rama and Lakshmana with his own hand when  they were badly injured on the battlefield.

The  only King of Sri Lanka who managed to wipe out all the divisions among  the Sri Lankan people was the Great King Ravana. Under his leadership,  King Ravana managed to unite all the Sri Lankan tribes. Sri Lanka became  a secular country not subject to or bound by any religious dogma, with  no official religion, language or official yes men. Not only ruling Sri  Lanka, he governed a vast kingdom with boundaries extending over South  Asia – and was hence named Chakravarthi. In chronological records about  Ravana, it is almost impossible to find a single battle fought against  another community of people in order to invade their land or usurp their  throne. Not a single ‘racial’ conflict is mentioned in any of those  records written during his reign, though the chronicle of the Ramayana  by Valmiki stereotyped him as the most evil human to have ever existed,  providing an erroneous and biased interpretation of the Rama-Ravana war.

Ram and Lakshman, the princes of Ayodhya were admonished and sent to exile in forest.
Ram's wife Sita,a pretty,coy lady feared the repercurssions of living alone in Ayodhya and decided to be with her husband during the exile, she believed the wild forest to be safer than living as a single woman in a repressive society with three royal mother-in-laws.

One day during their exile in forest, Minakshi,the beautiful and much adored sister of King Ravana saw Ram. She was bewitched by his handsome looks and fell for him. Minakshi went upto Ram and expressed her feelings of desire for him. Ram and Laskhaman were shocked at the courage of this woman, back home in ayodhya no woman would have had the guts to propose a man.They would remain in their goongats and would have had only fleeting glances at their bridegrooms before wedding. Without hiding his disgust Lakshman retorted to Minakshi "O you filthy woman,how dare you speak like this.Women should not behave so.See our Sita here,she is a role model of how a woman should be.You are a demon".

Minakshi replied back "O you misogynist,which law of your land forbids women to express their feelings.If a man had done this you would have termed him as a courageous romantic and if a woman does it,she is a demon?.Being a sita,who does not speak against the men in her household however unjust they are is not how a woman should be". For the first time in their lives the princes of ayodhya heard a woman speak up against a man. An aghast Lakshman drew his sword and sliced the nose of the unarmed Minakshi.

Ravana propogated "Raksh Neeti" which meant equality for all.

Raksh tribe believed in nature worship and universal identity without  any bias for caste or creed and gender. The other tribes had deep caste  divides and wanted to keep that alive

Ram and Lakshman found that Sita had been abducted.How will they face the world now? how can they ever go back to ayodhya without her? the world will chastise their ability and manhood for not being able to safeguard a woman. Their masculine egos would be thrashed and their legacy relegated to oblivion. The princes decided to find out sita,they started their travel towards south.

Meanwhile in Lanka,Sita was put in a ladies community centre.There she was mocked and ridiculed by the lankan women. They could not imagine someone so coy and so dependent,and without any ability to rebel or speakup against men. Her misery was compounded when she came to know about the beautiful and intellectual Mandodari, Ravana's wife. People compared Sita's beauty to Mandodari but when they stuck a conversation with her,they scorned her intelligence or rather the lack of it.

On the other side luck favored Ram and Lakshman,they befriended Sugriva,the leader of a dark,strong and muscular race of beings from the south. Sugriva's story,of being exiled for betraying his brother,stuck a chord with Ram and Lakshman. Ram decides to help sugriva defeat his brother and in return use sugriva's army to find sita. As decided Ram killed from hiding Sugriva's brother Vali during their duel.

With the help of Sugriva's army and his commander-in-chief Hanuman,ram was able to find that Sita was imprisoned in the island of lanka. He decided to build a bridge to cross over to Lanka.

Rama wanted to construct the famous "sethu" and needed a pandit to  do the commencement puja or ritual.  The only pandit nearby was Ravana,  the best amongst all. Ravana came and performed Puja for his "enemy"  dutifully and blessed him. If this arrogance, be it..

Rama  wanted to pick an auspicious time to start the battle. Rama needed an  astrologer. Everyone unanimously suggested none other than Ravana.  Heeding to the suggestion, Rama went to ravana to ask him a good time.  Ravana as a great professional gave him the best muhurtha  (9  navaratris) and blessed him with "Vijaya Bhava". 

Finally Rama tired of all weaponry , picked up his Brahmaastra ,  equivalent of nuclear weapon in modern age. This weapon technically was  never supposed to be used in war as it was more of a deterrance. Ravana  had this weapon as well. But seeing Rama open this weapon, Ravana did  not open his Brahmastra (which he had) because he knew that had he done  that , entire humanity and ecology would have been finished, imagine 2  hydrogen bombs colliding. He opted out and gladly accepted death and  defeat for the larger purpose.

In fact before his death, Ravana makes a request to Rama to protect the Humanity and Ecology to its fullest !

Many slam Ravana condemning him as lustful and arrogant but I beg to  disagree. If he had indeed been lustful then Sita would not have left  his palace untouched by him. However, even if it had become lust, he has  the sage Vishwamitra for competition in horniness! If arrogance is a  crime, hang Durvasa first who was much more arrogant than Ravana and is  still considered a maharishi!

Our idea of Ravana being a demon or cruel is totally wrong,its either because History belongs to the victors,and the text by the historians is biased,or the The fault lies not with the text but on how we perceive it.

I would say that there were no hero or villains in the epic just people struggling with life,responding to crisis,making mistakes,in innocence or arrogance,while trying to make their live's meaningful and worthwhile.

If you want to know the story from Ravana's view, i would recommend reading 'Asura-Tale of the vanquished' by Anand Neelkanth 

In the end everything is Moh Maya, Happy Dussehra  :D


The content in the post is grabbed from various answers on quora with only few lines of my own.
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Important Note - Read the next post "Illusions Everywhere" if you have read this one,its a continuation of this one with some twists.
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