Yudhishthira
Yudhishthira ( Sanskrit : युधिष्ठिर Yudhiṣṭhira [ jʊˈdʱɪʂʈʰɪrʌ ]) is the oldest of the five Pandava brothers or half-brothers mentioned in the Indian Mahabharata epic ; the others are Bhima , Arjuna , Nakula, and Sahadeva. All five were married to the Princess Draupadi .
myth
Yudhishthira ( स्थिर sthira for "steadfast", युधि yudhi for "at war") was the eldest son of King Pandu and his wife Kunti , who lived in Indraprastha and Hastinapur . Pandu himself was not allowed to attend because of a curse from his wife Kunti, and he had renounced his royal dignity in favor of his older but blind brother Dhritarashtra ; But already in her youth Kunti had received the prophecy from the rishi Durvasas that if she invoked the gods ( devas ), they would give her a child. With the consent of her husband or even at his behest, she invoked God Dharma (or Yama ) and became pregnant by him.
As the firstborn, Yudhishthira had the right to the succession, but this was contested by the eldest son Dhritarashtra ( Duryodhana ). Like his brothers, he was trained in the craft of war and became a master in the use of the spear and chariot ; with him as the charioteer, the chariot always floated a little above the ground. Ultimately, Dhritarashtra decided to divide the kingdom between the Pandavas and their cousins, the Kauravas . Yudhishthira organized the Rajasuya yagna , which made him the 'ruler of the world', whereby he wanted to use this power to defend or strengthen the religion.
The jealous Duryodhana and his counselor Shakuni invited Yudhishthira to a game of dice in their palace; in the process he lost his kingdom and, in the end, his wife Draupadi. In the end, however, it was decided that he and his brothers and their wife would go into exile for 13 years. In the forest there was a lake, near which a forest spirit ( yaksha ) lived, who asked people questions about morality etc. - his brothers laughed about it, drank from the lake water and died. However, Yudhishthira answered all the questions of the forest spirit, who in the end revealed himself as his father Dharma; then his brothers came back to life. Other adventures followed.
After returning from exile, Duryodhana continued to claim both halves of the kingdom for himself, while Yudhishthira tried to achieve his goals by the means of diplomacy. However, the god Krishna caused him to dare a military conflict with the Kauravas, the great battle of Kurukshetra , in which he was able to defeat his adversary Duryodhana on the 16th day of the fight.
Krishna disappeared and the new age Kali-Yuga dawned . Together with his brothers and their common wife, Yudhishthira went on a pilgrimage to the mountains of the Himalayas , during which Draupadi first collapsed under the strain or the burden of their sins - afterwards his four brothers suffered the same fate. The group was accompanied by an old dog that Indra commanded Yudhishthira to leave behind before entering nirvana . But Yudhishthira preferred to do without it because he could not reject the loyalty of the dog, which was considered unclean, out of selfishness. Then the dog revealed himself to be the god Yama and Yudhisthira had passed the last test to be able to enter nirvana.
presentation
Medieval portraits of Yudhishthira hardly exist. With the rise of miniature painting among the Mughals , the situation changed somewhat, but individual representations remained a great exception.
literature
- Mahabharata , Diederichs, Cologne 1986, ISBN 3-424-00576-2 .
