Jarasandha and Krishna Debate Dharma and Challenge Each Other
Confronted by three disguised brahmanas, King Jarasandha demands to know why they consider him an enemy when he believes he has done no wrong. Krishna reveals their identities and mission: to stop Jarasandha from sacrificing the captive kings he has imprisoned. The debate that follows is a clash over the very definition of a king's dharma.
Jarasandha looked at the three brahmanas who had come to his court. They had asked for a human being as their bhiksha (alms), and he had offered them anything in his kingdom. Now they stood before him, and he sensed the confrontation in their stance. He spoke plainly.
“I do not recall that I have ever exhibited any enmity towards you,” he said. “After reflection, I cannot see any evil act I have done towards you. O brahmanas! If I have never done an evil act and am innocent, why do you regard me as an enemy? Tell me honestly.”
He laid out his reasoning. Injuring an innocent man was a violation of dharma, one that would trouble even a kshatriya’s mind. A man could know all the rules and keep all the vows, but if he acted wickedly, he destroyed his own welfare. Jarasandha presented his own case: “You know that in the three worlds, I am supreme among righteous ones in the practice of the dharma of kshatriyas. I never hurt my subjects. Therefore, you speak in delusion.”
The brahmana who was Krishna replied.
“O great king! There is someone from a lineage who has to undertake the tasks that lineage requires. The three of us have acted against you at his request.” He named Yudhishthira, the Pandava king preparing for the rajasuya sacrifice, who needed Jarasandha subdued. Then he went to the heart of the matter. “O king! The kshatriyas who live in this world have been abducted by you. Having committed this cruel act, how can you think of yourself as innocent?”
He accused Jarasandha of planning to sacrifice these captive kings to the god Rudra. “Human sacrifices have never been seen. Why do you wish to sacrifice humans to the god Shankara? You are of the same varna. Yet, you are treating those of the same varna as animals. O Jarasandha! Is there any other mind that is as perverted as yours?”
Krishna stated their purpose: “We help all those who are distressed. For the protection of our kin, we have come here to counter you, the one who is acting so as to destroy our kin.” He then dismantled Jarasandha’s assumed invincibility. “O king! If you think that there is no man among the kshatriyas of this world who can do this, your mind is greatly deluded.”
He described the kshatriya path to heaven — through battle. “O king! Which kshatriya who knows the nature of his own noble birth will not wish to attain unparalleled heaven by falling in the field of battle? O ruler of Magadha! With their minds on heaven, know that kshatriyas of the world are consecrated in the sacrifice of battles and worship them.” Victory, great fame, austerities, and the straight route of battle — these were the qualities of Indra, who defeated demons by being focussed on this truth. “What can be a better road to heaven than a battle with someone like you, since you are proud of the strength of your extensive Magadha army?”
Krishna warned him not to deprecate others. “Valour exists in every man. O lord of men! You are superior only if you don’t know of valour equal to yours and as long as glory equal to yours is not known. O king! Listen to me when I say we are capable of equalling it.” He named kings like Dambhodbhava and Kartavirya who had been destroyed for ignoring their superiors.
Then he revealed who they were. “We who wish to liberate the captive kings are not self-proclaimed brahmanas. I am Shouri Hrishikesha and these two brave men are the two Pandavas.” He issued the challenge. “O king! O Magadha! Stand firm. We are challenging you. Either liberate all the kings or go to Yama’s abode.”
Jarasandha heard him out. His reply was calm and rooted in his own understanding of a king’s duty. “I never take a king until I have vanquished him. Who is here who has not been vanquished? Whom have I not conquered?” He cited the kshatriya code: “O Krishna! It has been said that the livelihood and dharma of kshatriyas is to bring others under his sway through valour and then do as he pleases.”
The captive kings, he explained, had been collected for a divine purpose — the sacrifice to Rudra. “Remembering the duty of kshatriyas, how can I free them today out of fear?” Then he offered the only alternative he would entertain. “I am prepared to fight—army against army, one against one, or one against two or three, all at the same time, or separately.”