The Smartest of Them All!
Once Shiva, Vishnu and Brahma were sitting and having yet another super philosophical discussion. The topic was very simple but so troublesome that even the divine trinity were bugging their heads.
It was well established that the one who solves this problem will be established as the smartest among them and hence in universe.
Brahma explained that he has given mortals the gift of logic, so that sometime in future they can decipher the code of living and growing in all aspects. For him mankind was a project which can become self sustainable and take care of solar system. So that he can move to other systems and create more such beings. The problem was that humans are using logic for selfish purposes and have not understood the benefit of what they already have.
Vishnu, in sheer excitement of bragging later on said, that the only way to make humans understand something is to show them how it can be done.
Shiva, the most energetic among them was doubting this philosophy, according to him the only way humans would understand something is if they fear the repercussions of their own actions.
Brahma the eldest amongst the lot suggested that we can have this as a competition, the problem will get solved and my creations will have the necessary tweak in their build quality and we all would even have some fun in way of healthy competition between Vishnu and Shiva.
Vishnu enthusiastically jumped, let me try first, I will teach them the simple most valuable thing, I will teach them about Dharma and at the same time I will establish the right path, which these mortals will follow and make earth a better place to live.
Vishnu announced that in order to make humans understand the values of dharma they will have to be shown the right way, which can only happen if a mortal shows them the right path, they will understand the it is doable and hence will follow.
Shiva, known for his far nearsightedness smiled on the love for humans by Vishnu. He thought that Vishnu was blinded by his love for humans and will fail in his endeavor. But in the spirit of the game he chose not to speak in between.
Vishnu devised the whole plan, looked for the right options, he was very careful for not to disrupt Brahma’s delicate balance. Niti, vidhi and vidhaan (policy, procedure and legislation) were to be understood and contemplated with. He summoned his best data cruncher, who made the thorough list of all the boons and curses which were laid by the holy trinity. They knew that playing with time line can be tricky.
In order to show the righteous path he would be needed to show troubles, sacrifices and relative passion and compassion. The problem was to find the right time. A time when an avatar born will face mortal troubles accurate to show the above traits. Astrologers were invited to find the exact time of birth of an avatar where his life will have such miseries that the avatar can use to show the power of DHARMA. Finally after months of careful study, Bruhaspati announced the right time and place for him to go down to earth as mortal.
It was “treta yug”,last leg and the place was Ayodhya. Thankfully Vishnu had one avatar left for this yug. He wanted to establish path of righteousness - Dharma.
So on January 10, 12.05 hours, 5114 BC, again came to earth as a mortal for the seventh time as lord RAM.
What followed next is we all know, he showed humans how to be a son, a brother, a husband, a friend and also a king, but above all what he showed them was that the righteous path - Dharma was attainable and he established the duties or guidelines for achievement of the same.
Happily he returned back to heaven , with a feeling of achievement. He was sure that now, Shiva would acknowledge his way of teaching.
He went to the trilogy temple where all three were supposed to meet. He was happy he chose to wear his favorite HALO, hell yeah, he was soon going to be acclaimed the smartest person in universe by his closest and only friends.
As soon as he reached and explained how everything has been done, Brahma quickly did his calculations to check if no time-space continuum were broken. All the while Shiva was just smiling, and right at the moment when Brahma was about to hand the trophy to Vishnu, Shiva stood up. A bit angry. Even Brahma and Vishnu were afraid of Shiva's anger. Shiva saw their faces and realized that his anger was easily being seen on his face, he cools himself down and simply explained , that it is necessary to put the whole teaching experiment done by Vishnu to go though the most important test of all - TIME. If the methods are actually effective it will withstand time if they are not, they will slowly erode. Moreover it was in accordance with Brahma’s basic rules of universe which were clearly mentioned in RIGVEDA.
Finally, the trilogy accepted and decided to wait till the end of Treta yug to see if ram’s dream of RAM RAJYA is still intact or has been shattered by single most constant - TIME!!!
Just before the end of Treta yug, as foresighted by Shiva, the humanity started degrading the values of DHARMA played by RAM. The path of righteousness was so tough that the actions of Rama were called heroic and hence un-achievable. To make things worse it was leaked to humans that Ram was actually an avatar of Vishnu. This made mortals believe that hence the DHARMA path was unattainable as it was something only gods can do. Right after that hero worship started. No other Vishnu avatar was treated this way before. There were temples of lord RAM. His deeds were declared heroic and the connection with Vishnu made them sound true. Humans got relieved from their self guilt of not attaining and maintaining Dharma.
Although sad by the failure of this experiment, Shiva knew what this would mean, that simply by doing nothing he had won the competition. Again he summoned the meet of trilogy and claimed his reward. By now the story about the competition had already reached all the gods.This time the meeting was attended by everyone, the trilogy, their wives, all the Gods, and even the sage of heaven - Narad Muni.
Narad was known by gods for his wittiness and tactfulness. When Shiva claimed his prize, Narad, who all knew was a Vishnu fan (his divine chants were - Narayan, narayan!!), said - that whole episode just proves that Lord Vishnu’s method were not successful. But to prove that Lord Shiva’s ways are right he will have to prove them to the gods. Basically it was established that it is indeed difficult to teach humans. Now it was time for Vishnu to smile. But Shiva known for his aggression and passion accepted the challenge.
Brahma - declared the competition to be eternal and amendments were made. Now it was Shiva's turn, to teach the unteachable.
Even gods shiver when it comes to teach us. No longer mortals were called “mere” mortals.
