When Gods descend on earth as Nara Narayana

This morning, I read the Mahabharata in the version by Madeleine Biardeau. Despite some questionable interpretations, her work is brimming with fascinating and stimulating ideas.¹ It invites me to revisit this great epic, to cast a fresh eye upon God and humanity. The Mahabharata opens me up to a unique vision of the history of the world and of mankind. And, what is more, all of it is in French!

Notwithstanding her mastery of Sanskrit and her knowledge of India, where she lived for several years, Biardeau approaches the Mahabharata from an atheist perspective that limits the depth of her interpretation.

​I was reading about Nara and Narayana — two remarkable divine figures and avatar incarnations: Narayana embodies God, while Nara, whose name means "man," is his eternal companion. In the context of the Mahabharata, their relationship takes a specific form through Krishna and Arjuna, a duo whose dynamic reaches its peak in the Bhagavad-gita.

These Deities have one of India's most famous temples dedicated to them in Badrinath, in the Himalayas. I have never had the opportunity to travel there, as the area remains inaccessible for much of the year due to heavy snow. This temple is one of the main pilgrimage sites in India.

​When these gods are invoked, reference is often made to the analogy of the two birds from the Katha Upanishad. Madeleine Biardeau translates these verses into prose as follows: "Two birds, a pair of friends, perch on the same tree. One of them eats the sweet fruit of the pippal, the other, without eating, observes."

​The interpretation given by Biardeau is a structural one. According to the scriptures and the Vaishnava masters —meaning the worshipers of Vishnu— the explanation is quite different: within the heart reside two entities: the individual soul and Paramatma (the Supreme Soul, or God). The individual soul immerses itself in the pleasures of material life, indifferent to the presence of Paramatma, who observes, detached, without intervening. Yet, Paramatma waits patiently for this soul to turn its attention away from ephemeral pleasures and toward Him, thus opening the way to another reality, that of spirituality.

1 I propose another version of this analysis written one year later. Coming soon. 

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