Originally posted by: MrspetloverUS
Namaskar NB, Hi Kavita, Deepa and to everyone else's FYI.
Continuation to Yesterday'sconversation about Mahabharata, kunti, Draupadi and her 5 husbands. Taran and I sort of had some debate abt SHiva, Draupadi and 5 husbands than too I thought I share it with everyone again.
Taran wrote: Has anyone realised that our first promiscuous woman in Bharathvarsha was sadly, Draupadi?
I mean why would lord Shiva play such a nasty joke on her ?
While she asked for his blessings saying patidevaam , patidevaaam , patidevaam, patidevaam and patidevaam five times could he not have stopped her at the first patidevaam ? And legitimised her wedding with three nippled Arjun? But no ?? Even this Ganges jutting lord had a weird sense of humour methinks/..And Arjun had to pay the price for same ...
Varsha's response:
Lord Shiva did not really play cruel joke on her. It was Draupadi's previous life that got her into this fix. I just thought I share.
Draupadi is the only instance we come across in epic mythology of a sati becoming a kanya. It is stated that in an earlier birth as Nalayani (also named Indrasena), she was married to Maudgalya, an irascible sage afflicted with leprosy. She was so utterly devoted to her abusive husband that when a finger of his, dropped into their meal, she took it out and calmly ate the rice without revulsion. Pleased by this, Maudgalya offered her a boon, and she asked him to make love to her in five lovely forms. As she was insatiable, Maudgalya got fed up and became an ascetic. When she remonstrated and insisted that he continue their love-life, he cursed her to be reborn and have five husbands to satisfy her lust. Thereupon she practiced severe penance and pleased Lord Shiva with her prayers. He granted a boon to her. Nalayani said that she wanted a husband and to ensure that her request was heard, she repeated it five times in all. Shiva then said that in her next life she would have five husbands. She obtained the boon of regaining virginity after being with each husband.
Thus, by asserting her womanhood and refusing to accept a life of blind subservience to her husband, Nalayani, the sati, was transformed into Yajnaseni, the kanya. Some sources have a slightly different narration. Draupadi made her request only once but she added a long list of qualities that she wanted in her husband. Lord Shiva said that it would be impossible to find one man with all these qualities. Hence she would have five husbands in her next life. All of them together would posses the qualities she had enumerated. [ According to Brahmavaivarta Purana, she is the reincarnation of the maya Sita (shadow Sita - wife of Lord Rama, an incarnation of Lord Vishnu, and hero of Ramayana) who, in turn, was Vedavati, reborn after molestation at Ravana's hands, and would become the "Lakshmi of the Indras" ] (one of the forms of Goddess Lakshmi, eternal consort of Lord Vishnu) in heaven.
In ancient India, women occupied a very important position, in fact a superior position to men. It is a culture whose only words for strength and power are feminine - "Shakti" means "power" and "strength". All male power comes from the feminine.
CID
