Mystery behind Ashtavakra

Ashtavakra, from within his mother’s womb, had corrected his father, who was teaching the Vedas to his disciples. His father had cursed him that he would be born with eight crooked limbs and it took him twelve years to be free of this curse.

The most important practice for a student of yoga is ‘dharna’, the capacity to hold. In correcting his father, Ashtavakra showed that even though he had acquired knowledge in his mother’s womb, he did not have ‘dharna shakti’ or the power to hold it. He corrected his father at a very inopportune moment. Everything that we express, in words or action, has a right time and space. Unfortunately, we do not have the strength to wait for it.

For this small slip in consciousness, Ashtavakra had to pass through a cycle of twelve years to reach to that level of consciousness called dharna. This cycle is called an octave or eight, which is symbolized by Ashtavakra’s transformation from eight crooked limbs to a normal body structure. All that was still lower in Ashtavakra’s psyche was transformed to the higher.

Let us review the story from Ashtavakra’s father’s side. He was not teaching the slokas to his disciples properly. This shows two sides of him. He had knowledge but his being was low. Many of us gather a lot of knowledge but in our personal lives we still are victims of irritation, jealousy, suspicion, and egoism. We relate to our family and friends in a very rough manner. Despite all our knowledge, we have not changed at all. Life is not just gathering of knowledge, but transformation of being.

Change in being is brought about by purifying our emotional energy and rising above the logical mind we are trapped in. Ashtavakra has a debate with Bandi (meaning prisoner) or one who is imprisoned (in logical thinking). In Bandi’s instance, he was a master or an expert at use of the lower or logical mind. When Rishi Patanjali talks about different kinds of samadhis, the lowest form is the one with judicial thinking. We see this very fine use of the logical mind in great thinkers, judges, and statesmen and Bandi is depicted as such a thinker.

In yoga we say that the intellectual centre is over-developed, while the emotional centre is still raw. Ashtavakra’s father was drowned in the river, where water represents our emotional centre. It takes twelve years for him to come back from the river, signifying that it takes twelve years to transform our lower emotions and reactions into higher ones. A similar period of twelve years can be observed in Arjuna’s tour of religious places and also in the twelve years that Pandavas spent in the forest. After Ashtavakra defeats him, Bandi is also drowned in the river. He now has to work on his emotions to rise from a lower samadhi to a higher one.

The story shows the transformation of three people – Ashtavakra, his father, and Bandi.

King Janaka then takes Ashtavakra as his Guru, and their dialogues are captured in the great classic called the Mahageeta. Let’s keep that for another day.