What Happenes When Someone
Sacrifices Himself To Save Someone Else
This
just in...today at Karma Watchers Headquarters, we go a tip-off that
someone was
murdered during a kidnapping. The victim was none other than
Jatayu. We here at Karma Watchers were not surprised, since we
all know Jatayu from an earlier
story
of him and his brother Sampathi flying up into the heavens to see the
gods. Here is what happened on that fateful day:
One day back
in February, we got word of two birds flying up into the heavens.
We
were not sure what for, but you better believe we found out. Once
we
got word of this we took our helicopter up to see if we could catch a
glimpse of the birds flying high. We could see them for a little
while, but then they were too far away to be seen. We stayed on
the
ground for several hours waiting for them to return. Suddenly,
out of
nowhere we saw an object falling out of the sky with a trail of smoke
behind him. We stretched out a large tarp and caught the object
before
it hit the ground. It turned out to to Sampathi. I could
not believe
my eyes. His wings were seared off like he had been burnt.
A few
minutes later Sampathi's brother Jatayu finally reached the
earth. We
still had not heard the story of why the two birds had tried to fly so
high because Sampathi was not in the condition to speak. Jatayu
informed us of what had happened.
He said it was very early
in the morning and he and his brother had wanted to go out on some kind
of adventure that
day. They were brainstorming and Jatayu came up with an
idea. He had
always wanted to get a glimpse of the gods up in the heavens, but had
never attempted to fly so high. He told Sampathi about his idea,
but
Sampathi didn't really think it was a good idea and tried to urge
Jatayu not to do it. Jatayu already had his mind set on it
though, so
he began to fly away. Sampathi could not just let his brother go
alone, so he decided he had better go along. The two brothers
flew for
several hours. Finally, they could see the heavens right above
them.
They were extremely tired, but flew faster and faster the closer they
got. Jatayu said that they finally made it and all of a sudden
they
were blown about a hundred feet through the air by a huge gust of
wind.
It
was Vayu, the wind god, urging them to leave. They began to feel
like
maybe flying up to heaven wasn't such a good idea after all, but since
they were already
there they wanted to see what the other gods looked like as well.
They
flew around for a while and then all of a sudden they were blinded by
the
shiny skin of the sun god. They could not see anything, let alone
each
other. The sun god urged them to leave as well. Sampathi
started to
think maybe this trip hadn't been the greatest idea and that they
should turn
around now and go home, but Jatayu wanted to see more. Before
Sampathi
could say another word to Jatayu, the storm god came out of nowhere and
yelled at them to leave the heavens and go home immediately.
Jatayu
would not listen and the storm god sent a lightning bolt straight for
Jatayu, but Sampathi jumped in front of Jatayu and took the lightning
bolt himself, which leads us to him falling out of the sky all scorched
and out of it.
Sampathi attempted to save Jatayu's
life and
ended up wingless for the remainder of his life. Jatayu learned a
lesson that day about always listening to your elders. For him
that was
his brother, when he told him that they should turn around and go
home.
He also learned that he should sacrifice his own life to save someone
else since that is what his brother had done for him.
That
brings us to the kidnapping and the murder that happened late last
night. Jatayu was minding his own business perched on a tree
branch
when all of a sudden Ravana came flying by with Rama's wife, Sita, in
his arms. Jatayu knew something was wrong by the screams coming
from
Sita. He followed them and yelled at Ravana to stop. When
Ravana
finally stopped he and Jatayu battled to save Sita. Ravana was
much
more powerful than Jatayu and cut off his wings. As Jatayu fell
to the ground, he knew he was paying the debt to his brother
Sampathi. Jatayu had tried
to
save Sita, but failed and was murdered by the evil Ravana.
I
guess this shows us that when we don't listen and someone has to
sacrifice their life for us, then we might one day end up daving to
make a similar sacrifice.
Author's Note:
In the original story
Sampathi's wings were burnt
off by the
sun god, not by a lightning bolt from the storm god. I thought I
would
change the story to make it a little bit more exciting and
eventful. I
also added several details to my story like Sampathi urging Jatayu to
go home
and Jatayu not wanting to go home as well as having the other gods,
Vayu and
the storm god added into the story. I think this fits in with my
selection of karma because Sampathi urged Jatayu not to go in the first
place,
then he urged him to go home when they were told to leave, but Jatayu
would not
listen. Since he wouldn't listen, his life was threatened and
Sampathi sacrificed
his life to save Jatayu. Later in the original story Jatayu ends
up
sacrificing his life to save Sita and it does not have a great ending,
which
shows that karma does in fact come into play here. If Jatayu had
listened,
then his brother never would have been burnt, and if his brother had
not
sacrificed his life for Jatayu's, then Jatayu would not have had to
sacrifice
his life
trying to save Sita.
Jatayu Trying to Save Sita. Web
Source: Eco
History
Bibliography:
Buck, William. (1976). Ramayana. California: University of
California Press.
Narayan, R. K. (1972). The Ramayana. New York: Penguin
Group.