| YouTube Channel

जटासुरवधपर्वन् (jaTAsuravadhaparvan)

 
Mahabharata
English
[Jaṭāsuravadhaparvan] (“the section treating of the killing of Jaṭāsura, ” being the 37th of the minor parvans of Mhbhr.). (Cf. Jaṭāsuravadha.) § 435: One day, after the Rākshasas with Ghaṭotkaca had departed, while Bhīma was a-hunting, and Lomaśa and the other ṛshis had gone away to bathe and collect flowers, the Rākshasa Jaṭāsura, who had followed Yudhishṭhira in the guise of a brahman versed in all the śāstras, with the object of possessing himself of the arms of the Pāṇḍavas and of Draupadī, began to flee away with the arms and Draupadī and the three Pāṇḍavas. Sahadeva extricated himself, and snatching the sword Kauśika, he began to call Bhīmasena. Yudhishṭhira reproached him, saying that the Rākshasas are the root of virtue and know virtue (dharmaṃ) best, and that the Rākshasas, gods, Pitṛs, Siddhas, Ṛshis, Gandharvas, etc., depend for their lives on men, etc. Yudhishṭhira then made himself ponderous. Sahadeva was about to attack the Rākshasa, when Bhīma appeared mace in hand. The Rākshasa set them down, and he and Bhīma began to fight with trees, like Vālin and Sugrīva, and then with rocks, and at last by wrestling, till Bhīma, having dealt a blow on the neck of the Rākshasa, lifted him up, and dashed him on the ground and severed his head from his body, and then presented himself before Yudhishṭhira (III, 157).