The Sura as Paradigmatic Heroic Warrior
MBh 12.98 opens with Yudhisthira posing a fundamental soteriological question to Bhisma: ‘By what actions can a king win heavenly worlds?' His concern is predicated on the fact that because kings slaughter many people during military campaigns, then ‘no law is more evil than the law of the martial class' (MBh 12.98.1ab: ksatradharman na paplyan dharmo 'sti); specifically, those who rule through warfare.
What follows is a sustained justification for violence that is not only meant to edify kings but also intended to define the identity and responsibilities of soldiers in the king's army. Since a strong, fearless king is unparalleled on earth, then in order to understand the moral, social and cosmological implications of his actions, a king's role in battle is correlated with that of the sura. The chapters consistently focus on the theme of a sura's bravery and his ritualised death and ascension. At its core, the truest realisation of heroism is to fight and die willingly in the front lines of battle. For example:Every heroic warrior inspired to sacrifice his highest, having abandoned his life, never showing his back to the enemy, reaches the same heavenly world as Indra. (MBh 12.98.31)
Just fifty heroic warriors who know each other well, who are riled up, who have given up all hope of survival, and who are determined can smash an enemy army. (MBh 12.103.20)
In the first example, heroism is defined by a warrior's fearless self-sacrifice in battle, which is given a soteriological justification in the concept of Indra's heaven. The value placed on men who fully internalise and enact heroic ideals is underscored in the second example, which conveys some of the sentiments expressed by Marlon Brando's character Colonel Walter E. Kurtz in his famous ‘the horror' speech in the 1979 film Apocalypse Now - namely, that a small force of soldiers completely committed to the cause could win any conflict, no matter the physical or psychological cost.
A warrior's death in battle thus affirms his commitment to his duty and the law, both subsumed under the concept of dharma, as well as securing his place in the heaven of the greatest warrior of all, Indra.The theme of obtaining heaven after dying in battle is central to MBh 12.100.1-18, which involves an ancient dialogue between two kings, Pratardana and Janaka of Mithila. After donning ‘a ritual thread for the purpose of making war' (MBh 12.100.2a: yajnopavitl samgrame), Janaka addresses his soldiers to motivate them, while evoking images of heaven (svarga) and hell (naraka):
Look at these brilliantly shining celestial worlds for those who do not fear! They overflow with Gandharva girls and furnish everything you could wish for! They will never waste away. On the other side are these hells for those that run away. They will fall into them immediately and endure everlasting ignominy as well. Having seen these worlds, having resolved to give up your lives, be victorious over the enemy and do not end up as subjects in the bottomless hell. The unsurpassed gate into heaven rests upon the base of heroes' giving up their lives. (MBh 12.100.4-7ab)
Since the chapters reflect a heavily patriarchal and gendered perspective, it is both unsurprising and informative that the slain hero will be greeted in heaven by alluring ‘Gardharva girls' who will fulfil his every (sexual) wish. In the same eroticised vein, another stanza states that a bevy of celestial nymphs or Apsarases - thousands, in fact - will beg to be his wife.[1276] If ever there was a euphemism for the promise of liberal sex in ancient India, this would be it, and of course, the fantasised incentives underlying the ideals of heroism and bravery are self-evident. As can be seen, the promise of Indra's heaven and the threat of hell are deliberately used to shape the identity of warriors, while circumscribing their choices as men.
The theme of a warrior's heroic death takes on a personal, embodied element as the demeanour of a sura is characterised by an extreme tolerance for pain and injury, which is also correlated with metaphysical rewards.
For example: ‘However many sharp blades cut his skin in battle, that many heavenly worlds does he enjoy, heavenly worlds that fulfill his every wish and never fade away!' (MBh 12.98.12). According to this stanza, injuries sustained in battle symbolise a warrior's righteous commitment to war as well as the guarantee of heavenly ascension. In short, a warrior literally bleeds for heaven. It is not hard to imagine that battle wounds, and the scars they leave, would function as badges of honour and emblematically signify membership in a closed military world predicated on stoic toughness and resolve in the face of physical and psychological trauma. In fact, Bhisma informs Yudhisthira that a sura who fights vehemently, filled with ‘oaths and rage' (MBh 12.98.29), will take no heed ofhis wounds in battle. In addition, the hero's anticipated injuries and death in battle are elevated to the highest form of merit-generating, religious devotion because any form of suffering that he endures from burning wounds will produce more merit than an ascetic can accrue from the physically gruelling practices of asceticism (MBh 12.98.13-14). Consequently, it is ‘unrighteous' (adharma) for a Ksatriya to die on his bed, ‘coughing up phlegm and bile, weeping pitifully'. At his time of death, if a noble warrior's body is without any battle wounds, then his life's deeds receive no praise from those who ‘know the ancient ways'. Such a death is simply ‘unmanly, unrighteous, and pitiful for proud men', and ‘miserable, terrible, and wicked'. A true man (vlra) with any pride and self-respect does not deserve such a death, and a Ksatriya should die in battle surrounded by his fellow warriors with his body completely disfigured by sharp weapons. Being killed in battle is thus ‘celebrated and honoured in the world', and due to the ‘abundant merit' it accrues, the warrior goes to the same heavenly world as Indra (MBh 12.98.23-30).The six epic chapters communicate a coherent gendered message about how all martially inclined men should think, feel and act in relation to violent expectations, and such values are encoded in the myth of Ksatriya excellence and the heroic role of the sura.
In R. W. Connell's words, ‘True masculinity is almost always thought to proceed from men's bodies - to be inherent in a male body or to express something about a male body.'[1277] In the epic chapters, a warrior's body functions as a dominant symbol of core sociopolitical and religious values which circumscribe a man's sense of self-worth and agency to the point that the only way he can demonstrate his devotion to dharma and the gods is by repeated acts of violence, by experiencing physical pain, and ultimately by dying in battle. Indeed, the key characteristic of ‘all heroic warriors' is that they ‘have forsaken their own bodies' in battle (MBh 12.102.13b: sarve suras tanutyajah). This ideology is not new: it has a much older precedent in the Rgveda, which states that ‘heroic champions who abandon their bodies' (RV 10.154.3b: suraso ye tanutyajah) and die fighting in battle rise immediately to heaven. As Nancy Scheper-Hughes and Margaret Lock have aptly observed, aggressive warlike cultures regularly socialise men to think of their bodies as inherently defined by violence to the point that they cannot but think of themselves as foolhardy warriors whose self-worth comes from protecting the socio-political and cosmic order.[1278] In ancient India, to be a real/true man, a warrior must turn his body into a weapon of war to be used against other bodies, yet ultimately this will inflict harm on himself. The hero is nevertheless subject to the usual ethical guidelines incumbent on Ksatriyas. He is prohibited from slaying old men, children, women, Brahmans and those who have surrendered, though he is expected to spare no enemy combatant in battle.1[1279] Conversely, any warrior who enters into a kind of uncontrolled berserker rage represents the extreme of the heroic ideal. Such men are considered to be dangerous because they ‘pay no heed to the law', yet in recklessly abandoning their lives in battle the king benefits doubly from their deaths by gaining victory and in removing any potential problems in the future (see MBh 12.102.18-20). Therefore, according to the six chapters of the Santi Parvan, heroic masculinity is performed and legitimised through acts of violence and displays of physical and mental toughness rather than being a natural consequence of biological sex. What is more, while a hero's body is scarred with social prestige and the promise of heaven, his life is not his own but a tool of the army and the state.