The objective of this blog is not to dispute the divinity of either krishna or christ. But it is to respond to people who are ever comparing the two. It is most certainly an objection to the fanatics who want to show how krishna( who belonged to a much earlier era and lived at a different period) does not meet the standards of christ. I am not going to be probing any of the beliefs of the christians in bible and I assume that the modern bible may be indeed recording the real life of christ.
I present a few common arguments made against krishna and provide my answers.
1. Krishna was not born to a virgin but Christ was - I can understand the angle from which this point is stated by christians. It is their belief that if he were not born to a virgin then somehow his divinity is lost. Let us proceed by the assumption that christ was born to a virgin. Fine! Here we need to stretch ourselves and accept that occassionally,in human history, unusual things happen. This defies conception of modern science. Fine! But then in that case none of the miracles in krishna's life can be dismisssed as implausible either, by the same set of standards. Can a woman be a sinner if she is not a virgin after marriage? It is merely an assumption by christians that she is! There is no basis for such a belief . The Hindus believe that the reason unwedded or extramarital sex is to be prohibited is that it prevents a proper lineage in the family to be passed on. It is more of a practical law that prevents disintegration of the family. It may be a divine law or otherwise but it assumes importance because of its practicality. Thus this law is very much followed by the hindus as much as they abstain from meat or alcohol. Millions of hindu women remain virgin until marriage even if it means that they need to wait for 40 or 50 years for getting married or even if it means that they must stay unmarried for life. So hindus are certainly following moral life here and they need no tutoring on this. Its great that christ was born to a virgin but somehow his mother was impregnated by the holy ghost according to some. During the same period as krishna , another person karna was born to his mother kunti who was a virgin. The great sage Vyasa in that period having born to his mother satyavati immediately grew up to an older boy ready to travel with his father for education. These are miraculous events and one can easily see that each of these events are equally likely or unlikely.
On the other hand the reason why krishna was born to devaki and vasudeva( his mother and father) was because they were granted boon of being the parents of vishnu's incarnation. If krishna were to be born to a virgin then he couldnt be a true son to his father vasudeva. Also there is nothing to prove that sexual affair between married parents is a sin. It can easily be argued that the only reason that sex is ever considered a sin, is that it has a possibility of abuse , and of perpetuating a wrong lineage(if done illegally). In fact jesus had to pass through the genital tract of his mother. One can easily see that this kind of thing may be called impurifying . So this whole argument is a needless one. Joseph was not present with Mary for a long time,so if jesus wanted to be born to her, he could only be born to a virgin. Because a divine being cannot be born in an illicit affair. If one is looking for miracles at the time of krishna's birth there are plenty of them recorded. Further to assume that God can be defiled by the simplistic acts of humans is ridiculous. This is what the whole virgin argument does. This argument can in no way distract from hindu claim of krishna's divinity
2. Claim that Krishna did not heal people and cure the sick and bring the dead back to life - Krishna did bring sandeepani's son back to life. He did save draupadi from being abused even though he was not physically present at the place where she was affected. Then again parikshit was born dead and was brought to life by krishna. Now we can see that krishna's power did not necessarily have limitations. Jesus was supposed to be like a wandering mystic healing people and bringing back the dead. Krishna's life mission was different. It had a clear agenda to inspire people in devotion. hindus are aware that through devotion to the lord of universe one is able to connect with the divinity that pervades this universe and there is a gradual process of mental and emotional clensing which happens till the point is reached when the individual soul meets the divine lord. Krishna's whole life was to inspire devotion through his eternal charm and beauty and it is this everlasting charm and beauty that has kept vaishnavism flourishing to this date.
To cure a few sick people God need not incarnate on earth at all. He can cure them from whereever he is. The point of coming onto visible earth is to provide inspiration for devotion. There is a group of hindus who with good reasons reject this whole concept of faith healing, not because it is not possible, but because it is wrong. There was no need for krishna to make healing the only purpose of his life because he could do the same wherever he is. Had he made healing and cure of the dead as the main motive of life, it distracts from the real purpose of life, not to run away from suffering but to conquer it. Suffering is caused by one's own actions. Christians believe that too in some way. Hindus believe that through surrender to god, one can be cured of suffering, but they add that the individual must make the best efforts to keep away from unwarranted wrongs if one has really surrendered to god. christians have somewhat a similar belief but there are many who believe that surrender to christ is the only means of being freed from sin. Krishna does not say that, he only says that the kind of being one worships results in prayer being granted according to the nature of the divinity in the being. At the same time, if at all any kind of wish or prayer is fulfilled it is because of the power of the one supreme lord of universe. In many ways we can contrast the teachings of krishna and christ but it is easy to see that the entire purpose of their lives were different. krishna established order in the world before leaving it. This is considered proof of krishna's great mission. Christ and krisna therefore have a different kind of mission, and it is pointless comparing these aspects to establish the divinity of one and rejecting the divinity of another on the basis of comparison of few superficial aspects such as way of life.
3. krishna's life was filled with imperfections whereas christ's life was not- This is a spurious argument when we cite individual cases of krishna's supposed misdeeds.
i. krishna stole butter from the neighbours- Claim is this is bad example to set for people. It completely misses the fact that krishna was playing around with people and teasing them as a child and actually gave joy to the people.Neither is the fact that he stole butter hidden nor is the fact the fact that people were overjoyed by the pranks of a naughty child hidden from hindus.Stealing is a reprehensible act, and no true devotee of krishna ever does that even in his dream. Further to this there was a purpose to these acts and that was to teach the people to share the food they have and not to hide it away from others. Krishna not only stole the butter but shared it with his friends. Critiscism also misses the basic fact that the whole village community lived like an extended family and krishna did not steal food from any stranger. There are more beautiful and detailed explanations to this story but it should suffice that when determing whether something as right or wrong the following things need to be investigated
a. who are the parties being affected by a "so called crime"
b. what is the conclusion of the affected parties at the end of the episode
c. what was the intention behind the acts
No hindu has ever been shy of the story of krishna stealing butter including the most honest of people and the legend as described in bhagwatam describe how the people of the village felt blessed by krishna. Further to this - the same krishna protected the villagers from the wrath of Indra( the lord of the angelic beings) by stressing the importance of hardwork as opposed to blind prayers.
ii. krishna played pranks with women and stole their clothes-
the facts stand
a) the girls secretly admired krishna and undertook a long ritual for getting married to krishna. They were so committed in their prayer that they took bath naked in the cold river of yamuna and only the last day of that period of prayer did krishna make his entry
b) krishna was not a stranger to them nor is the description of the story mentioned in anyway that the girls felt humiliated and insulted by such an act. On the contrary they were basically shy even though they harboured such a desire
c) a Prank is wrong only if it affects the parties concerned. krishna does not fit the bill here as well
Here there are likely to be two more objections
...krishna should set a moral example from desisting from such pranks. the fact that he did not indicates that he was not god- this objection is based on the assumption that to honour the desire of an individual is wrong. krishna however did not set any immoral precedent. Neither were the girls molested nor were they strangers nor was there a sexual act nor is krishna described to have been infatuated by the ladies nor was he said to have done something the girls did not wish for. Finally reading the episode between the lines cannot be justice. One must read the whole episode and find out the real intention behind the play. The ultimate climax of krishna's play with gopis was the following
1. the gopis(his lady friends) lost any form of sexual feelings for krishna and realized him as the divine lord
2. the gopis lost jealousy , pride, greed, lust and realized the presence of krishna everywhere
3. the gopis develop true devotion to god
If one just quotes a small part of an episode without reading the full episode one is bound to lead to absurd conclusions. The entire episode happens in a logical sequence and once one reads the full episode one can see and understand why each episode happened the way it did. krishna's stealing of the clothes was not just to thrill the ladies but it was his way of bringing out the feeling of these ladies into an open unabashed manner. he brings the feeling out and slowly purges the base qualities in the desire. the desire for krishna was not wrong, the infatuation was.the ladies are filled with infatuation even before krishna was involved in stealing the clothes but their infatatuation only leads to them realizing that krishna is really unattainable through infatuation, and one by one all their worldly feelings are transformed into pure divine love for god. It is easy to cristiscize but to this date there has been no one other than krishna who could remove all forms of lust and base qualities from his devotees.
c. krishna married, christ did not - this is again a presupposition that an incarnation of god should not marry. if he can be the son of someone, he can be the husband of another.
d. krishna had thousands of wives- if god can have one wife he can have thousands. Infact the reason he had more than one wife was that there were many who equally desired him and if at all god can marry someone who loves him he cannot be partial.the common hindu is wedded to one wife- not to speak of the fact that most do not undergo even divorce. but there is reason for the general tendency to have only one wife- that is one must not neglect resposibilities to one's partner. hinduism sees possibility in both polyandry and polygamy within the framework of marriage. But it is no where a common practice . this cannot be accepted as an imperfection because krishna does not impose restriction on his wives and their freedom, all the women he married desired him, and he is supposedly present at the same time in everyone's house and showered equal love on all. the legend actually recalls the above fact. Marrying more than once is wrong only to the specific repurcussions of the act. people may dismiss krishna's amazing simultaneous presence at the homes of all his wives but they are willing to believe that he had 16000 wives and no wife was forced to marry him nor was the freedom of any wife restricted in any way. we certainly dont have a jealous and admonishing god here. if one holds strict conventions on right and wrong without understanding the purpose why something is called right and something wrong , one is ever likely to critiscize krishna.
e. krishna could have stopped the war from happening if he was god-
firstly krishna was the one who went on a peace mission to stop the war. Infact to prove his point he showed his divinity to the blind king who was momentarily filled with wonder, but fell back to his ignorant thinking. the reasoning of the king and his sons was not correct and their act was an unjust proposition. the pandavas could have accepted the unfair agreement and desisted from war totally. It would have only saved the royal family from death but not the world from an unjust king and his aides. if the accusation is that a god can prevent death and wars then this accusation is no different from the accusation of atheists " that if there were a god, he could have prevented death". krishna's bhagwat gita answers this question well enough.the message here is death is something that should never be feared as fatal.it has a purpose. so no incarnation of god ever completely stopped war and death whether it was christ on his heavenly throne or on his earthly life . the argument is spurious. if one is to accept this argument then that means that everyone should tolerate all the injustice meeted out to them and resist in no way even if the welfare of public is not being served through this silence.
4. krishna did not save people from sin- this is purely a theological argument . the concept of sin as preached by modern church even it was advocated by jesus has not been proven to be true. it is an assumption possibly coming from the teachings of jesus. krishna saves all his devotees provided they act in a god conscious manner. this idea has been presented well by prabhupada the founder of iskcon and one may read it for a detailed understanding of the saving grace of krisna.
5. krishna did not have all qualities of god- well vaishnava literature lists down an exhaustive list of attributes of god and they show krishna satisfying all of them. somebody brings different scales and shows different definitions and such readings conveniently fitting one person and rejecting another. if the scale of vaishnavas were to be used against jesus, then he would fail to qualify. it can easily seen that humans want a rigid definition but god cannot be circusmcribed to a limited circle. when krishna invokes his power to save parikshit he says- if I have never done anything unrighteous may he be protected. vaishnavas take that as proof of his correct nature.when one reads the narrative of srimad bhagwatam one can easily see that but for rigid definitions of actions( without examining whether these definitions can be held universally valid- the way to examine that is to understand the purpose behind rules) there is no way krishna can seen to be doing something improper or there is no real instance when he was immoral or when someone was unjustly affected by krishna.
Of late the main accusations against krishna that I have seen are regarding his many girl friends and wives, his stealing of butter as a child, his encouragement of war. I have briefly provided the lines of argument in support of each these acts. People are free to discuss with me on specifics
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