Krishna Avatar

Lord Krishna is the eighth avatar of Vishnu. He is the most popular and highly honoured figure of Indian Mythology. He plays an important part in the epic Mahabharata. Mahabharata includes the Lord Krishna’s discourse to his disciple Arjuna during the famous battle between Kauravas and Pandavas. The discourse is known as Bhagvad Gita.

The story of Lord Krishna as per the Puranas goes as follow:

Lord Krishna was born into the Yadava community. He is the son of Vasudeva and Devaki but Kamsa, the King of Mathura smuggled the baby Lord Krishna to Gokula because of a prophecy. Lord Krishna was raised by the leader of cow herds, Nanda and his wife Yashodha. Childhood of Lord Krishna is filled with stories of his mischievous pranks and incidents that depict his divine nature. He was popular among the gopis of Vrindavan, especially Radha. Radha and Lord Krishna grew up together and their story is romanticised as Rasa-lila.

When Lord Krishna returned to his original birthplace, Mathura, he killed the tyrant king Kamsa and became a close ally to Pandava prince, Arjuna. At that time, Lord Krishna married Rukmini. During the Kurushetra war which is shown in Mahabharata, Lord Krishna chose to be on the side of Pandavas on condition that he would not raise any weapon.

As the war progressed, Arjuna was moved by the deaths of his family members, when he put down his weapon, Lord Krishna then advised him about the battle and its repercussions, Karma, the purpose of life and death, the power of Dharma. This conversation between Lord Krishna and Arjuna soon extended to into a discourse which was later brought together as the Bhagvad Gita.

Lord Krishna was the peace bearer and had a profound effect on the war and its consequences. He acted as messenger of peace to bring an end to the long war between Kauravas and Pandavas.