Reading Diary A: The Mahabharata

I really enjoyed the part of this week's readings where Arjuna is living as a hermit in the Himalayas and has an encounter with the great god Shiva. I absolutely love the image that is set up of Arjuna spending his days in peace, worshiping and gaining mental strength while in the midst of the serenity of the mountains.  I also loved reading this part of the story because I have a strong fascination with the god Shiva.  I think Shiva is one of the most interesting gods to read about for me because of his power and strength and because of his magical weapons.  I once played a video game where one of the weapons was "The bow of Shiva", but it was actually a special type of round able to be shot be a tank and it was so powerful that it would destroy everything in the game, including the one who used it. I think that's another reason I liked this story so much because it makes me feel like that must be where the creators of that video game got the idea of that weapon from, since in the story Shiva even says to never use this magical weapon unless everything else fails as it is so powerful it could destroy the whole universe.  That was really exciting to read because I was finally able to see where Shiva's mythical universe-destroying weapon came from.

Vyasa telling Arjuna of Shiva's powers

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