which reaches its climax in Kr.s.n.a’s declaration of his attachment (bhakti)to
Arjuna and the promise that by his grace he can be reached and entered into.
This way of devotion is available to all, unlike the way of knowledge, which few
can achieve, or the way of action without attachment, and so is superior to
either. It is worth noting that Kr.s.n.a presents himself in the Bhagavadgı ̄ta ̄as the
supreme, identical to or more often superior to Brahmanand that there is no real
trace of his identification with Vis.n.u, either directly or as avata ̄ra.
The substantial transformation in the view of Kr.s.n.a which we find in the
Harivam.s ́a(which revolves around the figure of Kr.s.n.a) is undoubtedly one of the
most pivotal innovations in the history of Hinduism. Here for the first time is pre-
sented Kr.s.n.a the child hero of the forests in Vr.nda ̄vana and protector of cows,
the figure who over the centuries is to become the adorable infant, the cowherd
and the lover of the cowgirls (gopı ̄s). Although there may be occasional hints of
this facet of his nature in the Maha ̄bha ̄rata (but this is debatable), the Harivam.s ́a
provides the first connected account of this and other aspects of his life, such as
the taming of the water snake Ka ̄liya (55–6), his lifting of Mount Govardhana
in defiance of Indra, whose continuing decline is still more marked in other
episodes (60–1), the killing of his evil uncle Kam.sa (72–76), the attack on
Mathura ̄by Jara ̄sam.dha (80–2) and the move from Mathura ̄ to the new city of
Dva ̄raka ̄ (84 and 93). Equally, his older brother Balara ̄ma, who appears in only
a minor role in the Maha ̄bha ̄rata, is now a much more important figure and there
is much about the youthful exploits of the two brothers. The other members of
their clan are still presented in the Harivam.s ́aas being generally ignorant of
Kr.s.n.a’s divine nature, in which it contrasts with later narrations in, for example,
theVis.n.uandBha ̄gavata Pura ̄n.as.
TheRa ̄ma ̄yan.a
In the Ra ̄ma ̄yan.aRa ̄ma is, of course, central and its portrayal of him as the
ks.atriyaideal or prince and warrior prompts the understanding of Ra ̄ma as
anavata ̄ra of Vis.n.u and eventually as supreme deity himself precisely through
dharma; an alternative view stresses the theme of the divine king in Indian
thought as the key to Ra ̄ma’s divinity (on this view, present from the earliest
phases of the epic). In the core narrative, the second to sixth books, Ra ̄ma is pre-
sented as the outstanding martial figure (often compared to Indra, the divine
warrior) whose adherence to ethical values is equally outstanding (he is fre-
quently called “the best of upholders of dharma”), a basically human but
exemplary figure. As his moral elevation is emphasized, various episodes of
the original story receive a moralistic gloss, in order to eliminate the possibility
of moral lapses on his part; so, for example, his killing of the va ̄nara chief Va ̄lin
while the latter is fighting his brother Sugrı ̄va, with whom Ra ̄ma has made a
pact, is given an elaborate justification, as are his martial activities to protect the
hermits while they go about their religious activities (basically in terms of his
the sanskrit epics 121