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“I’m just a soul whose intentions are good. Oh Lord, please don’t let me be
misunderstood.”
– Nina Simone
The Indian epic of the Mahabharata tells the story of two sets of cousins, the
Kauravas and the Pandavas, and their battle for succession to the throne of the Kuru
Kingdom. The story progresses, and the sole Kaurava calling for war is the eldest son,
Duryodhana. Duryodhana is the son of Dhrtarastra. Dhrtarastra, though being the oldest
son in his generation, was passed over for succession because of his blindness. As a
result, his younger brother, Pandu, succeeded as king. On Pandu’s side, are the sons of
Kunti, the Pandavas. Kunti is the reigning queen of the kingdom after the death of her
husband before he had the chance to have sons. Kunti, fearing the death of her husband’s
line, has three sons, each to a different celestial diety. First, there is Yudhisthira, whose
father is Dharma, or Law, second there is Bhimasena, whose father is the Wind, or Vayu,
and lastly there is Arjuna, son of Indra, king of the gods.
The tale itself is being told to ancestors of Arjuna’s son, and it seems, to me, that
the entire epic is told in a way that paints the Kauravas as evil and the Pandavas as good.
Specifically in our preceptorial, we oftentimes were quick to jump to assign value
judgments on these characters. I feel that its important to look at all perspectives in
ancient works, and to not assign values like ‘good’ and ‘evil’ until the epic has been
completely read. By suspending judgment, we can take into accounts all angles of the
story. Not suspending value judgment is a dangerous way to read ancient works, or any
works of history. As such, I think it will be helpful to see how Duryodhana is portrayed,
as opposed to his archrival, Yudhisthira. I think it will also be helpful to make
comparisons between the battle of the Devas and the Asuras with the battle between the

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Kauravas and Pandavas, as I think we may find more similarities than we initially
thought were present. By comparing the ‘evil Kaurava’ with his demigod cousin,
Yudhisthira, we may find that the picture painted by Vyasa in his telling of the epic is one
that favors the Pandavas from the beginning.
Taking a moment to walk two hundred bow lengths in the expensive silk shoes of
Duryodhana, we may find that he felt his intentions to be good, so long as we entertain a
few alternative viewpoints. Firstly, that Vyasa, the storyteller, intentionally told the story
to positively portray the Pandavas and to the negatively portray the Kauravas. His motive
for this was that the spectators of the telling of the epic were direct descendants of the
line of Arjuna, one of the Pandava brothers. As a result, Duryodhana’s character may
have been altered slightly to portray him in a more malevolent light. Secondly, that Vyasa
completely removes any blame from Yudhisthira and Draupadi for the provocation of the
great war, and places all of the blame only on Duryodhana. Though Duryodhana was a
strong force in the lead up to the war, he wasn’t the only force. Vyasa completely drops
Yudhisthira, Draupadi, and even Krsna from any responsibility. Lastly, Duryodhana
denied the godhood of the Pandava brothers, and as such recognized them as men, and
not what they really were: demigods. Duryodhana cannot be blamed for this, considering
that oftentimes Vyasa refers to the equality of Duryodhana and Bhimasena, have both
trained under the same martial arts master, and both being of comparable size. As
demigods, the Pandavas had extreme prowess in strength, wisdom and agility, and
Duryodhana, as a simple man, could not stand a chance against the sons of gods.
However, since he was unwilling to accept the Pandavas as demigods, nor their advisor
and mentor Krsna, as an avatar of Vishnu, he failed to recognize his futility in attacking

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them. Taking these alternative viewpoints into account, one may begin to see how this
story could have portrayed Duryodhana had the Kauravas been the direct ancestors of
Janamejaya.
It’s also interesting to note the similarities between this story of the Pandavas and
the Kauravas and the story of the Devas and the Asuras. Intitially, the Asuras we not
perceived as malevolent deities, that value judgment was placed upon them later on by
history. The Asuras assisted the Devas in the first Soma sacrifice, rendering the consumer
immortal and allowing them into the kingdom of heaven, only to be denied the elixir by
Indra and an avatar of Vishnu, Narayana. The Kauravas assisted the Pandavas in
maintaining the kingdom in their absence, only to be denied any acceptance into the
dramatically larger kingdom of the Pandavas by Krsna, an avatar of Vishnu. The way the
story is told by Vyasa, it seems that Vishnu has some vested interest in maintaining the
line of his brother, Indra. By preventing the Asuras from drinking the elixir, he secured
Indra’s place as the king of heaven. By provoking the Kauravas into battle, he secured
Indra’s grandson, Abhimanyu, a place as the king of the Kurus.
Let’s take a moment to look at the characterization of Duryodhana in the text. In
“The Partial Incarnations”, it is written;
“Prince Duryodhana, evil-spirited, evil-minded disgracer of the
Kurus, was born on earth from a portion of Kali; he was a creature of
discord, hated by all the world; it was he, meanest of men, who caused the
massacre of all the earth, he who fanned the great feud into a blaze that
was to put an end to the beings. (245)”
This is Vyasa’s characterization of the Prince Duryodhana to Janemejaya’s court.
While his name is noted here as Duryodhana, I think its also important to point out that
he is also referred to a few times by another name, Suyodhana, the distinction of which I

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think is important. According to Volume 3 of Dermot Killingley’s Beginning Sanskrit,
the suffix of the name, ‘yodhana’, means ‘to conquer, or to struggle’. The prefixes are the
important difference here. ‘Duh’ means ‘bad, badly, or difficult’, so this can translate
Duryodhana to mean either ‘bad conqueror’ or ‘difficult to conquer’. ‘Su’ means ‘good,
or well done’, so Suyodhana can translate to ‘good conqueror’ or ‘well done conqueror’.
We can see why this distinction is important. Born Suyodhana, I imagine it wasn’t until
the later tellings of the epic that his name was changed from Suyodhana to Duryodhana.
Throughout the Mahabharata, several characters go by many names, so it’s interesting
that the majority of the time Duryodhana is referred to in the majority by something other
than his birth name. While Arjuna was born named Arjuna, he also has many other names
including Partha, Jinsu and Phalguna. However, he is in the majority referred to by his
birth name, Arjuna. It is the same with Bhimasena, and Krsna, as well as many other
characters in the epic. So it seems odd that another central character would be referred to
primarily by a nickname, when that doesn’t seem to be the standard. This is a good
observation of a possible manipulation of the epic by the storyteller.
Above it can also be noted that Duryodhana, allegedly, has been possessed by the
demon Kali. The tale of Kali is interesting for several reasons. First, Kali, as a character
in the Mahabharata, possessed the king Nala, who eventually lost his entire kingdom to
his brother in a gambling match. We can see the parallels within the story already. Kali,
throughout ancient India, was looked at as an avatar of Vishnu, who once again appears
as a ‘mover’ in the epic. However, though Kali is an avatar of Vishnu, he represents the
exact opposite of what Vishnu represents. Vishnu represents creation, so Kali represents

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destruction, destruction of the whole world, in fact. So, we can see how attributing Kali
to Duryodhana can add to the negative portrayal of him as the destroyer of the Kuru line.
In the above quote, Vyasa also mentions that Duryodhana is the sole cause of the
‘massacre on earth’, clearly forgetting the tale he himself is telling. Thought I’m not
denying Duryodhana’s hand in causing the battle, one cannot forget that many others,
specifically Yudhisthira, also played a very large role in fanning ‘the great feud into a
blaze that was to put an end to the beings’. It was Yudhisthira, who once he had a small
tract of land in the Kuru Kingdom, who sent his brothers out to conquer the rest of the
world, from China to Greece. It was Yudhisthira, who agreed to the gambling match that
eventually led to him losing the entire kingdom, his brothers, and himself. It was
Yudhisthira who agreed to bet his own wife, Draupadi, in a gambling match. In our later
reads, it is Draupadi that is one of the loudest voices for war; specifically for revenge for
the way she was treated during the gambling match. However, she blames Duryodhana,
and not Yudhisthira, even though it was Yudhisthira who gambled her in the first place.
To Draupadi, thousands of soldiers should be killed in battle as a result of her treatment.
Draupadi should not be forgotten as an integral element in the fanning of the
flames of the epic battle. First off, as I mentioned before, she wrongfully holds
Duryodhana to blame for her harassment, even though Yudhisthira had to agree to any
and all terms before the gambling began. As a result of this displaced anger, Draupadi
calls for the death of Duryodhana and his allies. This portrays her as a haughty princess
who had never known anything but getting exactly what she wants. Here, in The Book of
Effort, this side of her character truly comes out, where soldiers’ lives are meaningless to
her until she gets her revenge on Duryodhana;

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“’It has been said often enough…has there been a woman like me
on earth[?] [W]ho in holy radiance equal[s] five Indras[?] I, a woman of
such standing, was grabbed by the hair and molested in a men’s hall, while
the sons of Pandu looked on…[t]he Pandavas watched it without showing
anger or doing anything…A curse on Bhimasena’s strength, a curse on the
Partha’s bowmanship, if Duryodhana stays alive for another hour.’ (357)”
Krsna replies;
“Soon…you shall see the woman of the Bharatas weep! They
shall, timid woman, weep for their kinsmen and relatives who are killed.
They at whom you are enraged, radiant woman, have already lost their
friends and troops.’ (358)”
Here we see Draupadi’s true nature. Sure, she was stripped in front of a room of
men while she was menstruating, but her husband agreed to it all when she was gambled
with over a game of dice! She wrongly places the blame on Duryodhana, considering that
everything had to be condoned by Yudhisthira. Regardless, she feels that all of the Kurus
must be punished for what has been done. Personally, I just think she should have just
made Yudhisthira sleep on the couch.
In doing a bit of research for this paper, I came across a version of the story of the
Palace of Illusions from a very credible source, the Mahabharata television series. In
episode forty-four, Duryodhana slips and falls on the crystal. But instead of just laughs
from all of the Pandava brothers, there also is included an insult of Duryodhana by
Draupadi regarding his father’s blindness; ‘andhey ka putra andha’
or ‘the son of a blind man is blind’. From the way it is portrayed in the episode,
Duryodhana is actually impressed by the Palace of Illusions, and it wasn’t until
Draupadi’s insult that he became upset and then envious. While I realize that the
Mahabharata Indian television series may not be the most reliable source, I thought it was

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interesting that this small incident was left out of the text, even though it drastically
changes the story of the Palace of Illusions.
Taking this into account, maybe with a grain of salt, and also that Vyasa seems to
completely deny Yudhisthira and Draupadi from having any part in provoking the great
war. By removing blame from both the Pandavas and Draupadi, and placing it solely with
Duryodhana, I think we may be able to see another example of possible manipulation by
the storyteller.
Another important point is that Duryodhana does not recognize the demigod
status of the Pandava brothers. He says in The Book of Effort:
“’The Parthas are the same as other men, born just as they are, so
why do you think that victory is theirs solely? We are all born the same
from human wombs, grandfather, so how do you know that victory will go
to the Parthas?’ (331-332)”
By not recognizing the superhuman status of the Pandava brothers,
Duryodhana denies himself the realization that he has no chance against the
demigods. He had been raised alongside them, was of comparable size, and was
trained by the very same martial arts instructor, Drona. Vyasa even remarks at
their similarities during one of their many challenges, in The Book of the
Beginning:
“Suyodhana and the Wolf-Belly descended, as always in high
spirits, clubs in hand, like two single-peaked mountains. The strong-armed
princes buckled their armor, hell-bent on showing off their masculine
prowess, like two huge rutting bull elephants joining battle over a cow.
(277)”
By turning a blind eye, no pun intended, to the godhood of the Pandavas,
and instead believing them to be the sons of men, Duryodhana cannot be blamed

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when he thinks that he can defeat them. If we take this into account it starts to
become a bit clearer that he may have really believed that his intentions were
good, and that he truly believed he had the ability to defeat the Pandavas in battle.
The winners always tell the stories of history. Generally, the winners portray
themselves as always in the right, on the side of good. For example, oftentimes in the
American history books about World War II, we leave out the fact that the United States
maintained internment camps of their own, but instead of Jews, these camps consisted of
Japanese immigrants. This fact is generally left out of the history of one of the most
gruesome wars of our times. This is just one example of how the winners have
manipulated or omitted parts of history to portray themselves in a better light.
In the case of the Mahabharata, the winners’ ancestors only hear the stories of
history, and as a result, that history may be misconstrued to make the winners more
benevolent and the losers more malevolent. This epic may be a perfect example of that.
The story itself is being told to the ancestors of the winners, who, in order to fully enjoy
the story, must feel that their war was won for noble purposes. As a result, the storyteller,
Vyasa, portrays the two sides as a battle of good versus evil, with good prevailing in the
end. However, these value judgments of good and evil were merely incorporated into the
story many generations afterwards. It is clear that while Duryodhana was a driving force
in the cause of the great war, he was never the sole initiator. His cousin Yudhisthira, and
Yudihisthira’s wife, Draupadi played very large roles in the build up to the struggle that
almost ended the line of the Kurus. This is not the only instance where the Pandavas are
portrayed as good and the Kauravas are portrayed as evil. There is also the manipulation
of Duryodhana’s name from Suyodhana, ‘good conqueror’ to Duryodhana ‘bad

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conqueror’. This is a clear rewriting of history by Vyasa, though it seems to go
dramatically overlooked. Finally, there is Duryodhana’s denial of the demigod status of
the Pandavas. As a result, he truly felt that he could conquer them and rule the kingdom
himself, completely unaware that he could never stand a chance against the sons of
celestial beings.
In the end, I believe Suyodhana truly believed that his motives were in the right,
and that he was ultimately enacting what he felt was for the best of the kingdom. It was
Vyasa, and his manipulation of Suyhodhana’s character, that eventually made him out to
be the evil individual we read about in the epic. What’s most important is that when we
read ancient texts, we remember that it is the winners who are writing these texts, and
that the winners will always portray themselves to be on the side of good. It is when we,
as students of the text, blindly assign these values to the sides that we overlook the
perspectives of the losers. It is always important to look at all sides in a conflict, and it is
when we make judgments before we find out the whole story that we disrespect the
memories of the losers, and oftentimes, cannot fully understand the conflict itself.