Scene 3
(Kumara, running, enters his home and sees two most beautiful girls with Ganapati and his parents. He is furious.)KUMARA: (to his parents): You have deceived me! You didn’t even wait for me. How did he come back before me?
SHIVA: My son, he knew that I am divine. He knew that I am the Creator and I am the creation. He knew that I am God and I am the world. So he went around me not once, but seven times. And you, my son, you have come only now, so late.
KUMARA: No! It is all deception, all deception! I can’t tolerate this. I am going into the forest. I will never, never marry in this life. I don’t need women, Who cares for a woman’s beauty? Beauty is, after all, only skin deep. I shall care only for the soul’s beauty, the eternal beauty. Women are bondage. I don’t need bondage. My brother now has double bondage: two women in his life. He was a fool to get married. Now he is stuck, but I can run towards my goal the fastest because I am free from bondage.
(Shiva blesses his son.)
SHIVA: Kumara, in some cases, marriage does help; in other cases, it is an obstruction. For you, marriage would be an obstruction, a curse. You do not need a wife. You need only God. To realise Him, to fulfil Him, is your sole aim. Marriage would not allow you to think of God, to meditate on God, And I want you to realise God as soon as possible without having this added burden on your shoulders. So to remain unmarried is, for you, a real blessing. But in Ganapati’s case, marriage is a blessing, a real boon. With his marriage, he will be able to fulfil himself and God. The added strength it gives him will allow him to run the fastest in his own way. We want satisfaction, real satisfaction, from both of you. Your unmarried life the world will adore. In his case, the world will see that with a wife one can also go to God. God is both man and woman. How can you ignore the part that is woman? Ganapati will take the other half, woman, to God. Both husband and wife can go to God simultaneously to fulfil Him, which is absolutely necessary. God wants you to remain unmarried and He wants your brother to lead a married life. Your brother is fulfilling God’s wish, as you will be from now on. So you please God in one way, and he pleases God in another way. Both of you are pleasing God in His own Way.
(Shiva sings.)
What is marriage?
The smile of love
That allows two souls
To soar above.
(To Kumara.)
What is marriage?
The curse of Night.
A tug-of-war.
No escape to Light.
(To Ganapati.)
What is marriage?
God’s fulfilment true.
In Silence and Power
His Vision’s due.
