Infatuation

Shakuntala lost in thought by Raja Ravi Varma 19th C. Indian Painter

Shakuntala was lost in thought.

Meanwhile, Shakuntala, wondered about their guest. Who was this handsome young king. How dare he come to the forest and hunt. And for deer! Her fawn was the sweetest most innocent creature she had ever known. But what had become of the stranger? He had gone off to stop a mad elephant. What courage! But what if he were crushed by the elephant? She was worried. How could she be worried about a total stranger? It was all so confusing.

But when she consulted with her heart, she realized that she wasn’t worried. What pierced her heart like an arrow and made her head spin was love. She was enchanted by their guest, the handsome king.  She was  feverish with love for the stranger who had entered the grove.  He spoke so sweetly and ran bravely after the mad elephant.

All this gave Shakuntala a headache. She was now burning with passion, and felt feverish and sick. But why had he left so soon? She felt abandoned. It wasn’t the first time. Her mother was the beautiful apsara, Menaka. She had been sent to earth to break the vow of Vishvamitra Muni. 

Everyone in the ashrama knew the story. Vishvamitra had been a king and a great Kshatriya warrior. But he was unsatisfied with his position. Once he had been hunting in the forest when he came upon the great sage Vasistha. Enamoured by his wish-fulfilling cow, he attempted to steal it, but Vasistha ordered the cow to produce an army of soldiers. The magic army defeated Vishvamitra. 

Thwarted, he was determined to understand the source of Vasishta’s power. How could a brahman be more powerful than an Kshatriya?  And so he resolved to become a greater mystic than Vasishta, by dint of severe penances and austerities. This was brought to the attention of Indra, the lord of rain, who decided to put a stop to Vishvamitra’s yogic practice.

Menaka's dance

He had prevailed upon Menaka to seduce the sage. One  day Vishvamitra was meditating on the banks of the Ganges. Menaka gathered flowers by the river. As she approached the sage, he was moved by the fragrance of her perfume, the sweetness of her smile, her enchanting eyes. Still, he resolved to follow his vows. Menaka began to frolic and dance through the forest, picking flowers and smiling graciously at the sage. But Vishvamitra was firm in his vows.  Menaka continued to tempt Vishvamitra until he was captured by her intoxicating beauty and drawn into the web of her seductive wiles.

Temptation of Visvamitra by Raja Ravi Varma, 19th C. traditional painter

Before long, a child was born, a daughter as enchanting as her mother and as strong-willed as her father. With this the spell was broken. 

Birth of Shakuntala

Vishvamitra rejected his daughter and returned to his austerities and meditation. Menaka was an apsara dancing girl from the heavens. She grew restless and bored with the simple tasks of motherhood. 

She longed to return to the court of Indra, king of the heavens. And so it was that she abandoned Shakuntala in the forest. One morning, when no one was to be seen, Menaka slipped into the forest and laid the infant girl on a bed of mango leaves by a tall tamarind tree near the ashram of Kanva the forest sage. 

She said mantras and prayers to the gods to protect the tiny girl and then returned to the heavens to dance in the court of the god of rain. Menaka had been abandoned by her father, the great sage Vishvamitra, and now by her mother, the beautiful apsara, Menaka.

Shakuntha birds with baby girl

As fortune would have it, the birds took pity on her. A family of Shakuntha birds brought her food and sang her to sleep on her bed of leaves. Finally, the sage Kanva, enchanted by the song of those exotic birds, found the nest where the little girl slept. And seeing the helpless child, he resolved to care for her. The compassionate sage raised her in his ashram as his own daughter and named her Shakuntala in honor of the shakuntha birds that had fed her.

Sage Kanva and Shakuntala

And there in the ashrama of Kanva Shakuntala had passed nearly sixteen years. She was a devoted daughter, polite, and well-educated. All the animals of the forest loved her, especially the birds who would perch on her shoulder and sing to her. But her favorite was the fawn that had escaped the ashram and was nearly killed by the king who came to hunt, the noble Dushyant.