Hari Om Parents,
Hope everyone had a relaxing Thanksgiving with your friends and family.
Below was covered in the last class.
Shloka Chanting:
We started the class with our opening prayers. Class began learning Mahalakshmi Ashtakam. We chanted 7 & 8 verses of this. Please refer to page 40 in My Prayers book.
Gita Chanting:
Class revised and chanted along with Bhagavad Gita Video of Chap 5, Verses 6 & 7
link:
Lesson:
Mahabharata:
Mayasura builds an exquisite palace for Pandavas. Narada visits the palace and encourages Yudhishthira to perform Rajasuya Yagna for the sake of his forefathers. It also would establish Yudhishthira's supremacy as the emperor. Before conducting the ceremony, Yudhishthira needed to ensure the allegiance of all kings, which required defeating the tyrannical ruler Jarasandha of Magadha, who had imprisoned many kings.
Krishna, Bhima, and Arjuna devised a plan to eliminate Jarasandha. They challenged him to a duel. Jarasandha chose Bhima for a wrestling match that lasted 14 days. Following Krishna's guidance, Bhima tore Jarasandha's body apart and threw the two halves in opposite directions, ensuring he could not regenerate. Jarasandha defeated, cleared the way for Yudhishthira's Rajasuya Yajna.
During the ceremony, Krishna was honored as the most revered guest, which angered Shishupala. He insulted Krishna repeatedly, exceeding his allotted forgiveness of 100 offenses. Krishna then used his Sudarshana Chakra to behead Shishupala, ending his misdeeds. With this auspicious incident in the Yagna, the destruction of the entire Kurus was predicted.
Immediately after the Yagna, Duryodhana became extremely jealous of Pandavas' fame and riches. He also felt insulted by Draupadi when he was strolling the palace. He and his Uncle Shakuni came up with a vicious plan of defeating them in the game of dice.
Yudhishthira had to accept this invitation from Kauravas and Pandavas was drawn into a disastrous game. Shakuni defeated Yudhishthira, causing the Pandavas to lose their kingdom, wealth, brothers and even their wife, Draupadi, who was humiliated in the Kaurava court. Draupadi was miraculously saved by Krishna's divine intervention, as he provided her with an unending stream of cloth when Dushasana tried to disrobe her. Bhima vows to kill Duryodhana and Dushasana. Concerned Dhritraashtra gives back their kingdom and frees them from slavery.
When they were challenged to a second game of dice, they again lost. As a result, they went into exile for 13 years, including a year of incognito living. Pandavas proceed to the forest with a vow to get back at Kauravas after the exile/incognito period.
We discussed with the class the aspect of Dharma, how it was followed in Dwapara Yuga vs Kali Yuga, the greatness of Draupadi who stood up for herself and her sense of responsibility and forgiving nature towards Yudhishtira though he betted her away in the game of dice.
Discussion on Class play:
We presented 4 choices to the class for the class play. Kids chose to do a jeopardy game instead of play as their first choice. Their second choice was to pick scenes from the post Mahabharata war. We will work on these two choices by next class to come up with the class presentation plan.
Our class play is scheduled for 23rd March. Please let us know kids availability by marking this in the google sheet below.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1vQKlmOf8PCnSYuBB3Oa5eGBq-sObz591D9n9VXEBbgQ/edit?usp=sharing
Announcements:
We will not be having Bala Vihar for the next 2 weeks. The next class will be on December 15th.
We have our Annual Fundraising Event, featuring:
✨ Sampoorna Ramayana Yajna by Swami Shantananda ji (Dec 7–13)
✨ Radha Kalyanam by NJ Sri Swaminatha Bhagavatar and Group (Dec 14–15)
. Please participate in sponsorship and/or volunteering for any of the days in the event,
Link : Surabhi
Thankyou,
Sirisha and Sachin
