SITA

SITA The ten-headed Ravana has tÃ¥ken away Sita, therefore Rama grieves….. (Shalok VÃ¥ran te Vadhik, M. l, p. 1412) The false Gurus sing about the episode of Rama and Sita. (Var Asa M. l, p. 465) Rama had lost his wife and had to wage a war with Ravana. (Gond Namdev, p. 875) Sita was the daughter of Janaka Videhi, the king of Mithila. For her marriage, a Swayyamavara was arranged. It was proclaimed that whosoever would bend the bow of Shiva, would be married with the princess.

Several princes tried, but it was only Rama who was successful in this brave act. After her marriage she went to Ayodhya with her husband. Rama was the crown prince, but before the coronation, his step-mother Kaikeyi prevailed upon the king to banish him from the kingdom for fourteen years and instead install her son Bharata in his place. Sita accompanied Rama in his exile, but was carried away by Ravana, the king of Lanka.

The tyrant king made every effort to win her to his will, but could not do so. A great war ensued between Rama and his allies on one side and the armies of Ravana on the other. Ultimately, the demon king was killed, but this pious and chaste great lady had to pass through a fire-ordeal as a proof of her innocence for the world. After that she returned with her husband to Ayodhya. But before she gave birth to her twins Lava and Kusha, she was sent to the hermitage of Valmiki because of a slanderous utterance of a washerman.

There she lived till her sons mastered all the arts of war and intercepted the Ashvamedha Yajna (horse-sacrifice) of their father. When Rama came to know to their identity, he called back Sita. But her heart was very heavy because of the treatment meted out by her. She wanted to go back to the mother-earth from which she is said to have sprung up. Because of her wish, the ground opened and she was tåken back into the source.

The word \’Sita\’ ordinarily means \’a furrow\’. In the Ramayana her father says that he found her while ploughing his field. For this reason, she is sometimes called Ayoni-ja (not born from the womb). Being the daughter of the king Janaka, she is also called Janaki. See : Rama Lakshmana and Janaka

References :

1. Kohli,Surindar Singh ed,Dictionary of Mythological References in Guru Granth Sahib 1993