Vālmīki Jayanti 1999

Vālmīki Jayantī (also called Pragaṭ Divas, Day of Manifestation) celebrates the birthday of Maharṣi Vālmīki, the sage who composed the Rāmāyaṇa, the first and greatest Sanskrit epic. He was born on the full moon of Āśvina: the same Śarad Pūrṇimā when the moon is brightest and most beautiful. Vālmīki is revered not just as a poet but as the Ādi Kavi (the first poet), whose grief at witnessing senseless violence became the world's first literary verse.

The origin of the śloka (the Sanskrit metric verse form used in millions of subsequent poems, hymns, and scriptures) is directly traced to Vālmīki. He was walking by the Tamasā river when he saw a hunter shoot and kill one of a pair of Krauñca birds (herons) in the act of mating. The female bird's cry of grief pierced his heart and, involuntarily, out of his grief (śoka) came the first spontaneous verse in perfect anuṣṭubh metre: Mā Niṣāda, “O hunter, may you never find peace for eternity.” His grief had transformed into poetry. Śoka had become śloka. That moment is considered the birth of Sanskrit literature.

Vālmīki's earlier life is itself a story of transformation. Born a Brahmin named Ratnākara, he became a bandit who robbed travellers to feed his family. When he encountered the sage Nārada and asked if his family would share his sin, he found they refused, and was so shaken that he entered meditation for years, so long that an anthill (vālmīka) grew around him. When he emerged, he was Vālmīki: the sage born from the anthill. He then composed the 24,000-verse Rāmāyaṇa in 7 Kāṇḍas, sheltered Sītā during her forest exile, and taught Rāma's twin sons Lava and Kuśa to sing the Rāmāyaṇa he had written, ensuring the story would reach the world.