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Sura-Asura and Deva-Danava are terms that have the same meaning. Suras are the sons of Aditi and Asuras are sons of Diti. Diti and Aditi are sisters and also wives of the Sage Kashyap. Their father is Prajapati Daksha, who is venerated as a leader of the Devtas. When Brahma made up his mind to create the universe, he just had to think about the creation to cause it to appear. He created ten Prajapatis by the power of his thought, among whom Daksha Prajapati was one. Sanakadi Kumar, Devrishi Narad, Brigu, Atri, Pulatsya, Angira, Kritu are brothers of Daksha Prajapati. Brahma created these human sons and asked them to populate the earth. However Sanakadi, four other sages and Narada declined to do so and chose the path of Bhaktimarg (path of devotion). The other Prajapati's undertook the task of creating progeny. To extend the creation of Brahma, they decided to populate it with their progeny. Prajapati Daksha created 60 girls with his wife Veerani. Of these twenty seven were wedded to Chandrama, the moon and thirteen to the Sage Kashyap.
All the creatures of the world, those who dwell in air, or water or land, are the descendants of these thirteen mothers. The chief among them are Sura, the Devtas who dwell in heaven. The Asura with Tamagun or negative tendencies were confined to Patallok (hell). The Asuras are always fighting the Suras for their rights and are at loggerheads with them. The rise and fall in the human world is also linked to the constant animosity between the Sura and Asura groups. The joys and sorrows of the world can also be traced to them. The Sura-Asura are closely related as brothers and also arch enemies and opponents. The human life reflects their unceasing battle.
In cultures world-over there is the classic good vs. bad theme which we have tried to depict through the Samundra Manthan (the churning of the ocean), the unusual event which occurred between the Sura and the Asura clans, when the two groups had to work together instead of against each other to churn the ocean in order to unravel the many gifts that the ocean held including Kamdhenu (the wish-fulfilling cow) and ultimately the Amrita (nectar of immortality) for which a fight did take place between the two groups.
The side of the Sura's represents the good forces and the side of the Asura's represents the negative energies and hence all the characters that played a positive role in these stories have been placed on the side of the Suras and vice-versa. There is no word as "evil" in the Hindu thinking as ultimately everyone is "good" and there is no permanent "evil" or "satan", as can be seen that even the main villain in the stories for example Ravana in Ramayana achieves ultimate God-head because he utters the name of "Shri Ram" before dying. So God forgives everyone eventually and he has to or then he is not the all-forgiving god. |
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