Hanuman meets Bhima

1. 1Hearing strange sounds, Bhima felt the hair on his body stand on end. He searched the banana grove and saw the monkey chief, Hanuman, sitting on a high rock.
2. 2Bhima sees the monkey chief. He shines and moves like lightning, with a short thick neck, broad shoulders, a slim waist, and a long hairy tail raised high like a flag.
3. 3Bhima looks closely at the monkey, who is Hanuman. He has a coppery face, red ears, bright eyes and sharp white teeth. His head glows like the moon, and he lies among golden banana trees, shining like a fire.
4. 4Hanuman lies there huge as a mountain, blocking the path, his eyes red as if drunk. Bhima is not afraid. He walks up quickly and gives a thunderous shout that scares all the birds and animals.
5. 5Hanuman barely opens his eyes and smiles. He says he is sick and was sleeping peacefully, so why did Bhima wake him? Animals do not know right from wrong, he says, but humans can think, so they should be kind to all creatures.
6. 6Hanuman scolds Bhima. He says thinking people should not harm others in deed, word or thought. Bhima frightens animals because he is young and has not learned from wise people. Then Hanuman asks who Bhima is and where he is going, and warns that he cannot go further.
7. 7Hanuman warns that the mountains ahead are the path of the gods. Ordinary people cannot pass, except through long spiritual discipline. He says he is stopping Bhima out of kindness and welcomes him to stay.
8. 8Hanuman invites Bhima to rest there and eat sweet fruits and roots, instead of throwing his life away for nothing.
9. 9Bhima asks who this being really is and why he looks like a monkey. Then he proudly introduces himself as a warrior of the Kuru family, son of Kunti and Pandu, born of the wind-god, named Bhimasena.
10. 10Hanuman, also a son of the wind-god, smiles and refuses to let Bhima pass. Bhima demands that he get up and move, or be hurt. Hanuman says he is too sick to rise.
11. 11Hanuman tells Bhima to jump over him. Bhima refuses, because God lives in every body, and stepping over a being would disrespect God. He boasts he could leap like Hanuman leapt the ocean. Hanuman asks who this Hanuman is.
12. 12Bhima says Hanuman is his brother, famous in the Ramayana for leaping a vast ocean to find Rama's wife Sita. Bhima boasts that he is just as strong. He threatens to send the monkey to Yama, the god of death, if he does not move.
13. 13Hanuman sees that Bhima is drunk on his own strength. Quietly unimpressed, he gently asks Bhima to have pity on an old monkey and simply move his tail aside to pass.
14. 14Bhima thinks the monkey is weak. He smirks and grabs the tail with one hand, planning to fling him away, but he cannot move it. Then he pulls with both arms.
15. 15Even with all his strength, straining and sweating, Bhima cannot lift the tail. He gives up and stands beside the monkey, embarrassed.
16. 16Bhima bows with joined hands and asks forgiveness for his rude words. He humbly asks if the monkey is some god or heavenly being. He says he asks as a student and seeks his protection.
17. 17Hanuman agrees to tell his story. He says he is Hanuman, son of the wind-god and the wife of Kesari. He was a close friend of Sugriva, a monkey prince, in the time of the monkey kings Sugriva and Vali.
18. 18Hanuman says Sugriva was driven out by his brother and lived with him. In that time Rama was born, who is the god Vishnu in human form. Rama went to live in the Dandaka forest with his wife and brother to honor his father's word.
19. 19Hanuman tells how the wicked demon king Ravana kidnapped Rama's wife Sita. He tricked Rama using the demon Maricha, who took the form of a beautiful golden spotted deer.
20. 20While searching for Sita, Rama and his brother met Sugriva and became friends. Rama killed Vali and made Sugriva king. Sugriva then sent thousands of monkeys to search for Sita.
21. 21Hanuman went south with many monkeys to look for Sita. The vulture Sampati told them she was held in Ravana's home. To help Rama, Hanuman leapt across the ocean, a hundred yojanas wide (a yojana is several miles).
22. 22Hanuman tells Bhima how he crossed the ocean by his own strength and found Sita, King Janaka's daughter, in the palace of Ravana, the demon king. After meeting her, he set fire to Lanka, Ravana's city, announced his name there, and came back.
23. 23When Rama heard Hanuman's report, he knew what to do. He built a bridge across the sea, crossed it with a huge army of monkeys, and killed Ravana and his Rakshasa (demon) armies in battle.
24. 24After killing Ravana and his family, Rama made Ravana's good and kind brother Vibhishana the king of Lanka. Rama got his wife Sita back, went home to his city Ayodhya, and ruled as king.
25. 25Hanuman says he asked Rama for a gift: to live as long as the story of Rama's deeds is still told on earth, and Rama agreed. Thanks to Sita's blessing, Hanuman is given every comfort where he lives, and Rama later ruled for eleven thousand years before going back to heaven.
26. 26Hanuman explains that heavenly singers and dancers keep singing Rama's deeds for him. He blocked Bhima's way because this path is for the gods and no human can walk it, and he wanted to keep Bhima safe from harm or curses. The lake Bhima is looking for lies in that direction.
27. 27Bhima says he will not leave until Hanuman shows him the huge form he once had. He asks for this as a favour.
28. 28Hanuman smiles and, to please his brother Bhima, grows into the giant form he used to leap across the ocean. He becomes as tall as the Vindhya mountains and fills the whole banana grove.
29. 29Hanuman's body becomes like a mountain, with copper-colored eyes, sharp teeth, a frowning face and a long swishing tail. Bhima is amazed and gets goosebumps. Hanuman shines like the sun, so Bhima has to close his eyes.
30. 30Hanuman smiles and tells Bhima that this is as much as Bhima can bear to see. He can grow even bigger whenever he wants, and when enemies are near, he grows larger by his own power.
31. 31Bhima, son of the wind god, is confused and overwhelmed by Hanuman's enormous body. With folded hands he says he has seen it, and asks Hanuman to make himself small again.
32. 32Bhima says he cannot look at Hanuman, who shines like the rising sun. He wonders why Rama had to fight Ravana himself, since Hanuman alone could have destroyed Lanka and its whole army.
33. 33Bhima says there is nothing Hanuman cannot do, and that Ravana and all his followers could not have matched Hanuman in a fight.
34. 34Hanuman shrinks back to normal size and hugs Bhima. The hug takes away Bhima's tiredness and gives him so much new strength that he feels no one is as strong as he is.
35. 35With tears in his eyes and a choked voice, Hanuman tells Bhima to go home and to mention him sometimes when he talks. He asks Bhima not to tell anyone where he lives, because heavenly women come here and will arrive soon. He says seeing Bhima has blessed his eyes.
36. 36Hanuman says touching a human again reminded him of Rama, who was the god Vishnu in human form and brought joy to the world and to Sita. So he asks Bhima, as a brother, to ask him for a gift so their meeting is not wasted.
37. 37Hanuman offers to destroy the sons of Dhritarashtra, the Pandavas' enemy cousins, or crush their city with rocks, or tie up Duryodhana, their leader, and bring him to Bhima, all that very day.
38. 38Bhima happily says he will think of all that as already done. He only asks that Hanuman be pleased with him, and says that with Hanuman protecting them, the Pandavas will defeat all their enemies.
39. 39Hanuman promises to help Bhima out of brotherly love. In battle he will sit on the flag of Arjuna's chariot and roar along with Bhima's roars, scaring the enemy so the Pandavas can defeat them easily. Then he shows Bhima the way and disappears.