Did Mata Sita Go Through a Fire Test?

As a child I loved watching animation movies of Ramayana and read children’s book on it. As an adult, watched almost every episode of Siya ke Ram in mobile app. I felt deeply connected to the characters in the Ramayana. I would cry when Lord Rama had to leave his kingdom and my eyes would become wet seeing Bharat’s love for Ram. But there were two instances mentioned in the Ramayana that made me temporary upset with Lord Ram during my teen age days. One was Mata Sita’s Agni Pariksha and another was abandoning Sita after returning to Ayodhya due to gossip in the kingdom. But slowly, as I grew up, read Bhagavat Gita, I was drawn to Sri Hari/Lord Narayan. As I walked two steps towards him, I felt he walked four steps towards me. I have felt his grace immensely in my life and it was his grace alone that brought Om Swamiji in my life during my low phase. As a devotee I felt, Lord Narayan is an ocean of compassion and unconditional love and that he could never have asked Sita Ma for an Agni Pariksha or abandon her when she was pregnant due to gossip in his kingdom.

In order to know what actually happened in Treta Yuga, there are two ways. One could be that Lord Narayan or Goddess Lakshmi tell us what actually happened or if someone could travel back in time through meditation to know what actually happened.

To all my readers surprise, I would like to share that both the events have happened during this blessed time on earth. There is a saying that you don’t choose a book to read, the book chooses you and I firmly believe that. It was Divine grace alone that I came to know about the two books, first one was “A Thousand Seeds of Joy: Teachings of Lakshmi and Saraswati written by Ananda Karunesh” and  second one was “The Untold Story of Sita: An Empowering Tale of Our Times written by Dena Merriam”. Ananda Karunesh had a Zen awakening around the age of 19 and then reading and meditating for next 25 years until he turned 44. But everything changed one October evening in 2007, when he started having conversations with Goddess Lakshmi. Goddess Lakshmi told him that this book was not the first instance of his working with her. He had incarnated in other lifetimes and had done prayer work, mantras and channelings to spread her message. The messages came to him slowly around the time of his father’s death in October 2012, but as his devotion to Goddess Lakshmi grew, he began to receive answers to his questions  directly from her. The answers came as a strong sense of knowing or the gift of clairsentience, especially when he  would be in a joyful surrender to her energy.

Let us go through few of their conversations in the book regarding Mata Sita’s fire test and after reading it you will know the truth.

Ananda Karunesh : Before returning to Ayodhya, Rama made you go through an Agni Pariksha—a fire test—to prove your fidelity. Was this done to prove to everyone else that you were pure, even though Rama believed in his heart that you were pure?

Mahadevi Lakshmi: Isn’t interesting that so much of human history has been written from a patriarchal perspective? There are so many incorrect stories about enlightened women like Eve, Mary and others. Some have been lost in translation. Others were created to suit male-oriented cultures throughout human history

Ananda Karunesh : Are you saying that you did not go through the fire test ?

Mahadevi Lakshmi: I chose all major events of my life as Sita . It was my decision to go with Rama into exile. My soul desired to know the depths of loneliness, so I chose to be sequestered with the help of Ravana. The three of us had a soul contract in this. Once Ram and I , totally surrendered to our lower chakras, we found our nothingness and blossomed into bliss. We realized who we were and that is when Rama gathered the strength to defeat Ravana. We were open in all our chakras and so nothing was hidden from us at this point. We could communicate directly using our thoughts without using any words or language. I could have walked on water or disappeared at will if I wanted, for I had full control over the elements at this point.

Ananda Karunesh : So, you could have even gone in fire without being burned. Did u go through the fire test?

Mahadevi Lakshmi: No, there was no Fire test! The fire was metaphor for my enlightenment. Think of Sun as it melts down over the clouds into a place where you cannot see it anymore. This is what it means. This is to help you understand that the ego must be released into ultimate nothingness, just as the sun is released in the void of night. Then the snake of energy rises and one has pure enlightenment. So, there is a double metaphor related to my being in fire – one is releasing of ego and other is claiming of enlightenment. It is like phoenix: a rebirth from the ashes.

The Ramayana was altered over centuries to suit the beliefs of its new authors who valued patriarchy. Some parts were expanded and whole new sections were added in other parts, that Valmiki never wrote. When you research this, you will find clear evidence that entirely new sections were added to Ramayana hundreds of years after Valmiki initially composed it.

In the new writings, the male authors tested my virtue as Sita and “purified” me by putting me through fire.

Valmiki reincarnated on Earth to correct this soon after the medieval periods, when the temples were destroyed in India. He wrote a translation of Valmiki’s Ramayana that was closer to truth, but even he did not recollect everything from his earlier incarnation as Valmiki.

Ananda Karunesh : Oh, you mean as Tulsidas, who wrote the Ramcharitmanas?

Mahadevi Lakshmi: Yes

Ananda Karunesh : So, is Ramcharitmanas the correct version of what happened?

Mahadevi Lakshmi: It is closer to truth, though not entirely true, as Tulsidas was also a human. Tulsidas prayed often  and was inspired by angels and gods. In his meditations he realized that his own words from his earlier incarnation as Valmiki had been changed, and whole new chapters and sections had been added to make me appear weak and submissive.

After knowing the truth from Mahadevi Lakshmi, let us know a little about the author of the second book (The Untold Story of Sita: An Empowering Tale of Our Times) Dena Merriam. She began meditating in the 1970s under the guidance of her Gurudeva Paramahansa Yogananda. Over the course of her life, she has recalled events from numerous past births, but those births have been relatively near in time, going back a mere few hundred years. She has recorded these experiences in My Journey Through Time: A Spiritual Memoir of Life, Death and Rebirth. One day on a pilgrimage to Vaishnav Devi and then visiting Raghunath temple in Jammu, when she bowed before the central images of Shri Ram and Mata Sita, she was immediately drawn from this world and taken back in ancient past. She saw herself as a five-year-old leaning towards her mother’s leg and watching her father speak to one she knew immediately to be Shri Ram himself. Her father explained to Shri Ram that from the time she was very young, each time they passed the palace she would call out “Mata” and try to escape his arms to run to the palace gates. Then Shri Ram looked into her eyes and said she was one of the servants who came with Sita from Mithila. She loved Sita very much. Shri Ram placed his hand on her head and said to her “There will always be someone in every life to bring you back, to point you in the direction of your true home”. The memories of the Sita story unfolded over a period of seven months after she returned to New York, drawing her back into a past and to a region for which she felt great love and deep attachment.

Now, I would like to summarize the incident that Dena Merriam saw and heard in her meditations and wrote in the book “The Untold Story of Sita”. After Ravana brought Mata Sita to Lanka and she took refuge at a large Ashoka tree. A group of fierce – looking female guards surrounded her and one of them said to Mata Sita that you must be thirsty, drink water and have some fruit. Mata Sita took a deep drink of water and went into meditation. Her mind began to feel foggy and she struggled to keep herself alert. She realized that the water she had drunk upon her arrival had been tainted and had clouded her mind. She would have to refrain from taking anything to drink or eat. That much she knew. Ravana tried to torture Mata Sita by creating illusions in her mind about Shri Ram and Mata Sita’s parent’s death and Shri Ram marrying someone else to weaken Mata Sita’s resistance. Mata Sita with the guidance of Sage Anusuya who had emerged as a ball of light, entered Ravana’s dream world and brought before his mind all damage he has done. He saw all abused women that he had violated, appeared in front of him and their voices rang out for justice in his dreams. After getting repeated dreams, Ravana was afraid to sleep and lack of sleep made him weak. With Shri Ram now beyond Mata Sita’s reach, the only one who could guide her was Parvati Ma. From the depths of her being, Mata Sita called her. Mata Parvati appeared in front of her and asked her to remain in meditation most of the time but not to lose consciousness of the outer world. Mata Parvati said to Mata Sita that she will be sustained by amrita, the nectar of immortality so she can do without food and water.

Mata knew the moment the battle was over. At the exact time, the amrita that has sustained her stopped flowing. As she began to emerge from meditation, the waves of love were replaced by a great fire that engulfed her body, the heat of her tapasya bursting into flames. It was just then Shri Ram and others found her, seated in a bowl of fire. Lakshman called out in panic, thinking she was being burned alive. He started to run towards her, but Shri Ram stopped him. In amazement he gazed at the sight and said “She is consuming all the impurities of this place and the effects of the war. This fire is the heat of her tapasya; let it burn.” The fire then withdrew back into her body and subsided. After the flames had been absorbed into Mata’s body, she felt the presence of Shri Ram and opened her eyes to behold him. In a moment of overwhelming joy, she rose to greet him. But she had not stood on her foot for days and with amrita gone, her body suddenly experienced weakness from lack of food and water. As she tried to rise, the world began to spin around her and Mata fell to ground unconscious.

               Although Shri Ram also needed to be treated for his wounds and was depleted from the battle, he carried her into the palace and for days sat by her side, pouring drops of water into her mouth. After Mata gained consciousness, she took her first food from Mandodari’s hand as Mata had promised her during her stay in Lanka. Before Leaving Lanka, Mata and Mandodari cooked and arranged feast for all people in Lanka. Her last act on Lanka was go to the sacred Ashok tree that had sheltered her and to touch her forehead to its roots, paying homage to the great being who had been her companion and witness that difficult year.

Author Dena Merriam concludes in her book saying that we must erase from our collective consciousness the imposed view of Sita as a victim or having a secondary or supportive role and see her as equal partner to Ram. After reading the entire book, knowing who she truly was and her contributions to mankind, I completely agree to the author’s views and that is the reason I decided to write about it and share with others.

I will write a separate blog in near future regarding the truth of abandoning Mata Sita after returning to Ayodhya due to gossip in the kingdom.

I offer this blog to Mahadevi Lakshmi on the occasion of Diwali. I feel that there is no greater offering than spreading her words and letting people know who she truly was.

I am sharing the amazon links of the two books I talked about in this blog so that readers of my blog benefit from it by buying and reading them:

 1. A Thousand Seeds of Joy: Teachings of Lakshmi and Saraswati (Ascended Goddesses Series Book 1) written by Ananda Karunesh ( https://www.amazon.in/Thousand-Seeds-Joy-Teachings-Saraswati/dp/B078HF88ZB )

2.  The Untold Story of Sita: An Empowering Tale Of Our Times written by Dena Merriam (https://www.amazon.in/Untold-Story-Sita-Empowering-Tale/dp/0578465345 )

Wishing all the readers of my blog “A Very Happy Diwali! Jai Siya Ram!”.