Sītā Comforted

The moment had come, and Hanumān approached it with all the care its delicacy required, for he understood that a wrong move here could undo everything. Sītā had been deceived once by a demon in disguise, and the wound of that deception was raw; if Hanumān revealed himself suddenly, in his vānara form, a talking monkey in a tree, she might well take him for another of Rāvaṇa’s shape-shifting torments, another cruel trick to raise her hopes and dash them, and she might cry out, or despair, and the whole errand would be ruined.

Hanumān had to win her trust before he claimed it, to soften the ground before he stepped on it, to make himself known so gently and so truly that she could believe, past all her wariness, that here at last was a real friend.

So he began not by declaring himself but by speaking, softly, from his hiding place in the branches, of Rāma. In a low and gentle voice, so as not to startle her, he began to tell the story of Rāma, to sing his praises, to recount the tale of the prince of Ayodhyā, his birth, his virtues, his exile, his loss of Sītā, his grief, his alliance with the vānaras, his search.

He let the beloved story fall into Sītā’s ears like a gentle rain, speaking of Rāma with such knowledge and such love that the words themselves carried their own proof, for who but a true friend of Rāma would speak of him so, and know so much, and love him so plainly?

And Sītā, hearing from somewhere above her the name of Rāma spoken with love, hearing his whole story told tenderly by an unseen voice, was at first amazed, and then wary, and then, slowly, moved past her wariness toward a trembling hope. Who spoke so of Rāma, here, in the demon’s garden? Could it be true? Or was it another trick? She looked up, and saw at last the small vānara form in the branches, and her wariness flared, for what was this creature, and was it another of Rāvaṇa’s illusions?

But the words it had spoken, the love in them, the true knowledge of Rāma, pulled against her fear, and she hardly dared to believe and hardly dared to disbelieve.

And Hanumān, seeing her caught between hope and fear, gave her the proof, the one unanswerable sign that no demon’s trick could counterfeit. He came down, gently, humbly, making himself small and unthreatening, and he spoke to her directly now, telling her who he was: the messenger of Rāma, sent to find her, come across the ocean to bring her word and hope.

And to prove it, he brought out the token that Rāma had given him for exactly this moment: Rāma’s signet ring, the ring from Rāma’s own hand, which Sītā knew, which she could not fail to know, which no demon could have counterfeited. He gave her the ring.

And when Sītā took the ring into her hands, and saw that it was truly Rāma’s, truly the ring she knew from his own finger, the last of her wariness broke and fell away, and the truth flooded in upon her: that this was real, that this was a true messenger, that Rāma lived, that Rāma knew where she was, that help had come at last across the impossible ocean, that she was not forgotten, not abandoned, not alone in the dark forever.

The ring in her hands was the proof of everything her captivity had made her fear to hope: that Rāma was alive, that he grieved for her and sought her, that rescue was truly coming.

And the flood of it overwhelmed her. After all the long months of captivity, of grief, of menace, of not-knowing, of holding on with no visible reason to hope, the sudden certainty that Rāma lived and that his messenger stood before her broke through all her hard-held composure, and Sītā wept, and her tears were not the tears of despair that had been her companions so long but the tears of a hope almost too great to bear, the release of all the pent grief and longing of her captivity into a single overwhelming moment of restored hope.

She held the ring, and she wept, and she asked Hanumān a thousand things at once: Did Rāma truly live? Was he well? Did he grieve for her? Was he coming? How had this messenger crossed the ocean? When would rescue come? All the dammed-up longing of her heart poured out in questions, and the messenger’s coming was to her as water to one dying of thirst, as light to one long in darkness, the first pure joy she had known since the day she was taken.

Let us feel the sweetness of this moment, for the story means us to, and it has earned it. We have followed Sītā through her taking, her captivity, her grief, her unbreakable endurance, her defiance of Rāvaṇa, her despair under the demon-women’s cruelty; we have seen her hold on with no reward, keep faith with no visible reason, endure and endure and endure.

And now, at last, comes the first ray of light, the first reward of all that faithful endurance: the certain knowledge that Rāma lives and seeks her and is coming, brought to her across the ocean by a faithful friend. It is the turning of her long night toward its dawn, the first breaking of the darkness that had held her so long, and the joy of it, breaking through her long-held grief, is one of the tenderest things in the whole telling.

Her faith, held so long in the dark, was vindicated at last; the deliverance she had defiantly promised Rāvaṇa, and half-feared to hope for herself, was truly coming; and the messenger of it sat before her with her husband’s ring in her hands and her husband’s love in his words.

And Hanumān, for his part, was filled with joy to have found her, to have brought her comfort, to have lifted, even a little, the terrible weight of her captivity. This was the fruit of his great leap, the purpose of his whole crossing: not yet her rescue, for that would take the army and the war, but this, the finding of her, the bringing of hope, the assurance to the grieving captive that she was not forgotten and that help was on its way.

He had crossed the ocean for this moment, and it was worth every league of the crossing, to see the light of hope break at last across the worn face of the captive queen, and to know that he would carry back to Rāma the news that would end his grief: that Sītā lived, and had kept faith, and waited, unbroken, for her rescue.

There remained now the practical matters, the questions of how and when the rescue would come, and Sītā would have counsel to give and a token to send, and there was the question, too, of whether Hanumān might simply carry her away himself, then and there, and spare the whole labour of the war. All this remained to be spoken of between them in the grove. But the great thing was done: Sītā was found, and Sītā was comforted, and the long darkness of her captivity had, at last, been pierced by the light of certain hope.