Śrī Rukmiṇī Saṃvāda

The Śrī Rukmiṇī Saṃvāda is a conversation in the Mahābhārata, Anuśāsana Parva, Chapter 11. Yudhishṭhira asks Bhīshma in which kind of man or woman Lakshmī makes her lasting home. Bhīshma answers by telling what happened once at Dvārakā, in the presence of Śrī Kṛshṇa. Rukmiṇī put a direct question to Lakshmī, the daughter of Bhṛgu, who sat shining and lotus-coloured in the lap of Śrīman Nārāyaṇa. She asked whom Lakshmī serves, with whom she lives, and whom she looks on with grace.

Lakshmī’s reply is a long teaching on the qualities, conduct and places that draw prosperity and those that drive it away. It ends with the statement that her true embodied form, mūrtimatī, lives forever and only in Nārāyaṇa. Elsewhere she is present only bhāvena (in essence), as the growth of dharma, yaśas (fame), artha (wealth) and kāma (desire).

This is a different conversation from the one in the tenth skandha of the Bhāgavata Purāṇa, where Kṛshṇa playfully tests Rukmiṇī in her inner chamber. Here Lakshmī herself is the speaker, in a teaching of the Anuśāsana Parva, and Kṛshṇa is not.

The setting

Yudhishṭhira asked Bhīshma: “Grandsire, foremost of the Bharatas, in what kind of man, or in what kind of woman, does Lakshmī make her lasting home? Tell me this.”

In answer, Bhīshma told of an event just as it had happened: a question that Rukmiṇī had once put to Lakshmī, in the very presence of Devakī’s son, Śrī Kṛshṇa.

Lakshmī was there. She was lotus-coloured and radiant, seated in the lap of Śrīman Nārāyaṇa, and she is the mother of Manmatha. Rukmiṇī spoke to her: “O daughter of Maharshi Bhṛgu! O beloved of Śrīman Nārāyaṇa, master of the three worlds! O Devī Lakshmī! Which beings do you serve? With whom do you live? Upon whom do you look with grace? Tell me this.”

Rukmiṇī had asked, and the lotus-faced Śrīdevī was pleased. She spoke sweetly and gently before Bhagavān Garuḍadhvaja.

The Mahābhārata gives this in Anuśāsana Parva, Chapter 11.

Lakshmī’s teaching

Śrīdevī’s reply covers the qualities of the men she favours and avoids, the conduct of women that draws her or drives her away, the good things and places where she lives, and last the teaching of her mūrtimatī presence beside Nārāyaṇa alone. In short:

• She lives among those who are fortunate, eloquent, hard-working, self-controlled, thankful and devout. She leaves those who are lazy, who do not believe (nāstika), who are unthankful, deceitful or thieving.
• She favours homes and women marked by truthfulness, cleanliness, modesty and devotion. She leaves those marked by carelessness, quarrels and disregard for the husband.
• She lives among vehicles, maidens, ornaments, yajñas, rain-clouds, blooming lotuses, starry nights and autumn nights, elephants, cow-pens, rivers where ṛshis go, and kings on their thrones. She lives in the homes of those who honour cows, brāhmaṇas and devas.

Her teaching ends with the point that separates her embodied and her essential presence:

“I dwell mūrtimatī, of undivided mind, with complete bhāva, in Śrīman Nārāyaṇa alone… I cannot dwell with my śarīra (body) among others, in other places. Nor can I say that everywhere I dwell in this same form. Where I am present in bhāva-rūpa alone, there dharma, yaśas, artha and kāma increase.”

The Mahābhārata gives this in Anuśāsana Parva, Chapter 11.

The teaching

Bhīshma gives this as a direct lesson in how a household and a person gain or lose the presence of Śrī. It shows a precise link between conduct and character on one side and the lasting grace of Devī Lakshmī on the other. The conversation closes the eleventh adhyāya (chapter) of the Dāna-dharma Parva within the Anuśāsana Parva.

Sources

• Mahābhārata, Anuśāsana Parva, Chapter 11
• Bhāgavata Purāṇa, tenth skandha (named only to set apart a different Rukmiṇī and Kṛshṇa conversation)