Hanuman Meets Sita in Lanka and Lays the City Waste

Entering Lanka fearlessly with a few attendants, Hanuman goes to Vibhishana's palace and, honoured there, asks whether it befits Ravana, lord of three khandas, to steal another's wife like a pauper, since a king is the source of propriety as a mountain is of a river, and urges Vibhishana to restrain him for the world's good. Vibhishana replies that he has pleaded many times in vain, that since bringing Sita Ravana will not even speak to him, and that today is the eleventh day Sita has taken neither food nor water, yet Ravana feels no pity.

Moved, Hanuman goes to the Pramada garden, lovely as a garden of the Bhogabhumi (land of enjoyment), and sees Sita, steadfast in right faith, like a smokeless flame, her eyes full of tears, cheek on hand, hair dishevelled and body wasted, and vows to reunite this great mother with Rama even at the cost of his life. Making himself invisible, he drops Rama's ring in her lap, and at the sight of it her face brightens.

Told by the maids that Sita is smiling, a pleased Ravana rewards them and sends Mandodari and all his queens, and Mandodari urges Sita to become the queen of the lord of three khandas; Sita angrily retorts that news of her husband has come and he is well, and Mandodari thinks eleven days of fasting have made her rave. Sita then calls on whoever brought the ring, a brother to her, to show himself, and Hanuman, thinking it base to help and then hide, appears before Mandodari and all the queens and bows to Sita with folded hands, looking as if Bhamandala had come to fetch her.

Hanuman names his clan, lineage and parents and then himself, and gives Rama's message: Rama dwells in palaces like celestial vimanas, but drowned in the ocean of her absence he has given up all pleasures, never listens to the vina, songs or tales of love, speaks only of her and lives only to see her again. Overjoyed, Sita asks with tears what she can give him, and he answers that the sight of her is his great reward.

Sita anxiously asks how he crossed the monster-filled ocean, where he saw Rama, whether Lakshmana came back safe from battle, and whether Rama has died, become a monk, or grown so thin that the ring slipped from his finger; Hanuman recounts everything: Lakshmana's winning of the Suryahasa sword, Chandranakha rousing her husband Kharadushana, Ravana's false lion-roar, Rama's search, the dying Jatayu given the Namokara mantra and the four aradhanas (devotions) for a peaceful death, Kharadushana's fall, the alliance of Viradhita, son of Chandrodaya, and Rama's slaying of Sahasagati in Sugriva's form. He adds that he has come at Rama's command to free her and hopes that Lanka's lord, whom he calls kind, wise and fearful of public censure, will heed him and send her back without war.

When Sita asks how many heroes like this monkey-bannered one serve her husband, Mandodari answers that Hanuman has no equal in Bharata-kshetra: son of Pavana and beloved son of Anjana, he is Ravana's nephew-in-law, married to Chandranakha's daughter Anangakusuma, has often fought for Ravana and is held by him dearer than a brother, so it is a wonder that he comes as the envoy of Bhumigocharas. Hanuman retorts that she, daughter of King Maya and chief queen of an Ardhachakravarti (half-world emperor), has stooped to be a go-between for her husband's lust instead of stopping him from eating poison, and that he now takes her for a mahishi in the sense of a she-buffalo rather than a queen.

Mandodari threatens Hanuman with Ravana's harshest punishment and scorns Sugriva and the others who abandoned Ravana to serve the slayer of his brother-in-law, but Sita answers that the twang of Rama's Vajravarta bow makes great warriors flee, that Rama and Lakshmana will soon cross the ocean, and that Mandodari will see her husband slain and weep as a widow. Enraged, Mandodari and the eighteen thousand queens rush at Sita with harsh words to strike her, but Hanuman steps between them like a physician warding off pain, and the humiliated queens go off to Ravana.

Hanuman then begs Sita to eat, since the earth to the ocean's edge is Rama's and so this food is his, not the enemy's, and since she had vowed to eat only after news of her husband; he orders the maid Ira to bring the finest provisions and himself dines with Vibhishana. Ira returns within four muhurtas with ghee, sugar, lentils and rice in golden vessels; Sita cooks by rule, invites Ira and her companions, treats Hanuman with a sister's affection, bows to the Lord, wishes to feed the three kinds of worthy recipients, and eats pure food by daylight, as is proper, never at night.

Hanuman offers to carry her on his shoulders across the ocean to Rama in a moment, but Sita, weeping, refuses to go without her husband's command, lest he ask why she came uncalled, and urges Hanuman to leave before Ravana acts. She sends secret tokens: how Rama tamed a wild elephant in rut after they had worshipped a Charana muni and bathed in a lotus lake, how he caught her in his arms when bees stung her as she swung from a branch, how he playfully gave her a lotus stalk, and how on the bank of the Karnakundala river they fed two Charana munis and the five wonders occurred, rains of jewels, wish-tree flowers and fragrant water, a cool breeze and celestial drums with cries of ‘blessed the recipients, blessed the giver, blessed the gift’.

Taking the chudamani from her head so that Rama will believe, Sita bids Hanuman tell Rama to guard his life with care, since only his valour can reunite them, and Hanuman promises she will soon meet her lord; she slips Rama's ring onto her finger and feels as if united with him. The garden women marvel at Hanuman as Kamadeva or a god, Ravana sends ruthless warriors to kill the intruder in his pleasure garden, and Hanuman, flashing the jewelled monkey emblem on his crown and showing many forms, scatters the guards, then, weaponless, uproots tall trees and hurls mountain rocks at the next wave, killing many of Ravana's vassals with fists and kicks.

Hanuman levels the garden's vimana-like mansions and the city's houses, shops and palaces, the slain servants turning the market into a battlefield and fallen arches and banners lying like rainbows, until Indrajit and Meghavahana come out in armour with a great army and, after a long fight outside Lanka, Indrajit binds Hanuman with a nagapasha (serpent noose). Ravana, already told how Hanuman joined Rama, defeated Mahendra, saved the monks, sent Dadhimukha's princesses to Rama, broke the wall, killed Vajramukha and married his daughter Lankasundari, has him bound in iron chains; the courtiers reproach him for deserting his patron to serve wandering beggars, and Ravana calls him no son of Pavana but a base-born traitor fit to die.

Hanuman laughs that Ravana's own evil mind has brought his death near: as one never sated by countless nectar-like dishes dies of a single drop of poison, so one unsatisfied by thousands of wives will perish by lusting after another's, and Ravana has become the base son who will destroy King Ratnashrava's line and the Rakshasa clan, whose forebears kept to propriety and won liberation. When Ravana orders him paraded in chains through the city to be mocked by women, children and dogs, Hanuman snaps the chains, leaps into the sky and with his kicks brings down Lanka's great gate, its smaller gates and Ravana's Indra-like palace, leaving only pillars standing and grinding its jewelled wall to dust.

Sita rejoices at Hanuman's might but grieves to hear he was bound, until Vajrodari, sitting beside her, points him out flying free through the sky; sure that he will carry her news to Rama, Sita blesses him from afar and scatters flowers, wishing him a safe journey, kindly planets, freedom from every obstacle and long life. The chapter closes that men of merit like Hanuman, who practised great austerity, vows and restraint in past lives, achieve deeds beyond imagining.