SHANTANU MARRIAGE OF CONVENIENCE WITH SATYAWATI

Shantanu marriage with Satyawati was serious effort to solve progeny problem and ensure, in future, natural growth of humanity.
In the previous post SATYAWATI RELATION WITH PARASHAR AND BIRTH OF VYAS, Satyawati and Maharishi Parasher came together for the sake of having a son. Later they separated.

On the other hand Maharaj Shantanu was looking for a lady who can beget him a son in the traditional manner without the use of genetic engineering. Shantanu was totally opposed to the idea of genetic engineering and was strongly and strategically working for doing something which could, if not today, in future, eliminate this menace. 

Right now genetic engineering was becoming popular day by day and he too had accepted Devvrat, without any reservation as his son. Being a king he had wide resources at his command, and he got news of how Satyawati had helped Mahamuni Parashar to father a son. He also came to know that Satyawati was eligible for re-marriage.

Please note that this post does NOT accept that Shantanu fell in love with Satyawati, and the reason for the same are as follows:

1. Satyawati was already mother of a son, though the son was now in care of his father Mahamuni Parasher, some Puraans have made out that this fact was kept concealed, but that does not go with the reputation of Mahamuni Parasher. No there is NO reason to believe that Mahamuni Parasher would have liked to father a son by concealing the facts.
2. Satyawati was not beautiful. Further a foul smell used to come out from her body. It is stated that Mahamuni Parasher blessed her which converted this foul smell into some very attractive smell, but we do not believe in supernatural powers, so the correct answer is that she was treated by Mahamuni, which REDUCED this problem, perhaps made it negligible.
3. If one goes through the Puraans, one would find that if social standards were ever compromised by princes/kings, they were for exceptional beauty. Satyawati under no circumstances could qualify for that.
4. The best one can say about the beauty of Satyawati, considering all the facts in various Puraans, is, that Satyawati beauty could be classified anywhere between ugly to repulsive. A more liberal view could be ugly and NOT repulsive. But when we add the status of Satyawati father here, the inescapable conclusion would be that Shantanu needed her because of her track record of successful birth of her earlier child.

So the marriage was a marriage of convenience, and as such Satyawati father struck a hard bargain, and Shantanu could not agree to the conditions laid down by Satyawati father. It was Shantanu son, Devvrat, who, when he came to know about the ‘so called love’ of his father, accepted Satyawati father’s condition, through his vow (promise, PRATIGYA), that marriage could be solemnized. Read, in Hindi: जब भीष्म पितामह ने मानवता कि विजय के लिए प्रतिज्ञा तोडी

Though Shantanu was saddened by the vow of Devvrat, but nevertheless felt that it was his social responsibility to make use of the resources Devvrat could provide and further develop those resources to wipe out the menace of genetic engineering and human cloning. He knew that the existing circumstanced, like lack of progeny and serious shortage of females did require extraordinary measure like genetic engineering and human cloning, but such measures should be reversed in future. He could also visualize that it would not be easy.

After accepting that no human can have supernatural powers, do you still BELIEVE that Devvrat was NOT a genetically engineered human?

And remember BELIEF in supernatural power would further DEBAR the Hindu youths from undertaking research.

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