Mahābhārata — The Greatest Epic of Mankind

An expansive exploration of the Mahabharata — from its astronomical dating to approximately 3067 BCE, through the dynastic feud of the Pandavas and Dhartarashtras, to the immortal Bhagavad Gita and the epic's enduring influence on world civilization. The article traces how the longest poem in world literature — 96,635 couplets across 18 cantos — has served as a perceptive record of India's history and an unparalleled encyclopedia of Dharma, inspiring thinkers from Thoreau to Gandhi to Martin Luther King Jr. The author recounts his own teenage meeting with Bharata Ratna Rajagopalachari, who admonished him to read the epic "over and over, at least monthly, to get to the Truth of Human Behavior."