Ramayana and the Concept of Lust Ramayana by RK Narayana is an epic tale of the patron god Vishnu in his human form as Rama. Ramayana is not only a story about Rama's journey to abolish evil, but also about conquering the five evils and reaching a higher level of one's spirituality. Lust is a major folk evil and is a very common topic in epic storytelling. In many cases and situations, Rama conquers it to save many lives, including his own. First, Rama learns the sin of lust, how the people involved in the story should be judged and then he learns the art of defeating the fold of evil. In his journey with Viswamithra, he learns about sin from two different stories. First, he learns it from the story of God Shiva and then through the story of Ahalaya. God Shiva turned the god of love into ash when he tried to play Shiva while he was meditating on a mountain. Through this case, Rama learned that lust is considered one of the greatest sins in the Hindu religion practiced at the time. This concept is demonstrated by Ahalaya's story in which her husband, Gautama, punishes her by turning her into a stone until Rama arrives and releases her soul. She is punished due to Lord Indra disguising himself in the form of Sage Gautama while she was away because he is mesmerized by her beauty and considers himself the only one worthy of her. Ahalaya was punished for surrendering to Indra without confirming whether she was truly Gautama. Furthermore, when he realized that Indra was not Gautama, he took no action against him. Gautama also curses Indra who tries to escape by transforming into a cat; with an entire body covered in female parts. Subsequently, he changed his punishment due to the supplication of Lord Brahma. This caused the female parts of his body to transform into eyes, making Indra a “thousand-eyed” god. Learning about Ahalaya and Indra's punishment, Rama understands that when one falls into the trap of lust, he has to face severe punishment and thus has to perform various tasks to purify his body and soul. Rama releases Ahalaya's soul and asks Gautama to take her back as his wife because Ahalaya has now fully justified her accusation. Rama faced his own battle of lust when Ravana's sister Soorpanaka disguises herself as a beautiful woman and tries to seduce Rama..