Mark Gagnon

Well, it actually starts with a tragedy.

So here we're going to set the scene, okay?

There's this paranoid, brutal king named Kamsa who rules the city of Mathura.

Now, during his sister Devaki's wedding, a voice thunders from the sky and delivers this prophecy.

And it says, Devaki's eight child will be the one who kills King Kamsa.

Now, fear just takes over completely.

And of course, Kamsa throws his own sister and her husband, Vesudeva, into a dungeon.

And every year when a child is born, Kamsa himself descends into the cell and murders the infant with his own hands.

Six children are killed this way.

The seventh is mysteriously saved, transferred to another womb through this divine intervention.

And that child would become Balarama.

This is Krishna's older brother.

And then the eighth child arrives.

This is the prophecy and ultimately where the story turns unmistakably supernatural.

This moment, Krishna is born.

And basically upon the birth of Krishna, the chains fall away.

on their own, and the iron door just swings open and the guards collapse into the sleep.

And Vesudeva understands immediately what he must do.

He lifts the newborn into a basket and walks out into a flooding night.

And the river Yamuna is raging before him.