Why Arjun was better than Karna?

Both of them were indeed great warriors. No one could match their valour, knowledge, strength and focus. But still why did the Tridev call Arjun the best warrior on earth?  I’ll try to explain that to you in the next few minutes.

A common myth spread among people is that Arjun was declared best because Lord Krishna was on his side. This is a baseless statement. Lord Krishna was on his side because he was on the side of dharm.

So what is the actual reason? They had the same teacher and same knowledge was given to both of them still one student was superior than the latter. The truth is Arjun acquired the knowledge of weapons to become an excellent warrior while on the other hand Karna acquired the knowledge to become the best. He was always in an unhealthy competition with Arjun.

Before moving forward we need to first understand the difference between being best and being excellent. Excellent means achieving your full potential. Achieving something not to make someone jealous but for the satisfaction of one’s soul. On the way of becoming excellent there is no competition of any kind with anyone else but there is competition with one’s own self. The person who desires to become excellent will sooner or later grasp all the knowledge and easily become the best. Being best is a by-product of being excellent. But the person who desires to be the best may or may not become best, but will never become excellent. Then dissatisfaction, jealousy and pain start to take over the person.

Lets come back to Arjun and Karna. Arjun learnt all the celestial weapons for knowledge and no personal gain. While Karna learnt all the weapons to defeat Arjun. He never wanted to learn them for the purpose of knowledge but for competition (proving himself to be superior). Even in the case of Brahmastra, Guru Dronacharya refused to teach Karna Brahmastra because he was always in the side of adharm i.e. the Kauravas and wanted the divine weapon just to slay Arjun. He wasn’t disheartened that he didn’t get the knowledge but was disheartened because Arjun was taught the mighty weapon. Just for the sake of competition he lied to Lord Pashuram. Any knowledge learnt for some material gain will never be permanent and will be lost when its needed the most. Same happened with Karna and he lost the knowledge of Brahmastra at the time of his death. Some people call this the curse of Lord Pashuram but it is the way the universe works.

I hope everyone has understood the topic and will try to bring more of these topics as the days pass.

Till then Jai Shri Krishna. Have a great day!

Taksh Singhal