The Mahabharata consists of a mass of legendary and didactic material surrounding a central heroic narrative that tells of the struggle for supremacy between two groups of cousins, the Kauravas and the Pandavas. Together with the second major epic, the Ramayana, it is an important source of information about the evolution of Hinduism during the period about 400 BC-ad 200. Contained within the Mahabharata is the Bhagavadgita ("Song of the Lord"), which is the single most important religious text of Hinduism.

The poem is made up of almost 100,000 couplets--its length thus being about seven times that of the Iliad and the Odyssey combined--divided into 18 parvans, or sections, to which has been added a supplement entitled Harivamsha ("Genealogy of the God Hari," i.e., Krishna-Vishnu). Authorship of the poem is traditionally ascribed to the sage Vyasa, although it is more likely that he compiled existing material. The traditional date for the war that is the central event of the Mahabharata is 1302 BC, but most historians prefer a later date. The poem reached its present form about AD 400.

Above all, the Mahabharata is an exposition on dharma (codes of conduct), including the proper conduct of a king, of a warrior, of a man living in times of calamity, and of a person seeking to attain emancipation from rebirth. The several centuries during which the epic took shape were a period of transition from the religion of Vedic sacrifice to the sectarian, internalized worship of later Hinduism, and different sections of the poem express varying and sometimes contradictory beliefs. Some sections, such as the Narayaniya (a part of Book XIII), the Bhagavadgita (Book VI), the Anugita (Book XIV), and the later supplement, the Harivamsha, are important sources of early Vaisnavite thought. There Krishna is identified with Lord Vishnu, and other avataras (incarnations) are also described.

But the historical importance of the Mahabharata is not the main reason to read the Mahabharata.  Quite simply, the Mahabharata is a powerful and amazing text that inspires awe and wonder.  It presents sweeping visions of the cosmos and humanity and intriguing and frightening glimpses of divinity in an ancient narrative that is accessible, interesting, and compelling for anyone willing to learn the basic themes of India's culture.  The Mahabharata definitely is one of those creations of human language and spirit that has traveled far beyond the place of its original creation and will eventually take its rightful place on the highest shelf of  world literature beside Homer's epics, the Greek tragedies, the Bible, Shakespeare, and similarly transcendent works.

The Mahabharata story has been retold in written and oral vernacular versions throughout South and Southeast Asia and has always enjoyed immense popularity. Even after it became a famous Sanskrit writing it continued to exist in various performance media in many different local genres of dance and theater. Its various incidents have been portrayed in stone, notably in sculptured reliefs at Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom in Cambodia, and in Indian miniature paintings.