Namaste!
Recap from last week: Sage Vishwamithra explains the birth of Lord Shanmukha and death of demon Taarakaasura in lord's hands.
As Vishwamithra and his disciples continue their journey towards Mithila, they travel on the holy river Ganga. Prince Rama- an ever curious one to know all possible good asked his teacher to kindly tell him about this river and its birth.
Vishwamithra starts narrating the story of birth of River Ganga. He narrates it to Rama in such a way that it takes a firm stand in his mind that whatever may happen, a king has to fulfill his word- no matter how difficult the task may be. This is what gave strength to Rama later in his life when he had to make some tough choices in his life.
"O prince Rama! Listen as I tell you the descent of River Goddess Ganga to this mere Earth. Once upon a time there was one king in your family named 'Sagara'. He was the mightiest king of Ayodhya but also very generous. He had two wives. His first wife was the daughter of the king of Vidarbha and her name was 'Keshini'. She also was a follower of Dharma, generous and truthful all her life. His second wife was the daughter of Arishtanemi prajapathi and her name was 'Sumathi'. She was the most beautiful lady that ever lived then. They had no sons or daughters. To have sons he and his wives went to Bhrigu prasravana parvatha on Himalayas to do his penance and please Maharshi Bhrigu. Pleased by their devotion Rishi Bhrigu appeared and asked for his wish. King Sagara asked him to bless him with progeny. So Bhrigu maharshi blessed him such that one wife would have 60,000 sons and the other wife would have one son. So upon the wives' request Maharshi blessed the Keshini with one son and Sumathi with 60,000 sons who would be highly energetic but does things without a reason.
The son of Keshini was named 'Asamanjasa' and Sumathi had 60,000 babies born like eggs so her maids seperated them one by one and preserved these eggs in ghee coated pots until they were fully developed. (This was probably the first test tube baby procedure done in the whole world!!). This Asamanjasa had one peculiar habit- he used to drown other friends' of his in Sarayu and killed them. Being a king's son he would escape doing all these. He was later married and had a son "Anshumantha" but could not stop his killings. But Sagara being a follower of Dharma he threw his son Asamanjasa out from his kingdom."
Listening this Rama was being taught by Vishwamithra that to follow Dharma his elders did not care even for their own blood. Hearing all this Rama was making up his mind to be strong to face any situation in future. This had made him live without Seetha when he had to, live in a forest for 14 long years just for a promise he made to his step mother which he could avoid and do what he wanted. But no, Dharma is what he always wanted. That is what he is learning from this story.
"So Sagara threw his son Asamanjasa out of the kingdom but kept his grandson Anshumantha with him because the grandson knew that what his grandfather did was Dharma. Later one fine day, King Sagara decided to perform an Ashwamedha yaaga- willing peace and prosperity for his kingdom. As part of this yaaga, a horse would be allowed to roam free and any person wishing to stop it would indirectly call for a battle with the king. So in this sequence when the horse was left free, it suddenly disappeared after a few days. King Sagara asked his other 60,000 sons to go and find it at any cost. Being impulsive, they set out for the search of the horse and when they got to know that the horse is in paathaala(under the earth), they started digging the earth till they found the Diggajaas (the 4 elephants standing as pillars to support the Earth. Finally, the found the horse standing in front of sage Kapila maharshi who is an incarnation of Vishnu and was in deep meditation at that moment unknown of the horse and chaos. Thinking maharshi to be the thief who stole the horse, they started beating him. Being disturbed in that deep state of meditation, he opened his eyes with anger thus burning all the 60,000 princes into ashes. He then went back to meditation.
Upon seeing no return of any of his sons, king Sagara sent his grandson Anshumantha in search of his sons and the horse. Anshumantha though finally found his uncles and the horse- could not help his uncles in anyway. Later after many years he died trying. Then from the same family came a great king named Bhagiratha. When he got to know the plight of his grandfathers, he decided to give them a right funeral and wipe of their sins so that they would be eligible to go to heaven. He started tapasya (meditation) towards lord Brahma and continued it for many decades until when finally Lord Brahma appeared in front of him. Bhagiratha prayed to Lord Brahma and asked him to allow the sacred heavenly river Ganga to flow down to the Earth and then to paathaala where his grandfathers' ashes were lying so that they would get rid of their sins and go back to heaven. Brahma pleased by his devotion and dedication, told him that he had no problem asking Ganga to flow down but no one would be able to bear her fierceness and sheer force and the Earth along with paathala would be submerged in her. Listening to this, a disappointed Bhagiratha asked Lord Brahma to suggest an idea to get Ganga down in a controlled fashion. A pleased Brahma then told him that there is only one person who could control her might and that is none other than Lord Shiva himself. Saying so, Brahma left. Bhagiratha with his strong desire to get Ganga flow down on the ashes started praying and meditating for Lord Shiva standing and balancing all his weight just only on his big toe. It took many decades before Shiva appeared in front of him and asked him for his wish. Bhagiratha prayed to him and asked him to control the force of Ganga when she would start flowing down from the heaven and thus prevent drowning of Bhoomi and paathaala. Pleased with Bhagiratha, Lord Shiva agreed to his wish"
To be continued in the next blog article..! Stay tuned!
Precap next week: The dedication and devotion of king Bhagiratha towards his family- The beauty and force of Ganga free flowing down from heaven to Earth- The calm, contained but mighty Shiva controlling her- The Ganga Avatharanam- How the sacred river descended to Earth to wash our sins.
For all you folks out there, here is the pictorial representation!
Sai Ram
Vipanchi Krishna.
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