3.1.3 Devotees, stories and places of the Bhagavatham

Explained

Parikshit (Skandhas 1 and 12).

• In the womb he was struck by Ashvatthama's Brahmastra; Krishna entered the womb and shielded him. He was named Vishnurata ("given by Vishnu"). He was called Parikshit because he kept examining (pariksha) everyone, looking for the being he saw in the womb.
• He let Kali (found beating Dharma as a bull and the Earth as a cow) live only in gambling (dyuta), drinking, illicit women, slaughter and gold. Later, hunting and thirsty, he hung a dead snake on the silent sage Shamika, and Shringi cursed him to die of Takshaka's bite.
• He gave up the throne to Janamejaya, fasted on the Ganga bank, and heard the Bhagavatam from Shuka. The seven-day reading (Bhagavata Saptaha) comes from this.
• After his death, Janamejaya held the Sarpa Yaga (snake sacrifice) to avenge him. In the Mahabharata (Adi Parva) Astika stopped it; the Bhagavatam (Skandha 12) has Brihaspati persuade him to end it.

Dhruva (Skandha 4).

• A grandson of Svayambhuva Manu. At about five years of age he was pushed off his father's lap by Suruchi.
• His mother Suniti told him to seek God. Narada gave him the twelve-syllable mantra "Om namo bhagavate Vasudevaya" and sent him to Madhuvana on the Yamuna.
• After hard penance, Vishnu appeared on Garuda and touched his cheek with the conch. Dhruva got a kingdom and, after death, the fixed place of the Pole Star.
• When a Yaksha killed Uttama, Dhruva made war on the Yakshas (Kubera's people). His grandfather Svayambhuva Manu stopped him: a whole race must not suffer for one person's crime. Offered a boon by Kubera, Dhruva asked only never to forget Hari.

Vena and Prithu (Skandha 4).

• Vena, son of King Anga and Sunitha, banned yajnas and demanded worship for himself; the sages killed him with their curse.
• The sages churned his body. From the thigh came Nishada, a dark, short man; from the arms came Prithu and his queen Archi.
• The Earth had hidden her crops; she fled as a cow. Prithu milked her, with Svayambhuva Manu as the calf and his own hands as the pail, and levelled the land for farms and towns.
• He completed 99 Ashvamedhas. Indra stole the horse of the hundredth; Brahma stopped the yajna and Vishnu reconciled them. As a boon Prithu asked only to keep hearing Hari's stories.

Prachetas and Puranjana (Skandha 4).

• King Prachinabarhi of Prithu's line had ten sons, the Prachetas. Shiva taught them a hymn to Vishnu, the Rudra Gita, which they chanted in the sea for 10,000 years. Daksha was reborn as their son by Marisha.
• To turn Prachinabarhi from animal sacrifice, Narada told him the allegory of King Puranjana:

Skandha 5: Priyavrata and Bharata.

• Priyavrata, son of Svayambhuva Manu, drove his shining chariot seven times round the earth behind the Sun. The wheel ruts became the seven oceans, and the land between them the seven dvipas:

• Jambudvipa has nine varshas, with Mount Meru at the centre. The land once called Ajanabhavarsha took the name Bharatavarsha from King Bharata, son of Rishabhadeva.
• Bharata's three births:
  1. A king who retired to Pulaha's hermitage on the Gandaki and grew attached to a motherless fawn.
  2. A deer, because he thought of the fawn at death.
  3. Jada Bharata, a brahmin who acted dull and mute to avoid new attachment. King Rahugana of Sindhu-Sauvira made him carry his palanquin; Jada Bharata taught him that the Self is not the body, and the king fell at his feet.

Skandha 6: Ajamila, Narada's curse, Vritra.

• Ajamila, a brahmin of Kanyakubja, left his wife and Vedic life for a woman of bad conduct. He named his youngest son Narayana. At death, as three messengers of Yama came, he cried out "Narayana!" to the boy, and four messengers of Vishnu stopped Yama's men.
• Spared, he went to Haridwar (Gangadvara), lived in devotion and reached Vaikuntha. The story teaches the glory of the Lord's name.
• Yama told his men to leave Hari's devotees alone and named the twelve mahajanas who know true dharma: Brahma, Narada, Shiva, the Kumaras, Kapila, Svayambhuva Manu, Prahlada, Janaka, Bhishma, Bali, Shuka and Yama himself.
• Daksha had 10,000 sons (Haryashvas) and then 1,000 more (Shabalashvas); Narada led all of them to renunciation instead of begetting children. Daksha cursed Narada never to stay long in one place.
• Vritrasura rose from the fire of Tvashta's yajna to avenge his son Vishvarupa. Indra killed him with the vajra made from the sage Dadhichi's bones. Vritra, though an asura, prayed only for service to Hari.
• In his previous birth Vritra was King Chitraketu of Shurasena. Seeing Shiva seat Parvati on his lap in an assembly, Chitraketu joked about it; Parvati cursed him to be born an asura.

Prahlada (Skandha 7).

• Narada narrated this story to Yudhishthira at the Rajasuya.
• Hiranyakashipu, son of Diti, did fierce penance on Mount Mandara to win Brahma's boons. Meanwhile Indra seized his pregnant wife Kayadhu; Narada rescued her and taught her in his hermitage, and the child in her womb learnt it all. Hiranyakashipu and his brother Hiranyaksha were Vaikuntha's gatekeepers Jaya and Vijaya; in their second birth they were Ravana and Kumbhakarna, in the third Shishupala and Dantavakra.
• Teachers: Shanda and Amarka, sons of Shukracharya.
• Prahlada listed the nine forms of bhakti (navavidha bhakti): hearing (shravana), singing (kirtana), remembering (smarana), serving the feet (padasevana), worship (archana), salutation (vandana), service (dasya), friendship (sakhya) and self-surrender (atmanivedana). He himself is the model of smarana.
• His father tried to kill him with weapons, elephants, snakes, poison, fire and a fall from a height. Then Narasimha came out of the pillar and killed Hiranyakashipu at twilight on the threshold.
• Asked for a boon, Prahlada asked for none for himself and prayed for his father's release. Narasimha said 21 generations of his family were purified.
• Line: Hiranyakashipu → Prahlada → Virochana → Bali → Bana.

Gajendra Moksha (Skandha 8).

• In the Tamasa manvantara, Gajendra lived on Mount Trikuta. A crocodile (graha) seized his leg in a lake, and they struggled for a thousand years.
• When his strength failed he lifted a lotus in his trunk and prayed to the Supreme with no name or form in mind (the Gajendra stuti). Vishnu (the Hari avatar) came on Garuda and cut the crocodile's mouth with the Sudarshana. Gajendra gained a form like Vishnu's.
• Past births: Gajendra was the Pandya king Indradyumna, cursed by Agastya for not rising to greet him. The crocodile was the gandharva Huhu, cursed by Devala.

Ambarisha and Rantideva (Skandha 9).

• Ambarisha, son of Nabhaga, kept the Dvadashi vow. Durvasa came as a guest and went to bathe in the Yamuna. To end the fast at the right time on Dvadashi, Ambarisha only sipped water. Durvasa took offence and sent a fiery demoness (kritya) at him.
• The Sudarshana destroyed her and chased Durvasa to Brahma, Shiva and Vishnu. Vishnu said he is under the control of his devotees and sent him back to Ambarisha, who had waited a year living on water alone and now calmed the chakra.
• Rantideva, after 48 days without food or water, gave his little food to a brahmin, a shudra and a man with dogs, and his last water to an outcaste. The guests were gods testing him.

Bali (Skandha 8).

• Bali conquered heaven. At his sacrifice at Bhrigukachchha on the Narmada, Vamana asked for three paces. Shukracharya warned him and cursed him when he would not listen. Vindhyavali brought the water-pot for the gift.
• After the third step was placed on his head, Bali was bound with Varuna's noose, then sent to Sutala. Vishnu became his gatekeeper. Bali is to be Indra in the eighth (Savarni) manvantara and is one of the chiranjeevis. His eldest son Banasura had a thousand arms.

Krishna's childhood and youth (Skandha 10).

• Balarama was Devaki's seventh child, moved by Yogamaya into Rohini's womb; he is Haladhara, the plough-bearer. His kills: Dhenuka (donkey demon of Talavana), Pralamba (disguised as a cowherd boy), the wrestler Mushtika, the ape Dvivida, Romaharshana, Balvala and Rukmi. Keshi was killed by Krishna, not Balarama.
• Uddhava took Krishna's message to Vraja; the gopis' words to a bee are the Bhramara Gita.

Krishna's eight chief queens (Ashtamahishis).

• Revati is Balarama's wife, not one of Krishna's queens.
• Sons and grandson: Pradyumna (Rukmini's son, Manmatha reborn) was thrown into the sea by Shambara, swallowed by a fish and raised by Mayavati (Rati); he killed Shambara. Samba was Jambavati's son. Aniruddha, Pradyumna's son, was carried by Chitralekha to Shonitapura, capital of Banasura, whose daughter Usha loved him. Shiva fought for Bana; Krishna cut Bana's thousand arms down to four.

Places.

Dwaraka, Prabhasa, Kamarupa in more detail.

• Dwaraka: Krishna had Vishwakarma build a city in the sea after Jarasandha's seventeen attacks on Mathura and the threat of Kalayavana. Rukmini, Satyabhama and the other queens lived there. Dwaraka is one of the seven moksha-giving cities (Saptapuri) and the western seat of Shankara's four mathas.
• Prabhasa:
  • At Pindaraka, Yadava boys dressed Krishna's son Samba as a pregnant woman and mocked a group of sages (Vishvamitra, Kanva, Durvasa, Narada and others). Together they cursed: he would bear an iron pestle (musala) that would destroy the clan.
  • The pestle was ground and thrown into the sea; the powder grew on the shore as eraka reeds. A fish swallowed the last iron piece, and the hunter Jara made it his arrowhead.
  • At Prabhasa the Yadavas, drunk on maireya, fought with the reeds and died: the Mausala lila. Balarama left his body in yoga on the shore.
  • Krishna sat under a peepal tree; Jara mistook his foot for a deer and shot it. Krishna forgave him and sent his charioteer Daruka to Dwaraka with the news. Arjuna led the survivors to Indraprastha, and the sea took the city.
  • Prabhasa is the site of Somnath and is praised in the Prabhasa Khanda of the Skanda Purana.
• Kamarupa: Narakasura (Bhauma, son of the Earth) seized Aditi's earrings and Varuna's umbrella and imprisoned the princesses. Krishna flew there on Garuda with Satyabhama, killed his general Mura (hence Murari), killed Naraka with the Sudarshana, married the freed princesses and crowned Naraka's son Bhagadatta. On the way back he took the Parijata tree from Indra's garden for Satyabhama. Naraka Chaturdashi, the day before Deepavali, recalls this victory. Kamarupa is also home to Kamakhya, a Shakti peetha.

Other devotees and stories often asked.