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2024-03-28, 5:50 PM |
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Chapter
2: Hiranyakas'ipu,
the
King
of
the
Demons,
on
Bereavement
(1) S'rî Nârada said: 'When the brother
[Hiranyâksha] as said was killed by the Lord in the form of a
boar [see 3.18-19], Hiranyakas'ipu got very sad and angry oh King. (2) Enraged biting his lips because of this, he with his eyes fuming of anger stared into the grey sky and then spoke. (3) He
with his terrible teeth and fierce look
ghastly to behold, raised his
trident in an assembly of
Dânavas
and said with a grimace the following: (4-5) 'Oh Dânavas and Daityas,
Dvimûrdha ['the two-headed one'], Tryaksha ['the three-eyed one']
S'ambara and S'atabâhu ['the hundred-armed one']; oh
Hayagrîva
['the horsehead'], Namuci, Pâka, Ilvala and Vipracitti!
Puloma, S'akuna and all others, listen to what I have to tell you
and may you thereafter all quickly act to it without delay. (6) My so
very dear brother and
well-wisher was, while those insignificant enemies, the theists who are
of worship, conspired behind his back, killed by Hari who was supposed
to treat us all equally. (7-8) He
[not being equal] has forsaken His love for us and is now, abominably
in mâyâ behaving like a wild beast. Like a
child He unsteadily changes from this to that form according to
the desire of His worshiping devotees. With my trident I will cut His
neck and make Him swim in blood so that I can find my peace in satisfying him
[Hiranyâksha,] who was so
fond of drinking it. (9) When
He, [Vishnu] that most deceitful enemy of all is finished,
the same will happen to
those guys of God
whose life belongs to Vishnu, just like it is with the drying up of the branches and leaves of
a tree that is cut by its roots. (10) All of you meanwhile go to that world so
neatly kept in order by the priests and politicians and see to the
destruction of all those repenting and sacrificing bookworms who are of
vow and charity. (11)
Lord Vishnu roots in their sacrificial activities. He is that person
full of religious principles who exhaustingly being worshiped by the twice-born ones is the man of dharma, the one who is the shelter of
these gods and sages, forefathers and all the rest. (12) Wherever the twice-born ones keep their
cows, study their Vedas and are busy with their varnâs'rama
ado, set all those towns afire and cut down all their trees.'
(13) Proving him their respects they took the
instructions of their master on their heads and terrorized, as
experts in destruction, all the people. (14) The cities and villages, pasturing grounds,
orchards and gardens, fields, forests, hermitages and mines, farms,
mountain places, cowherd camps and also the capitals, they all
burned down. (15)
Some of them set the dwellings ablaze with firebrands and
others demolished with picks the bridges, surrounding walls and the
city gates while another group took axes to destroy the source of
livelihood by
cutting down the fruit trees. (16) When the people thus time and again were disturbed by the followers of the king of the
Daityas, the God-fearing ones gave up their heavenly positions and
wandered all over
the earth not to be visible to
the demons. (17)
Hiranyakas'ipu, very distressed about the loss of his brother,
performed
the obsequies and pacified his nephews. (18-19) S'akuni,
S'ambara,
Dhrishthi,
Bhûtasantâpana,
Vrika,
Kâlanâbha,
Mahânâbha,
Haris'mas'ru
and
Utkaca
as
also
their
mother
Rushâbhânu
and
Diti,
his
own mother, he as a well
adapted person addressed in sweet words saying this, oh ruler of man.
(20) Hiranyakas'ipu said: 'Oh mother, oh mother; oh
sister in law and nephews, you should not lament about our
hero who facing the enemy chose for the glory of a hero's death. (21) Just
like travelers who amassing at a road house thereafter resume their
course oh sweet mother, the ways of living beings, who by providence in this world were brought together in one place [in a
family, a country or religion], part again according to each his karma. (22)
The eternal inexhaustible soul, free from the tinge of matter,
is capable of going anywhere. Knowing all and being transcendental that
soul takes up the self of a body that under the
influence of the material world demonstrates various qualities [see
B.G. 13:
22]. (23) Just
as being reflected in water the
trees may appear to be moving, one can also with moving one's head
[one's 'eyes'] have the illusion that the world is moving around. (24) So
too the unchangeable living being is
confused by the mind he has with the qualities of matter oh mother of
mine,
which leads to it that he despite of his
formlessness starts to believe in a physical form.
(25-26) This
soul confounded about his
formless existence, falls in love with the body and thus knows loved
ones
and enemies, allies and strangers in his karma with the material
affair. Departing from being born and dying he laments in different
ways and has all kinds of worries, is uncertain about what the scriptures say and forgetful
about proper discrimination. (27) In this context one often recites an ancient
story about Yamarâja in discussion with the friends of someone
who died. Listen closely. (28) Once in
Us'înara there was a famous king known as Suyajña who was killed by his enemies in
a war. His kinsmen sat around him. (29-31) With his
jeweled armor scattered here and there and his ornaments and garlands
fallen down, he was lying there in his blood pierced by an arrow
through
his heart. With his hair loose and his eyes obscured, he had his lips bitten in anger, his lotus face covered by dust and his arms
and
weapons cut off lying on the battlefield. When the queens ascertained
that
the master of Us'înara thus was
treated
by
providence, they had
their eyes full of tears and pounded their breast constantly
with their hands while they fallen
down
at
his
feet repeatedly cried 'oh
husband!' (32)
Wailing loudly about their
beloved husband they moistened
the lotus
feet with their tears that were red because of the kunkum of their
breasts. With their
ornaments and hair loosened they for everyone heart-rending lamented, sobbing
pitiably:
(33) 'Alas by merciless providence oh Lord of us,
you oh beloved one, have been taken beyond the range of our sight. You used to provide the livelihood
of
the
state and the inhabitants
of Us'înara, but now that you have departed you are the cause of
an
increasing lamentation. (34) You
were such a grateful
husband for us oh King, how can we all following you live without you?
You
who are our best friend, please tell us whereto those who served
your lotus feet, have to follow you, now you left us.' (35) The
queens thus lamenting had
taken the dead husband on their lap, not wishing that the corpse would
be cremated. Meanwhile the sun was setting in the west. (36) Hearing the kith and kin of the ruler crying
that loudly, Yamarâja personally appeared in the form of a boy
and spoke to them.
(37) S'rî Yamarâja said: 'Alas how can
you people older than me who saw
the
law of nature ruling every day of your lives, be of this bewilderment? Don you not understand that
you
yourselves will return to the same nature where this man
returned to? Yet you meaninglessly
weep [compare B.G. 2: 28]! (38) Oh we are
most
fortunate because we, presently abandoned by our father and
mother,
weak as we are have not been eaten by the wolves! So why worry knowing
that He who protected us in the
womb will also protect us later on? (39) Oh poor women, the Supreme Controller by the
exercise of His will creates all of this without ever changing Himself
and it is He who next to that also maintains and destroys. One says
that all that moves and does not move belongs to the game of the Lord
who is always fully entitled to maintain something or someone or put an end
to it all. (40) Something lost in the street
can, protected by destiny, be preserved, while something kept at
home, can be fated to be lost. Despite of being
unprotected one under His protection may remain alive whether one is at
home or in the forest, but this one here being struck down, well
protected as he was,
did not survive. (41) Any
embodied
soul
has
his
own
type
of
birth
according
to
his
karma
and
also disappears in due course of time
because of [this finite] karma. But all of this does not apply to the
soul despite of
the fact that he,
being situated within this material world, in various forms is
bound to her
different modes. He is completely different [see also B.G. 2: 20].
(42) This
body of the person that with fire, water and earth out
of ignorance was born, undergoes changes and is vanquished again, is
just as separate from him as the material of a house is
separate from its indweller. (43) The
fire in wood can be observed
separately,
just as the air within the body and the
[time-effect of the] all pervading ether that does not mix with
anything. The same way the living entity can be separately
considered as transcendental to its
material encasement of involvement with the modes.
(44) [The body of] this man [called]
Suyajña is there right in front of you and you, oh foolish
people, now
cry for him. But he who heard and spoke with that body in this world,
you have never seen! (45)
The
great ruler of the body, the life air, is despite of residing within this body not the listener, nor the
speaker. It is the soul and he differs from the life air that is locked
up in the body with all its sense organs. (46) That
what expands and
manifests, this
might, this powerful soul, obtains and forsakes high and low-class
bodies that are characterized by the five
elements, the
senses and a mind. In that engagement he [this power of the self in the
form of the so-called linga,
the
subtle
body] differs from the form he assumes by dint of his moral quality
[see also 4.29]. (47) One
is bound to karma for as long as one is covered by the subtle body
[consisting of mind, intelligence and
false ego]. From that karmic bondage there is the reversal [from being
controlled by the spirit soul to being controlled by the body] and the
misery which follows that illusory unification [B.G. 8:
6]. (48) Just
like everything produced by the senses with what one sees in a daydream
is false and offers no firm
ground, it is equally useless to cling to the dream of [the happiness
and distress derived from] the material qualities of nature. (49) They
who understand that, for that reason do not complain about that
what is permanent and that what is
transient in this world. Or else they could, as you'll understand,
not tackle the habits of those who do make their complaints [see also
B.G. 2:
11]. (50) Some hunter who was assigned the task to
decimate the number of birds in
the forest, spread a net and
luring the birds here
and there with food then caught
them. (51)
When he saw a pair of kulinga
birds foraging in the forest, the hunter quickly managed to lure the
female bird of the two. (52) Oh
queens, the male seeing how the female bird in the grip of time was
caught in the ropes of
the net, very upset did not know what to do next so that the poor thing
emotionally started to wail about its mate:
(53) 'Alas what a cruel fate
for my wife who was so kind to me! What can I do for
the poor one crying for me, her poor lordship? (54) Let
the Lord also take my life. What
is the use of the life of the single half of my body? What kind of
miserable existence is it to suffer that pain for a lifetime! (55)
How unfortunate are my babies waiting for their mother in their nest.
How can I without the mother maintain the young that cannot fly yet?' (56) While
the bird thus with wet eyes most sad at
a distance lamented over
the loss of his beloved, the bird-catcher as a messenger of time
managed to sneak up on him and take his life by piercing him
with an arrow.
(57) And so it is with you, oh ignorant ladies. You
do not see the finality of your existence! Lamenting over your husband
will not bring him back, not even in a hundred years.'
(58) S'rî Hiranyakas'ipu said: 'The boy thus
having spoken, astounded the hearts of all the relatives. They
understood that everything material was just a temporary, false
appearance [see also B.G. 2:
18]. (59) After
Yamarâja in this form had given instruction he disappeared.
Thereupon the relatives of
King Suyajña performed the duties for the funeral. (60) Therefore
do
not
lament
about
yourself
or
anyone
else.
In
this
material
world
one
only lacking in
knowledge is obsessed with the meaning of this 'mine' and thine' of
one's self-interest and the interest of others. For
who is that actually, that soul of you and of the others?'
(61) S'rî Nârada
said:
'Diti and her daughter-in-law [Rushâbhânu,]
hearing the speech of the king of the Daityas promptly gave up their
grief over their son and husband and submitted their minds to the true
knowledge of
life.'
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