Agnipurana 1

English (machine translation) 1

Language: English

1.7 — 3 parts
1.15 — 5 parts
1.18 — 3 parts

1.1

Introduction to the work:
I bow to Śrī, Sarasvatī, Gaurī, Gaṇeśa, Skanda, and Īśvara,
to Brahmā, Agni, Indra and the other [gods], and to Vāsudeva.

1.2

In the Naimiṣa forest, sages headed by Śaunaka, worshiping Hari,
spoke to the Sūta who had arrived in the course of his pilgrimage to sacred fords:

1.3

The sages said:
O Sūta, you have been honored by us; declare to us the quintessential essence,
by the mere realization of which omniscience arises.

1.4

The Sūta said:
The quintessential essence is the blessed Lord Viṣṇu, the all-pervading creator of creation and the rest.
Having known him—'I am Brahman'—omniscience arises.

1.5

'Two Brahmans are to be known: the Brahman as sound and that which is supreme;
two sciences are indeed to be known'—so states the revelation of the Atharvaveda.

1.6

Having gone to Badarikāśrama, I, Śuka, Paila, and the others,
bowed to Vyāsa and questioned him; he then spoke the essence to us.

1.7

Vyāsa said:
O Sūta, listen, together with Śuka and the rest, to how Vasiṣṭha spoke to me,
as I and the sages questioned him about the essence of Brahman, the highest of the high.

1.7.p2

1. "lakṣmīm" is the variant reading in manuscript 'gha'.

1.7.p5

4 The reading in the two manuscripts kha and gha is 'yadabravīt'.

1.8

Vasiṣṭha said:
I shall explain the two kinds of brahman; listen, Vyāsa, to that which pervades all,
just as Agni told me formerly along with the sages and the gods:

1.9

the supreme Āgneya Purāṇa, the supreme imperishable knowledge of brahman,
and the lower brahman consisting of the Ṛgveda and the rest, which brings happiness to all the gods.

1.10

The Purāṇa spoken by Agni, which is the Āgneya, commensurate with brahman,
bestows worldly enjoyment and liberation, divine, upon men who read and listen [to it].

1.11

Together with the sages, [Vasiṣṭha] questioned the god, Viṣṇu in the form of the fire of destruction,
the radiant brahman, higher than the highest, worshipped through knowledge and ritual works.

1.12

Vasiṣṭha said:
Speak of the boat to cross the ocean of saṃsāra, the lord of brahman,
the essence of knowledge, having known which a man becomes omniscient.

1.13

Agni said:
I am Viṣṇu, Kālāgnirudra; I will tell you the essence of knowledge,
the Purāṇa which is the essence of knowledge, the all, the cause of everything,

1.14

of creation, secondary creation, lineage, cosmic era of a Manu,
and the dynastic chronicles, bearing the forms of the Fish, the Tortoise, and others.

1.15

There are two knowledges, Lord Viṣṇu: the higher and indeed the lower;
the Ṛg, Yajur, Sāma, and Atharva, and the six ancillary limbs of the Veda, O twice-born:

1.15.p2

1 The reading in manuscript gha is 'dve vidye brahma'.

1.15.p3

2 The reading in manuscript kha is 'akhilātmagam'.

1.15.p4

3 The reading in manuscript kha is 'sarvavedamukham param'.

1.15.p10

9 The reading in manuscript kha is 'yad dvija'.

1.16

phonetics, ritual theory, grammar, etymology, the movements of astronomy,
metrics, lexicography, hermeneutics, legal treatises, and the Purāṇa,

1.17

logic, medicine, music, archery, and statecraft—
this is the lower; the higher knowledge is that by which brahman is attained:

that which is invisible, ungraspable, without lineage or limbs, constant.
As it was spoken by Viṣṇu to me, [and] formerly by Brahmā to the gods,
so I shall relate to you the cause, having the form of the Fish and other [incarnations].

1.18.p1

Thus ends the first chapter, named 'The Inquiry', in the Ādi-Mahāpurāṇa Āgneya.

1.18.p3

Now the second chapter.

1.18.p4

Description of the Fish Incarnation.

Other recensions (1)

Agnipurāṇa (Nag Publishers edition, Delhi) — Sanskrit

Linked texts (1)

Agnipurāṇa — Vyāsa, Sanskrit