Bhagavatapurana 2.1

English (machine translation) 2.1

Language: English

2.1.1

Śrī Śuka said: / 'This question of yours is most noble, made for the benefit of the world, O king, / approved by knowers of the self, and superior among all things to be heard by men.

2.1.2

There are thousands of things to be heard, O king of kings, for mortals / who do not see the truth of the self, householders living in their homes.

2.1.3

Their lifespan is carried away at night by sleep or sexual union, / and during the day by the pursuit of wealth or the maintenance of their family, O king.

2.1.4

Deluded regarding his body, offspring, wife, and other false armies of his self, / even while seeing their destruction, he does not see it.

2.1.5

Therefore, O descendant of Bharata, the Lord, the Ruler, Hari, the Self of all, / should be heard, glorified, and remembered by one who desires freedom from fear.

2.1.6

This much is the supreme gain of human birth through Sāṅkhya and yoga, / and through steadfast dedication to one's own dharma: remembrance of Nārāyaṇa at the end.

2.1.7

Generally, sages, O king, who have turned away from injunctions and prohibitions / and abide beyond the guṇas, delight in recounting the qualities of Hari.

2.1.8

This Purāṇa named Bhāgavata, equal to the Veda, / I studied from my father, Dvaipāyana, at the beginning of the Dvāpara age.

2.1.9

Though established beyond the guṇas, my heart was captivated / by the divine play of Him of highest renown, and so I studied this narrative, O royal sage.

2.1.10

I shall recite that to you, who are a great servant of the Lord; / in those who place faith in it, steadfast devotion to Mukunda quickly arises.

2.1.11

For those who are becoming dispassionate and for yogins who desire fearlessness, / the repeated glorification of Hari's name has been determined [as the means], O king.

2.1.12

What is the use of many unseen years to a heedless man in this world? / Better is a single hour known [as one's remaining time], since one can strive for what is highest.

2.1.13

The royal sage named Khaṭvāṅga, knowing the measure of his life remaining in this world, / abandoned everything in an hour and attained Hari, the fearless.

2.1.14

Your life's limit, too, O descendant of Kuru, is seven days from now; / prepare during this time all that pertains to the hereafter.

2.1.15

When the final hour has arrived, a man, free from fear, / should sever with the sword of non-attachment all desire for the body and those who follow it.

2.1.16

Having departed from home, firm in mind, bathed in the waters of a holy pilgrimage-place, / he should sit in a clean and secluded place on a seat prepared according to rule.

2.1.17

He should mentally practice the pure, threefold, supreme syllable of Brahman; / with his breath conquered and not forgetting the seed-syllable of Brahman, he should restrain the mind.

2.1.18

With the intellect as charioteer, he should restrain the senses from their objects through the mind; / the mind distracted by actions he should fix upon an auspicious object through the intellect.

There he should meditate upon one limb with unbroken concentration; / having made the mind free of objects, he should then remember nothing at all, / [dwelling upon] that supreme abode of Viṣṇu in which the mind becomes serene.

2.1.20

Whenever his mind, deluded, is distracted by passion and darkness, / the resolute man should restrain it through concentration, which destroys the impurity caused by them.

2.1.21

When this [concentration] is maintained, yoga characterized by devotion / quickly arises for the yogin who perceives that auspicious refuge.'

2.1.22

The king said: / 'How is concentration maintained, O brāhmaṇa, where is it approved, / or of what nature is it that quickly removes the impurity of a man's mind?'

2.1.23

Śrī Śuka said: / 'Having conquered his posture, breath, attachments, and senses, / one should fix one's mind through the intellect upon the gross form of the Lord.

2.1.24

This universe is His specific, grossest body among all gross things, / in which this cosmos—past, future, and present—is manifested as real.

2.1.25

In this cosmic egg-shell body with its seven coverings, / that Cosmic Person who is the Lord is the object of concentration.

2.1.26

Pātāla, they say, is the soles of His feet, Rasātala the heels and forefeet, / Mahātala the ankles of the Creator of the universe, and Talātala the shanks of the Person.

2.1.27

Sutala is the two knees of the Universal Form, Vitala and Atala His two thighs, / the surface of the earth His hips, O protector of the earth, and the expanse of the sky they declare to be His navel-lake.

2.1.28

His chest is the realm of the luminaries, His neck Mahar, His face Janas, / Tapas they know as the forehead of the Primal Person, and Satya as the heads of the thousand-headed Lord.

2.1.29

The gods headed by Indra are His arms, the quarters His ears, and sound His hearing; / the two Aśvins are the nostrils of the Supreme, smell His sense of scent, and blazing fire His mouth.

2.1.30

The sky became His two eyes, the sun His sight, day and night the eyelashes of Viṣṇu; / the movement of His brows is the realm of the Supreme Creator, the waters His palate, and taste His very tongue.

2.1.31

The Vedic metres they declare to be the head of the Infinite, Yama His molars, affection His teeth, / His smile is the creative power that drives men mad, and the unending creation is the casting of His glance.

2.1.32

Shame is his upper lip, and greed verily his lower lip; dharma is his chest, and the path of adharma is his back. / Prajāpati is his penis, and Mitra and Varuṇa are his testicles; the oceans are his belly, and the mountains are his heaps of bones.

2.1.33

The rivers are his channels, and the trees are the body-hairs of him whose body is the universe, O king. / The wind is the breath of the one of infinite power; his movement is time; his action is the stream of material qualities.

2.1.34

They know the clouds to be the hair of the Lord, and twilight to be the garment of the all-pervading one, O best of Kurus. / They say the unmanifest is his heart, and his mind is the moon, the repository of all modifications.

2.1.35

They declare the intellect to be the cosmic intelligence of the Self of all, and Śiva his inner organ. / Horses, mules, camels, and elephants are his nails; all wild beasts and cattle abide in his hip-region.

2.1.36

The birds are his marvelous artistic skill; Manu is his intellect, and humankind is his dwelling. / The Gandharvas, Vidyādharas, Cāraṇas, and Apsarases are the memory of his musical notes; the demonic hosts are his prowess.

2.1.37

The brāhmaṇa is the face of the Great Self, the kṣatriya his arms, the vaiśya his thighs, and the dark caste of śūdras rests on his feet. / Comprising the collection of deities known by various names, the sacrificial performance of rites consists of ritual materials.

2.1.38

Such is this arrangement of the Lord’s form which has been described by me to you. / By one's own intellect, the mind is fixed upon this coarsest form, beyond which nothing else exists.

2.1.39

He is the Self that experiences everything through all functions of the intellect, just as a dreaming person is the sole perceiver. / One should worship Him, the truth, the treasury of bliss; one should not cling to anything else, from which comes the fall of the self.

Translations (1)

The Srimad Bhagavatam — S. Subba Rau 1928, English

Linked texts (1)

Bhāgavatapurāṇa — Vyāsa, Sanskrit