Bhagavatapurana 2.10
English (machine translation) 2.10
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2.10.1
Śrī Śuka said: / Here [in this Purāṇa], primary creation, secondary creation, maintenance, nourishment, karmic impulses, / the reigns of the Manus, narrations of the Lord, cosmic dissolution, liberation, and the supreme support [are described].
2.10.2
To make the tenth perfectly clear, the great-souled ones / describe the characteristics of the nine here directly through Vedic testimony and indirect reasoning.
2.10.3
The origination of the subtle elements, senses, and intellects is called primary creation; / secondary creation, known as stemming from the Cosmic Person, arises from the imbalance of the guṇas of Brahman.
2.10.4
Maintenance is the triumph of Vaikuṇṭha; nourishment is His grace; / the reigns of the Manus denote virtuous dharma; karmic impulses are the latent impressions of action.
2.10.5
The accounts of the Lord are declared to be the deeds of the incarnations of Hari / and of the people who follow Him, enriched by diverse narratives.
2.10.6
Dissolution is the slumber of this soul along with its potencies; / liberation is dwelling in one's own essential nature after abandoning an alien form.
2.10.7
That from which manifestation and dissolution are perceived to arise / is the supreme support; it is named the supreme Brahman, the Supreme Self.
2.10.8
He who is this subjective person is indeed the presiding divine person; / and the person who separates the two is the objective, physical person.
2.10.9
When we cannot apprehend one in the absence of the other, / he who knows that triad is the Self, the support of His own support.
2.10.10
When that Person, having broken through the cosmic egg, emerged from it, / seeking a resting place for Himself, pure, He created the pure waters.
2.10.11
In those waters created by Himself He dwelt for a thousand solar years; / hence His name is Nārāyaṇa, because the waters arose from the Person.
2.10.12
Substance, action, time, innate nature, and the individual soul— / it is by His grace that they exist, and by His disregard that they do not.
2.10.13
Being one and desiring multiplicity, the God arose from His yogic bed / and by His creative power released threefold His golden potency:
2.10.14
as the divine, then the subjective, and the objective, the Lord [projected it]. / Now listen to how that single potency of the Person was divided threefold.
2.10.15
From the space inside the body of the Person as He stirred, / vigor, endurance, and strength arose; thence arose the vital breath, the great life force.
2.10.16
All the vital breaths breathe in accordance with Him as He breathes in all creatures, / and breathe downward when He breathes downward, like attendants following a king.
2.10.17
Through the surging of the vital breath, hunger and thirst arose within the all-pervading Lord; / as He wished to drink and eat, the mouth broke open first.
2.10.18
From the mouth the palate broke forth; upon it the tongue was produced; / thence arose the manifold tastes that are perceived by the tongue.
2.10.19
When the Vast One wished to speak, fire and speech burst forth from His mouth; / in the water, for a very long time, their restriction remained.
2.10.20
The two nostrils broke forth as the wind blew strongly; / there the scent-bearing wind and the sense of smell appeared in the nose as He desired to smell.
2.10.21
When there was darkness within Himself, and He wished to see Himself, / His two eyes broke forth: light, the sense of sight, and the grasping of form.
2.10.22
As He was awakened by the sages and wished to perceive that, / His two ears broke forth: the cardinal directions, the sense of hearing, and the grasping of sound.
2.10.23
Wishing to perceive the softness, hardness, / lightness, heaviness, heat, and coldness of things, His skin broke forth, and on it the hairs, like trees on the earth; / and there, inside and out, the wind was enveloped, having obtained its property through the skin.
2.10.24
His two hands grew forth from a desire to perform various actions; / in them was Indra the mighty, and grasping, which rests on both.
2.10.25
His two feet grew forth as He wished to move at will; / through the two feet sacrifice itself and the offering are performed through actions by men.
2.10.26
The penis broke forth for Him as He desired offspring, sexual pleasure, and celestial nectar; / the organ of generation became [the seat] of desires, and [sexual] delight rested on both.
2.10.27
As He wished to expel the impurities of the bodily elements, the anus broke forth; / thence the organ of excretion, thence Mitra, and evacuation rested on both.
2.10.28
Wishing to move from body to body by the downward breath, the aperture of the navel [appeared]; / there was the downward breath, thence death, and separation rested on both.
2.10.29
As He wished to ingest food and drink, the belly, the intestines, and the arteries arose; / the rivers and the oceans [were their presiding deities], and satisfaction and nourishment rested upon them.
2.10.30
Wishing to meditate upon His own creative power, the heart broke forth; / thence the mind and the Moon, and thence volition and desire.
2.10.31
Skin, hide, flesh, blood, / fat, marrow, and bone are the seven bodily elements composed of earth, water, and fire; the vital breath is composed of space, water, and air.
2.10.32
The sense faculties consist of the guṇas; the guṇas originate from the ego; / the mind consists of all modifications; the intellect has the nature of discernment.
2.10.33
This gross form of the Lord has been related to you by me, / covered on the outside by the eight coverings beginning with earth.
2.10.34
Beyond this is the most subtle, unmanifest, devoid of distinguishing attributes, / without beginning, middle, or end, eternal, beyond speech and mind.
2.10.35
These two forms of the Lord have indeed been described to you by me; / but the wise accept neither of them, as both are produced by creative power.
2.10.36
Assuming the form of Brahman through the expressed word and the expressing word, / the Lord, the Supreme, though free from action, assumes name, form, and action along with karmic activity.
2.10.37
Progenitors of creatures, Manus, gods, sages, the classes of ancestors separately, / Siddhas, Cāraṇas, Gandharvas, Vidyādharas, Asuras, and Guhyakas,
2.10.38
Kinnaras, Apsarases, Nāgas, serpents, Kimpuruṣas, human beings, / Mātṛs, Rakṣases, Piśācas, Pretas, Bhūtas, and Vināyakas,
2.10.39
Kūṣmāṇḍas, Unmādas, Vetālas, Yātudhānas, and the planets, / birds, wild beasts, domestic animals, trees, mountains, O king, and reptiles,
2.10.40
and the others, dwelling in water, land, and sky, whether of two kinds or four kinds— / these are the auspicious, inauspicious, and mixed destinies of actions.
2.10.41
Sattva, rajas, and tamas are the three [guṇas producing] gods, men, and hellish beings; / even there, O king, each destiny is divided threefold, / whenever one nature is modified by the other two.
2.10.42
The Lord Himself, the creator of this world, assuming the form of dharma, / nourishes and maintains the universe by means of beasts, men, gods, and others.
2.10.43
Then, having the nature of the fire of time and of Rudra, that which He created of Himself / He withdraws in due course, as the wind disperses an array of clouds.
2.10.44
In this manner the Lord, the most divine, has been described; / yet the wise should not see the Supreme as limited to this manner.
2.10.45
No agency is attributed to the Supreme in His deeds such as birth; / for that agency is superimposition through creative power, to negate [ultimate] doership.
2.10.46
This has been declared as the secondary cosmic cycle of Brahmā, / in which the standard order holds, with primary and secondary creations.
2.10.47
The measurement of time, defined by the characteristics of a kalpa, / as I shall explain hereafter; now hear of the Pādma-kalpa.
2.10.48
Śaunaka said: / When, as you told us, Sūta, the chamberlain Vidura, highest among the Bhāgavatas, / wandered to the earth's sacred places after abandoning his relatives, whom it is so hard to renounce;
2.10.49
The dialogue that the chamberlain had with Kauṣārava concerning the inner self, / or how that Lord, when questioned by him, spoke the truth;
2.10.50
Tell us this, gentle one: of Vidura's deeds, / and the reason for renouncing his kin, and how he returned again.
2.10.51
Sūta said: / What the great sage said when questioned by King Parīkṣit, / that I shall declare to you; listen in accordance with the king's inquiry.
Translations (1)
- The Srimad Bhagavatam — S. Subba Rau 1928, English
Linked texts (1)
- Bhāgavatapurāṇa — Vyāsa, Sanskrit