Bhagavatapurana 6.10

English (machine translation) 6.10

Language: English

6.10.1

Śrī Bādarāyaṇi said: / Having thus instructed Indra, the Lord Hari, the creator of the universe, / disappeared right there before the eyes of the sleepless gods.

6.10.2

Thus approached and begged by the gods, that great sage, the descendant of Atharvan, / spoke this with joy, as if smiling, O descendant of Bharata:

6.10.3

Do you gods not know / what severe, agonizing, consciousness-stealing pain occurs for embodied beings at death?

6.10.4

To living beings wishing to live, the body is the dearest and most desired thing here. / Who would have the resolve to give it up, even to Viṣṇu himself who comes begging?

6.10.5

The gods said: / What indeed is difficult to abandon, O brāhmaṇa, for persons compassionate to living beings, / exalted souls like you, whose actions are praised by those of purifying renown?

6.10.6

Surely, worldly people devoted to self-interest do not know the distress of others; / if they knew, they would not ask. Nor does a capable person say 'no' [to a petitioner].

6.10.7

The sage said: / Desiring to hear dharma from you, I made that reply to you. / Here I abandon for you this dear body, which is already abandoning me.

6.10.8

The man who, through this non-eternal body, O masters, does not seek / dharma and fame through compassion for beings, is to be pitied even by stationary creatures.

6.10.9

This is the entire imperishable dharma practiced by those of purifying renown: / that a person grieves and rejoices through the grief and joy of all creatures.

6.10.10

Alas, what wretchedness! Alas, what misery! that a mortal does not render aid to his own kin / with bodies that belong to others, are fragile every moment, and cannot serve their own interest!

6.10.11

Śrī Bādarāyaṇi said: / Having thus made his resolve, Dadhyañc, the descendant of Atharvan, abandoned his body, / unifying his self with the Supreme Lord, Brahman.

6.10.12

With his senses, vital breath, mind, and intellect restrained, seeing the truth, with his bonds broken, / established in the supreme yoga, he did not even notice his body departing.

6.10.13

Then Indra, taking up the thunderbolt fashioned by Viśvakarman, / empowered by the sage's strengths and imbued with the splendor of the Lord,

6.10.14

surrounded by all the hosts of gods, shone upon the lordly elephant [Airāvata], / being praised by the assemblies of sages, as if delighting the three worlds.

6.10.15

He rushed toward his enemy, Vṛtra, who was encircled by commanders of the asura armies, / with his power, O King, like the enraged Rudra rushing toward Death.

6.10.16

Then an exceedingly fierce battle between the gods and the asuras / took place on the bank of the Narmadā, at the beginning of the Tretā age, in the first yuga cycle.

6.10.17

Together with the Rudras, the Vasus, the Ādityas, the two Aśvins, the Pitṛs, the Agnis, / the Maruts, the Ṛbhus, the Sādhyas, and the Viśvedevas, the lord of the Maruts [Indra],

6.10.18

holding the thunderbolt, Śakra, shining with his own splendor— / seeing him, the asuras headed by Vṛtra could not tolerate it in the battle, O King.

6.10.19

Namuci, Śambara, Anarvan, Dvimūrdhan, Ṛṣabha, Asura, / Hayagrīva, Śaṅkuśiras, Vipracitti, Ayomukha,

6.10.20

Puloman, Vṛṣaparvan, Praheti, Heti, Utkala, / Daiteyas, Dānavas, Yakṣas, and Rākṣasas by the thousands,

6.10.21

led by Sumālin and Mālin, adorned with gold ornaments, / resisting the vanguard of Indra's army, which was unapproachable even for Death,

6.10.22

wild with fury, undaunted, with roaring like lions, attacked [them] / with clubs, iron bludgeons, arrows, darts, mallets, and javelins,

6.10.23

with tridents, battle-axes, swords, hundred-killers, and cannons, / from all sides they showered weapons and missiles upon the foremost of the gods.

6.10.24

Covered on all sides by networks of arrows falling feather to feather, / they were not visible, like the celestial luminaries covered by clouds in the sky.

6.10.25

Those floods of weapons and missiles did not reach the soldiers of the gods, / for they were cut into thousands of pieces in the path of the Siddhas by the swift-handed gods.

6.10.26

Then, their stores of missiles and weapons exhausted, they showered the army of the gods / with mountain peaks, trees, and stones, and the gods cut them down just as before.

Seeing Indra's soldiers unharmed, safe and sound, completely unwounded / by the hosts of weapons and missiles, by trees, stones, and various mountain peaks, the leaders with Vṛtra as their head were terrified.

6.10.28

All the efforts made again and again by the Daityas against the host of gods were in vain, / just as biting and harsh words directed by base people against exalted devotees favored by Kṛṣṇa come to nothing.

6.10.29

Seeing their effort come to naught, lacking devotion to Hari and stripped of their pride in battle, / their strength broken, abandoning their master at the vanguard of the fight, they set their minds on flight.

6.10.30

The noble and heroic Vṛtra, seeing those asura followers fleeing / and beholding his broken army routed by intense fear, laughed and spoke thus:

6.10.31

The foremost hero among men addressed words timely and pleasing to the noble: / 'O Vipracitti, Namuci, Puloman, Maya, Anarvan, and Śambara, listen to me!

6.10.32

For one who is born, death is certain from every quarter, and no remedy for it has been devised here in this world. / If a world of renown follows from it, what man indeed would not embrace such a proper death?

6.10.33

Two kinds of death are praised here as difficult to attain: when one, having mastered his breath by concentrating on Brahman / and engaged in yoga, casts off the body; and when, leading at the forefront, one falls upon the hero's couch without retreating.'

Translations (1)

The Srimad Bhagavatam — S. Subba Rau 1928, English

Commentaries (1)

Bhāgavatapurāṇaṭīkā — Vaṃśīdhara 1630, Sanskrit

Linked texts (1)

Bhāgavatapurāṇa — Vyāsa, Sanskrit