Markandeyapurana 14
English (machine translation) 14
- Language
- English
Contents
14.1
The son said:
When questioned thus by that great-souled man, while we listened,
even that fierce servant of Yama spoke gentle words.
14.2
The servant of Yama said:
"O Great King! Just as you have said, so it is, there is no doubt of this.
Yet a minor sin was committed by you; I shall remind you of it.
14.3
Your wife, a princess of Vidarbha, named Pīvarī by name—
when she had bathed after her course, her fertile period was made barren by you long ago.
14.4
Because you were attached to the very beautiful princess of Kekaya,
you have arrived at such a dreadful hell on account of transgressing the fertile period.
14.5
Just as fire at the time of sacrifice awaits the pouring of ghee,
so Prajāpati in the fertile season awaits the discharge of seed.
14.6
The righteous man who, disregarding that, remains attached to pleasures of love
incurs sin from the debt to the ancestors and falls into hell.
14.7
Only this much is your sin, none other exists;
therefore come, go to enjoy the fruits of your merits, O king."
14.7.p1
The king said:
14.8
"I shall go, O attendant of the god, wherever you lead me.
I ask something: you ought to tell me that properly.
14.9
These crows with adamantine beaks tear out the eyes of men,
and their eyes grow back again and again in like manner.
14.10
What deed did they commit? Tell me this abhorrent thing!
Likewise, they tear out their tongues as they grow anew.
14.11
Why are these [sinners] torn apart by a saw, utterly wretched?
These are boiled in groat-sands, plunged into oil.
14.12
And what manner of men are these dragged by iron-beaked birds,
crying out with great screams in the agony of dismembered bodies?
14.13
Pained by all their limbs wounded by the strikes of iron beaks,
why are these men, doers of evil, struck day and night?
14.14
These and other torments of evil-doers are seen;
tell me fully by the ripening of what deed [each occurs]."
14.15
The servant of Yama said:
"Since you ask me, O king, about the arising of the fruits of evil deeds,
I shall tell it to you concisely and accurately.
14.16
A person experiences merit and demerit in turns,
and as he experiences it, sin or merit comes to an end.
14.17
Except through experience, no human action, whether meritorious
or sinful, is swiftly purged; destruction [of karma] comes from experiencing [it].
14.18
Learn from me how, through experiencing, he casts off merit and demerit:
from famine to famine, from affliction to affliction, from fear to fear,
14.19
from dead to dead, the poor evil-doers go;
creatures undergo diverse states through the bondage of action.
14.20
From festival to festival they go, from heaven to heaven, from joy to joy—
those who possess faith, who are peaceful, who give wealth, and who do good deeds.
14.21
To impasses full of wild beasts and elephants, and to perils from serpents and thieves,
the wicked go, struck down by sin; what is further than this?
14.23
Merit and demerit accumulated by men in a heap of many hundreds of thousands of births
likewise sprout forth as pleasure and pain.
14.24
Just as a seed, O king, awaits water,
so merit and demerit await time, place, and another agent of action.
14.25
A slight sin committed by a man, brought to fruition by place and time,
bestows pain arising from a thorn on stepping with the foot.
14.26
A greater and grosser sin bestows pain arising from a colic or a spike,
and likewise unbearable suffering such as diseases of the head,
14.27
causing unwholesome diet, cold, heat, fatigue, fever, and the like;
so sins depend upon one another when their fruits unite.
14.28
Thus great sins result in the affliction of chronic diseases and the like,
and likewise in the fruits of weapons, fire, severe distress, and bondage.
14.29
Slight merit easily bestows a pleasant fragrance,
or a touch, or a sound, a taste, or a form.
14.30
Likewise, in time, a heavier [merit] born of time brings even great [rewards];
and thus pleasures and pains arise from merit and demerit."
14.31
Experiencing [the fruits] born of many transmigrations, one remains here, / restrained by birth and place, as well as the fruits of knowledge and ignorance.
14.32
They remain attached there merely by the subtle body in the self. / Never at any time, anywhere, does a man abide
14.33
without performing an evil or a meritorious deed with body, mind, or speech. / Whatever misery or happiness a person experiences,
14.34
abundant or meager, causing agitation to the mind, / by that much does one's merit, sin, or other [karma]
14.35
go to destruction through experience, just like food being consumed. / Thus do these men, rolling in the midst of hell,
14.36
day and night exhaust their terrible, great sin through torments. / In the same way, O king, [men] enjoy [their] merits in the heavenly world together with the immortals,
14.37
with the songs and other delights of Gandharvas, Siddhas, and Apsarases. / In the state of a god, in the state of a human, and in the state of an animal, one experiences the good and evil
14.38
arisen from merit and sin, characterized by pleasure and pain. / As to what you ask me, O king: 'The torments of evildoers, / through what specific sins [do they occur]?' That I will tell you completely.
14.39
The wives of others who were looked at with an evil eye by the vilest of men, / and the wealth of others [desired] with an evil mind by the covetous—
14.40
these birds with adamantine beaks pluck out their eyes; / and then repeated regeneration of their eyes takes place.
14.41
For as many winks of the eye as sin was committed by these men, / for that many thousands of years indeed they suffer the devouring of their eyes.
14.42
Those by whom false teachings were imparted, and by whom they were advised / by men for the destruction of right view, even of enemies;
14.43
by whom scripture was spoken perversely, by whom untrue speech was uttered, / and by whom reviling of the Vedas, the gods, the twice-born, and the guru was done—
14.44
their tongues, reborn again and again, / these fierce [birds] with adamantine beaks seize for so many years.
14.45
The estrangement of friends, or of a father from a son and from his own kinsmen, / of a patron and a teacher, of a mother and a son, of companions,
14.46
and whatever lowest of men caused a division between husband and wife— / see them here, O protector of the earth, being torn apart with a saw!
14.47
Those who afflicted others, and those who prevented delights, / who took away fan-breezes, lodging, sandalwood, and vetiver,
14.48
and the base men who gave deadly distress to the innocent— / these sinners stand upon parched sand.
14.49
A man who eats another's śrāddha when invited by someone else, / whether offered to the gods or to the ancestors, is torn in two by birds.
14.50
And he who pierces the vital spots of good people with untrue words— / these birds stand unhindered, tormenting him.
14.51
And he who engages in slander, speaking one thing while intending another— / his tongue is indeed split in two thus with sharp razors.
14.52
Those arrogant men who showed contempt for parents and gurus / plunge headlong into a pit of pus, feces, and urine.
14.53
Those who eat while gods, guests, spirits, servants, / and newly-arrived persons have not eaten, and likewise ancestors, the sacred fire, and birds—
14.54
those wicked ones feed on exudation of pus, having needle-like mouths, / born with the size of mountains; see what kinds of men these are!
14.55
Those who fed a brahmin or one born of another class unequally in a single row— / here they eat feces, as [you see] these do.
14.56
Those who, having abandoned a destitute man seeking sustenance who traveled in the same caravan, / eat their own food—these [here] are phlegm-eaters.
14.57
Those by whom cows, brahmins, and fires were touched while impure from food, O lord of men— / their hands, placed into fire-pots, are licked [by flames].
14.58
Those by whom the sun, moon, and stars were looked at intentionally while impure from food— / into their eyes fire placed by Yama's men is kindled.
14.59
Cows, fire, mother, brahmin, elder brother, father, sister, / female relatives, elders, and old people who were touched with the feet by men—
14.60
their feet bound with iron chains heated by fire, / standing in the midst of a heap of charcoal, they remain burning up to their knees.
14.61
Rice cooked in milk, rice with sesame, goat-meat, and whatever food of the gods / were eaten by those without consecrating them—the eyes of those sinners,
14.62
thrown down upon the surface of the earth, gazing with rolled-up eyes, / are then pulled out from their face with tongs by Yama's men; see!
14.63
And by whatever lowest of men the reviling of gurus, gods, the twice-born, / and the Vedas was listened to, applauding the wicked—
14.64
into their ears, even as they lament, these servants of Yama drive iron stakes / raining fire, again and again.
14.65
By whom auspicious water-stations, dwellings of gods and brahmins, temples, and assembly halls / were broken and destroyed, pursuing anger and greed—
14.66
with these sharp weapons, Yama's extremely cruel men separate the skins / from the bodies of those who constantly wail.
14.67
The men who urinate on the paths of cows, brahmins, and the sun— / their entrails are pulled out through the anus by crows.
14.68
And having promised a maiden to one, he gives her to a second— / he is thus cut in many pieces and washed away in a river of caustic alkali.
14.69
And that man who, devoted to nourishing himself, abandons / destitute son, servant, wife, and group of kinsmen
14.70
in famine or panic—he too, thus having had his own flesh cut off / and placed into his mouth by Yama's servants, eats it out of hunger.
14.71
He who out of greed abandons those who have sought refuge and live by his employment— / he too is crushed thus with tortures of the oil-press by Yama's servants.
14.72
Men who [falsely] claim the good deeds done throughout a lifetime [by others]— / they are crushed by grinding stones, as are these evildoers.
14.73
Those who steal deposits, bound in all limbs with fetters, / are eaten day and night by worms, scorpions, and ravens.
14.74
Wasted with hunger, their tongues and palates falling from thirst, afflicted with pain— / the sinners who copulate by day and those who enjoy another's wife,
14.75
Likewise, behold the silk-cotton tree with long iron thorns / on which they are mounted, their limbs torn apart, smeared with flowing torrents of blood.
14.76
O tiger among men, behold these violators of others' wives / being destroyed in a crucible by the attendants of Yama.
14.77
The arrogant man who, having humbled his teacher, / receives instruction or a craft, he too in this way, carrying a stone on his head,
14.78
undergoes distress, exceedingly afflicted on the highway, / emaciated by hunger day and night, his head tormented by the pain of the burden.
14.79
Those by whom urine, phlegm, and feces were cast into water, / they have gone to this hell foul with the stench of phlegm, feces, and urine.
14.80
And afflicted with hunger, they devour one another's flesh; / formerly they ate without the rites of hospitality to one another.
14.81
Those who, having maintained the fires, abandoned the Vedas and the fires, / are cast down again and again from the top of the branch of a śāla tree.
14.82
Men who are decrepit husbands of remarried women as long as they live, / having become worms here, are eaten by ants.
14.83
From accepting gifts from an outcaste, from sacrificing for one, or from serving one constantly, / a man continually attains the condition of an insect inside a stone.
14.84
He who eats sweet food alone while his train of servants, friends, and guests look on, / eats a heap of blazing coals.
14.85
His back is perpetually devoured by frightful wolves, / because, O king, he backbit [lit. 'ate the back-flesh of'] people.
14.86
Blind, deaf, and mute, he is driven about, tormented by hunger— / the ungrateful wretch who acted against men who benefited him.
14.87
This ungrateful villain, who harms friends, / falls into a heated pot, and from there he will go to being crushed;
14.88
from there into hot sand, then into compression by a press; / from there into the sword-leaved forest, and sawing with a handsaw;
14.89
and likewise cutting upon the Kālasūtra thread and many tortures. / Having met with these, I do not know how he will attain release.
14.90
The wicked brahmins who assemble at funeral feasts, leaping upon one another, / indeed drink the froth that has issued from all their limbs.
14.91
A stealer of gold, a killer of a brahmin, a drinker of liquor, one who violates the teacher's bed, / burning all around in blazing fire below and above,
14.92
remain for very many thousands of years; then again / they are born as humans marked with leprosy, consumption, and other diseases.
14.93
Dying, they return to hell; and born again, they undergo / such disease for the duration of a kalpa, O ruler of men.
14.94
A cow-slayer goes to a lesser hell for three births; / and such is the certainty for all the secondary sins.
14.95
Hear from me as I declare what wombs they enter / when fallen from hell, according to the sins committed by each.
14.95.p1
Thus ends the fourteenth chapter, titled 'The Dialogue of the Attendant of Yama' in the Story of the Dullard in the glorious Mārkaṇḍeyapurāṇa.
14.95.p2
Fifteenth Chapter
Translations (1)
- The Mārkaṇḍeya Purāṇa — Frederick Eden Pargiter 1888, English
Linked texts (1)
- Mārkaṇḍeyapurāṇa — Vyāsa, Sanskrit