Matsyapurana 160

English (machine translation) 160

Language: English

160.1

Sūta said: / Hearing all this proclaimed by the divine bards, / Tāraka remembered the word of Brahmā that his death was imminent at the hands of a child.

160.2

Remembering it, his entire body wet with sweat, on foot and without attendants, / he swiftly left his palace with a mind gripped by grief.

160.3

The Daityas headed by Kālanemi, their minds bewildered by agitation, / then astonished with haste amidst their respective forces, [shouted]: / 'Warriors, run! Seize [your weapons]! Marshal the army!'

160.4

Seeing Kumāra, Tāraka of terrifying form spoke: / 'Why, child, do you wish to fight? Play the game of balls!

160.5

You have not seen the Dānavas who make battles terrifying. / Therefore, because of childhood, your mind perceives things so meanly.'

160.6

Kumāra too, delighting the Suras, spoke to him who stood before him: / 'Listen, Tāraka! The meaning of the treatises is now explained to you.

160.7

Matters [of battle] are not determined by treatises by fearless warriors in war. / Do not despise my youth; a deadly serpent is [also] young.

160.8

The morning sun is hard to look upon, and likewise I, a child, am hard to conquer. / Is not a powerful mantra with few syllables seen to be brightly radiant, O Daitya?'

160.9

When Kumāra had spoken thus, the Daitya hurled a club; / but Kumāra struck it away with his thunderbolt of unfailing splendor.

160.10

Then the lord of the Daityas hurled an iron sling-stone; / and Kārtikeya, the slayer of the foes of the immortals, caught it in his hand.

160.11

The six-faced one unleashed a mace of supreme roar at the Daitya; / struck by it, the Daitya then shook like the king of mountains.

160.12

The Daitya then deemed the six-faced one hard to conquer in battle; / he thought in his mind: 'The time of death has surely arrived.'

160.13

Seeing him enraged, the lords of the Daityas headed by Kālanemi / all attacked Kumāra, who was ferocious in battle.

160.14

Untouched by those blows, an exertion in vain, the greatly radiant one [stood firm]. / But the Daitya lords, skilled in battle, again with darts and arrows—

160.15

the mighty thorns to the gods struck Kumāra along with the immortals; / yet there was no pain for Kumāra when struck by the weapons of the Daityas.

160.16

The battle with the Dānavas became life-ending for the gods. / Seeing the gods tormented, Kumāra was filled with rage.

160.17

Then he checked the army of the Dānavas with weapons. / Struck by those irresistible [missiles], the thorns to the Suras—

160.18

all those headed by Kālanemi turned away from battle. / When the Daityas were thus routed and slain on all sides,

160.19

then the great Daitya Tāraka, the leader of the Asuras, enraged, / seized a divine mace adorned with golden mesh.

160.20

Wearing armlets of refined gold, he struck Kumāra with the mace, / and with peacock-feathered arrows he turned the Suras back.

160.21

Likewise with other great broad-headed arrows the enraged Tāraka, / that leader of Asuras amidst his army, pierced the peacock, the mount of Guha.

160.22

Seeing the gods turned back and his own mount shedding blood, / he grasped in battle a spotless spear adorned with gold,

160.23

with an arm splendid with a golden armlet, the six-faced one. / Then Mahāsena with speed [approached] Tāraka, the lord of the Dānavas:

160.24

'Stand! Stand, O fool! Look upon the world of the living! / Today you are slain by me with my spear! Recall your well-practiced weapons!'

Having spoken thus, he then hurled the spear against the Diti-born. / Discharged by the arm of Kumāra, accompanied by the clatter of his armlets, / it pierced the heart of the Daitya, hard as a thunderbolt and the king of mountains.

160.26

Lifeless, he fell to the earth like a mountain at the cosmic dissolution, / his crown and turban scattered, all his ornaments fallen away.

160.27

When that Daitya was slain, amidst the great celebration of the thirty [gods], / no one, even an evildoer in the hells, was sorrowful then.

160.28

Praising the six-faced one and sporting together with their women, / the gods of abundant splendor, eagerly longing, went to their own dwellings.

160.29

And all the gods, satisfied, with all their wishes fulfilled, / along with the Siddhas rich in asceticism, granted a boon toward Skanda:

160.30

The gods said: / 'The mortal of noble intellect who recites this narrative connected with Skanda, / or hears or relates it, that man will become renowned;

160.31

long-lived, fortunate, prosperous, radiant, handsome in appearance, / fearless from spirits, and freed from all suffering.

160.32

Having performed the morning twilight devotion, whoever recites the deeds of Skanda / will be freed from all sins and will become the master of great wealth.

160.33

For children afflicted with illness, and for those who serve at the royal court, / this is supreme, divine, always granting all desires; / and at the destruction of the body, a man attains union with the six-faced one.'

Translations (1)

The Matsya Puranam — A Taluqdar of Oudh 1916, English

Linked texts (1)

Matsyapurāṇa — Vyāsa, Sanskrit