Skandapurana 16.5

Sūta said: / When this was spoken by the great-souled Śaṃkara, O best of brahmins, / that goddess, her mind filled with joy, asked again.

The goddess said: / O God of gods, Lord of the universe, for the welfare of all living beings, / tell me in detail, O Lord, the māhātmya of the Prabhāsa sacred field.

Īśvara said: / I shall tell you another illustrative narrative, O illustrious one, / of how this sacred field, dear to me, was created, O great goddess.

The state that belongs to unattached yogins who meditate perpetually / is that very supreme state for those who cast off their life-breaths in Prabhāsa.

Even the great ascetic Mārkaṇḍeya, who endures for many kalpas, / always worships the god Virūpākṣa in Prabhāsa.

Having wandered through all sacred fords, he never abandons Prabhāsa. / And Durvāsas, endowed with great splendor, intent upon worshipping the liṅga, / does not abandon for a moment that sacred field of the moon-crested god, O goddess.

Bharadvāja, Marīci, the sage Uddālaka, / Kratu, Vasiṣṭha, Kaśyapa, and Bhṛgu,

Dakṣa, Sāvarṇi, Yama, and Aṅgiras, / Śuka, Vibhāṇḍaka, Ṛṣyaśṛṅga, and Gobhila,

Gautama, Ṛcīka, the great Śaunaka, Agastya, / Nārada, Jamadagni, Viśvāmitra, and Lomaśa,

and other seers and divine celestial seers, / intent on worshipping the liṅga, do not abandon the great sacred field.

I myself reside right there, intent upon worshipping the liṅga; / I do not abandon the great sacred field; truly, truly, O fair-faced one.

All sacred fords on the earth's surface have been seen by me, O goddess of the gods; / a sacred field equal to Prabhāsa has never been seen.

O goddess, sixty thousand [seers] led by Yājñavalkya, / residing along the Candrabhāgā, perform the chanting of the Rudras.

Forty thousand seers of upward-drawn seed, / resorting to the bank of the Devikā, chant the Śatarudriya.

And fifty crores of sages of upward-drawn seed, / having reached Umāpati, [worship] the liṅga situated right there.

A crore of recitations of the Rudras was performed by them right there in ancient times; / a crore [of them] attained perfection right there at that liṅga, without a doubt.

And a hundred thousand great perfected beings, devotees of my sacred field, / worship the Lord of gods, who is adorned with the moon.

And whatever reward has been proclaimed in the Upaniṣads by the great seers, / that entire reward is attained there by the darśana of the moon-adorned god.

At Agnitīrtha, O auspicious one, more than a crore of seers reside; / a hundred thousand are recorded at Rudreśvara, and likewise at Kapardīśa.

At Ratneśvara dwell a thousand seers of upward-drawn seed; / at auspicious Arkasthala, of great religious merit, over a crore reside.

Sixty thousand abide there at Siddheśvara; / and seven thousand reside at Mārkaṇḍeya.

Countless sages are remembered at Brahmakuṇḍa on the Sarasvatī; / ten times a hundred million, and indeed three crores,

seers dwell there where the eastward-flowing Sarasvatī [runs], / where Śaṃkara’s sin of killing a brahmin vanished in that very instant,

his body attained a golden hue, and the skull fell from his hand. / Knowing this, great austerity was formerly performed there by Śaṅkin.

The god Lord Śaṃkara was pleased with the liṅga by Vāsava’s boon: / the fruit of a crore of sacrifices [is gained] through ritual ablution in the eastward-flowing [stream] and worship of the liṅga.

Through an ancestral cake, a hundred times the fruit of Gayā is gained on a new-moon day falling on a Monday; / one who offers an ancestral cake there on the fourteenth day delivers a crore of ancestors in his lineage.

And whatever men bathe there for the destruction of impurities, / they too shall obtain the merit born of the gift of ten cows.

Or men who, playing about, touch the water with their foot, / to them also shall accrue the fruit of a śrāddha performed according to rule. / The liṅgas there, such as Śūlabheda and the others, are to be worshipped;

thus regarding the liṅgas, the fruits of horse-sacrifices [accrue]. / By the mere darśana of them all, [the fruit is attained]; indeed, by touch the fruit is doubled.

Thus pleased, the Lord of the Universe dwells forever in the forest of the eastward-flowing [stream]. / What need be said of those who even set their mind on ritual ablution and gifts?

With them the Lord of the Universe, Śaṃkara, the Blue-and-Red Lord, is well pleased. / A host of thirty crores guards the eastward-flowing [stream] there on every side.

Whether one is of great sinful conduct, the most sinful, or exceedingly guilty, / relinquishing his breath at the eastward-flowing [stream], even as by mere chance, he reaches Śiva.

A gift of curd and a blanket should be given there to an eminent twice-born; / it is declared as that which quells sin, truly the quintessential of the quintessential.

Now I shall proclaim the great rise of Hiraṇyā; / austerity was performed there by Durvāsas, and the Sun was installed there.

Right there resides a crore of seers of upward-drawn seed, / surpassing the twenty-four cosmic principles, bearing form and strength,

where, O Goddess of the gods, he abides accompanied by a crore of Bhṛgus. / Whatever fruit one would obtain elsewhere from [feeding] a crore of brahmins,

that fruit is attained by feeding just one in this seat of Brahmā. / Knowing this, O great Goddess, I remain contented there / surrounded by crores of celestial seers and gods. / The sacred fords remain there, hidden inside, in the Kali age.

In that most delightful sacred field where Someśvara resides, / there are two attendants of mine, O Goddess: Vibhrama and the supreme Saṃbhrama.

These two, through illusions and delusions, ever perplex the minds / of the people dwelling in the sacred field, filling them with doubts and division.

There are troubles caused by the Vināyakas, and likewise other ten blemishes; / in this way they guard the sacred field from sinful persons of wicked mind.

The best of men who behold Daṇḍapāṇi here with devotion, / to those residents of the sacred field no obstacle arises.

Brahmins, kṣatriyas, vaiśyas, śūdras, or those of mixed castes, / without desire or full of desire, who die in auspicious Prabhāsa,

all crowned with the crescent moon, having an eye on the forehead, and with the bull upon their banners, / those men are reborn there in my divine city of Śiva.

The wise brahmin who dwells there, self-controlled and concentrated in mind, / even if eating at the three times of the day, becomes equal to one who feeds on air.

It is possible to recount the virtues of Meru, and likewise the virtues of the continents; / the virtues of all the oceans can also be told, my dear;

yet the virtues of the primordial God, the Great Lord, the Supreme Sovereign, / can never be told, O Goddess of the gods, even in hundreds of crores of years.

Thus ends the fifth chapter, entitled “Description of the Hosts of Seers and Gods Residing in the Field,” in the Prabhāsakṣetramāhātmya, the first [subdivision] of the seventh Prabhāsakhaṇḍa, in the glorious Skanda Mahāpurāṇa, a collection of eighty-one thousand [verses].