Skandapurana 4.28

Umā said:

I desire to ask something, O Lord, to dispel my own doubt;

speak, if it is no weariness to you, O you who are skilled in knowledge of the three times! // 1

Where was King Bhagīratha then, and where was the Bhāgīrathī then,

when Viṣṇu performed austerity on the bank of the Cakrapuṣkariṇī? // 2

Śiva said:

No doubt should be held here, O large-eyed one, ever immaculate!

In the Śruti, Smṛti, and Purāṇas, the three times are described— // 3

past, future, and present; do not entertain doubt in vain.

Having said this, the Lord spoke again of the supreme māhātmya of the Gaṅgā. // 4

Agastya said:

O son of Pārvatī, speak fully again about the river of heaven,

just as its greatness was spoken to Hari at that time by the God of gods. // 5

Skanda said:

O sage, son of Mitra and Varuṇa, just as it was uttered by the God,

hear the sin-destroying māhātmya of the river flowing along three paths. // 6

Having reached the three-streamed [river], whoever offers rice-balls even once

delivers the ancestors from the ocean of worldly existence by means of water and sesame seeds. // 7

As many sesame seeds as are taken by mortals in the ancestral rite,

for so many thousands of years the ancestors dwell in heaven. // 8

Because gods and ancestors are always present in the Gaṅgā,

there is consequently no invocation nor dismissal for them there. // 9

Those who have died in the paternal line, and likewise those in the maternal line,

kinsmen of the guru, father-in-law, and relatives, and whatever other relatives have died, // 4.1.28.10

Those who died before their teeth had grown, and those who perished in the womb;

Those killed by fire, lightning, or thieves, or by tigers and tusked beasts;

Those who died by hanging, the degraded, those who took their own lives;

Those who sold themselves, thieves, and those who officiated for the unworthy;

Those who sold liquids, and those suffering from diseases born of sin;

Arsonists, poisoners, cow-killers, even among one's own kin;

Those who have gone to Asipatravana, and those who have gone to Kumbhīpāka;

Those who have gone to Raurava, to Andhatāmisra, and to Kālasūtra;

Those who wander through thousands of different wombs because of their own deeds;

Those who have entered the wombs of birds, beasts, and the like,

Of worms, trees, and creepers—innumerable [souls], or of countable, wretched names;

Those brought to the realm of Yama by the terrifying servants of Yama;

Those who are not kin or who are kin, or who were kin in another birth;

Those whose names are unknown, and childless members of one's own clan;

Those who died of poison, and those struck down by horned beasts;

The ungrateful, the slayers of gurus, and those who betrayed friends;

Slayers of women, slayers of children, and breakers of trust;

Those devoted to untruth and violence, and those ever engaged in sin;

Those who sold horses, and those who stole the property of others;

The helpless, the miserable, the wretched, unable to attain human rebirth—

When propitiated once with the waters of the Jāhnavī by a man according to rule,

Even they attain a heavenly state, and those already in heaven attain liberation.

He who recites these mantras and performs the propitiation of the ancestors,

The śrāddha and the offering of piṇḍas, is here called a knower of the rules.

Whatever sacred fords grant desires in the three worlds,

All of them attend upon the north-flowing [Gaṅgā] in Kāśī.

The heavenly river is holy everywhere, removing the sin of killing a brahmin,

Especially in Kāśī, O Viṣṇu, where she flows northwards.

The hosts of divine seers and ancestors indeed sing this song:

'May the north-flowing [Gaṅgā] in Kāśī come within our sight!

Satisfied with the nectar there and freed from the three afflictions,

May we truly become immortal by the grace of Viśvanātha!'

The Gaṅgā alone is determined everywhere for liberation, O Hari,

Especially in Avimukta, on account of the majesty of my dwelling there.

Knowing the Kali age to be terrible, devotion to the Gaṅgā was kept deeply hidden;

People do not find the Gaṅgā, the bestower of the path to liberation.

Wandering through millions of different births among wombs,

Who here could attain peace without worshipping the Jāhnavī?

For men of small intellect whose minds are bewildered by sins,

The Gaṅgā alone, O Viṣṇu, is the supreme medicine for those afflicted with the disease of worldly existence.

He who repairs broken and dilapidated [structures] on the bank of the Gaṅgā

Enjoys imperishable happiness for a long time in my world, O Hari.

He who sets out intending to go to the Gaṅgā, whether for another's sake or his own,

And does not go purely out of delusion, falls along with his ancestors.

Mortals whose entire rituals are performed with the waters of the Gaṅgā—

Even while standing on earth, they are truly immortals, O Hari.

Even in the final stage of life, he who resorts to the heavenly river,

Though having committed sins many times, goes to an auspicious destination.

As long as a man's bone remains in the waters of the Gaṅgā,

For that many thousands of years he is honored in the heavenly world."

Viṣṇu said:

"O God of gods, Lord of the universe, Lord who works welfare for the worlds,

If by chance the bone of an evil-conducted, wicked-souled person

Should fall into the sinless water of the heavenly river, how does he attain the supreme state

When he has perished by an untimely death? Reveal that, O Lord!"

Maheśvara said:

"On this matter I will narrate an ancient event, O Adhokṣaja;

Listen with a single-pointed mind, O Viṣṇu, concerning the twice-born Vāhīka.

Formerly, in the Kalinga country, there was a twice-born man who sold salt,

Devoid of twilight prayers and ritual ablution, and destitute of the syllables of the Veda.

Vāhīka by name, having only the sacrificial cord [as a sign of his caste].

And his wife was a young widow of the weaver caste.

Then, afflicted by famine, without [means], that keeper of a low-caste woman,

seeking a livelihood, went from one region to another.

Then, in the midst of the Daṇḍaka forest, emaciated with hunger and lacking any companion,

he was slain there by a tiger fond of human flesh.

A vulture seized his left foot and flew up from there;

with another carnivorous vulture, a battle arose in the sky.

As the two vultures, eager for flesh, sought victory over each other,

the ankle of the foot then dropped from the vulture's beak.

Of that brahmin Vāhīka, who had been slain by the tiger,

it fell, by the ordinance of destiny, into the midst of the Gaṅgā from the two contenders.

At the very moment when the leopard killed that Vāhīka wandering in the forest,

at that very instant he was bound with nooses by cruel attendants [of Yama].

Beaten exceedingly with whips and pierced all around with awls,

vomiting blood from his mouth, he was brought by them before Yama.

Then Citragupta was questioned by the King of Dharma, O lord of the earth:

“Examine the righteousness and unrighteousness of this twice-born, and speak quickly.”

Then Citragupta, of wondrous intellect, questioned by the son of Vivasvat,

the knower of all the deeds of all creatures at all times,

spoke to the brother of Yamunā concerning the evil deeds of the twice-born Vāhīka,

the wicked one, from the day of his birth onwards.

Citragupta said:

“No rite beginning with conception was performed for him in the beginning by anyone;

no birth ceremony was performed for him by his ignorant father, O Hari,

which is the cause for pacifying sin from the womb and bestows health and happiness for all life.

On the eleventh day, his name was not given according to the rules,

by which sacred rite he would become known everywhere.

The dull-witted father did not perform his ceremony of going outdoors in the fourth month,

on an auspicious lunar day and the like, which averts going to a foreign land.

In the sixth month, the first feeding of solid food was not performed according to the rules,

by which rite one always eats sweet food, O son of the Sun.

Nor was his tonsure performed in [the proper] year according to family custom,

by which rite the hair becomes glossy and rains flowers.

The piercing of his ears was not performed by his father at an auspicious time,

by which the ears would receive gold and hear well.

Nor did the tying of the mauñjī girdle take place for him when his eighth year had passed, O Hari,

which is for the enhancement of celibacy and the cause of receiving the Veda.

Even the mention of untying the mauñjī was never made by him in his lifetime,

after which rite the superior state of a householder is attained.

Somehow a wife was wed, one who had abandoned the path of her family,

by that keeper of a low-caste woman, who abducted the wives of others.

Beginning from his fifth year, a stealer of others' wealth,

this ill-behaved man became devoted to gambling.

While living at Rumā, a one-year-old cow was struck by him / once with a heavy stick while licking salt, and she died.

He beat his mother repeatedly by kicking her with his foot;

never indeed was the word of his father obeyed by him.

Fond of quarreling, he consumed poison many times;

given to tormenting people, he tore open his own belly.

Datura, oleander, and various minor poisons,

this fool would consume in mere mock quarrels.

He was burned by fire, O son of the Sun, and seized in the jaws of dogs;

he was gored all around by horned animals with the points of their horns many times;

he was bitten repeatedly by snakes, wicked and reproached by the virtuous.

With pieces of wood, bricks, and clods of earth, the most sinful man constantly brought harm upon himself.

And his own head was dashed against the ground repeatedly by this evil-souled man—

that highest limb which is always worshipped in many ways by the virtuous.

Indeed, this foolish brahmin did not even know the Gāyatrī;

fish and meat were willfully consumed by this evil-minded one.

He cooked rice pudding for himself alone on many occasions;

of lac, salt, and meat, along with milk, curds, and ghee,

of poisons, iron, and weapons, and of female slaves, cows, and horses,

this fool was a seller constantly, and likewise indeed of hair and skins.

With limbs nourished on the food of a śūdra, having copulated on sacred festival days,

averse to rites for gods and ancestors, this wicked-minded man,

by him birds were killed, and deer too by the hundreds;

a cutter of trees without cause, ever pitiless in mind,

always an instigator of distress even among his own kinsmen,

a constant speaker of untruth, ever devoted to violence,

never giving gifts, malicious, devoted solely to his genitals and belly—

why say much, O son of the Sun? He was sin personified.

In Raurava, in Andhatāmisra, in Kumbhīpāka, and in Atiraurava,

in Kālasūtra, in Kṛmibhuk, in the mire of pus and blood,

in the frightful Asipatravana, in Yantrapīḍa, in Sudaṃṣṭraka,

in Adhomukha, in Pūtigandha, in pits of excrement, in hunger,

in Sūcībhedya, then in Saṃdaṃśa, in Lālāpa, in Kṣuradhāra—

let him be cast into each and every hell for counts of kalpas!

Dharmarāja, having heard this from the mouth of Citragupta,

rebuked that vile-behaved man and commanded his attendants:

At a sign of [his] brow, seized and bound by them, he was led to the abode of hell,

where the loud wailing shrieks of sinners make the hair stand on end.

Īśvara said:

While Vāhīka was situated in those exceedingly fierce tortures,

into the pure water of the Gaṅgā, yielding merit at that very instant,

that [bone] of Vāhīka the twice-born fell indeed from the vulture's beak.

O Viṣṇu, at that instant a vimāna arrived from the abode of the gods,

hung with bells, celestial, crowded with hundreds of celestial women.

Mounting that divine vehicle, dressed in celestial attire, that twice-born,

fanned by hosts of apsarases and anointed with celestial perfumes,

went to the world of heaven on account of his bone falling into the Gaṅgā, O Viṣṇu.

Skanda said:

This investigation of the inherent power of things is wonderful, O pot-born [sage]!

This is an inexplicable supreme power of Sadāśiva in liquid form.

By the god of gods, Śambhu, who is filled with the nectar of compassion,

this Gaṅgā was set flowing for the deliverance of the world.

Just as there are other rivers in the world, filled with water by the thousands,

this Three-pathed River should not be considered likewise by the virtuous.

Having distilled the syllables of the Vedic scriptures out of compassion, O muni,

this Gaṅgā was fashioned from their liquid essence by Gaṅgādhara himself.

Drawing out this essence of the Yoga-upaniṣads, Śaṃkara,

out of pity for all living beings, made the best of rivers.

Just as nights without the moon and trees without flowers [are barren],

even so are those lands where the River of the Immortals does not flow.

Just as wealth gained without righteousness, and sacrifices without sacrificial fees [are worthless],

so are all lands and directions lacking the waters of the Gaṅgā, O Viṣṇu.

Just as the expanse of the sky without the sun, and a house at night without a lamp,

and just as brahmins without the Vedas, so are the quarters devoid of the Gaṅgā.

If someone should perform a thousand Cāndrāyaṇa fasts to purify his body,

and someone else drinks the nectar of the Gaṅgā, of the two, the drinker of Gaṅgā water is superior.

He who stands on one foot for a hundred thousand autumns,

and he who drinks Gaṅgā water for a year—between the two, the drinker of Gaṅgā water is superior.

A man who hangs upside down for a hundred years,

better than him, O Viṣṇu, is one who sleeps on a bed of sand of the mother of Bhīṣma.

For living beings scorched by the heat of sins in this world, the Jāhnavī [is a refuge];

there is nothing in the Kali age that removes sins and sorrows like the Gaṅgā.

Just as two-fanged serpents lose their poison at the mere sight of Garuḍa,