Skandapurana 4.33

Agastya said:

"O Skanda, declare now the māhātmya of the sacred ford Jñānoda,

since even the denizens of heaven greatly praise the Jñānavāpī."

Skanda said:

"O jar-born one of great wisdom, listen to the origin of Jñānavāpī,

which dispels sin, as it is now told by me.

In the beginningless, established saṃsāra, long ago in the age of the gods, O sage,

Īśāna arrived from somewhere, wandering about at his own will,

when clouds did not yet rain, when rivers had not begun to flow,

when there was no desire for water for ritual ablution, drinking, and other acts,

when the appearance of water existed only as salt or fresh,

and while the movement of human beings was occurring only here and there on the earth.

[He reached] the field of the lotus of nirvāṇa, the glorious Ānandakānana,

the great cremation ground, the supreme sterile ground for all seeds [of karma],

the awakener of living beings asleep in the great slumber,

the boat for living beings falling into the whirlpool of the ocean of saṃsāra,

the resting pavilion for living beings exhausted by coming and going,

the razor that severs the cord of karma multiplied through many births,

the abode of existence-consciousness-bliss, the elixir of supreme brahman,

the producer of a lineage of happiness, bestowing the attainment of the means to liberation.

Having entered this sacred field, that matted-haired Īśāna,

pervaded by the pure network of rays of his glittering trident,

beheld the great liṅga that had manifested in the beginning

during the great rivalry of Viṣṇu and Brahmā,

surrounded on all sides by luminous garlands

and constantly by multitudes of divine seers and gaṇas,

unceasingly worshipped by throngs of perfected beings and yogins,

sung of by gandharvas and praised by cāraṇas,

attended in various ways by apsarases with bodily movements,

continually waved with lamps of jewels by Nāga women,

adorned at the three junctures of the day by Vidyādhara and Kinnara women,

and fanned on all sides with rows of yak-tail whisks by goddess-women.

Upon seeing that liṅga, a desire then arose in Īśāna:

'I shall give a ceremonial bath to the great liṅga with jars of cool water.'

And with his trident, near the southern direction,

Rudra, bearing a terrible form, dug a pool with vehement speed.

Then, O sage, the waters enclosing the earth gushed forth."

which envelop this earth tenfold compared to the measure of the earth.

With those waters, untouched by other embodied beings, / icy, banishing dullness, removing multitudes of rebirths,

extremely clear like the minds of the good, unobstructed like the path of the sky,

radiant in luster like moonlight, purifying like the name of Śambhu,

sweeter than nectar, delightful to the touch like the limbs of cows,

profound like a sinless intellect, fluctuating like the happiness of a sinner,

surpassing the great fragrance of lotuses, delighting with the scent of trumpet flowers,

captivating the minds and eyes of people who had never seen the like before,

the sole protectors of the lives of creatures tormented by the heat of ignorance,

with jars of the five nectars, granting boundless fruit through a ceremonial bath,

causes of the triad of liṅgas in the heart touched by faith,

shining like the sun to the darkness of ignorance, bestowers of the gift of knowledge,

causing the extreme delight of the touch of Umā to the Lord of the Universe,

performing great purification like the noble ablution of the final sacrificial bath—

with jars of a thousand streams, that Īśāna, O jar-born [Agastya],

bathed [him] a thousand times, his heart completely overjoyed.

Then, pleased, the Blessed Lord, the Soul of All, the Eye of All,

spoke to that Īśāna, to Rudra who bore the form of Rudra:

“I am pleased with you, Īśāna, O one of noble vows, by this act,

weighty, unprecedented, and causing Me extreme delight.

Therefore, O matted-haired Īśāna, rich in austerity, choose a boon!

There is nothing that cannot be given to you today, O one dedicated to great effort!”

Īśāna said:

“If You are pleased, O Lord of gods, if I am worthy of a boon,

then let this incomparable sacred ford be named after You, O Śaṃkara!”

The Lord of the Universe said:

“Whatever sacred fords there are in the three worlds, situated on earth, sky, and heaven,

higher than all those sacred fords is this Śivatīrtha.

Those who contemplate the meaning of the word ‘Śiva’ say it is the knowledge of Śiva;

and that knowledge has become liquefied here through the rising of My majesty.

Therefore this sacred ford is celebrated in the three worlds by the name Jñānoda (‘Water of Knowledge’).

Merely by the darśana of it, one is freed from all sins.

From the touch of the Jñānoda sacred ford, one obtains the fruit of an horse sacrifice;

and by touching and sipping [it], [the fruits] of both the royal consecration and horse sacrifice.

Whatever fruit a man obtains having bathed in the Phalgu sacred ford and satisfied his ancestors,

he obtains that here through the performance of a śrāddha.

When a Vyatīpāta yoga occurs on a Thursday during Puṣya on the dark eighth day,

then by performing a śrāddha here, [the fruit] becomes ten million times that of Gayā.

Whatever fruit one obtains by satisfying the ancestors at Puṣkara,

that fruit is multiplied ten million times at the Jñānatīrtha with water and sesame seeds.

Whatever fruit [is gained] by offering rice balls at the Sannihitī in Kurukṣetra when the sun is seized by darkness [in an eclipse],

that [is gained] day by day at Jñānoda.

Those ancestors for whom the offering of rice balls is made by their sons at the Jñānatīrtha,

rejoice in the world of Śiva until the universal dissolution of creatures.

A best of men who fasts on the eighth and fourteenth days,

having bathed in the morning and then drunk the water, becomes filled with the inner liṅga.

Having fasted here on the eleventh day, if one drinks three mouthfuls of water,

three liṅgas undoubtedly arise in his heart.

Whoever bathes in the Īśānatīrtha, especially on a Monday,

satisfies the gods, seers, and ancestors, and gives gifts according to his means,

and then worships the glorious liṅga with extensive offerings and provisions,

giving various riches here as well, that man has fulfilled his purpose.

Having performed the twilight devotion at Jñānoda, whatever sin arose from missing the proper time,

wiping it away in an instant, a twice-born becomes endowed with knowledge.

This is declared to be Śivatīrtha; this is the auspicious Jñānatīrtha;

this is the sacred ford called Tāraka; this is certainly the sacred ford of liberation.

Even from the mere remembrance of Jñānoda, the mass of sins is surely destroyed;

from darśana, touching, bathing, and drinking, the arising of righteousness and the rest occurs.

Ḍākinīs, Śākinīs, spirits, ghosts, vetālas, rākṣasas,

seizers, kūṣmāṇḍas, jhoṭiṅgas, Kālakarṇī, child-seizers,

all come to complete pacification from beholding the water of the sacred ford of Śiva.

The wise person who bathes a liṅga with the waters of the sacred ford Jñānoda,

has certainly bathed it with the waters of all sacred fords.

I myself, whose nature is knowledge, having assumed a liquid form here,

shall destroy dullness and impart instruction in wisdom."

Having thus granted these boons, Śambhu disappeared right there;

and he too, the wielder of the trident, considered himself to have achieved his purpose.

The matted-haired Rudra, Īśāna, having tasted that supreme water,

attained supreme knowledge, through which he obtained absolute bliss.

Skanda said:

O pitcher-born [Agastya], hear the ancient account of wondrous import,

what indeed occurred at the Jñānavāpī; that I will tell you; listen!

Formerly in Kāśī there was a twice-born known as Harisvāmin.

To him a single daughter was born, matchless in beauty on earth.

None on the earth's surface equaled her in the wealth of good conduct.

She was skilled in all arts and surpassed the cuckoo in voice.

There was no mortal woman like her here, nor celestial woman, nor kinnarī,

nor vidyādharī, nor nāgī, nor gandharvī, nor asurī.

She was the abode of all beauty, a true mine of all auspicious marks.

Surely, out of dread of the sun, darkness lay settled upon her crest.

I think the moon, having sought shelter in her face from fear of the new moon day,

would not leave her even by day, terrified of the fierce-rayed [sun].

Her brow, like a row of black bees amid the leaf-creeper designs on her cheeks,

practiced the movements of rising, dipping, and darting in flight.

And roaming within the field of her lovely eyes, two wagtails

ever enjoyed autumnal delight at their own will.

In the divisions between the row of teeth of that fair-toothed maiden, the five-arrowed god [Kāma]

fashioned a golden line; where is there such a digit in the moon?

Her two lips, excelling the lovely hue of coral,

were perhaps [two gems] in the auspicious palace of gems of King Madana.

"Such beauty belongs to no woman anywhere in heaven, on earth, or in Pātāla!"—

Under the guise of the three lines on her neck, Smara swears an oath.

I think her two breasts, rich with a treasury of priceless jewels,

were a pair of shining cloth-tents of the king born of the mind.

Because the waist of the slender-browed maiden was naturally invisible, as if unmanifest,

the creator made her line of fine hair as a straight rod to mark it.

Having entered the cave of her navel, Kandarpa became bodiless;

as if to regain his limbs, he performs supreme austerity.

By the weight of her hips, as if by an initiation into great passion,

which young men on earth were not brought under the control of their eyes?

And by the pillar of her thigh, like a pillar, whose mind was not made rigid?

O sage, or whose well-conducted mind was not held in check by that well-rounded pillar?

By the radiance of the luster of the big toenails of that deer-eyed maiden, O sage,

whose clarity of mind born of discernment was not destroyed?

Bathing daily in the Jñānavāpī, she performed sweeping and other duties

in the temple of Śiva, her mind focused on nothing else.

Grazing on the shoots of grass that were the lines in the reflections of her feet,

the deer of the young men's minds in Kāśī went to no other forest.

Leaving the lotus of her face, the swarm of bee-like eyes of the young men

frequented no other creeper, even one laden with fragrant blossoms.

Though fair-eyed, the maiden would look at no one's face;

though fair-hearing, the young girl would heed no one's words.

Good-natured and endowed with virtue, though courted in secret

by handsome youths tormented by separation from her, she conceived no desire.

Though her father was repeatedly besought with riches by young men,

he could not give away that graceful girl whose beauty was exalted by good conduct.

From devoted worship at the sacred ford Jñānoda, that virtuous maiden

then beheld the entire universe, outside and inside, as composed of liṅgas.

Once upon a time, while she was sleeping in the courtyard of the house,

a certain vidyādhara, infatuated by the abundance of her beauty, carried her away.

As he wished to carry her along the sky-path / that night as far as the Malaya mountain,

just then Vidyunmālin arrived.

A rākṣasa of terrifying form, wearing skull-earrings,

his limbs smeared with fat and blood, bearded, with reddish-brown eyes,

the rākṣasa said:

“You have come within range of my sight, young Vidyādhara!

Today I will send you, together with her, to Yama’s abode!”

Hearing this speech, then, she, like a doe that has scented a tiger,

trembled exceedingly, terrified again and again like a plantain leaf.

The rākṣasa struck at that Vidyādhara with a trident.

Even the young Vidyādhara, though exceedingly charming of form,

pierced in the shoulder by that terrifying trident, possessed of great strength,

struck him with a fist-blow resembling a thunderbolt stroke.

In battle, [he struck] Vidyunmālin, intoxicated with human flesh and fat;

crushed by the blow of the fist, he fell onto the surface of the earth,

the rākṣasa yielding to death like a mountain [felled] by a thunderbolt.

The Vidyādhara too, incapacitated by the strike of that spear,

spoke stammering words, his eyes rolling:

“My beloved, brought in vain…,” uttering half a word, “O fair-smiling one—”

the hero gave up his life-breaths in battle, remembering all around that beloved.

Having experienced the joy of being touched, never experienced before,

and considering him alone her husband, she consigned her body to the fire of grief.

Because of the presence of her who was embodied as the three liṅgas,

that rākṣasa attained a divine body and went to heaven.

The son of the Vidyādhara, who had wagered his life in battle,

remembering his beloved at the end, obtained birth from Malayaketu.

And that young woman, meditating on him, the young Vidyādhara,

having cast away her life in the fire of separation, obtained birth in Karṇāṭa.

In time, the son of Malayaketu married her,

Mālyaketu, possessing the splendour of the bodiless god, [married] Kalāvatī given by her father.

She too, devoted to worship of the liṅga by virtue of previous impressions, being virtuous,

set aside sandalwood powder and prized holy ash greatly.

Far more than pearls, lapis lazuli, rubies, and topazes,

she, beautiful from the womb, considered adornment with rudrākṣa beads priceless.

Kalāvatī, a devoted wife, having gained Mālyaketu as her husband,

enjoying the abundance of divine pleasures, bore three children.

Once, a certain northern painter / showed the king Mālyaketu

a wonderful picture-scroll.

The king presented that picture-scroll to Kalāvatī.

Then she, looking again and again in secret at that delightful picture-scroll,

with the hairs of her body standing on end, [gazing at] the deity of her life,

forgot even herself, like a yoginī in absorption.

Opening her eyes for a moment, making the cloth the guest of her sight,