Skandapurana 5.44

Menakā said: / Surely, O you of great splendor, you are not skilled in the ways of love; / for that reason, you ward me off, who am impassioned, with such words. // 1

Sūta said: / Thus addressed, Viśvāmitra then spoke this again, / filled with great anger, having no desire to accept her. // 2

Viśvāmitra said: / Either live or go to death; I will not do your bidding! / For greater is the sin that arises from the destruction of a vow than from killing a woman. // 3

An expiation has been declared by the wise for observers of vows when the killing of a woman is committed, / but none for contact with them; therefore you should depart. // 4

Not only do those engaged in vows incur sin from contact with women; / even men devoid of vows, when attached to women, fall low. // 5

A woman reveals the wandering of worldly existence even at the very first union, / by the very pretext of circumambulating the fire. // 6

Therefore, a wise man should avoid even conversation with women, / let alone intimate union, if he desires his own welfare. // 7

A woman is like a glowing coal, and a man is like a jar of clarified butter: / without contact he attains firmness; upon contact with her, he melts away. // 8

Women are the root of all misfortunes for all living beings on earth; / therefore, they should be abandoned far away, being obstacles to heaven. // 9

Even women of noble birth, wealthy, and having husbands, / being extremely fickle, set their passion elsewhere in an instant. // 10

For there exists nothing else on earth that leads to sin more than women, / having obtained whose contact people wander in worldly existence. / Even a base man who serves them in secret— / women attend upon him, whether he is deformed or low-born. // 11-12

Due to the worthlessness of men and fear of their attendants, / unruly women stay within the bounds of propriety toward their husbands. // 13

Sūta said: / Thus rebuked by him, Menakā, filled with anger, / cursed that best of sages with trembling lips: 14

“Since I, filled with desire, have been abandoned by you, O extremely evil-minded one, / abandoning the duty born of desire, therefore accept my curse! 15

This very day, O fool, become covered with wrinkles and grey hair, / with limbs worn out by old age, your eyesight diminished, and bent crooked!” 16

Sūta said: / The moment the word was spoken, instantly the best of sages / became just as she had described. 17

Then, his mind overcome with rage, he too prepared to curse her; / taking water from his water-pot, his eyes red with anger, [he said:] 18

“Because I, though faultless, was cursed by you, O lowest of courtesans, / therefore do you also quickly become worn out in your limbs with old age!” 19

She too, by his word, instantly took on such a form / as that best of sages, bearing a body with wrinkles and grey hair. 20

Then, having bathed in that reservoir in such a form, / she again became just as she had been before. 21

Seeing that supreme wonder, filled with great haste, / he too took a ritual ablution there and became as [he was] before. 22

Then the two of them, endowed with the qualities of beauty and nobility through the māhātmya of the sacred ford, / took leave of each other delighted and went to the place each desired. 23

Having thus understood the māhātmya of the sacred ford, the venerable ṛṣi / installed a liṅga of the trident-bearing God of gods. 24

He then performed great austerity at that best of sacred fords; / with a clump of kuśa grass the lord created that vast lake. 25

A person who, having bathed there, worships that excellent liṅga, / known as Viśvāmitreśvara, goes to the abode of Śiva. 26

Even today the water seen there is equal to the water of the Gaṅgā, / removing all sins, holy, and granting all desires. 27

Whoever performs a ritual ablution there with a mind purified by faith / reaches the world of the gods and rejoices with the ancestors. 28

From that time forth, that sacred ford attained fame on the earth, / in Pātāla, and in the heavenly realm, as bestowing beauty and nobility upon mortals. 29

All this has been related to you about which I was asked, O best of the twice-born: / the māhātmya of Viśvāmitreśa, which destroys all sins. 30

Thus ends the forty-fourth chapter, entitled “The Origin of Viśvāmitrakuṇḍa and the Description of the Māhātmya of Viśvāmitreśvara,” in the māhātmya of the sacred field of Śrī Hāṭakeśvara in the Nāgarakhaṇḍa, the sixth [section] in the venerable Skandapurāṇa, a collection of eighty-one thousand [verses]. 44