Skandapurana 1.4.13

English (machine translation) 1.4.13

Language: English

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Varāṅgī said:
I have been ruined, cast away, terrified, and tormented
repeatedly by the terrible lord of the gods, who acted like one having no master.

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Seeing no end to my sorrow, I have resolved to give up my life.
Grant me a son who will be a deliverer from this dreadful sorrow, if you have compassion.

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Addressed thus, the lord of the daityas, distressed, thought in his heart:
"Even though I have no desire for demonic states of mind,

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nevertheless, from the scriptures I consider that a beloved wife is to be pitied,
because a man with a wife, having taken up all life-stages into his own life-stage,

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crosses over the ocean of misfortune as if [crossing] an ocean with water-vessels.
Relying upon whom, householders easily conquered the enemies [that are] the senses,

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which are hard to conquer by other stages of life, just as a fortress commander [vanquishes] bandits;
and no one is able to emulate the mistress of the house.

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Moreover, as one wishes to apply oneself to duty throughout life or in its entirety;
because one's self comes to be in her, she is therefore called jāyā.

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And since she must be maintained, she is therefore remembered as bhāryā.
She alone is called the house, and therefore she is remembered as the housewife (gṛhiṇī).

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She protects from the taint of worldly existence, hence she is [called] a wife (kalatra).
Who indeed ought not to have compassion for such a beloved?

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Devala indeed said that a man has three lights:
wife, ritual action, and sacred knowledge; these three must be secured with effort.

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Therefore, if I, being her husband, do not protect her when she is tormented,
then according to the declarations of the scriptures I shall go to the depth of hell, without a doubt.

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I too am capable of conquering this Indra so as to be free from debt.
I shall fulfill her desire again; I will give her a son of great strength."

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Reflecting thus, Vajrāṅga, his eyes agitated with anger,
resolved upon austerity once more in order to retaliate against the great Indra.

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Knowing his intention, which was even fiercer,
Brahmā came with haste to where that son of Diti was.

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The Lord, the master, spoke to him with sweet words.

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Brahmā said:
For what purpose do you wish for a harsh observance yet again?
Having turned toward food, O daitya of great vows, tell that to me.

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The fruit that is obtained by fasting for a thousand years,
was obtained by you in merely an instant when you gave up food that was received.

For the abandonment [of pleasures] by those who have not obtained their desires is not considered as great
as when one renounces a desire that has been obtained, O lotus-eyed one.
Having heard these words of Brahmā, the daitya, with folded hands, said:

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The daitya said:
I shall perform dreadful austerity for the sake of my wife, O Grandfather;
and I am resolved for the sake of a son who will destroy the pride of the gods.

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Hearing this speech, the god born from the lotus womb,
the four-faced one, then, pleased, spoke to the king of the daityas:

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Brahmā said:
Enough of your austerity, my child; do not enter into the extent of distress.
You shall have a son of great strength named Tāraka,

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who will loosen the braids of hair desired by the women of the gods.
Spoken to thus, the king of the daityas, bowing to the Great-grandfather,

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having taken leave and gone to his queen, delighted her with joy.
And the couple, having achieved their purpose, then went to their hermitage.

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And then the fair-complexioned Varāṅgī, having conceived an embryo,
bore it in her womb indeed for a full thousand years.

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Then, at the end of the thousand years, Varāṅgī gave birth.
While that lord of the daityas, terrifying to the worlds, was being born,

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the entire earth trembled, and the great oceans were agitated;
the mountains also shook, and terrifying winds blew.

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The best of seers muttered prayers like deer pierced by a hunter;
the sun and the others lost their luster, and mists covered the directions.

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When that great asura was born, all the great asuras
arrived there, delighted, and likewise the asura women.

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Filled with joy, the asura women sang and danced.
Then, when the great festival of the dānavas took place, O son of Pṛthā,

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the gods, along with the great Indra, became despondent in mind.
As soon as he was born, Tāraka, the lord of the daityas of fierce valor,

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was consecrated by the daityas Kuraṅga, Mahiṣa, and others,
joined by all the great asuras, into the great sovereignty of all asuras.

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Having attained the great sovereignty, Tāraka, O best of Pāṇḍus,
spoke these words endowed with reason to the foremost dānavas:

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"Listen, all you asuras of great strength, to my words.
Having heard, let your intellect remain firm upon my instruction.

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By the nature of our kind, an imperishable enmity has grown;
I shall wage that enmity both [for our duty] and for victory over them."

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"However, I consider that confronting the gods must be accomplished through austerity. / Therefore, O sons of Danu, I shall first perform severe austerity.

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Then we will conquer the gods and enjoy the three worlds. / For a man who employs the proper means is indeed one whose fortune becomes stable.

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One who is improper and unsteady is unable to preserve even what has been obtained." / Having heard that speech of that asura, all the dānavas,

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amazed, said to him: "Excellent! Excellent!" / He then went to an excellent cave of the Pāriyātra mountain,

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strewn with flowers of all seasons, illuminated by various herbs, / affording shelter in diverse caverns that were wondrous with the flow of essences of various minerals,

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filled with manifold forms, teeming with various flocks of birds, / endowed with diverse cascades, and possessing various bodies of water.

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Having reached that cave, the daitya performed immense austerity. / Holding the Pāśupata initiation, he chanted the five mantras.

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Without food, performing the five fires austerity, he spent ten thousand years indeed. / Then, cutting a karṣa [of flesh] from his own body day after day,

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he offered flesh into the fire; thereby he became fleshless. / Then, his body stripped of flesh, he became a mass of austerity.

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All living beings blazed up on all sides from his brilliance, / and all the gods became agitated, terrified by his austerity.

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At that juncture, Brahmā attained the highest satisfaction. / To grant a boon to Tāraka, he went to the peak of the mountain.

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Having reached that king of mountains, seated upon his swan-vehicle, / the god then addressed Tāraka in a sweet voice:

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Brahmā said: / "Arise, son, from your austerity! Nothing is impossible for you now. / Choose the desired boon that dwells in your mind."

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Being thus addressed, the daitya Tāraka, with folded palms, spoke to the lord:

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Tāraka said: / "O Lord, by our inherent nature we have incurred enmity with the immortals, / and by them the daityas were wiped out, being treated cruelly and mercilessly.

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My thought is: 'May I be their rescuer! / May I be invulnerable to all living beings, and to weapons of great power,

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and also to the immortals!' This is the boon that lies in my heart. / Grant this to me, O Lord of the gods; I do not desire any other boon."

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Then Virañci, the leader of the immortals, said to that daitya: / "For an embodied being, holding a body without death is not proper; / for death is certain for one who is born—this is the truth stated by the sacred tradition.

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Reflecting on this, choose a boon from which you have no fear." / Then the lord of the daityas, having reflected, [chose death only] from an infant of seven days.

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Tāraka said: / "Except for an infant of seven days, / may I be invulnerable even to the gods—this is requested by me!"

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Deluded by pride, the great asura chose [his] death from Brahmā. / Brahmā then said to him, "So be it," according to the word of Hara.

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The god went to heaven, and the daitya also went to his own abode. / When that daitya emerged from his austerity, the lords of the daityas then

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surrounded him, just as birds surround a tree laden with fruit. / When that Tāraka, the son of Diti, was established in his great kingdom,

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in the place designated by Brahmā on the northern shore of the great ocean, / O son of Pṛthā, auspicious trees of all seasons sprang up there.

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Radiance, splendour, resolve, intelligence, and unbroken sovereignty / surrounded that dānava, all of them without defect, filled with virtues.

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His limbs anointed with black aloe, adorned with a great crown, / equipped with beautiful armlets, seated upon a great lion-throne,

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the foremost apsarases danced, and the gandharvas sang; / the moon and the sun served as lights, and the wind functioned as fans; / the planets were his heralds, declaring the decree of his life.

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Thus, having attained the kingdom through his own arm-strength, rejoicing exceedingly, / that daitya, proud of the strength of all his fully raised limbs, once summoned and spoke to his ministers.

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Thus ends the fifteenth chapter, named "Description of the Rise of Tārakāsura," in the Māhātmya of Kumāreśa, in the Kaumārikākhaṇḍa of the first section, the Māheśvarakhaṇḍa, in the glorious Skandapurāṇa, a compendium of eighty-one thousand verses.

Linked texts (1)

Skandapurāṇa — Vyāsa, Sanskrit