Mudgalapurana 2.19: cauravadho nāmaikonaviṃśo'dhyāyaḥ

Salutations to the holy Gaṇeśa!

Mudgala said: / In the lineage of Aṅgiras there was a brāhmaṇa, the best of sages; / then his son was Bharata, the best of kings.

There too, afraid of attachment, this great sage endowed with knowledge / stayed near the sage, meditating in his mind on Gaṇeśa.

There the praise of the great-souled Gaṇeśa proclaimed in the Vedas and other texts / and the knowledge heard by him were formerly made firm.

Afraid of association, the best of brāhmaṇas became like an inert person; / he concealed all his cleverness in the presence of everyone.

Out of fear of marriage and the like, all inertness was exhibited by him, / behaving like a fool there, remaining in the state of a child.

That sage descended from Aṅgiras performed the investiture of his sacred thread; / afterwards he instructed him in rites such as twilight prayers and pure conduct.

The highly intelligent one did not grasp at all what was spoken by his father; / even if beaten, that lord of yogins did otherwise.

Taking him by the hand, his father made him perform the Vedic rites, / and all the sipping of water and so forth was indeed done by him in that manner.

Asked again by his father, he did not recall it on his own; / like an inert person, all conduct was abandoned by that great soul.

Then the name given to him by all the people, O Prajāpati, / was 'Inert'; constantly, here and there, he was called that by them.

There great respect, disrespect, scorn, and so forth occurred, / and even that was abandoned by him just like an inert person.

All the people there said: 'Knowledge is not firmly established in him; / blame, praise, and everything else are borne by the great fool.'

Due to the defect of inertness and the like, his marriage and similar rites / were not performed by his father at all; thereby he attained bliss.

Then in the course of time, his father the sage met his death; / his mother, a virtuous and devoted wife, accompanied him on the funeral pyre.

There were also nine brothers born from a co-wife of his mother; / this twice-born, observing the yoga of peace, came under their control.

His brothers' wives, intoxicated with pride, showed not even the slightest affection; / they gave him leftover and foul food, and parched chaff.

All the brothers showed him no hospitality with clothes or words; / having abandoned affection, they called him the disgrace of the family.

Even so, clad in rags, the lord of yogins ate all the spoiled, / soggy, and burnt food as if it were ambrosia.

Even that the brothers' wives did not give him, / and the sage ate only once every two or three days.

Tormented by hunger, O Prajāpati, the wise Gāṇapatya yogin / wandered constantly from house to house for the sake of food.

Wherever he was taken by people for their own purposes, / he respectfully performed all their work for the sake of food.

Then, delighted, they all respectfully gave him clothes, food, and the like; / contented in mind, he became a laborer himself.

Then, seen by his brothers, they brought him to their own home; / filled with joy, the brothers made him do their work.

Even so, their wives gave him vile food and chaff; / yet displaying his true nature, he ate that food as though it were nectar.

Once, O lord, the sage was stationed in the fields of ripe rice / by his brothers in order to guard them by night and day.

Staying there, the wise one did just as instructed, / [and]

for the sake of food, knowing the nature of the body, he was equanimous in pleasure and pain.

Now hear what strange thing happened there, O Prajāpati: / the goddess Bhadrakālī was praised by the leader of thieves:

‘If I obtain vast wealth, O mother of the universe, / then I will give you an excellent sacrificial victim in human form.’

When he had thus obtained wealth, he sent his men; / the thieves, wearied by night, arrived there by chance.

Seizing him by force, all those wicked men went to their own place; / the yogin then recognized that this was the body’s destiny.

There, honored with worship and the like by the chief of thieves, / that best of eminent brahmins even ate delicious food.

Placing him in front as musical instruments resounded, the wicked man went / with joy to the presence of the goddess, [having] honored [him] with the greatest respect.

Having worshipped Mahākālī, he then placed the eminent sage in front / to slay him with a sword, and drew his blade bare.

Seeing the death of the bodily condition, that best of yogins / was not in the least perturbed; he remembered Gaṇapa in his heart:

‘Let the body fall this very day, or let it live long— / what concern is that to me? O Gajānana, salutations to you!’

In that very moment, filled with rage, / the Gāṇapatya Mahākālī burst forth from the middle of the idol.

She seized the sword from the hand of the chief of thieves with ease; / severing his head with it, she drank his excellent blood.

The other thieves who had gathered were also destroyed with the sword; / intent upon the praise of Gaṇeśa, the goddess sported with her retinues.

Bowing to her, O Dakṣa, he departed and wandered about, / a great yogin moving at his own will, eating alms, remembering Gaṇapa.

‘Om tat sat.’ Thus ends the nineteenth chapter, named ‘The Slaying of the Thieves,’ in the account of Ekadanta, in the second section of the glorious and supreme Mudgalapurāṇa, an Upaniṣad of the Purāṇa.