Mudgalapurana 4.31: pauṣakṛṣṇacaturthīmāhātmyavarṇanaṃ nāmaikatriṃśo'dhyāyaḥ

Homage to the glorious Gaṇeśa.

Daśaratha said: / Tell me, O Guru, the majesty of the fourth day of the dark fortnight of Pauṣa; / I am never satisfied while listening to the supreme story that brings all perfections.

Vasiṣṭha said: / I will recount an ancient history: / A great king named Vīrasaha lived in Hastināpura.

He was powerful, moral, and had mastered both missiles and hand weapons; / he was righteous, generous, and greatly honored those worthy of honor.

Though devoted to diverse acts of giving, he was afflicted with childlessness; / making efforts to remedy that, he became intent upon the worship of the gods.

With the help of brāhmaṇas he performed the sacrifice for obtaining a son, desiring offspring; / yet he still did not obtain a son to continue his lineage.

He caused various religious rites to be performed at sacred pilgrimage places, shrines, and other sites; / though engaged in worship himself, he still obtained no offspring.

Then the king, deeply distressed, abandoned his kingdom and departed into the forest; / wandering accompanied by his wife, he was tormented by cold and heat.

Having entered deep into the great forest, accompanied by pain and sorrow, / he wandered fearless upon seeing lions, tigers, and other beasts.

There arrived a king of yogins, the great sage named Trita; / having seen him, [the king] bowed first and stood with folded hands.

Questioned by him, the highly renowned [king] related his entire story / and wept; the great yogin spoke to him with compassion.

Trita said: / In your kingdom, O tiger among kings, the complete vow born of the fourth day, / which brings all perfections, was lost; because of that, you are surely childless.

That [vow], which grants the fruit of the four goals of life, must be performed before all else; / then all rituals performed become such as to bestow [all] four quarters.

Though you are dedicated to various religious duties, and likewise the people, O giver of honor,

by the influence of [actions] that lack their fruit, they will fall into Raurava.

Having spoken thus, the best of sages recited the majesty of the fourth day / in full; then the king spoke to him.

Vīrasaha said: / Tell me the majesty of Gaṇeśvara, O treasury of compassion! / He whose vow is of such a kind, him I shall worship constantly.

Trita said: / How could the essential nature of Gaṇeśa be described? / I shall describe it according to its qualified forms with devotion; listen to that.

Formerly, endowed with asceticism, I was capable of cursing and bestowing favor; / I had two brothers, O king, named Eka and Dvita, endowed with learning.

With them I went to perform a sacrifice for a high-souled king; / after having caused it to be performed, I was eager to return to my own home.

As I stood on the path accompanied by the abundant priestly gifts and sacrificial animals, / the two brothers, accompanied by the people, threw me into a well and departed.

Fallen into the waterless well and filled with sorrow, / I performed a mental sacrifice there that would bring about my welfare.

The gods and others came there with respect to receive their share of the oblation; / fully worshipped by me, they were all gratified and shone with delight.

All the immortals granted me my desired boon, O king; / then they pulled me out of the well and departed.

Then, having solicited another king, I set out endowed with cattle / and joyfully went to my own hermitage, where I stayed practicing asceticism.

Then, from intense asceticism, all-pervading knowledge arose; / abandoning asceticism, I became through yoga a master of the stages [of consciousness].

The stages of the inert, the intoxicated, the goblin, and others were mastered by me; / in the end, united with Brahman, I rested as an even-minded self in that which bestows one's innate peace.

While I was joyful in my own hermitage, Mudgala arrived there— / righteous, generous, and one who greatly honors those worthy of honor.

Always praised by the kings of yogins, upon seeing him I bowed down; / having worshipped him who was well-rested, I asked him with folded hands: / 'Master, speak of the yoga of peace that bestows peace upon those who are at peace.'

Mudgala said: / Non-existence is the Śakti, the existent is Sūrya, Viṣṇu is the balance, O great sage; / Śaṅkara is the unmanifest; in their union, Gaṇapa was born.

In union, Gaṇeśa, the lord of Brahman, is joined with māyā; / in disunion, he is free of māyā—know this, O best of sages.

In the union of union and disunion, there is the yoga named after Gaṇeśa; / it is declared to bestow peace upon those who are at peace; worship him with devotion.

Having spoken thus, Mudgala gave him the single-syllable mantra / of Gaṇeśa according to rule; then he vanished.

Thereupon, I worshipped that lord of the gaṇas with my whole being; / filled with peace by that, I wander indeed free from fear on every side.

There is no Brahman higher than Gaṇeśa; there is no asceticism higher than Gaṇeśa; / there is no ritual higher than Gaṇeśa; there is no knowledge higher than Gaṇapa.

There is no yoga higher than Gaṇeśa; there is no devotion higher than Gaṇapa; / therefore, he is to be worshipped by all, the bestower of perfection before all else.

If one undertakes ritual, knowledge, or other practices while abandoning Gaṇeśa, / all of that goes to waste, like an oblation poured onto ashes.

If one abandons all and worships Gaṇeśa with undivided mind, / he immediately attains all perfection; he is said to become Brahman.

Having spoken thus, Trita gave him the ten-syllable mantra / according to rule; then he visibly vanished.

[Section 4, Chapter 31, Page 87]
O king, King Vīrasaha joyfully went to his own city. / Honored by all his ministers and citizens, he remained there.

There, first of all, when the dark fourth [lunar day] falling in Pauṣa arrived, / he, greatly delighted, observed it according to the prescribed rules together with the people of his city.

That excellent observance was performed by him everywhere, O ruler of the earth; / on earth, people undertook the observance of the fourth [day] of the bright and dark fortnights.

Then he obtained a son who was a great warrior, knowledgeable in policy, endowed with dharma, / and possessed of various virtues; the people were filled with joy.

Freed from diseases and other afflictions, they became joyful and thriving. / Wherever they were, people recounted the greatness arising from the fourth [day].

Having installed his son in the kingdom, the king, taking up retirement, / worshipped that lord of the Gaṇas together with his wife, endowed with devotion.

In the end, he too became identical with Brahman by the merit of the observance. / In due course, those living on earth also became one with Brahman.

Thus the greatness of the observance has been related to you, O best of kings. / Listen to another great [story], O fortunate one, which destroys sins.

In Gauḍa, there was a sinful merchant filled with greed. / For the sake of wealth, he even killed his father through the affliction of poison.

Likewise, that wicked man constantly killed his mother, / as well as various people and merchants on the road, by using poison.

Having thus acquired much wealth, he became lustful after other men's wives; / devoted to liquor and meat, the wicked man was eager for union with chaste women.

Under various pretexts, the wicked man forcibly violated chaste women / and wives of others; therefore, he was captured and beaten by the king.

Bound in chains, he was kept right in the king's palace. / By the turn of destiny, that dark fourth [lunar day] of Pauṣa arrived.

On it, deprived of food and the like, he remained overcome with suffering. / At moonrise, he ate whatever food was given by the guards.

On the fifth day, impaled on a stake by the royal messengers, he died. / Yet he indeed became one with Brahman by the efficacy of the merit of that observance.

Thus the ignorant and the wise alike became / one with Brahman solely through the power of this observance, O great-minded one.

How many such [cases] can I specifically relate to you there, O king? / It is impossible to recount them all; therefore, it has been told by me in brief.

Whoever hears this greatness of the Saṅkaṣṭī of Pauṣa, / or recites it, to him it will bring unending auspiciousness.

Om tat sat. Thus ends the thirty-first chapter, named 'Description of the Greatness of the Dark Fourth of Pauṣa', in the story of Gajānana, in the fourth section of the glorious Maudgala Mahāpurāṇa, a Purāṇic Upaniṣad.

[Section 4, Chapter 32, Page 88]