Puranic Encyclopaedia: A Comprehensive Dictionary with Special Reference to the Epic and Puranic Literature c9.4978

c9.4978

When Vyāsa began penance, the celestial maids also commenced their work of hindering the penance. He was Ghṛtācī who confronted Vyāsa. She took the form of a parrot of five colours and flew in front of Vyāsa. The hermit was excited at the beauty of Ghṛtācī and sat forgetting himself. As he sat there thinking of the infatuating beauty of the parrot, seminal discharge occurred to him. He became a slave to this infatuation, when he was engaged in making fire by attrition. In this amorous state of mind he was quite unaware of the seminal discharge or its falling on the pieces of wood used for attrition. He continued attrition. Then a very bright, divine person appeared from the pieces of wood. At the birth of a person, without attachment to a womb, all the worlds were delighted. The hide of black antelope, water pot, hermit's rod etc. fell from the sky. Birth rituals and ceremonies, according to the custom, were conducted by Vyāsa. As he was born from the semen discharged at the sight of the Śuka (parrot) the infant was named Śuka. As soon as he was born Śuka began to grow by divine power and shortly became a boy of shining radiance. After investiture with the Brahma-string, the boy was sent for education to the hermitage of Bṛhaspati, the teacher of the devas. Śuka completed his education with Bṛhaspati and having performed Samāvarta and offering of gift to the teacher, he returned home to his father.