Gorakhnath and the Kanphata Yogis c11.151

c11.151

Gorakhnāthīs recognize also the feasts of Śivrātri.³ The thirteenth of the light half of each lunar month is sacred to Śiva, and he is worshipped at sunset, a fast being kept until the stars appear. However, it is the dark thirteenth of each month that is called Śivrātri and that is devoted to the worship of Śiva the terrible. The Śivrātri of Māgh (some say Phālguṇa), Mahāśivrātri, is the chief day of the year for his worship. A very famous legend explains why this is so, why worship at this time is of absolute value.⁴ A hunter, a man of bad character, going out to hunt one day, which happened to be Māgha kṛṣṇa thirteenth (the thirteenth of the dark half of the month of Māgh), passed a Śiva temple, and saw a number of people worshipping the liṅga, singing, calling out ‘Śiva, Śiva,’ etc. Mockingly the hunter imitated their cries, and without his knowledge or desire, the very utterance of the god’s name on that holy day removed some of his sins. He killed nothing that day, and had to keep an involuntary fast. As night came on, through fear of wild beasts, he climbed into a tree, which happened to be a bel tree (the wood-apple, sacred to Śiva), but was unable to sleep, owing to the cold, thus keeping an involuntary vigil. Not only so, but, shivering and shaking, he dislodged a number of bel leaves, which fell, together with moisture, from the tree on a stone Śiva liṅga beneath, thereby offering, involuntarily, bel leaves and cool water to the god. The cumulative merit of all these involuntary acts not only released him from past sins, but caused his reception into Śiva’s abode of Kāilāsa.