{"collection":"Hinduism","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/hin/db/bk06ch25.htm","path":"hin/db/bk06ch25.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/hin/db/bk06ch25.htm","text":"THE SIXTH BOOK\nChapter XXV\nOn the cause of Moha of Vy\u00e2sa Deva asked before N\u00e2rada\n1-10. Vy\u00e2sa said :-- OKing! The mother became astonished to hear me. Becoming very anxious for a son, she began to speak to me. O Child! The wife of your brother, the daughter Amb\u00e2lik\u00e2 of K\u00e2s\u2019\u00eer\u00e2j, is a widow; she is very sorrowful; she is endowed with all auspicious signs and endowed with all good qualities; better cohabit with that beautiful young wife and get a child according to the tradition of the S\u2019istas. Persons born blind are not entitled to kingdoms. Therefore take my word and procreate a beautiful son and thus keep my honour. O Muni! Hearing the mother\u2019s words, I began to wait in Hastin\u00e2pura till Amb\u00e2lik\u00e2, the daughter of K\u00e2s\u2019\u00eer\u00e2j, finished her ablutions after menstruation. That King\u2019s daughter, of curling hairs, came to me alone at her mother-in-law\u2019s order, and became very much abashed. Seeing me an ascetic with matted hairs on my head and void of every love sentiment, perspiration came on her face; her body turned pale and her\nmind void of any love towards me. When I saw that lady trembling and pale beside me, I angrily spoke :-- \u201cO One of beautiful waist! When you have turned out pale, considering your own beauty, let your son be of a pale colour.\u201d Thus saying I spent there that night with Amb\u00e2lik\u00e2. After enjoying her I took farewell from my mother and went to my place.\n11-21. In due course, the two daughters of the King gave birth to two sons respectively, one blind and the other pale. The son of Ambik\u00e2 was named Dhritar\u00e2stra; and the son of Amb\u00e2lik\u00e2 was named P\u00e2ndu, as his colour was p\u00e2ndu (pale). Mother became absent-minded when she saw the two sons in those states. After one year she again called me and said :-- \u201cO Dvaip\u00e2yana! These two persons are not so fit to become kings; therefore beget one more son beautiful and according to my liking.\u201d When I consented, she became very glad and, in due course, asked Ambik\u00e2 to embrace me and give birth to a son, endowed with extraordinary qualities, and fit to preserve the line worthy of the Kuru dynasty. The bride did not then say anything on account of her bashfulness. But when I went in the night time according to my mother\u2019s order, to the sleeping room, Ambik\u00e2 sent to me a maid-servant of Vichitrav\u00eerya, full of youth and beauty, and adorned with various ornaments and clothings. That maid-servant of beautiful hairs and of a swan-like gait adorned with garlands and red sandal-paste, came to me with many enchanting gestures and making me take my seat on the cot, became herself merged in love sentiments. O Muni! I became pleased with her gestures and amorous sports and passed the night, full of love towards her and played and cohabited with her. At last I gladly gave her the boon, \u201cO Fortunate One! Your child, begotten by me, will be endowed with all good qualities, will be of good form, will be conversant with all the essences of Dharma, calm and quiet and truthful.\u201d\n22-34. In due course, a child named Vidura was born to her. Thus I had three sons; and in my mind grew up M\u00e2y\u00e2 and affection that these were my sons. When I saw again those three sons, heroic and full of manliness, the only cause of my sorrow due to the bereavement of my son S\u2019uka vanished away from my mind. O Lord of Dv\u00eejas! M\u00e2y\u00e2 is very powerful and extremely hard to be abandoned by those who are not masters of their senses; She enchants even the wise, though She does not possess any form nor any substratum nor any support. I could not find any peace, even in the forest, as my mind was attached to my mother and children. O Muni! My mind then began to oscillate like a pendulum and I remained sometime in Hastin\u00e2pura and sometime on the\nbanks of the Sarasvat\u00ee. I could not stay in a certain fixed place. By discrimination, the knowledge sometimes flashed in my mind :-- Whose sons are these? The attachment is nothing but merely a delusion. On my death they would not be entitled to perform my S\u2019r\u00e2ddha ceremony. These sons are begotten by ways and manners not sanctioned by Dharma; what happiness can they bring to me? O Muni! The powerful M\u00e2y\u00e2 has caused this delusion in me. What! Knowing this Sams\u00e2ra to be unreal, Alas! I have fallen into this well of the Darkness of delusion. Thus I repented when I thought over the matter deeply and when I was alone in a solitary place. When, subsequently, through the mediation of Bh\u00eesma, the powerful P\u00e2ndu got the kingdom, I became pleased to see the prosperity of my son. O Muni! This is also the creation of M\u00e2y\u00e2. The daughter of the King S\u2019\u00fbrasena, named Kunt\u00ee, and the daughter of the King of Madra, named M\u00e2dr\u00ee became the two beautiful wives of P\u00e2ndu. P\u00e2ndu was cursed by a Br\u00e2hmana that he would die if he cohabited with any woman; he therefore became dispassionate and quitting his kingdom, went to the forest with his two wives. Hearing P\u00e2ndu gone to the forest I felt pain and went to my son who was staying with his wives and consoling him, came to Hastin\u00e2pura, where I held a conversation with Dhritar\u00e2stra and then came back to the banks of the river Sarasvat\u00ee.\n35-50. P\u00e2ndu in his forest life, got five sons out of his wives by the Devas Dharma, V\u00e2yu, Indra, and the twin As\u2019vins. Dharma, V\u00e2yu, and Indra begat respectively of Kunt\u00ee the three sons Yudhisthira, Bh\u00eemasena and Arjuna; and the two As\u2019vins begat of M\u00e2dr\u00ee the two sons Nakulu and Sahadeva. Once M\u00e2dr\u00ee, full of youth and beauty, was staying alone in a solitary place and P\u00e2ndu seeing her embraced her and due to the curse, died. When the funeral pyre was ablaze, the chaste M\u00e2dr\u00ee entered into the fire and died a Sat\u00ee. Kunt\u00ee was prevented from doing so, as she was to nurse and look after her young children. The Munis then took the sorrowful Kunt\u00ee, the daughter of S\u2019\u00fbrasena, bereft of her husband to Hastin\u00e2pur and handed her over to the high-souled Bh\u00eesma and Vidura. When I came to hear this, my mind was greatly agitated to see the pain and pleasure that other people suffered. Bh\u00eesma, Vidura, and Dhritar\u00e2stra began to nourish and support Yudhisthira and others as they considered them the sons of their dearest P\u00e2ndu. The cruel and wicked sons of Dhritar\u00e2stra, Duryodhana and others united with each other and began to quarrel horribly with the sons of P\u00e2ndu. Dron\u00e2ch\u00e2rya came there accidentally and Bh\u00eesma treated him with great respect and requested him to stay in Hastin\u00e2pura and educate the sons of Kuru. Karna was the the son of\nKunt\u00ee, when she was young and unmarried; and he was quitted by her no sooner he was born. The charioteer S\u00fbta (or carpenter) Adhiratha found him in a river and nourished him. Karna was the foremost of the heroes and therefore the great favourite of Duryodhana. The enmity between Bh\u00eema and Duryodhana, etc., began to grow greater day by day. Dhritar\u00e2stra, thinking the difficult situation of his children, fixed the residence of the sons of P\u00e2ndu at the V\u00e2ran\u00e2vata city so that the quarrels might die away. Out of enmity, Duryodhana ordered his dear friend Purochana to build there a house of lac for the P\u00e2ndavas. O Muni! When I heard that Kunt\u00ee and her five sons were burnt in the lac-house, I became merged in the ocean of sorrows and thought that they were my grandsons. I was overwhelmed with sorrow and began to search after them in deep forests day and night till at last I found them in Ekachakr\u00e2 city, lean and thin and very much distressed with sorrow.\n51-63. I became very glad to see them and sent them soon to the city of the King Drupada. Wearing the deer\u2019s skin, they went there dejected with sorrow in the Br\u00e2hmin\u2019s dress and stayed in the royal court. The victorious Arjuna shewed prowess and pierced the mark (the eye of the fish) and obtained Krisn\u00e2, the daughter of the King Drupada. By the order of the mother Kunt\u00ee, the five brothers married her. O Muni! I became very glad to see that they were all married. The P\u00e2ndavas , then, accompanied by P\u00e2nch\u00e2l\u00ee, soon went to Hastin\u00e2pura. Dhritar\u00e2stra then fixed Kh\u00e2ndavaprastha as the residence of the P\u00e2ndavas. Visnu, the son of V\u00e2sudeva, then performed the Yaj\u00f1\u00e2 with the victorious Arjuna and satisfied the Great Fire. The P\u00e2ndavas next performed the R\u00e2jas\u00fbya sacrifice and that made me very glad. Seeing the affluence and prosperity of the P\u00e2ndavas and the great assembly hall beautiful and exquisitely artistic, Duryodhana was burnt up, as it were, with malice and made arrangements for play in dice, very injurious in its consequences. S\u2019akuni was expert in playing deceitfully and Yudhisthira the son of Dharma, was not expert in this play. So Duryodhana made S\u2019akuni play for him and stole away all that Yudhisthira had and insulted, at last, in the royal assembly, the daughter of Drupada, Yaj\u00f1\u00e2sen\u00ee and gave her much trouble. The P\u00e2ndavas then went with P\u00e2nch\u00e2l\u00ee in an exile in the forest for twelve years. And I was very much grieved to hear this O Muni! Though I know all about the San\u00e2tan Dharma, yet I was deluded and merged in these worlds of pains and pleasures. Who am I? To whom do these sons belong? My mind roams day and night on the thought of all these. O Muni! What shall I do? And whither shall I go? I don\u2019t find happiness anywhere; my mind is, as it were, floating in a\nrocking machine and it is never being fixed. O Best of Munis! You are all-knowing; solve my doubts so that my mental fever may be quietened and I may be happy.\nHere ends the Twenty-fifth Chapter on the cause of Moha of Vy\u00e2sa Deva asked before N\u00e2rada in S\u2019r\u00ee Mad Devi Bh\u00e2gavatam of 18,000 verses by Maharsi Veda Vy\u00e2sa.","title":"The Devi Bhagavatam: The Sixth Book: Chapter 25","type":"page"}