{"collection":"Hinduism","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/hin/db/bk09ch06.htm","path":"hin/db/bk09ch06.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/hin/db/bk09ch06.htm","text":"THE NINTH BOOK\nChapter VI\nOn the coming in this world of Laksm\u00ee, Gang\u00e2 and Sarasvat\u00ee\n1-10. N\u00e2r\u00e2yana said :-- \u201cO N\u00e2rada! Sarasvat\u00ee lives always in Vaikuntha close to N\u00e2rada. One day a quarrel arose with Gang\u00e2, and by Her curse, Sarasvat\u00ee came in parts as a river here in this Bh\u00e2rata. She is reckoned in Bh\u00e2rata as a great sanctifiying holy and merit-giving river. The good persons serve Her always, residing on Her banks. She is the Tapasy\u00e2 and the fruit thereof of the ascetics. She is like the burning fire to the sins of the sinners. Those that die in Bh\u00e2rata on the Sarasvat\u00ee waters with their full consciousness, live for ever in Vaikuntha in the council of Hari. Those that bathe in the Sarasvat\u00ee waters, after committing sins, become easily freed of them and live for a long, long time in Visnu-Loka. If one bathes even once in the Sarasvat\u00ee waters, during Ch\u00e2turm\u00e2sya (a vow that lasts four months), in full moon time, in Aksyay\u00e2 or when the day ends, in Vyat\u00eep\u00e2ta Yoga, in the time of eclipse or on any other holy day or through any other concomitant cause or even without any faith and out of sheer disregard, one is able to go to Vaikuntha and get the nature of S\u2019r\u00ee Hari. If one repeats the Sarasvat\u00ee Mantra, residing on the banks of the Sarasvat\u00ee, for one month, a great illiterate can become a great poet. There is no doubt in this. Once shaving one's head, if one resides on the banks of the Sarasvat\u00ee, daily bathes in it, one will have not to meet with the pain of being again born in the womb. O N\u00e2rada! Thus I have described a little of the unbounded glories of Bh\u00e2rata that give happiness and the fruits of all desires.\u201d\n11. S\u00fbta said :-- \u201cO Saunaka! The Muni N\u00e2rada hearing thus, asked again at that very moment to solve his doubts. I am now speaking of that. Hear.\u201d\n12-15. N\u00e2rada said :-- \u201cO Lord! How did the Dev\u00ee Sarasvat\u00ee quarrel with the Dev\u00ee Gang\u00e2 and how did she by Her curse turn out in India, into a holy river in giving virtues. I am becoming more and more eager and impatient to hear about this critical incident. I do not find satiety in drinking your nectar-like words. Who finds satiety in getting his good weal? Why did Gang\u00e2 curse Sarasvat\u00ee, worshipped everywhere. Gang\u00e2 is also full of Sattva Gunas. She always bestows good and virtue to all. Both of them are fiery and it is pleasant to hear the cause of quarrels between those two. These are very rarely found in the Pur\u00e2nas. So you ought to describe that to me.\u201d\n16-21. N\u00e2r\u00e2yana said :-- Hear, O N\u00e2rada! I will now describe that incident, the hearing of which removes all the sins. Laksm\u00ee, Sarasvat\u00ee and Gang\u00e2, the three wives of Hari and all equally loved, remain always close to Hari. One day Gang\u00e2 cast side-long glances frequently towards N\u00e2r\u00e2yana and was eagerly looking at Him, with smile on Her lips. Seeing this, the Lord N\u00e2r\u00e2yana, startled and looked at Gang\u00e2 and smiled also. Laksm\u00ee saw that, but she did not take any offence. But Sarasvat\u00ee became very angry. Padm\u00e2 (Laksm\u00ee) who was of Sattva Guna, began to console in various ways the wrathful Sarasvat\u00ee; but she could not be appeased by any means. Rather Her face became red out of anger; she began to tremble out of her feelings (passion); Her lips quivered; and She began to speak to Her husband.\n22-38. The husband that is good, religious, and well qualified looks on his all the wives equally; but it is just the opposite with him who is a cheat. O Gad\u00e2dhara! You are partial to Gang\u00e2; and so is the case with Laksm\u00ee. I am the only one that is deprived of your love. It is, therefore, that Gang\u00e2 and Padm\u00e2 are in love with each other; for you love Padm\u00e2. So why shall not Padm\u00e2 bear this contrary thing! I am only unfortunate. What use is there in holding my life? Her life is useless, who is deprived of her husband's love. Those that declare you, of Sattva Gunas, ought not to be ever called Pundits. They are quite illiterate; they have not the least knowledge of the Vedas. They are quite impotent to understand the nature of your mind. O N\u00e2rada! Hearing Sarasvat\u00ee's words and knowing that she had become very angry, N\u00e2r\u00e2yana thought for a moment and then went away from the Zenana outside. When N\u00e2r\u00e2yana had thus gone away, Sarasvat\u00ee became fearless and began to abuse Gang\u00e2 downright out of anger in an abusive language, hard to hear :-- \u201cO Shameless One! O Passionate One! What\npride do you feel for your husband? Do you like to show that your husband loves you much? I will destroy your pride today. I will see today, it will be seen by others also, what your Hari can do for you?\u201d Saying thus Sarasvat\u00ee rose up to catch hold of Gang\u00e2 by Her hairs violently. Padm\u00e2 intervened to stop this. Sarasvat\u00ee became very violent and cursed Laksm\u00ee :-- \u201cNo doubt you will be turned into a tree and into a river. In as much as seeing this undue behaviour of Gang\u00e2, you do not step forward to speak anything in this assembly, as if you are a tree or a river.\u201d Padm\u00e2 did not become at all angry, even when she heard of the above curse. She became sorry and, holding the hands of Sarasvat\u00ee, remained silent. Then Gang\u00e2 became very angry; Her lips began to quiver frequently. Seeing the mad fiery nature of the red-eyed Sarasvat\u00ee, she told Laksm\u00ee :-- \u201cO Padme! Leave that wicked foul-mouthed woman. What will she do to me? She presides over speech and therefore likes always to remain with quarrels. Let Her shew Her force how far can she quarrel with me. She wants to test the strength of us. So leave Her. Let all know today our strength and prowess.\u201d\n39-44. Thus saying, Gang\u00e2 became ready to curse Sarasvat\u00ee and addressing Laksm\u00ee, said :-- \u201cO Dear Padme! As that woman has cursed you to become a river, so I too curse her, that she, too, be turned into a river and she would go to the abode of men, the sinners, to the world and take their heaps of sins.\u201d Hearing this curse of Gang\u00e2, Sarasvat\u00ee gave her curse, \u201cYou, too, will have to descend into the Bhurloka (the world) as a river, taking all the sins of the sinners.\u201d O N\u00e2rada! While there was going on this quarrel, the four-armed omniscient Bhagav\u00e2n Hari came up there accompanied by four attendants of His, all four-armed, and took Sarasvat\u00ee in His breast and began to speak all the previous mysteries. Then they came to know the cause of their quarrels and why they cursed one another and all became very sorry. At that time Bhagav\u00e2n Hari told them one by one :--\n45-67. O Laksm\u00ee! Let you be born in parts, without being born in any womb, in the world as the daughter in the house of the King Dharma-dhvaja. You will have to take the form of a tree there, out of this evil turn of fate. There S'ankhach\u00fbda, the Indra of the Asuras, born of my parts will marry you. After that you will come back here and be my wife as now. There is no doubt in this. You will be named Tulas\u00ee, the purifier of the three worlds, in Bh\u00e2rata. O Beautiful One! Now go there quickly and be a river in your parts under the name Padm\u00e2vat\u00ee. O Gange! You will also have to take incarnation in Bh\u00e2rata as a river, purifying all the worlds, to destroy the sins of\nthe inhabitants of Bh\u00e2rata. Bhagiratha will take you there after much entreating and worshipping you; and you will be famous by the name Bhagirath\u00ee, the most sanctifying river in the world. There, the Ocean born of my parts, and the King S'\u00e2ntanu also born of my parts will be your husbands. O Bharat\u00ee! Let you go also and incarnate in part in Bh\u00e2rata under the curse of Gang\u00e2. O Good-natured One! Now go in full Amsas to Brahm\u00e2 and become His wife. Let Gang\u00e2 go also in Her fullness to S'iva. Let Padm\u00e2 remain with Me. Padm\u00e2 is of a peaceful nature, void of anger, devoted to Me and of a S\u00e2ttvika nature. Chaste, good-natured, fortunate, and religious woman like Padm\u00e2 are very rare. Those women that are born of the parts of Padm\u00e2 are all very religious and devoted to their husbands. They are peaceful and good-natured and worshipped in every universe. It is forbidden, nay, opposed to the Vedas, to keep three wives, three servants, three friends of different natures, at one place. They never conduce to any welfare. They are the fruitful sources of all jealousies and quarrels. Where, in any family females are powerful like men and males are submissive to females, the birth of the male is useless. At his every step, he meets with difficulties and bitter experiences. He ought to retire to the forest whose wife is foul-mouthed, of bad birth and fond of quarrels. The great forest is better for him than his house. That man does not get in his house any water for washing his feet, or any seat to sit on, or any fruit to eat, nothing whatsoever; but in the forest, all these are not unavailable. Rather to dwell amidst rapacious animals or to enter into fire than remain with a bad wife. O Fair One! Rather the pains of the disease or venom are bearable, but the words of a bad wife are hard to bear. Death is far better than that. Those that are under the control of their wives, know that they never get their peace of mind until they are laid on their funeral pyres. They never see the fruits of what they daily do. They have no fame anywhere, neither in this world nor in the next. Ultimately the fruit is this:-- that they have to go to hell and remain there. His life is verily a heavy burden who is without any name or fame. Never it is for the least good that many co-wives remain at one place. When, by taking one wife only a man does not become happy, then imagine, how painful it becomes to have many wives. O Gange! Go to S'iva. O Sarasvat\u00ee! Go to Brahm\u00e2. Let the good-natured Kamal\u00e2, residing on the lotus remain with Me. He gets in this world happiness and Dharma and in the next Mukti whose wife is chaste and obedient. In fact he is Mukta, pure and happy whose wife is chaste; and he whose wife is foul-natured, is rendered impure unhappy and dead whilst he is living.\nHere ends the Sixth Chapter of the Ninth Book on the coming in this world of Laksm\u00ee, Gang\u00e2 and Sarasvat\u00ee in the Mah\u00e2pur\u00e2nam S'r\u00ee Mad Dev\u00ee Bh\u00e2gavatam of 18,000 verses by Maharsi Veda Vy\u00e2sa.","title":"The Devi Bhagavatam: The Ninth Book: Chapter 6","type":"page"}