{"collection":"Hinduism","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/hin/vp/vp042.htm","path":"hin/vp/vp042.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/hin/vp/vp042.htm","text":"The Vishnu Purana, translated by Horace Hayman Wilson, [1840]\nOrigin of Rudra: his becoming eight Rudras: their wives and children. The posterity of Bhrigu. Account of \u015ar\u00ed in conjunction with Vish\u0144u. Sacrifice of Daksha.\nPAR\u00c1\u015aARA.--I have described to you, oh great Muni, the creation of Brahm\u00e1, in which the quality of darkness prevailed. I will now explain to you the creation of Rudra 1.\nIn the beginning of the Kalpa, as Brahm\u00e1 purposed to create a son, who should be like himself, a youth of a purple complexion 2 appeared, crying with a low cry, and running about 3. Brahm\u00e1, when he beheld him thus afflicted, said to him, \"Why dost thou weep?\" \"Give me a name,\" replied the boy. \"Rudra be thy name,\" rejoined the great father of all creatures: \"be composed; desist from tears.\" But, thus addressed, the boy still wept seven times, and Brahm\u00e1 therefore gave to him seven other denominations; and to these eight persons regions and wives and posterity belong. The eight manifestations, then, are named Rudra, Bhava, \u015aarva, I\u015b\u00e1na, Pa\u015bupati, Bh\u00edma, Ugra, and Mah\u00e1deva, which were given to them by their great progenitor. He also assigned to them their respective stations, the sun, water, earth, air, fire, ether, the ministrant Brahman, and the moon; for these are their several forms 4. The wives\nof the sun and the other manifestations, termed Rudra and the rest, were respectively, Suverchal\u00e1, Ush\u00e1, Vikes\u00ed, Siv\u00e1, Sw\u00e1h\u00e1, Di\u015b\u00e1, D\u00edksh\u00e1, and Rohin\u00ed. Now hear an account of their progeny, by whose successive generations this world has been peopled. Their sons, then, were severally, Sanai\u015bchara (Saturn), \u015aukra (Venus), the fiery-bodied Mars, Manojava (Hanum\u00e1n), Skanda, Swarga, Sant\u00e1na, and Budha (Mercury).\nIt was the Rudra of this description that married Sat\u00ed, who abandoned her corporeal existence in consequence of the displeasure of Daksha 5. She afterwards was the daughter of Himav\u00e1n (the snowy mountains) by Men\u00e1; and in that character, as the only Um\u00e1, the mighty Bhava again married her 6. The divinities Dh\u00e1t\u00e1 and Vidh\u00e1t\u00e1 were born to Bhrigu by Khy\u00e1ti, as was a daughter, \u015ar\u00ed, the wife of N\u00e1r\u00e1ya\u0144a, the god of gods 7.\nMAITREYA.--It is commonly said that the goddess \u015ar\u00ed was born from the sea of milk, when it was churned for ambrosia; how then can you say that she was the daughter of Bhrigu by Khy\u00e1ti.\nPAR\u00c1\u015aARA.--\u015ar\u00ed, the bride of Vish\u0144u, the mother of the world, is\neternal, imperishable; in like manner as he is all-pervading, so also is she, oh best of Brahmans, omnipresent. Vish\u0144u is meaning; she is speech. Hari is polity (Naya); she is prudence (N\u00edti). Vish\u0144u is understanding; she is intellect. He is righteousness; she is devotion. He is the creator; she is creation. \u015ar\u00ed is the earth; Hari the support of it. The deity is content; the eternal Lakshm\u00ed is resignation. He is desire; \u015ar\u00ed is wish. He is sacrifice; she is sacrificial donation (Dakshin\u00e1). The goddess is the invocation which attends the oblation; Jan\u00e1rddana is the oblation. Lakshm\u00ed is the chamber where the females are present (at a religious ceremony); Madhus\u00fadana the apartment of the males of the family. Lakshm\u00ed is the altar; Hari the stake (to which the victim is bound). \u015ar\u00ed is the fuel; Hari the holy grass (Ku\u015ba). He is the personified S\u00e1ma veda; the goddess, lotus-throned, is the tone of its chanting. Lakshm\u00ed is the prayer of oblation (Sw\u00e1h\u00e1); V\u00e1sudeva, the lord of the world, is the sacrificial fire. Saur\u00ed (Vish\u0144u) is \u015aankara (\u015aiva); and \u015ar\u00ed is the bride of \u015aiva (Gaur\u00ed). Ke\u015bava, oh Maitreya, is the sun; and his radiance is the lotus-seated goddess. Vish\u0144u is the tribe of progenitors (Pitrigana); Padma. is their bride (Swadh\u00e1), the eternal bestower of nutriment. \u015ar\u00ed is the heavens; Vish\u0144u, who is one with all things, is wide extended space. The lord of \u015ar\u00ed is the moon; she is his unfading light. She is called the moving principle of the world; he, the wind which bloweth every where. Govinda is the ocean; Lakshm\u00ed its shore. Lakshm\u00ed is the consort of Indra (Indr\u00e1n\u00ed); Madhus\u00fadana is Devendra. The holder of the discus (Vish\u0144u) is Yama (the regent of Tartarus); the lotus-throned goddess is his dusky spouse (Dh\u00famorn\u00e1). \u015ar\u00ed is wealth; \u015aridhara (Vish\u0144u) is himself the god of riches (Kuvera). Lakshm\u00ed, illustrious Brahman, is Gaur\u00ed; and Ke\u015bava, is the deity of ocean (Varuna). \u015ar\u00ed is the host of heaven (Devasen\u00e1); the deity of war, her lord, is Hari. The wielder of the mace is resistance; the power to oppose is \u015ar\u00ed. Lakshm\u00ed is the K\u00e1sht\u0301h\u00e1 and the Kal\u00e1; Hari the Nimesha and the Muh\u00fartta. Lakshm\u00ed is the light; and Hari, who is all, and lord of all, the lamp. She, the mother of the world, is the creeping vine; and Vish\u0144u the tree round which she clings. She is the night; the god who is armed with the mace and discus is the day. He, the bestower of blessings, is the bridegroom; the lotus-throned goddess is the bride.\n[paragraph continues] The god is one with all male--the goddess one with all female, rivers. The lotus-eyed deity is the standard; the goddess seated on a lotus the banner. Lakshm\u00ed is cupidity; N\u00e1r\u00e1ya\u0144a, the master of the world, is covetousness. Oh thou who knowest what righteousness is, Govinda is love; and Lakshm\u00ed, his gentle spouse, is pleasure. But why thus diffusely enumerate their presence: it is enough to say, in a word, that of gods, animals, and men, Hari is all that is called male; Lakshm\u00ed is all that is termed female: there is nothing else than they.\n58:1 The creation of Rudra has been already adverted to, and that seems to be the primitive form of the legend. We have here another account, grounded apparently upon \u015aaiva or Yogi mysticism.\n58:2 The appearance of Rudra as a Kum\u00e1ra, 'a boy,' is described as of repeated occurrence in the Linga and V\u00e1yu Pur\u00e1\u0144as, as already noticed (p. 38); and these Kum\u00e1ras are of different complexions in different Kalpas. In the Vaish\u0144ava Pur\u00e1\u0144as, however, we have only one original form, to which the name of N\u00edlalohita, the blue and red or purple complexioned is assigned. In the K\u00farma this youth comes from Brahm\u00e1's mouth: in the V\u00e1yu, from his forehead.\n58:3 This is the Paur\u00e1\u0144ic etymology: ### or rud, 'to weep,' and dru, 'to run' The grammarians derive the name from rud, 'to weep,' with ra affix.\n58:4 The V\u00e1yu details the application of each name severally. These eight Rudras are therefore but one, under as many appellations, and in as many types. The Padma, M\u00e1rka\u0144d\u0301eya, K\u00farma, Linga, and V\u00e1yu agree with our text in the nomenclature of the Rudras, and their types, their wives, and progeny. The types are those which are enumerated in the N\u00e1nd\u00ed, p. 59 or opening benedictory verse, of Sakuntal\u00e1; and the passage of the Vish\u0144u P. was found by Mons. Chezy on the envelope of his copy. He has justly corrected Sir Wm. Jones's version of the term ### 'the sacrifice is performed with solemnity;' as the word means, 'Brahmane officiant,' 'the Br\u00e1hma\u0144 who is qualified by initiation (D\u00edksh\u00e1) to conduct the rite.' These are considered as the bodies, or visible forms, of those modifications of Rudra which are variously named, and which, being praised in them, severally abstain from harming them: ### V\u00e1yu P. The Bh\u00e1gavata, III. 12, has a different scheme, as usual; but it confounds the notion of the eleven Rudras, to whom the text subsequently adverts, with that of the eight here specified. These eleven it terms Manyu, Manu, Mah\u00ednasa, Mah\u00e1n, Siva, Ritadhwaja, Ugraretas, Bhava, K\u00e1la, V\u00e1madeva, and Dhritavrata: their wives are, Dh\u00ed, Dhriti, Rasalom\u00e1, Niyut, Sarp\u00ed, Il\u00e1, Ambik\u00e1, Ir\u00e1vat\u00ed, Swadh\u00e1, D\u00edksh\u00e1, Rudr\u00e1n\u00ed: and their places are, the heart, senses, breath, ether, air, fire, water, earth, sun, moon, and tapas, or ascetic devotion. The same allegory or mystification characterises both accounts.\n59:5 See the story of Daksha's sacrifice at the end of the chapter.\n59:6 The story of Um\u00e1's birth and marriage occurs in the \u015aiva P. and in the K\u00e1\u015b\u00ed Khanda of the Skanda P.: it is noticed briefly, and with some variation from the Pur\u00e1\u0144as, in the R\u00e1m\u00e1ya\u0144a, first book: it is also given in detail in the Kum\u00e1ra Sambhava of K\u00e1lid\u00e1sa.\n59:7 The family of Bhrigu is more particularly described in the tenth chapter: it is here mentioned merely to introduce the story of the birth of the goddess of prosperity, \u015ar\u00ed.","title":"The Vishnu Purana: Book I: Chapter VIII","type":"page"}