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Skanda marches, the Kraunca mountain is pierced, and a tirtha becomes a second heaven
With the command of the celestial forces in his hands, Skanda stood there looking like a fire at the moment its flames go white. He took the companions and the mothers with him and moved out for the destruction of the daityas, and the sight of him going gladdened every one of the foremost gods. The host behind him was terrible to look at and beautiful at the same time. Bells hung from the standards. Drums and conchs and cymbals were carried among the ranks. Weapons went up on every side and banners went up above them, so that the whole force resembled the autumn sky when it is crowded with planets and stars. Then that vast assemblage of celestials and creatures of every kind began cheerfully to beat their drums and to blow their conchs, thousands of them at once. They played on their patahas and their jharjharas, on krikacas and cow horns, on adambaras and gomukhas, and the deep sound of the dindimas rolled underneath all of it. The gods with Vasava at their head praised Kumara. Celestials and gandharvas sang. The apsaras danced. Skanda, well pleased with all this attention, granted the gods a boon, and the boon was a single sentence: I shall slay all your foes. The illustrious celestials heard it from the best of gods and from that moment onward regarded their enemies as dead already. When the boon had been given, a sound went up out of all those joyful creatures that filled the three worlds and left no room in them for anything else.
He set out with that vast host for the destruction of the daityas and the protection of everyone who lived in heaven. Ahead of Kartikeya’s army, in the van, walked Exertion and Victory and Righteousness and Success and Prosperity and Courage and the Scriptures, all of them carrying bodies for the occasion. Behind them came the force itself, armed with lances and mallets and blazing brands, with maces and heavy clubs, with arrows and darts and spears, decked in beautiful ornaments and armor, and roaring as a proud lion roars. The divine Guha went with it. The daityas and rakshasas and danavas took one look and scattered in every direction with fear working in them, and the celestials came after them with weapons out. Seeing the enemy run, Skanda filled with wrath and began to hurl his terrible dart, again and again, and the energy he showed while he did it resembled a fire that has been fed with clarified butter. Each time the dart went out from his hand, meteoric flashes fell on the earth and thunderbolts came down with a noise that made the day resemble the day of universal destruction. Once the son of Agni had hurled that dart, millions of darts issued out of it. At the end of all this he killed Taraka, chief of the daityas, a being of great might and prowess who stood in that battle inside a ring of 100,000 heroic daityas. He killed Mahisha next, who was surrounded by eight padmas of daityas. He killed Tripada, who was surrounded by 1,000 ajutas of them. He killed Hradodara, who was surrounded by ten nikharvas of them, and all the followers with their assorted weapons went down with him. The followers of Kumara filled the ten points of the compass with noise while the killing went on, and they danced and jumped and laughed. Thousands of daityas burned in the flames that came off Skanda’s dart. Others simply stopped breathing, terrified by his roars. The three worlds flinched when his soldiers yawned. Some of the enemies of the gods were struck down by banners. Some heard the bells and fell flat on the surface of the earth. Some were cut apart by weapons and lay where they fell.
Then Vana, the son of Bali, a being of great might, climbed the Kraunca mountain and gave battle to the celestial host from it. Skanda, intelligent and now the great generalissimo, rushed straight at that enemy of the gods, and Vana took shelter inside the mountain in his fear of Kartikeya. Kartikeya, inflamed, pierced the mountain through with the dart Agni had given him. The mountain carried the name Kraunca because the sound that always came out of it resembled the cry of a crane. Shala trees made it look dappled. The apes and elephants on its slopes were terrified. The birds that lived on it came up off the rock and wheeled around in the sky. Snakes went darting down its sides. Leopards and bears ran back and forth in large numbers, crying out, and the other forests on it rang with the cries of hundreds upon hundreds of animals. Sharabhas and lions burst out of cover. Reduced to that pitiable condition, the mountain became strangely beautiful to look at. The vidyadharas who lived on its summits took to the air. The kinnaras grew anxious and distracted with the fear that the falling dart had put into them. Out of that blazing mountain came the daityas by hundreds and thousands, clad in beautiful ornaments and garlands, and the followers of Kumara prevailed over them in battle and killed them all. Skanda, inflamed with rage, quickly killed Bali’s son and his younger brother with him, the way Indra had killed Vritra in the old days. The son of Agni pierced the Kraunca mountain with his dart, dividing himself sometimes into many and sometimes gathering all his portions back into one. Hurled from his hand again and again, the dart came back to his hand again and again. Such was the might and the glory of the adorable son of Agni. With his heroism doubled, and his energy and fame and success doubled with it, he pierced the mountain and killed hundreds of daityas. Having finished the enemies of the celestials in this way, he was worshiped and honored by them, and great joy came to him.
After the Kraunca mountain had been pierced and the son of Bali killed, drums were beaten and conchs were blown. The ladies of heaven rained down showers of flowers in one wave after another on that divine lord of yogis. Auspicious breezes started up, carrying celestial perfumes with them. The gandharvas hymned his praises, and so did the great rishis who are always occupied with sacrifices. It is at this point that the accounts of who he is begin to disagree, and the epic lets them stand side by side. Some speak of him as the puissant son of the Grandsire, Sanat-kumara, the eldest of all the sons of Brahma. Some speak of him as the son of Maheshvara. Some call him the son of Agni. Others describe him as the son of Uma, or of the Krittikas, or of Ganga. Hundreds and thousands of people speak of that lord of yogis, blazing in form and great in might, as the son of one of those, or of two of them together, or of any one of the four.
That, Vaishampayana said, is everything about the installation of Kartikeya. Now listen to what happened to the sacredness of that foremost of tirthas on the Sarasvati. After the enemies of the gods had been killed, that tirtha became a second heaven. The puissant son of Agni handed out to each of the foremost celestials dominion and affluence of various kinds, and at the end of it the sovereignty of the three worlds. That is how the adorable exterminator of the daityas was installed by the gods as their generalissimo. And the other tirtha nearby, where in the old days the celestials had installed Varuna the lord of waters, goes by the name Taijasa. Balarama bathed in that tirtha and worshiped Skanda there. He gave the brahmanas gold and clothes and ornaments and much else besides. He passed one night on that ground, and Madhava, slayer of hostile heroes, praised that foremost of tirthas and touched its water and went on his way cheerful and happy. Everything you asked about, Vaishampayana said, has now been told: how the divine Skanda was installed by the assembled gods.
A key to reading this (the dart, the numbers, and the names): The dart that Indra handed over in the previous scene is called the dart given by Agni once the fighting starts. Both statements stand in the source and both are kept here. Padma, ajuta and nikharva are names for very large numbers, used the way a modern account would use millions and billions. Rama and Madhava in the closing lines are both names for Balarama, who is walking the Sarasvati and listening to none of this; the whole installation of Skanda has been Vaishampayana’s answer to a question Janamejaya asked about a tirtha on the riverbank.
The gist: Skanda takes command and moves against the daityas with drums, conchs and the whole celestial host behind him, promising the gods he will kill all their enemies. Exertion, Victory, Righteousness, Success, Prosperity, Courage and the Scriptures walk in the van. The enemy scatters, the dart goes out again and again and splits into millions, and Taraka, Mahisha, Tripada and Hradodara fall with their armies. Vana, son of Bali, fights from the Kraunca mountain and hides inside it, and Skanda pierces the mountain through and kills him and his brother. Flowers fall, the accounts of his parentage are laid out side by side without a ruling, the tirtha becomes a second heaven, the tirtha beside it is called Taijasa, and Balarama bathes there, gives gold to the brahmanas, passes one night and moves on.
Varuna given the waters, the fire that hid inside a sami tree, and the boons Kubera won in his own wood
Janamejaya let the silence sit for a moment after the last sentence, the way a man does when a story has gone further into him than he expected. This history I have heard from you, holy one, is a wonderful thing, he said at last, this account in its full detail of how Skanda was installed according to the proper rites. Man rich in the wealth of asceticism, I count myself cleansed simply by having listened to it. The hair is standing up along my arms and my mind has grown light. I have heard how Kumara was raised to the command and how the Daityas were broken, and my joy has been great. There is one more thing, however, that I am curious about, and it belongs to the same stretch of water. How was the lord of the waters installed by the celestials at that crossing, in the days that are gone? Tell me that as well, best of men, since you have great wisdom and the skill to tell it.
Listen, king, Vaishampayana said, to a wonderful history of what truly took place in a former Kalpa. Long ago, in the Krita age, all the celestials came to Varuna in the proper way, and they put their request to him in the form of a comparison he could not miss. Shakra, the lord of the celestials, always protects us from every fear, they said. Be you, in the same fashion, the lord of all the rivers. You live always in the ocean, god, in that home of the makaras. The ocean, which is itself the lord of rivers, will then lie under your dominion, and you will wax and wane with Soma. Varuna heard them out and answered in three words. Let it be so. Then the celestials assembled and made Varuna, whose abode is the ocean, the lord of all the waters, according to the rites laid down in the scriptures. They installed him over every creature that lives in water, they worshiped him duly, and they went back to their own homes. Installed by them, the illustrious Varuna began from that day to guard the seas and the lakes and the rivers and every other reservoir of water, exactly as Shakra guards the gods. An office of that kind is a weight rather than an ornament. Every drop that falls out of the sky and every thread of water that works its way between stones came, from that day, into one god’s accounting.
Bathing at that crossing as well, and giving away gifts of many kinds, the slayer of Pralamba, Baladeva of great wisdom, moved on to Agnitirtha, the place where the eater of clarified butter had vanished out of sight and hidden himself inside the entrails of the sami wood. Consider what that meant for the world he left. Every hearth went cold at once. The sacrificial fires that carry offerings up to the gods went out in the middle of the carrying, so that the gods themselves began to go hungry, and the light by which all the worlds are seen simply stopped. Sinless one, when the light of the worlds had gone out in that way, the gods went to the Grandsire of the universe. The adorable Agni has disappeared, they said. We do not know the reason for it. Let not every living creature be destroyed. Create fire, powerful lord.
For what reason did Agni, the creator of all the worlds, disappear, Janamejaya asked, and how was he discovered again by the gods? Tell me all of it in detail. Vaishampayana said, Agni of great energy had become badly frightened at the curse of Bhrigu. Hiding himself inside the entrails of the sami wood, that adorable god went out of sight. When Agni had gone, all the gods, with Vasava at their head, went looking for the missing god in great distress. Searching, they found him, and they saw that god lying inside the entrails of the sami wood, which is to say inside the one tree whose dry sticks men rub together when they want to bring fire into the world. Tiger among kings, the celestials, with Brihaspati at their head and Vasava among them, grew glad at having found him out, and they went back to the places they had come from. And Agni, by the working of Bhrigu’s curse, became an eater of everything, exactly as that utterer of Brahma had said he would.
Having bathed there, the intelligent Balarama proceeded to Brahmayoni, the place where the adorable Grandsire of all the worlds had carried out his work of creation, and where in the days that are gone the lord Brahman had bathed along with all the gods, according to the rites laid down for celestials. Bathing there and giving away gifts of many kinds, Baladeva went on to the crossing called Kaubera, where the powerful Ailavila, having practiced severe austerities, obtained lordship over all treasures. While he lived there at his penances, every kind of wealth and every precious gem came to him of its own accord, which is a strange sort of reward for a man who had given up wanting things. Baladeva came to that crossing, bathed in its waters in the proper way, and gave away a great deal of wealth to the Brahmins. At that spot Balarama looked on the excellent woods of Kubera. In the days that are gone the high-souled Kubera, chief of the Yakshas, practiced the severest austerities in that very place, and the boons he obtained for it were many. There was the lordship of all treasures. There was the friendship of Rudra, whose energy has no measure. There was the status of a god, and the regency over one point of the compass, the north, and a son named Nalakuvara. Mighty-armed one, the chief of the Yakshas won all of that there, and quickly. The Maruts came and installed him in his sovereignty according to the rites. For a vehicle he received a celestial chariot, fully equipped, as fleet as thought, and with it all the affluence that belongs to a god. Bathing at that crossing and giving away much wealth, Balarama, with white unguents on his limbs, moved on quickly toward another crossing. Populous with creatures of every kind, that one is known by the name Badarapachana. The fruits of every season are always to be had there, and flowers and fruit of every kind are always in abundance.
A key to reading this (names and hints): The sami is the tree whose dry wood is churned to produce the sacrificial fire, so Agni hiding inside it says the same thing twice, once as story and once as ritual. Why Bhrigu cursed Agni is told earlier in the epic, in the Adi Parva, where Agni, compelled to speak the truth, pointed out Bhrigu’s wife Puloma to a Rakshasa who carried her off; this chapter takes that as already known and moves on. Ailavila, the son of Ilavila, is Kubera. Vasava and Shakra are both names for Indra, Baladeva and Rama are both Balarama, as are Vala and Valadeva in Ganguli’s spelling, and the eater of clarified butter is a standing epithet for fire. Badarapachana means the cooking of jujubes, and the next crossing is named for something that happened over a cooking pot.
The gist: Full of the Skanda story, Janamejaya asks how Varuna came to be lord of the waters at that crossing, and the answer reaches back into a former Kalpa, when the gods asked him to hold the rivers as Shakra holds the heavens and then installed him over every water on earth. Balarama moves on to Agnitirtha, where fire, frightened by Bhrigu’s curse, hid inside the sami wood and left the worlds dark until the gods hunted him down, after which the curse made him an eater of everything. Then Brahmayoni, where creation was done, and then Kubera’s crossing, where austerity brought a Yaksha the treasuries of the world, Rudra’s friendship, the north, a son, and a chariot swift as thought. Balarama turns toward Badarapachana.
Shruvavati’s burning feet, and the jujubes that sat on the fire for twelve years
Balarama came, as has been said, to the crossing called Badarapachana, where a great many ascetics and Siddhas had their huts, king, Vaishampayana said. Living among them was the daughter of Bharadvaja, a girl named Shruvavati who had no equal on earth for beauty, a maiden keeping the life of a brahmacharini. She had taken vows of many kinds and was practicing the most severe of penances, and she was doing it with one object, that the lord of the celestials should become her husband. Perpetuator of Kuru’s race, the years went by in numbers, and through all of them that girl kept observances that the books themselves call exceedingly difficult for a woman to keep. At last the adorable chastiser of Paka was gratified, by her conduct, by her penances, and by the regard she had shown him and no one else. Then the powerful lord of the celestials came down to that hermitage, and he came in a borrowed shape, wearing the form of the high-souled and regenerate Rishi Vasishtha. Seeing that foremost of ascetics standing in front of her, Bharata, a man of the austerest penances, she worshiped him according to the rites that ascetics observe, and then, conversant with vows, sweet of speech, she said what she had evidently decided to say to any visitor. Adorable one, tiger among ascetics, tell me your commands. Man of excellent vows, I will serve you to the measure of my strength. My hand, however, I will not give you, because of the regard I bear for Shakra. It is the lord of the three worlds I am seeking to please, with vows and rigid observances and penances.
The illustrious god smiled as he let his eyes rest on her, knowing every one of her observances better than she did, and he answered her sweetly, Bharata. You practice penances of the austerest kind. That is known to me, woman of excellent vows. The object cherished in your heart, the one you are laboring for, will be accomplished for you, auspicious one of the beautiful face. Everything is attainable by penances. Everything rests on penances. All those regions of blessedness that belong to the gods can be had by penances, and penances are the root of great happiness. Those who cast off their bodies after austerities of this kind obtain the status of gods. Keep these words of mine in your mind. And now, blessed girl of excellent vows, boil these five jujubes for me. Having said that, the adorable slayer of Vala took his leave and went off to an excellent crossing not far from the hermitage, to recite certain mantras in his mind. That crossing came to be known through the three worlds afterwards by the name of Indra, giver of honors. And what he was really doing there, while his lips moved over the mantras, was testing her devotion, because he was holding the jujubes back from boiling.
The girl cleansed herself and sat down to the work, king. She restrained her speech, fixed her attention on the one task, and felt no weariness at it. Bull among men, the day began to go and the jujubes showed no sign whatever of softening, and then the fuel she had gathered was used up. Seeing the fire beginning to die for want of wood, she started to feed it with her own limbs. The beautiful maiden put her feet into the fire first and sat still while they began to be consumed, and she did not mind them at all. The thing was hard to do, and she did it out of a wish to do good to the Rishi who had been her guest. Her face did not alter under that painful process and no cheerlessness came into her. Having pushed her limbs into the fire she felt the same joy she would have felt dipping them into cool water. The words of the Rishi, cook these jujubes well, were in her mind, Bharata, and holding on to those words she went on cooking, although the fruit, king, was still as hard as it had been at noon. The adorable Agni himself was eating her feet, and the maiden did not feel the slightest pain from it.
Watching her do this, the lord of the three worlds was deeply satisfied, and he showed himself to her in his own proper form. I am pleased with your devotion, your penances, and your vows, the chief of the celestials said to that maiden of very austere observance. The wish you have cherished, auspicious one, will therefore be accomplished. Casting off this body, blessed one, you will live in heaven with me. And this hermitage will become the foremost crossing in the world, able to cleanse a person of every sin, and it will be known, woman of fair eyebrows, by the name Badarapachana. It will be celebrated in the three worlds and praised by the great Rishis. In this very place, auspicious and sinless and highly blessed girl, the seven Rishis once left Arundhati, the wife of one of them, and went off to Himavat to gather fruit and roots for their sustenance. While they were in a forest of Himavat at that work, a drought came that lasted twelve years. Those ascetics made themselves a shelter and stayed where they were, and meanwhile Arundhati, at the spot where they had left her, gave herself to penances. Seeing her at those austerest of vows, the boon-giving three-eyed deity came to her, highly pleased, in the form of a Brahmin, and asked for alms. Our store of food is finished, Brahmin, the beautiful Arundhati said to him. Eat jujubes. Cook these jujubes, woman of excellent vows, Mahadeva replied. So she set about cooking them, to do what was agreeable to that Brahmin, and having put the fruit on the fire she sat listening to the excellent and charming and sacred discourses that came from his lips. The twelve years of drought went past as though they were a single day. Without food, employed in the cooking and in the listening, that terrible stretch of time passed for her like one afternoon.
Then the seven Rishis came back to the spot with fruit from the mountain. Mahadeva, highly pleased with Arundhati, told her to approach those Rishis as she had formerly done, since he had been gratified with her penances and her vows, and then the adorable Hara stood confessed in his own form. Pleased, he told them what her conduct had been worth. The ascetic merit this lady has earned, regenerate ones, is much greater than what you have earned on the breast of Himavat. Her penances have been exceedingly austere, because she has passed twelve years in cooking and has fasted every one of them. Then the divine Mahadeva turned to her. Ask for the boon that is in your heart, auspicious lady. And that lady of large eyes with a reddish light in them said this to the god, in the middle of the seven Rishis. If you are gratified with me, divine one, let this spot be an excellent crossing. Let it be known by the name Badarapachana and let it be the favorite resort of Siddhas and celestial Rishis. And god of gods, let a man who cleanses himself and fasts here and stays three nights obtain the fruit of a twelve years’ fast. Let it be so, the god answered her. Praised by the seven Rishis, he went up to heaven, and the Rishis were left with two kinds of wonder on them, one at having seen the god, and one at seeing the chaste Arundhati unspent, still carrying the color of health in her face after such a famine.
That is how the pure-souled Arundhati obtained the highest success in the old days, Indra said, exactly as you have done, highly blessed lady, and for my sake, girl of rigid vows. You, however, amiable one, have practiced the severer penances of the two. Gratified with your vows, I will therefore grant you a special boon, one above the boon that was granted to Arundhati. Through the power of the high-souled god who gave her that boon, and through your own energy, I grant this now: that a person who lives in this crossing for a single night and bathes here with the soul fixed in meditation will, after casting off the body, obtain many regions of blessedness that are hard to reach by other means. Having said these words to the cleansed Shruvavati, the thousand-eyed Shakra of great energy went back to heaven. After the wielder of the thunderbolt had gone, chief of Bharata’s race, a shower of celestial flowers of sweet fragrance came down on that place, celestial kettledrums of loud sound were beaten, and auspicious perfumed breezes blew. And the auspicious Shruvavati, casting off her body, became the spouse of Indra, and having won that station by austere penances she passed her time with him from then on, always.
Who was the mother of Shruvavati, Janamejaya said, and how was that fair girl reared? I want to hear it, Brahmin, because the curiosity I feel is great. Vaishampayana said, the vital seed of the regenerate and high-souled Rishi Bharadvaja fell from him once when he saw the large-eyed Apsara Ghritachi going past, and that foremost of ascetics caught it in his hand. It was kept afterwards in a cup made of tree leaves, and in that leaf cup the girl Shruvavati was born. Having performed the usual post-genital rites, the great ascetic Bharadvaja gave her a name in the presence of the gods and the Rishis, and the name he gave her was Shruvavati. Leaving the girl in his hermitage, he went away to the forests of Himavat. And that foremost one among the Yadus, Baladeva of great dignity, having bathed in that crossing and given away much wealth to many of the best of the Brahmins, went on with his soul well fixed in meditation to the crossing of Sakta.
A key to reading this (names and naming): Badara is the jujube and pachana is cooking, so Badarapachana means the place where the jujubes were cooked, and the name is earned twice here, over Arundhati’s fire and over Shruvavati’s. The chastiser of Paka, the slayer of Vala, the thousand-eyed one and the wielder of the thunderbolt are all Indra; the three-eyed deity and Hara are Mahadeva. Arundhati is the wife of Vasishtha among the seven Rishis, which gives Indra’s disguise a quiet edge: he arrives wearing the face of the husband of the woman whose story he is about to tell.
The gist: At Badarapachana, Bharadvaja’s daughter Shruvavati spends years in penance to win Indra for a husband. He comes disguised as Vasishtha, leaves her five jujubes to boil, walks off to a nearby crossing that afterwards carries his name, and holds the fruit back from softening. When her firewood runs out she feeds her own feet to the fire and her face does not change. Indra shows himself, promises her heaven and the crossing its name, and tells her the older story of the same place, where the seven Rishis left Arundhati through a twelve-year drought while she cooked jujubes for a disguised Mahadeva and never noticed the famine. Shruvavati becomes Indra’s spouse. Janamejaya asks about her birth and hears of Ghritachi and the leaf cup, and Balarama moves on toward the crossing of Sakta.
A hundred sacrifices and a new name for Indra, the earth given away as a fee, and the crossing where the sun took charge of every light in the sky
Vaishampayana said, the mighty chief of the Yadus went on from there to the tirtha of Indra, and he bathed in it by the rites laid down and gave away wealth and gems to the Brahmins. This was the ground on which the chief of the celestials had performed a hundred horse sacrifices, and on which he had given Brihaspati so much wealth that the counting of it was abandoned. Shakra carried out every one of those rites with the help of Brahmins who knew the Vedas, and he carried them out exactly as the scriptures prescribe. Nothing in them was stinted anywhere. Horses of every kind and every color were brought to the ground. The fees paid to the Brahmins were of a size that makes the ordinary word for giving inadequate. Chief of the Bharatas, when the hundredth of those sacrifices had been completed in due form, the splendid Shakra acquired a name he has carried ever since, and from that day he was called Satakratu, the lord of a hundred rites. And the auspicious and sacred crossing itself, which has the power to wash away every sin, came to be known after him as Indra-tirtha. Balarama bathed there in due form and then honored the Brahmins with presents of excellent food and excellent robes.
From there he went on to that auspicious and foremost of crossings which is called after the name of Rama. The Rama in question was of the race of Bhrigu, highly blessed, rich in ascetic merit, and he had subjugated the Earth again and again and killed the foremost of the Kshatriyas, going over the same ground until there was nothing left on it to conquer. Having achieved all of that, he performed a Vajapeya sacrifice at this tirtha, and a hundred horse sacrifices as well, with the help of his preceptor Kashyapa, best of the Munis. And there, Janamejaya, he gave his preceptor the whole earth with her oceans as the sacrificial fee. The land his axe had won he let go of at the end of a rite, in the presence of the priests, with no reservation made for himself. The great Rama bathed there in due form and made his presents to the Brahmins and worshiped them. Gems of many kinds, milch cows, elephants, female slaves, sheep and goats, all of it went out of his hands, and when it was finished he retired into the woods. Balarama bathed in that sacred and foremost of crossings, which is the resort of gods and of the regenerate Rishis, and he worshiped the ascetics who were living there in the proper way.
Then he proceeded to the tirtha called Yamuna. Lord of Earth, in days gone by the highly blessed Varuna, the son of Aditi, endued with great effulgence, performed the Rajasuya sacrifice at this crossing. That slayer of hostile heroes had first subjugated men in battle, and the celestials, and the Gandharvas, and the Rakshasas, and only then did he perform his grand sacrifice here. At the commencement of it a battle broke out between the gods and the Danavas that filled the three worlds with terror. And after the completion of that foremost of sacrifices, Janamejaya, a terrible battle followed among the Kshatriyas. A war stood at each end of the rite and the rite itself went forward between them, with the ordinances of peace being recited over the fire. The Rajasuya is the sacrifice a king performs to declare that he has no equal left above him, and the text records without comment that the declaration cost two wars, one before the fire was lit and one after it had gone out. The ever-liberal and puissant Baladeva worshiped the Rishis at that place and gave to everyone who asked him for anything. Filled with joy and praised by the great Rishis, the hero who always wore garlands of wild flowers and whose eyes were shaped like the leaves of the lotus then went on to the tirtha called Aditya.
There, best of kings, the adorable Surya of great splendor had performed a sacrifice and obtained by it the sovereignty of all the luminous bodies in the universe, and his own great energy along with it. Every light that moves across the sky answers to an office that was settled on this riverbank. In that crossing on the bank of the Sarasvati, all the gods reside with Vasava at their head, and the Vishvedevas, the Maruts, the Gandharvas and the Apsaras, and the Island-born Vyasa, and Shuka, and Krishna the slayer of Madhu, and the Yakshas, the Rakshasas and the Pishachas, king, and diverse others numbering by the thousand, all of them crowned with ascetic success. It is a crowded place for a place so quiet. Chief of the Bharatas, at this auspicious and sacred crossing of the Sarasvati, Vishnu himself performed his ablutions in days of old, after he had slain the Asuras Madhu and Kaitabha. The Island-born Vyasa, of virtuous soul, bathed at this tirtha too, Bharata, and obtained great Yoga powers and attained to high success. And the Rishi Asita-Devala, endued with great ascetic merit, bathed at this very tirtha with his soul rapt in high Yoga meditation, and he also obtained great Yoga powers, and his story is the one that follows.
A key to reading this (which Rama, and the crossing of Shakta): The pilgrim moving down the river in these pages is Balarama, and this book of the epic often shortens his name to Rama on its own. The crossing he reaches in this passage, however, belongs to a different man: Rama of Bhrigu’s race, the one who conquered the earth repeatedly and then handed it to Kashyapa as a fee. To keep the two apart, the traveler is called Balarama or Baladeva throughout these pages and the bare name Rama has been left to the son of Bhrigu’s line. There is a second small knot here. At the close of the previous section the text sends Baladeva toward the crossing of Shakta, and the very next line finds him bathing at the crossing of Indra. Shakta appears to be another form of Shakra, which is Indra himself, though the source never says so. It has been left standing as it is.
The gist: Balarama stops at four crossings along the Sarasvati and behind each one stands a sacrifice. At Indra’s tirtha the chief of the celestials completed a hundred horse sacrifices and earned the name he still carries, Satakratu. At the crossing named for Rama of Bhrigu’s race, that Rama performed a Vajapeya and a hundred horse sacrifices and gave his teacher Kashyapa the whole earth with her oceans as the fee, then went into the forest with nothing. At the Yamuna crossing Varuna, son of Aditi, performed the Rajasuya, with a war between gods and Danavas at its opening and a war among the Kshatriyas after its close. And at the Aditya crossing the sun performed a sacrifice and took charge of every luminous body in the sky; Vishnu bathed there after killing Madhu and Kaitabha, Vyasa bathed there and won his Yoga powers, and so did Asita-Devala.
The silent beggar who reached the ocean first, and Asita-Devala, who chased him through the worlds and came back with a different religion
Vaishampayana said, in that crossing there lived in days of old a Rishi of virtuous soul named Asita-Devala, who kept the duties of the householder. He was devoted to virtue, his life was pure and restrained, his ascetic merit was great, and he never injured anyone. In word, in deed and in thought his conduct toward all creatures was the same conduct. Anger did not reach him, monarch. Blame and praise weighed the same in his hand, the agreeable and the disagreeable found him in one attitude, and in that freedom from partiality he was like Yama himself. He looked with an equal eye on gold and on a heap of pebbles. Every day he worshiped the gods, and his guests, and the Brahmins who came to his door, and being always devoted to righteousness he kept the vow of brahmacarya. Then one day, monarch, an intelligent ascetic named Jaigishavya came to his asylum, a man devoted to Yoga, rapt in meditation, living on alms. That great ascetic of great splendor attained to success in his austerities while residing there in Devala’s own hermitage. For as long as the Muni stayed, Devala kept his eyes on him and never at any hour neglected his guest.
A long time passed for the two of them this way. Then one day Devala lost sight of Jaigishavya and could not find him anywhere on the grounds. At the hour of dinner, Janamejaya, the same righteous and intelligent ascetic appeared before him in the guise of a mendicant, soliciting alms. Devala showed his guest great honor at the sight, and after the rites laid down by the Rishis, to the full measure of his ability, he worshiped him with great attention for many years. One day, however, in the sight of the great Muni himself, a deep anxiety disturbed the heart of the high-souled Devala, and he thought within himself, many years have we passed in worshiping this ascetic, and this idle mendicant has not yet spoken to us a single word. Having thought this, the blessed Devala took up his earthen jug and set out through the welkin for the shores of the ocean. Bharata, when he reached the coast of that lord of rivers, the righteous-souled Devala found Jaigishavya standing there ahead of him. The lord Asita was filled with wonder at the sight and asked himself how the mendicant had come to the ocean and finished his ablutions before his own arrival. Then he performed his own ablutions in due form and began silently to recite the sacred mantras, and when the bathing and the prayers were finished, Janamejaya, he carried his earthen vessel back to his asylum full of water. As he stepped inside he saw Jaigishavya seated there. The great ascetic said no word to him at all, and went on living in his host’s asylum as though he were a piece of wood.
He had seen that ocean of austerities plunged in the sea before his own arrival, and now saw him returned to the hermitage before his own return. Witnessing this power that Jaigishavya’s penances had produced, king, Asita Devala of great intelligence began to turn the matter over. That best of ascetics wondered greatly and said, how could this one be seen in the ocean and again in my hermitage. While absorbed in these thoughts, Devala, who was conversant with mantras, soared up from his hermitage into the sky to establish who this mendicant really was. There he saw crowds of sky-ranging Siddhas rapt in meditation, and he saw Jaigishavya being reverentially worshiped by those Siddhas. Firm in his vows and persevering in his effort, Devala was filled with wrath at the sight. Then he watched the mendicant cross one region after another: heaven, the region of the Pitris, the region of Yama, the abode of Soma; the blessed regions of the performers of certain rigid sacrifices, the regions of the Agnihotris, the region of those who perform the Darsa and the Paurnamasa; then, out of the regions of men who sacrifice by killing animals, that pure region which the gods themselves worship; then the place of the ascetics who perform the Chaturmasya and rites of the same kind, the region of the performers of the Agnishtoma, the region of those who perform the Agnishutta; then the regions of those highly wise men who perform the Vajapeya and that other sacrifice in which a profusion of gold is required; then the regions of the Rajasuya and the Pundarika; then those of the horse sacrifice and of the sacrifice in which human beings are slaughtered; then those of the Sautramani and of that other rite for which the flesh, so difficult to procure, of all living animals is required; then the performers of the sacrifice called Dadasaha and others of similar character. Asita saw his guest next in the region of Mitravaruna, and then in that of the Adityas, and then passing through the regions of the Rudras, the Vasus and Brihaspati. Having soared next into the blessed region called Goloka, Jaigishavya was seen to pass into the regions of the Brahmasatris. Having crossed three further regions by his own energy, he went on toward the regions reserved for women who are chaste and devoted to their husbands. And at that point, chastiser of foes, Asita lost sight of him. Rapt in yoga, the foremost of ascetics vanished.
The highly blessed Devala reflected on the power of Jaigishavya, on the excellence of his vows, and on the unrivaled success of his yoga. Then the self-restrained Asita, with joined hands and in a reverential spirit, put a question to the foremost of the Siddhas in the regions of the Brahmasatris. I do not see Jaigishavya, he said. Tell me where that ascetic of great energy is. I wish to hear it, because my curiosity is great. The Siddhas said, listen, Devala of rigid vows, and we will tell you the truth. Jaigishavya has gone to the eternal region of Brahman. Hearing these words of the Siddhas who dwell in the regions of the Brahmasatris, Asita made an attempt to soar higher, and he fell almost at once. The Siddhas addressed him a second time and said, you are not competent, Devala, to proceed to the abode of Brahman, where Jaigishavya has gone. Hearing that, Devala came down, descending from one region to the next in due order, and he reached his own sacred asylum very quickly, like a winged insect. As soon as he entered it he saw Jaigishavya seated there. Beholding again that power, Devala reflected on it with his righteous understanding, and approaching the great ascetic with humility, king, he said, adorable one, I wish to adopt the religion of Moksha. Hearing these words, Jaigishavya gave him lessons. He taught him the ordinances of Yoga and the supreme and eternal duties and their reverse, and seeing him firmly resolved, that great ascetic performed all the acts that the rites ordain for admission into that religion.
Then all creatures, with the Pitris among them, beholding Devala resolved on the religion of Moksha, began to weep, saying, alas, who will give us food now. Hearing those lamentations resound through the ten points of the horizon, Devala set his heart on renouncing it again. At that, Bharata, all the sacred fruits and roots, and the flowers and the deciduous herbs in their thousands, began to weep in their turn, saying, the wicked-hearted and mean Devala will without doubt pluck us and cut us once again, and having assured every creature of his perfect harmlessness he does not see the wrong he now intends. At this, that best of ascetics began to reflect with the aid of his understanding, asking which of the two will be better for me, the religion of Moksha or that of Domesticity. Having reflected, best of kings, Devala abandoned the religion of Domesticity and adopted that of Moksha, and by that resolve, Bharata, he obtained the highest success and the highest Yoga. The celestials headed by Brihaspati applauded Jaigishavya and his penances. Then Narada, that foremost of ascetics, addressed the gods and said, there is no ascetic penance in Jaigishavya, since he filled Asita with wonder. The denizens of heaven answered Narada, who had said such frightful words, do not speak so of the great ascetic Jaigishavya, for in force of energy and penance and Yoga there is no one above this high-souled one, and no one equal to him either. Such was the power of Jaigishavya and of Asita. This is the place of those two, and this is their crossing. Bathing there and giving away wealth to the Brahmins, the high-souled wielder of the plow earned great merit and went on to the tirtha of Soma. There, Bharata, where the Lord of stars performed the Rajasuya in former days, a great battle was fought in which Taraka was the root of the evil. Bathing in that crossing and making many presents, the virtuous Bala of cleansed soul went on to the tirtha of the muni named Sarasvata, where during a drought that lasted twelve years the sage Sarasvata taught the Vedas to many of the foremost Brahmins.
A key to reading this (three places where the source knots itself): The long catalogue of regions Jaigishavya crosses includes the worlds won by sacrifices that kill animals, one sacrifice in which human beings are slaughtered, and one that requires the flesh of every living animal. The text offers no comment on any of them and sets them in the line of worlds a yogi rises through. They have been kept here, with no softening and no defense. Devala’s resolve turns three times on a single page: he asks for Moksha, prepares to give it up when the creatures weep, then gives up the householder’s life when the plants weep. And Narada’s remark contradicts itself, since he praises Jaigishavya by declaring that there is no penance in him, and the gods rebuke him. All three stand as the source has them.
The gist: Asita-Devala, a householder Rishi at the Aditya crossing who held gold and gravel to be the same weight, kept a silent beggar named Jaigishavya in his hermitage for years, fed him, honored him, and never once got a word out of him. The silence worked on him. He flew to the ocean with his water jug and found the beggar already bathed; he came home and found him seated inside like a block of wood. So he went up into the sky to find out who the man was, saw the Siddhas worshiping him, and watched him rise through heaven, through the worlds of every named sacrifice, through Goloka and the regions of the Brahmasatris, until he lost him. The Siddhas told him where Jaigishavya had gone and told him plainly that he could not follow. He fell back to his hermitage like an insect, found the beggar sitting where he had left him, and asked to be taught. Then the creatures wept that their food was ending and the plants wept that their cutter was returning, and between those two cries Devala gave up his household life.
The bones that became the thunderbolt, and the boy who gave the Vedas back
Janamejaya had been waiting for this one. Holy one, he said, why did the sage Sarasvata teach the Vedas to the rishis through those twelve years of drought, and where did he keep a knowledge that had fallen out of every other head in the world? Vaishampayana began a long way back from the answer. In an older age, he said, there lived a sage named Dadhica, brilliant and exact, master of his senses, holding to the discipline of a celibate student with the kind of steadiness that makes other people uneasy. His austerities grew until Shakra, watching from heaven, began to be afraid of him. The lord of the celestials understood the arithmetic of his own position perfectly well. A man who wants nothing can be offered nothing, and a man who can be offered nothing cannot be managed. Shakra sent inducements of every kind down to the riverbank and Dadhica did whatever he had been doing before they arrived. So the chastiser of Paka fell back on the instrument he kept for cases like this and sent the apsara Alambusa, whose beauty had broken the resolve of men with a great deal more to lose. She came to the bank of the Sarasvati at the hour when the high-souled sage stood in the water making his offering to the gods, and she let herself be seen. Looking at her, the ascetic of cleansed soul lost the vital seed he had guarded for a lifetime, and it fell into the river.
The Sarasvati did what no one had asked her to do. She caught it. Seeing that seed in her current, the river held it, and then held it in her womb, because she knew whose energy it was and knew that such energy does not get to be wasted. In time it grew into a child inside her, and she carried it carefully so that life would come into it, and when the season was right the foremost of rivers brought the boy into the world and went with him in her arms to the sage. Dadhica was sitting in an assembly of rishis when she arrived. She put the child into his hands and spoke in front of all of them. This is your son, she said, and devotion to you is the whole reason he exists. The seed that left you at the sight of Alambusa fell into my water, and I held it in my womb out of devotion to you, knowing that energy of yours could never come to nothing. He is faultless, he is yours, and I am giving him to you. The rishi took the child, and joy went through him so completely that for a moment the assembly might as well have been empty. He bent his head and smelled the crown of his son’s head the way fathers do, and he held the boy against his chest for a long time without saying anything. Then he turned to the river with a gift. From this day, blessed one, he said, the Vishvadevas and the rishis and every tribe of the gandharvas and the apsaras will take great happiness from libations of your water.
He was not finished. Filled with gladness, the sage praised her aloud, and those words are worth hearing exactly as he said them. You rose in the ancient days from the lake of Brahman, most blessed of rivers, and every ascetic of rigid vows knows your name. Your face is always gentle and you have done me an enormous good. This great child of yours, fair one, will be called Sarasvata, and he will be able to make new worlds, and he will carry your name through the ages as his own. In a drought that will stretch for twelve years, blessed Sarasvati, this Sarasvata will teach the Vedas to many of the foremost brahmanas. And by my grace, beautiful one, you will stand first among all the sacred rivers for as long as there are rivers. The great stream had been given her boons and her praise together, and she went away in high delight, taking the child with her. Meanwhile, a war broke out between the gods and the danavas, and Shakra went through all three worlds looking for a weapon. He found nothing. There was not a single instrument anywhere in creation of a quality that could kill the enemies of the celestials, and Shakra came back and told the gods so. The great asuras are beyond me, he said. Without the bones of Dadhica our foes will not fall. Go to that foremost of rishis, all of you, and ask him for them, and say to him plainly: give us your bones, Dadhica, and with them we will destroy our enemies.
They went and they asked, and the rishi did not stop to consider it for the length of a breath. He gave up his life on the spot. Having done what pleased the gods, he went to regions whose merit does not run out. Shakra, delighted, had his bones worked into weapons of many kinds, thunderbolts, discs, heavy maces, clubs and bludgeons, the whole armory of heaven struck from one body. That body deserves a word of its own. Dadhica had been begotten by the great rishi Bhrigu, son of the Lord of all creatures, out of austere penance, and he was the equal of the Creator in force. He had been made the strongest creature in the world, stout limbed, tall as the king of mountains, and the chastiser of Paka had been anxious about his energy from the beginning, which explains the apsara and explains everything that came after. With the thunderbolt born of brahma energy and charged with mantras, Indra made a noise that shook the sky when he threw it, and he killed ninety-nine heroes among the daityas. A long and dreadful stretch of time went past after that, and then the drought came, the one that lasted twelve years. Water failed, fuel failed, the offerings failed, and the great rishis scattered in every direction looking for something to eat.
Sarasvata watched them go and set his own heart on leaving. The river stopped him. You do not have to go anywhere, son, she said. I will feed you here myself, with large fish, every day. Stay. So he stayed, and he went on making his offerings of food to the rishis and to the gods, and he took his own meal from her hands, and in that way he supported himself and the celestials both through years when nobody else could support anything. When the twelve years finally broke, the great rishis came looking for one another and began asking for lectures on the Vedas, because wandering with empty stomachs had emptied them of the scriptures as well. Among all of them there was no longer one man who could follow a text through to its meaning. Then one of them happened on Sarasvata in a lonely forest, reading the Vedas with his whole attention gathered on the page, and went back to the assembly to report that there was a young ascetic out there of unrivaled splendor and the bearing of a god, and that he was reading. The rishis came in a body to that spot and spoke to him together. Teach us, sage. He answered them with the one condition that mattered to him. Become my disciples in the proper form. The conclave balked. Son, they said, you are far too young in years. He held his ground. I have to act in a way that does not reduce my own religious merit, he said. A man who teaches improperly and a man who learns improperly are both destroyed quickly, and they end by hating each other. The claim of a rishi to merit does not rest on age, or on decrepitude, or on wealth, or on the number of his kinsmen. The greatest among us is the one who can read the Vedas and understand them. That settled it. They became his disciples in the proper form, received their Vedas back from him, and began once more to praise their rites. Sixty thousand munis took initiation from Sarasvata for no other reason than to recover what hunger had taken. He was a boy, and every one of them obeyed him, and every one of them carried in a handful of grass and laid it down to make him a seat. The mighty son of Rohini, elder brother of Keshava, gave away wealth at that crossing and went on in good spirits toward another place, where an old woman had once lived who never went through the ceremony of marriage.
A key to reading this (where the thunderbolt came from): Indra’s vajra runs through the war books as the standard comparison for any weapon falling with unbearable speed, and this crossing is where it is made. No forge produced it and no god granted it. It came out of the skeleton of an ascetic who was asked for his bones and answered by dying, and the reason the gods knew to ask is that Indra had spent years worrying about how strong that particular body was. The twelve-year drought in the second half of the story is the same famine this parva has named before, the one in which the Vedas simply fall out of human memory, and the detail worth holding onto is that learning survives it because of food, and the food comes from the same river that gave birth to the man carrying the learning.
The gist: Janamejaya asks why Sarasvata taught the Vedas during the famine, and the answer begins with his birth. Indra, frightened by the austerities of the sage Dadhica, sent the apsara Alambusa; the sage’s seed fell into the Sarasvati, the river carried it to term and returned the boy to his father, and Dadhica gave her boons and praise and named the child after her. Later, in the war with the danavas, Indra could find no weapon anywhere that would work, so the gods asked Dadhica for his bones and he gave up his life without hesitating. The thunderbolt, the discs and the maces were made from him, and ninety-nine daitya heroes died by the first throw. Long after, the twelve-year drought scattered the rishis and stripped them of the Vedas, while the river kept Sarasvata fed on fish in one place. When it ended, sixty thousand munis became the disciples of a boy, each carrying a handful of grass for his seat, and took their scriptures back from him. Balarama gives his gifts and moves on toward the story of an unmarried old woman.
One night, by agreement, and the king who plowed a field until heaven gave in
Janamejaya wanted the rest of it. Holy one, he said, why did that maiden take herself off to penances in the old days? What was her reason and what was her vow? Everything you have told me so far is beyond compare and full of things I do not understand, so give me the particulars of how she came to that life. Vaishampayana said that there had been a rishi of abundant energy and considerable fame named Kuni-Garga. That foremost of ascetics practiced the most severe penances available to a man, and at the end of them he created a daughter with fair brows by an act of will, which is what the austerities had been for. He looked at what he had made and was filled with joy, and then he put his body down and went to heaven, leaving her behind in the world with no instruction about what to do next. She decided for herself. Faultless, gentle, with eyes like lotus petals, she took up severe and rigid penances of her own and worshiped the fathers and the gods with fasts, and a very long stretch of years went by in that practice. Her father had wanted to give her away to a husband while he lived. She had no appetite for marriage, because she had looked at the available men with the same clear eye she turned on everything else and had seen nobody worthy of her.
So she stayed in that solitary forest, wearing her body down with austerities, keeping up her service to the fathers and the gods. Age took her in one direction and the penances took her in another, and by any ordinary reckoning her life was hard, and she considered herself happy in it. The end of the arithmetic arrived anyway. There came a day when she could no longer move a single step without a hand under her arm, and she understood what that meant and set her heart on departing for the other world. Narada saw her preparing to cast off the body and came to her with news she had no way to anticipate. Sinless one, he said, there are no regions of blessedness waiting for you, because you never cleansed yourself with the rite of marriage. We have heard this said in heaven, lady of great vows. Your austerities have been enormous and your claim on those regions is nothing at all. It is difficult to imagine a harder thing to hear at the end of a life spent exactly as she had spent hers, and the source gives her no speech of protest. She went instead, old as she was, to a concourse of rishis, and made them a straightforward offer. I will give half my penances to the man who accepts my hand in marriage.
A rishi named Sringavat, the son of Galava, took the offer, and attached a condition to it. On this understanding I will accept your hand, beautiful lady, he said: that you live with me for one night only. She agreed to the compact and gave him her hand. The son of Galava poured the libations on the fire according to the ordinances and married her properly, with nothing skipped. And on that night she became a young woman of the fairest complexion, dressed in celestial attire, wearing celestial ornaments and garlands, smeared with celestial unguents and perfumes, blazing with a beauty that had been waiting inside all those years of dust and fasting. Seeing her like that, the son of Galava became very happy, and he passed one night in her company, which was the length of time he had asked for. At dawn she held him to it. The compact I made with you has been fulfilled, brahmana, she said. Blessings on you. I am going now. She asked his leave and he gave it, and then she turned back with one more thing to say, a boon for the crossing itself. Whoever passes one night at this tirtha with his attention gathered, having gratified the dwellers in heaven with libations of water, will obtain the merit of a man who keeps the vow of brahmacarya for fifty-eight years. Having said that, she departed for heaven, and she was gone.
Her husband did not recover. He kept turning the memory of her beauty over in his mind, and it emptied everything else of interest. Because of the compact he had made, he accepted his half of her penances with difficulty, having received the smaller share of the bargain in every way that counted. Then he cast off his body and followed her, driven by sorrow, pulled after her by the sight of one night. That, said Vaishampayana, is the whole glorious history of the old maid, her brahmacarya and her auspicious departure. And it was at that crossing, in the middle of that story, that Baladeva heard of the slaughter of Shalya. He made his presents to the brahmanas there and then gave way to grief for the king the Pandavas had killed in battle, a man he had known and liked. Afterward the hero of Madhu’s race came out of the environs of Samantapanchaka and asked the rishis what had happened at Kurukshetra. They told the lion of Yadu’s race everything, in order, exactly as it had fallen out. Then they told him something about the ground he was standing on. Rama, they said, this Samantapanchaka is called the eternal northern altar of Brahman, the Lord of all creatures. The dwellers in heaven, who give great boons, performed a great sacrifice here in the old days. And the high-souled Kuru, foremost of royal sages, of great intelligence and immeasurable energy, cultivated this field for many years, and that is why men call it Kurukshetra, the field of Kuru. Rama asked the obvious question. Why did he cultivate it? Tell me, sages, you who are rich in penances. I want to hear this from you.
In the old days, the rishis said, Kuru was down in this soil, tilling it, day after day, with a persistence nobody could account for. Shakra came down from heaven to ask him about it. Why are you employed in this task with such perseverance, king? What purpose are you plowing toward, royal sage? Kuru answered him without stopping. Lord of a hundred sacrifices, the men who die on this plain will be cleansed of their sins and will go to the regions of blessedness. Shakra laughed at that and went back to heaven. The royal sage was not discouraged in the slightest, and went on tilling. Shakra came down again, got the same answer, and went away laughing again, and this happened over and over, and Kuru absorbed every visit and kept working. Watching the king drive his furrow with that unflagging steadiness, Shakra finally summoned the celestials and described to them what the man was doing. The gods heard Indra out and then came to the point that had been sitting under this all along. Stop the royal sage, Shakra of the thousand eyes, by granting him a boon, if you can manage it. If men can reach heaven by dying in one place, without ever performing a sacrifice to us, our whole existence is in danger. Instructed in this fashion, Shakra went back down to Kuru and spoke very differently. Stop toiling. Act according to my words. Those who die here with their senses awake, abstaining from food, and those who fall here in battle, king, will go to heaven. They will enjoy the blessings of heaven, great soul. And Kuru, hearing it, answered Shakra with two words. So be it. The slayer of Vala took his leave and went back to heaven at speed with a light heart, and that, foremost of Yadu’s race, is how the royal sage of the old days tilled this plain, and how Shakra came to promise great merit to everyone who casts off a body here.
A key to reading this (the ground under the conversation): Balarama is hearing the history of Kurukshetra while standing at the edge of Kurukshetra, eighteen days after the war ended there, at the hour when the two students he taught the mace to are facing each other with those maces in their hands. The sages are explaining that the sanctity of this plain was manufactured by a king with a plow, and that Indra confirmed it only when the celestials worked out that a place where dying is enough would put them out of business. Every claim made elsewhere in the epic about the war dead going straight to heaven rests on the boon granted at the end of this passage.
The gist: Kuni-Garga created a daughter by an act of will and then went to heaven. She spent her whole life in austerities, refused marriage for lack of a worthy husband, and grew so old she could not take a step unaided. Narada told her that without the marriage rite her penances bought her no regions of blessedness, so she offered half of them to any man who would take her hand. Sringavat, the son of Galava, accepted on the condition of a single night. She became young and radiant for that night, and in the morning she left for heaven, giving the crossing a boon: one night here equals fifty-eight years of brahmacarya. Her husband followed her out of grief. At that same crossing Baladeva learned that Shalya had been killed, and after leaving Samantapanchaka he asked the rishis what had happened at Kurukshetra. They told him, and then told him why the field carries Kuru’s name: the king plowed it for years under Indra’s open mockery, until the gods grew afraid for their sacrifices and sent Indra back with the boon that made the plain what it is.
Source: the Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Shalya Parva, Hradapravesha and Gada-yuddha sub-parvas, Sections 23-64. The Gita Press Hindi edition is the controlling witness. The Sanskrit e-text and an independent complete translation were used to verify names, sequence, and principal events. Where recensions differ, this retelling follows Gita Press.
Based on: The Mahabharata, Vyasa (Gita Press, Gorakhpur)