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Over the ghats of Kashi the smoke of funeral pyres climbed toward the sky, and in some corner of that same city the devotees of Kaal Bhairav stayed awake through the whole night, their minds fixed on him. Nandishvara first described to Sanatkumara the Bhairava incarnation of Lord Shankara, and then he began to speak.
The glory of Kaal Bhairav
On the eighth day of the dark fortnight of the month of Margashirsha, Lord Shankara took on the form of Bhairava. For that reason, the person who fasts near Kaal Bhairav on that lunar day and keeps vigil through the night is released from every sin. Whoever observes this vow with devotion is freed from even the gravest sins and reaches a good destiny, and the sins committed across millions of lifetimes are torn out by the root at the mere sight of Kaal Bhairav. But whoever brings harm to a devotee of Kaal Bhairav suffers in this very life and then falls into a wretched fate.
In Kashi this worship carries a special power. The one who lives there and still does not sing the praises of Kaal Bhairav watches his sins swell like the moon in its waxing fortnight, and the one who does not worship this lord of time on every Tuesday, on the eighth day of the dark fortnight, sees his merit dwindle like the moon in its waning fortnight. This story sets aside the famous account of how Kaal Bhairav severed Brahma’s head and carried the skull-vow. Here the episode is told for his glory, and for the fruit that his worship bears in Kashi.
A longing on the banks of the Narmada
This is an old story. On the lovely bank of the Narmada there stood a city called Narmapur. In it lived a sage named Vishvanara. Born into the lineage of Shandilya, he was supremely pure, a soul of great merit, a devotee of Shiva, and a master of his senses, and he remained always absorbed in the brahmayajna. He married a virtuous young woman named Shuchishmati, and, performing the duties proper to a brahmin, he lived a life dear to the gods and to the ancestors.
After a great deal of time had passed, one day Shuchishmati, who kept a noble vow, spoke to her husband. “My lord,” she said, “every joy that a woman is fit to know, I have known by your grace, here at your side. Yet one longing has settled in my heart for many days now, and it is a fitting longing for one who keeps a household. Master, if I am worthy of a boon and you are willing to grant it, give me a son like Maheshwara. Beyond this I wish for nothing.”
Hearing his wife’s words, Vishvanara fell silent for a moment. He turned it over in his mind: what a rare boon this slender woman had asked for, one that lay far beyond even his own hopes. Then a certainty came to him. Shiva is able to accomplish anything; it seemed that Shambhu himself had settled upon her lips and spoken through her, for who else could have prompted such a boon?
The child in the Viresha linga
Having reassured his wife, the sage, faithful to his one marriage, set out for Varanasi and began to worship the Viresha linga of Lord Shiva through fierce austerity. For a full year he honored that linga with devotion three times each day. When the thirteenth month arrived, one morning he bathed in the Ganga, she of the three paths, and the moment he came to Viresha he saw a boy of eight years standing in the middle of the linga, his body smeared with sacred ash. The little child’s eyes reached back toward his ears, a deep red glowed on his lips, beautiful yellow matted locks graced his head, and laughter played across his face. Wearing the ornaments of a child and the ash of the funeral pyre, he laughed in his own play and recited the hymns of the shruti.
The instant he saw the boy, Vishvanara felt his life fulfilled. His body thrilled with joy, and as he said again and again, “I bow to you, I bow to you,” his heart brimmed over. Then, folding his hands, he began to praise Shambhu in that child’s form. “Bhagavan, you alone are the one Brahman without a second. This entire world is your form, and there is nothing else here. No being exists apart from Rudra, and so we take refuge in you alone. You are one, yet you pervade many forms, and still you stand beyond all form. The coolness in water, the heat in fire, the gladness in the moon, the fragrance in a flower, all of it is your form. You are the lord of Gauri’s life, clothed in the directions, supremely serene, and you are the child, the youth, and the old man, all of these at once. What thing is there in which you are not present? We bow our head at your feet.”
Having praised him with these eight verses, Vishvanara was about to fall to the ground when Shiva, in that child’s form, older than the oldest, grew deeply pleased and spoke. “Best of sages, today you have satisfied us. Ask for some excellent boon.” Vishvanara joined his hands and said that nothing is hidden from one who knows all, and so let him grant whatever he himself thought right. Then Mahadeva, in the form of the child, said, “The longing you carry in your heart for your wife Shuchishmati will be fulfilled within a few days. We ourselves will appear as your son, born from Shuchishmati’s womb, and our name will be Grihapati. Whoever recites this sacred hymn you have spoken, three times a day for a year, will have every desire fulfilled. This hymn grants sons, grandsons, and wealth, and it destroys every calamity.” With these words the boy vanished, and Vishvanara returned home with a joyful heart.
Grihapati’s birth and Narada’s warning
Home again, Vishvanara recounted the whole episode to his wife, and Shuchishmati praised her own good fortune. In time she conceived, and when the eighth month came the sage had the simanta rite performed for her according to the proper form. Then, in an auspicious hour, Lord Shankara appeared as a son from Shuchishmati’s womb. In that moment the directions grew clear, the clouds rained down flowers, the drums of the gods sounded, and the water of the rivers ran pure. Rishis, sages, gods, yakshas, kinnaras, and vidyadharas came bearing auspicious gifts. Brahma himself performed the boy’s birth rite, and, weighing his features and his grasp of the Veda, on the eleventh day he gave him the name Grihapati. Then all the gods blessed him and returned, each to his own world.
Vishvanara carried out all the boy’s rites in their season and taught him the Veda. In his ninth year, while Grihapati was serving his mother and father, Narada arrived. The boy, along with his parents, bowed to him. Narada studied the lines of his palm, his tongue, his palate, and the other marks, and said, “Sage Vishvanara, your son is greatly blessed; every limb of his is filled with auspicious signs. Yet there is one matter. Even the Creator himself will have to protect him. In his twelfth year a grave danger of lightning or fire will fall upon him.” Having said this, Narada departed for the world of the gods.
The moment he heard this, Vishvanara beat his chest and fainted with grief for his son. Shuchishmati too broke into loud weeping. Seeing his mother and father sunk in such sorrow, the boy born of a portion of Shankara smiled and said, “Mother, Father, why do you weep? If we touch the dust of your feet to our body and guard it, then even Time can lay no power upon us, so what is this trifling death? Hear our vow. If we are truly your son, we will make such an effort that Death itself takes fright; we will worship Mrityunjaya and conquer even Mahakala.” The boy’s words fell like a rain of nectar out of season, and hearing them the grief of both husband and wife departed. They said, “Son, go to the shelter of that Shiva who is the maker of Brahma and the rest, the guardian jewel of the universe.”
Indra’s deception and the boon of Agnishvara
Receiving his parents’ leave, Grihapati bowed to them, walked around them in reverence, offered them his reassurance, and set out for that city of Varanasi which even gods like Brahma and Narayana find hard to reach and which Vishvanatha keeps under his protection. Arriving there, he went first to Manikarnika, bathed according to the rite, took the darshan of Vishvanatha, and, sinking into pure bliss, bowed to Shiva, the protector of the three worlds. Then, on an auspicious day, he installed a shivalinga and, with one hundred and eight pots filled with the holy water of the Ganga, bathed Shiva and took upon himself vows so severe that ordinary people would have found them impossible. A year passed like this, spent in austerity with his mind fixed on Shiva.
When the twelfth year from his birth arrived, making Narada’s word come true, Indra the bearer of the thunderbolt came to Grihapati and said, “Best of the twice-born, we are Indra, and we have come pleased with your vow. Ask for a boon, and we will grant whatever you desire.” Grihapati answered, “Maghavan, we know that you are Indra who wields the thunderbolt, but we do not wish to ask a boon of you. Our boon-giver will be Shankara alone.” Indra replied that Shankara was no different from himself, that he was the king of the gods, and that Grihapati should set aside his folly and ask. Then Grihapati answered without wavering, “Pakashasana, are you not the very one who destroyed Ahalya’s chastity and made himself the enemy of the mountains? We will beg before no god other than Pashupati.”
At this, Indra’s eyes turned red with anger. He raised his terrible thunderbolt and began to threaten and frighten the boy. Seeing that thunderbolt wreathed in flashes of lightning, Grihapati remembered Narada’s words and fainted with fear. At that very moment Shambhu, the lord of Gauri and the protector of the helpless, appeared before him, and, restoring him to life, said, “Child, rise, rise; may all be well with you.” Like a lotus that had closed for the night, Grihapati’s eyes opened, and he saw standing before him Shambhu, more radiant than hundreds of suns. A third eye upon his brow, a blue mark at his throat, Girija at his left side, the moon on his head, great matted locks, a trident and the Ajagava bow in his hands, a body fair as camphor, and the hide of an elephant for a garment. When, by the marks the scriptures give and by the words of his guru, he recognized that this was Mahadeva himself, tears of joy spilled from his eyes, his throat closed, and he stood as still as a mountain. When he could manage neither praise nor a bow, Shiva smiled and spoke.
“Grihapati, it seems you took fright at Indra the thunderbolt-bearer. Child, do not be afraid. Upon our devotee neither Indra nor his thunderbolt has any hold, and Yama himself can lay none either. This was only a test we set for you; it was we who took the form of Indra and frightened you. Now we grant you a boon. From this day you will hold the office of fire and become the giver of boons to all the gods. You will move within every living being as the fire of the belly, and as a guardian of the directions you will hold a realm between Dharmaraja and Indra. This shivalinga you have installed will be renowned under your name as Agnishvara. Its devotee will know no fear of lightning or of fire, no sickness of feeble digestion, and no untimely death, and whoever worships Agnishvara in Kashi, wherever fate may bring his death, will in the end be established in the world of fire.”
Having said this, Shiva summoned Grihapati’s kinsmen and, in the presence of his mother and father, anointed him to the station of a guardian of the directions, and then he himself merged into that linga. This fire is the visible, radiant image of Shambhu, which creates, sustains, and dissolves the world. Through it the incense, the lamp, and the food offering are received, and the gods enjoy them in heaven. Whatever is impure becomes pure the instant fire touches it, and for this reason fire is called Pavaka, the purifier.
Source: Shiva Purana (Gita Press, abridged Shivapurana edition), Shatarudra Samhita