The duty of the Guru of a kingdom is to perform all types of worship, oblations and spiritual administration. Biswarup had three heads. While performing oblations (यज्ञ) he used to give it the spiritual share of the offerings (यज्ञà¤ाग) to Devas, Danavs(demons) and Humans. As per rules spiritual shares of oblations were supposed to be given to the Devas only to increase their celestial power. But secretly Biswarup was giving the spiritual shares of the oblations to the Danavs (demons) and the Humans to make them powerful enough to take over heaven. Somehow Indradev comprehended the intention of Biswarup and killed him. But Biswarup was a brahmin by birth and killing a brahmin is sinful to the highest degree called the sin of 'Brahmahatya' (ब्रह्म हत्या). Getting free of such sins is next to impossible.
Unfortunately, Indradev committed Brahmahatya and to add to his misfortune the sin appeared in the form of a huge smoky figure having three heads like the heads of Biswarup. It wanted to swallow Indradev. Devraj Indra fled heaven and tried to hide. But the sin followed him everywhere. Brahmahatya is such a grave sin that nobody wanted to give him shelter. Being helpless he entered into a huge pond where the sin was unable to enter and remained there for three hundred years. During all this time, the smoky figure kept waiting for him on the brink of the pond.
In the meantime, heaven being kingless faced many problems. On the advice of Devarshi Narad, the Devas selected Nahush as Indra the king of heaven. He had completed 99 Aswamedh Yajna (अश्वमेध यज्ञ most difficult oblation). But after being made the king of heaven Nahush gradually became arrogant and lustful. One day out of lust he wanted Sachi the queen of heaven, the wife of real Indra. He asked his councillors that in spite of his becoming Indradev, Sachi was not giving him company. He asked them to take him to her. Sachi realised the bad intention of Nahush and kept a condition before him to accompany him to the palace. She wanted him to come to her sitting on a mount (वाहन) which can never be used as a mount and then only she would allow him physical favour.
After thinking a lot Nahush decided to go to her sitting on the back of Rishis using them as his mount. Accordingly, he selected some Rishis and went to her sitting on the back of them. On the way, the Rishis moving slowly uttered the word 'sarpa sarpa'(सर्प सर्प). The word sarpa has two meanings. One is 'to move faster' and the other is 'snake'.
Seeing his cruel behaviour out of lustfulness, the Rishis threw him from their back and cursed them to become a snake. Nahush fell down to earth and became a python and heaven became kingless again. Now the Devas searched intensely for Devguru who had left heaven after being insulted by the real Indradev and found him. On being informed about the situation of heaven he agreed to go to that pond where Indra was hiding from the smoky form. Reaching the pond he called Indradev aloud. Indra came out recognising the voice of Brihaspati. He begged forgiveness for the mistake he had committed.
Brihaspati, being moved by his prayer, assured him to rescue him from the misery. He requested the sin to leave Indradev for killing Biswarup to protect the Devas and the heaven from the demons. But the sin refused to let Indra go. So the Devas jointly prayed to Lord Brahma to solve the problem. Lord Brahma appeared and requested the 'Brahmahatya sin' to cooperate to which he couldn't refuse. He agreed to release Indradev provided somebody bears the sin of Indradev. So Brihaspati divided the sin into four parts and prayed to Mother Earth, Trees, Water and the Female gender to accept one part each. Initially, they were reluctant but agreed later. As they were not responsible for the sin and the sacrifice was for the sake of the universe, Lord Brahma imparted the knowledge to release themselves from the effect of sin. Then Indradev came out of the water body and returned to heaven with the Devas including Brihaspati and took the charge of heaven.
BRITTASUR(वृत्तासुर) - After the return of Indradev the occasion was lavishly celebrated in heaven which made Vishwakarma more sad and depressed. He decided to take revenge on Indradev for the death of his son Biswarup and went to the forest for severe penance(तपस्या). For a long time, Vishwakarma observed penance sacrificing everything including food and water to please Lord Brahma. His sacrifices became so severe that Brahma couldn't sit peacefully anywhere. So he appeared before Vishwakarma and asked for his wish.
Vishwakarma prayed to be blessed with a very very powerful, strong and huge son who would be able to defeat the Devas and be capable of killing all of them including Indradev. Lord Brahma granted the boon uttering the word Tathastu (तथास्तु) and left the spot. By the power of the boon instantly a huge figure appeared before Vishwakarma. He was named Britta and later on he was called Brittasur. He used to grow two feet every day and that way he became a gigantic demon having numerous miraculous power and enormous strength.
His aim was to destroy the ashrams (hermitage) and inhabitants to send the message to Indra about his arrival as his ultimate aim was to kill the Devas and destroy heaven. The arrival of Brittasur encouraged the demons in the lower world to take revenge on the Devas with his help. So all the demons excluding Bali went to Brittasur. They united to disrupt the growth of the universe. On being severely harassed by the demon, the Rishis prayed to Lord Brahma to save them. Lord Brahma asked the Devas to attack the demon and kill him. The Devas expressed their inability to do that. They had left their weapons in the ashram of Maharishi Dadhichi while Indradev was hiding from Brahmahatya sin.
Lord Brahma instructed them to go to Dadhichi and bring back the weapons. At the ashram, the Devas have welcomed things like tiger and deers, snake and mongoose, cow and lions etc were residing there together without harming each other from which they realised the depth of the austerity the Rishi. When they requested the Rishi to give back their weapons the Rishi informed them that he had absorbed all the weapons into his body as they didn't return back for a long period in anticipation of theft or misuse. So the Devas returned back to Brahma who advised them to go to Dadhichi again and ask him the bones of his body to make weapons.
The power of their weapons had got absorbed in it. But Indradev was reluctant because he had already suffered the consequence of the killing of a Brahmin. Since Rishi Dadhichi was a brahmin he would have to face the Brahmahatya sin again. Brittasur was also a brahmin because he was the son of Vishwakarma. Knowing his reluctance, Lord Brahma explained that the death of Dadhichi and Brittasur would be in the interest of the universe to save it from the demon.
The Devas again went to the Rishi and found him with the company of his wife Subacha. They paid respect to both of them and sat there silently. Dadhichi realised the discomfort of the Devas and asked Subacha to go inside. Then Devas prayed to him to donate his bones to them for the killing of Britta. Realising the importance of their request he agreed and started the process of Samadhi (the highest state of meditation) to leave his body and within some time his soul left the body liberated. For his sacrifice, Maharishi Dadhichi is remembered forever. Now the Devas invited Kamdhenu, the divine cow to make the body fleshless with her power of will. They then left the ashram and made different powerful weapons from the bones. The backbone was used for making the dangerous weapon Vajra Astra and from the head, another weapon 'Brahmashira' was made.
In the meantime when Subarcha, wife of the Rishi found out the reason for his death, she cursed the Devas to remain childless forever and sat down under a Pipal (पिप्पल) tree for meditation. During that time she was pregnant and in due time she gave birth to a baby boy who instantly transformed into a small boy. The boy was emanating a glow in his face. His mother instructed him to sit in meditation under that Pipal tree and she herself went back to samadhi and left her body to get united with her husband Dadhichi. This boy became a great sage. He was called Pippalad (पिप्पलाद) because of his connection with the Pipal tree.
When the Devas finished making the weapons from Dadhichi's bones they prepared themselves and moved to the earth for the war with Britta and his demonic force. Reaching the middle of the earth they started drumming heavily to challenge Brittasur for war. Hearing the sound, Britta came with his army and attacked the Devas. The furious demon Namuchi challenged Indradev. Indra attacked him with his mace (गदा), spear ( शूल) and other weapons, but nothing could harm Namuchi. At last, he hit the demon with his Vajra but to no avail. When the Vajra failed to harm Namuchi he felt very hopeless. The demon was laughing at him without hitting back because he knew that no weapons could kill him due to the power of a boon received by him.
At that time a voice from the sky announced that Namuchi can be killed only by throwing foams at him. Then Indradev ran towards the sea very fast and started sucking foams from the sea. Namuchi also reached there and got infuriated when he saw Indra sucking foams and attacking him. In retaliation, Indra threw the sucked foam from his mouth at the demon and at the touch of foams on his body Namuchi died there. On being informed about the death of Namuchi by the demons, Brittasur came to the front. His mountain like gigantic figure frightened Indra and the Devas. Still, they tried to fight him back. Nothing could work against Britta. Weapons of the Devas were like feathers for his huge body.
Feeling helpless Indradev asked Brihaspati to find a way to defeat Britta. The Guru advised him to perform a special puja (worship) of Lord Shiva called Pradosh Brata. Indra advising his army to check Britta for some time went to perform the puja. After completion, he returned back to the battlefield. Seeing Indra the demon moved towards him with his huge mouth open. Indra tried to stop him but the demon moved forward and swallowed Indra together with his elephant Airawat and this baffled the Devas. They fled the battlefield and went straight to Lord Brahma and described him about Indradev. Lord Brahma through his 'Dhyanshakti' (deep meditation) came to know the reason for the incident. He explained to the Devas that Indra had made some mistakes in the performance of the Pradosh Brata for appeasing Lord Shiva and asked the Devas to complete the worship of Shivji abiding by all the rules properly. When the puja was completed by the Devas, the grace of Lord Shiva made Indradev in the stomach of Brittasur powerful. He ripped apart the belly of the demon using the Vajra and came out of the belly of the demon. Thus the demon Brittasur was killed by Indradev.
Source: Skand Puran
){kind=link}
0 Comments
Please maintain social respect and ethics. IF you have any suggestion, doubt or question about the post or the blog please let me know. Thank you.