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Skandha 5, adhyayas 4-6 · Saptah day 3
Before walking naked into the wilderness as an avadhuta, the royal sage Rishabhadeva warns his hundred sons not to waste a human birth.
On the bank of the Ganga, the sixteen-year-old sage **Shukadeva Goswami** opens the fifth book of the Srimad Bhagavatam for **King Parikshit**—the Kuru emperor cursed to die in seven days—by tracing the lineage of **Priyavrata**, the elder brother of Dhruva's father Uttanapada (`5.1–3`). Although Priyavrata had initially resolved to remain a lifelong celibate at the feet of Devarshi Narada, Lord Brahma descended to tell him that until the mind rests completely in the lotus feet of Hari, even a forest hermit carries his six sense-enemies with him, whereas a self-realized soul remains unstained even in household rule (`5.1.11–19`). Obeying Brahma, Priyavrata ruled the earth, drove his blazing chariot behind the sun for seven nights to turn darkness into day, and carved with his chariot rims the seven concentric island-continents (`sapta-dvipa`) and seven oceans of the terrestrial plane (`5.1.30–33`).
From Priyavrata came **Agnidhra**, ruler of `Jambudvipa`, and from Agnidhra came **King Nabhi**, ruler of the southern land then called `Ajanabha-varsha` (`5.2–3`). Longing for a son equal to the Supreme Lord Himself, King Nabhi and his queen **Merudevi** performed a sacrifice with such pure devotion that Lord Vishnu appeared in the sacrificial arena (`5.3.2–15`). When the officiating priests confessed that even while praying for a worldly boon they were ashamed except that the king wished a son *like* the Lord, Bhagavan smiled: since no one in the universe is equal to Me (`5.3.17`), I Myself shall descend as a partial incarnation (`amsa-avatara`) in Queen Merudevi's womb to show the path of the self-satisfied sages (`5.3.17–20`).
Thus was born **Lord Rishabhadeva** (`5.4.1–5`), marked from birth with the thunderbolt and lotus on His soles, overflowing with equanimity, peace, detachment, and bliss. This episode (`5.4–6`) follows Rishabhadeva's reign, His famous farewell discourse (`Upadeshamrita`) to His **hundred sons** led by the eldest, **Bharata**, and His silent departure into the wilderness as a naked `avadhuta` sage.
Seeing how citizens and ministers adored young Rishabhadeva even in childhood, King Nabhi crowned Him emperor and retired with Queen Merudevi to Badarikashrama to worship Lord Nara-Narayana (`5.4.4–5`). Yet when Indra grew envious of Rishabhadeva's splendor and withheld rain from `Ajanabha-varsha`, the Lord of Yoga simply smiled in compassion and by His own spiritual potency (`atma-yoga-maya`) showered abundant rain across His realm (`5.4.3`).
To model household dharma for the world, Rishabhadeva accepted in marriage the radiant maiden **Jayanti**, presented to Him by Indra himself, and by her fathered a **hundred sons** exactly like Himself in stature and virtue (`5.4.8`). - The eldest and foremost of all hundred was the great yogi **Bharata** (`5.4.9`), out of whose glorious reign the land formerly called `Ajanabha-varsha` came to be celebrated across the worlds as **Bharata-varsha**. - Following Bharata were nine heroic princes (`Kushavarta`, `Ilavarta`, `Brahmavarta`, `Malaya`, `Ketu`, `Bhadrasena`, `Indrasprik`, `Vidarbha`, and `Kikata`) who ruled the nine islands of Bharata (`5.4.10`). - Next were the **Nine Yogis** (`Nava-yogendras`—`Kavi`, `Hari`, `Antariksha`, `Prabuddha`, `Pippalayana`, `Avirhotra`, `Drumila`, `Chamasa`, and `Karabhajana`), the great teachers of `Bhagavata-dharma` who roam the universe naked and fearless and later instruct King Nimi of Videha in the eleventh book (`5.4.11–12`; `11.2–5`). - And the remaining **eighty-one younger sons**, utterly obedient to their father's command, mastered Vedic sacrifice, extreme purity, and self-restraint, becoming the ancestral line of ritualist **brahmanas** (`5.4.13`).
Though completely free of karma and self-realized as the Lord Himself, Rishabhadeva governed His kingdom as if watching a play, modeling every rule of righteousness for householders (`5.4.14–16`). Finally, gathering His hundred sons in the sacred assembly at `Brahmavarta` before the brahmarshis and citizens so that all might hear how to rule and live, He delivered the celebrated instruction of `5.5.1–27`.
Rishabhadeva opened with a verse that rings like a bell through the entire Bhagavata tradition (`5.5.1`): **"My dear boys, this rare human body (`dehah`) in the mortal world is not meant for exhausting labor after sense pleasures (`kama-bhogah`), which belong even to hogs eating excrement (`viḍ-bhujām`)! Rather, this body is meant for divine austerity (`tapo divyam`), by which the heart is purified (`sattvam shudhyet`) and from which arises unending spiritual bliss (`brahma-saukhyam tv anantam`)!"**
How does that purification begin? The wise have declared (`5.5.2`) that **service to the great souls (`mahat-seva`) is the open doorway to liberation (`vimukti-dvaram`)**, whereas association with those attached to women and family enjoyment (`yoṣitāṁ saṅgi-saṅgam`) is the doorway to darkness (`tamo-dvaram`). Who are the true great souls? Those who remain equal toward all creatures, peaceful, free of anger, friendly, and righteous (`5.5.2`), or those whose sole life-goal is love (`kama`) for Lord Vasudeva (`5.5.3`) and who never discuss worldly houses, wives, children, and wealth except what barely sustains the body (`5.5.3`).
When a person instead believes that chasing sense objects is the purpose of life, his mind grows wild and reckless (`pramattah`), he commits wicked deeds (`vikarma`), andsolely to enjoy momentary bodily pleasures he builds up a fresh mountain of karma that forces him back into another material body (`5.5.4–6`). As long as he fails to inquire into the truth of the Self (`na jijnasata atma-tattvam`), his consciousness remains veiled by ignorance, and his own mind constructs wave after wave of action (`5.5.5–6`).
Look at how the **knot of the heart (`hridaya-granthi`)** is tied (`5.5.7–9`): even a learned man has his wisdom stolen by delusion when a man and woman unite; around their attachment to each other grow houses, fields, sons, relatives, and wealth (`griha-kshetra-suta-apta-vittaih`), binding them tighter every day (`5.5.8`). Only when that hard knot of ego (`ahankara`) in the heart relaxes does a soul turn back from the mirage of "mine", cast off the gunas and the root of action through devotion to Vasudeva and detachment from sense objects, and reach the supreme stage (`paramahamsyam`, `5.5.9–13`).
Then Rishabhadeva issued a solemn warning to every leader, teacher, and parent (`5.5.18`): **"One should never become a guru, nor a kinsman (`svajanah`), nor a father, nor a mother, nor a worshipable deity (`daivam`), nor a husband, if one cannot deliver one's dependents from the jaws of repeated birth and death (`na mochayed yah samupeta-mrityum`)!"**
My heart is hard to fathom (`durvibhavyam`), He told His sons (`5.5.19–27`): notice why I said earlier that My heart (`hridayam`) is dharma itself and My back (`prishtham`) has flung adharma behind! Therefore, all of you must look upon your eldest brother **Bharata** with pure devotion (`anuvrittya`),for seeing you equals serving the people (`prajaguptih`, `5.5.20`). Among all things moving and unmoving, conscious beings are higher than dry plants; animals with breath are higher still; intelligent humans are higher than beasts; ghosts, Gandharvas, Siddhas, and the attendants of the gods are higher still; the gods headed by Indra are higher than they; the sons of Brahma headed by Daksha are higher still; among them Rudra (Shiva) is supreme; and even Brahma himself is below Me, because Brahma worships the **brahmanas** (`5.5.21–22`). And yet, O assembly (`5.5.23–25`), **I do not see a single being in this universe equal to the peaceful, selfless brahmanas** (`na brahmanais tulaye bhutam anyat`): whatever people offer into their pure mouths with faith, I relish more joyfully than oblations poured into the blazing sacrificial fire (`agnihotram`), for in them hang the timeless Vedas fortified by the eight virtues of peace, self-control, truth, mercy, austerity, forbearance, renunciation, and realization! Know Me as the destitute ruler who begs for the dust of their feet (`5.5.25`); serve all mobile and immobile creatures as My very body (`mad-dhishnyataya`), for that is true worship of Me, and without it even studying, hearing, and pondering remains barren (`5.5.26–27`).
Even though Rishabhadeva's sons were already self-controlled, He crowned **Bharata** upon the imperial throne so that the world might learn how an awakened soul drops every trace of formal duty (`5.5.28`). Retaining nothing inside Himself save his own pristine consciousness and leaving His physical frame behind merely as an appearance (`abhasa-matra`), Rishabhadeva stepped out of `Brahmavarta` completely naked (`dig-vasah`), His hair disheveled (`prakirna-keshah`), His manner like that of a madman (`unmatta-lingah`), swallowing the sacrificial fires back into Himself (`ahavaniyan agnin atmani samropya`, `5.5.28`).
To cut off all worldly conversation (`jana-samvadah`), He accepted a lifelong vow of absolute silence (`mauna-vrata`), wandering like a blind, deaf, mute ghost or crazy man (`andha-badhira-muka-unmatta-pishacha`, `5.5.29–30`). Passing through towns, villages, mines, farms, cowherd camps, military tents, and forests, He was surrounded by wicked men just as a forest elephant is pestered by swarms of flies (`makshikabhir iva vana-gajah`, `5.5.30`). Some threatened Him, some beat Him, some urinated on Him, some spat on Him (`shthivana`), some pelted Him with stones, feces, and dust, some broke wind in His face, and some mocked Him with foul insults: "Look at this hideous, dirty beggar!" (`5.5.30–31`).
Yet because He knew that this material body of "I" and "mine" is altogether false (`asat`), resting solitary and rock-steady in the glory of the Supreme Self (`eka atma-mahima`), Rishabhadeva felt not the slightest tremor of hurt or anger (`aviganayan`, `5.5.31`). His hands, feet, chest, long arms, shoulders, lips, and lotus face remained as tender, smiling, and luminous as ever, with wide reddish eyes like dewy lotuses and dark curling locks framing an unearthly radiance (`5.5.31–32`).
Seeing that the yoga-paths practiced by earlier sages still left them vulnerable to disturbance, Rishabhadeva next adopted the extreme `avadhuta` practice (`ajagara-vritti`, the way of the python, `5.5.32–35`): lying down strictly on the ground to eat, drink, chew, and pass stool and urine, rolling in His own waste so that greedy, inquisitive people would keep their distance (`5.5.32–33`), even though His bodily waste carried no foul smell at all, instead perfuming the crisp air for ten yojanas around with a divine fragrance (`surabhi-saurabhya-vayuh`, `5.5.33`)! Moving in the ways of a cow (`go`), a deer (`mriga`), and a crow (`kaka`), eating, drinking, sitting, or walking in silence while swiming inside the boundless ocean of eternal bliss (`brahmananda`, `5.5.34–35`), He roamed across southern lands—`Konka`, `Venka`, and `Kutaka`—with a few small stones held inside His mouth (`kavalikrita-gudaka`, `5.6.6–7`).
One day, as He wandered through the forest of `Kutaka-chala` in South India, a fierce wind whipped the giant bamboo canes together until friction sparked a roaring forest fire (`davagnih`), which consumed the entire woodland along with Rishabhadeva's outer bodily frame (`5.6.7–8`).
When King Parikshit asks in `5.6.1` why a soul already free of desire needs to guard so strictly against the mind through such extreme austerity, Shukadeva answers (`5.6.2–5`) that the restless mind is like an unchaste wife (`asati`) or an angry hunter (`lubdhakah`): anyone who trusts his own mind without constant vigilance sees his austerity and yogic achievements plundered in an instant, just as great yogis have stumbled over a single careless glance (`5.6.3–4`). Moreover (`5.6.9–12`), Shukadeva adds a prophetic warning: in the coming Kali age, when adharma swells and heretical teachers arise, a deluded king of Konka-Venka-Kutaka named **Arhat** (`5.6.9`) will hear of Rishabhadeva's outer naked wanderings and—blinded by destiny—will invent his own non-Vedic dharma (`svayam dharma`), persuading low-minded people to abandon bath, sipping water (`achamana`), and cleanliness, pluck out their hair (`kesha-lunchana`), and revile the Vedas, brahmanas, and Lord Yajna-purusha, only to plunge into blinding darkness (`andha-tamisram`, `5.6.9–11`). Rishabhadeva Himself, by contrast, is the shelter of spotless memory (`pavitra-kirtih`), whose story wipes away every sin of Kali (`5.6.12–19`).
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