Śambhu’s Caitra Journey

Śambhu was a brāhmaṇa of Kāñcī. This is the second of two Caitra snāna stories in the eleventh sarga of the Manohara Khaṇḍa of the Ānanda Rāmāyaṇa. It tells of Śambhu’s journey to Ayodhyā for the Caitra snāna, the holy bath in the Sarayū at Rāmatīrtha in the month of Caitra. The bath ends on Caitra Navamī, the birthday of Rāma. Along the way a chain of beings is freed: a robber who became a devotee, a rākshasa under a śāpa (a curse), Śambhu’s father who was a piśāca, an elephant and a lion. Each is freed through the growing power of Caitra devotion, the name of Rāma (Rāmanāma), and the puṇya (merit) that Śambhu and his wife Kāśī gave away without asking anything back.

Śambhu leaves Kāñcī

Śambhu, a brāhmaṇa of Kāñcī, the old holy city in Tamil Nadu, set out on the long journey to Ayodhyā to take the Caitra snāna. The road from Kāñcī to Ayodhyā is hard, and his taking it showed how deep his devotion was. (Ānanda Rāmāyaṇa, Manohara Khaṇḍa, Chapter 11)

Karkaśa the bhilla and the gift of bananas

On the way Śambhu met Karkaśa, a bhilla, a forest robber. His name means “rough” or “harsh.” Karkaśa robbed Śambhu of his things and left him with very little.

But Śambhu acted in the spirit of Caitra, a month of giving and good deeds. He gave Karkaśa bananas. This was Śambhu’s answer, in keeping with dharma, to being robbed.

Fruit given in Caitra by a devotee of Rāma changed Karkaśa. His sattva-buddhi (good and clear understanding) woke up, and the harshness that had marked him began to soften. The Ānanda Rāmāyaṇa shows this as the Caitra-māhātmya (greatness of Caitra) at work. The holiness of the season turns even small acts of giving into means of inner change. (Ānanda Rāmāyaṇa, Manohara Khaṇḍa, Chapter 11)

The rākshasa remembers his past life

During his journey Śambhu met a rākshasa who had that form because of past karma. Śambhu sprinkled on the rākshasa water over which Rāma’s name had been spoken (Rāmanāma-jala). The touch of this water suddenly gave the rākshasa back his pūrva-janma smṛti, the memory of his earlier life.

Now awake, the rākshasa told how he came to be in this state. In a past birth he had stopped his wife from taking the Caitra snāna, and so had kept from her the great puṇya of that vow. He had also, without meaning to, eaten śrāddha food on the Navamī tithi, which he had no right to eat. That is a wrong in the order of offerings to the ancestors. These two wrongs sent him down into the rākshasa form.

Once he knew the cause, the rākshasa was freed when Śambhu’s puṇya from the journey and the Caitra snāna was later given to him. (Ānanda Rāmāyaṇa, Manohara Khaṇḍa, Chapter 11)

The Vaiśya and the piśāca father

As Śambhu went on toward Ayodhyā, he met a Vaiśya who was carrying Gaṅgā-jala, holy water from the Gaṅgā. This Vaiśya knew that Śambhu’s own father was a piśāca, held in a ghostly state without a body.

Because the Vaiśya told him, Śambhu was able to act. When he reached Ayodhyā and had taken the Caitra snāna at Rāmatīrtha, he made a tarpaṇa (water-offering to the ancestors) for his piśāca father, using what the Vaiśya had told him to aim the offering. The puṇya of the Caitra snāna, together with the tarpaṇa at Ayodhyā, was enough. Śambhu’s father was freed from the piśāca state and reached svarga. (Ānanda Rāmāyaṇa, Manohara Khaṇḍa, Chapter 11)

The elephant and the lion

On the way to or from Ayodhyā, Śambhu met a gaja (elephant) and a siṃha (lion). Both were held in their animal births by karma from earlier lives. In front of them Śambhu did Caitra kīrtana, singing the praises of Rāma in the month of Caitra. The power of Rāma-kīrtana in Caitra was so great that both animals gained from it, and their freeing began.

In the end Śambhu gave his puṇya to the elephant and the lion, and this finished their freedom from those animal births. Śambhu’s wife Kāśī is named as the one who freed the rākshasa by giving her puṇya. So both husband and wife took part in these acts of giving that asked nothing in return. (Ānanda Rāmāyaṇa, Manohara Khaṇḍa, Chapter 11)

Karkaśa is freed

Karkaśa the bhilla had been moved to goodness by the gift of bananas in Caitra. In time he made his own way to Ayodhyā and took the Caitra snāna at Rāmatīrtha. Śambhu’s first gift, his own awakened goodness, and the puṇya of the Caitra snāna at Ayodhyā together were enough. Karkaśa reached Vishṇuloka, the world of Bhagavān Vishṇu, from the rough start of a robber’s life. (Ānanda Rāmāyaṇa, Manohara Khaṇḍa, Chapter 11)

Sources

• Ānanda Rāmāyaṇa, Manohara Khaṇḍa, Sarga 11