Narratives from the Śrīmad Bhāgavata Purāṇa

Bhagavān Kṛshṇa teases Rukmiṇī in her chamber at Dvārakā, she faints, he revives her, and she answers why she chose him above all kings.

Śālva wins the flying city Saubha from Bhagavān Śiva and besieges Dvārakā; Bhagavān Kṛshṇa breaks the Saubha and kills him with the Sudarśana Cakra.

At a solar eclipse all Bhārata gathers at Samantapañcaka, and Bhagavān Kṛshṇa meets Nanda, Yaśodā and the gopīs of Vraja after years apart.

Sāmba carries off Lakshmaṇā and is captured; Balarāma goes to Hastināpura and drags the city toward the Gaṅgā with his plough until the Kauravas yield.

Bhagavān Kṛshṇa and Balarāma learn all knowledge from Sāṇḍīpani in sixty-four days and pay the guru-dakshiṇā by bringing back his drowned son from Yama.

The ṛshi Saubhari loses his tapas to desire, marries fifty princesses, finds no peace in luxury, and at last attains moksha with his wives.

Infant Kṛshṇa breaks the cart that holds the asura Śakaṭāsura, survives the whirlwind asura Tṛṇāvarta, and shows Yaśodā the whole cosmos in his mouth.

King Dushyanta marries Śakuntalā in the forest, refuses her and their son Bharata at court, and is told the truth by a voice from the sky.

Two events of Bhāgavata Skanda 10, Chapter 34: Kṛshṇa frees Nanda from a serpent who is the vidyādhara Sudarśana, and kills the asura Śaṅkhacūḍa.

Bhagavān Kṛshṇa visits Mithilā and enters the homes of the poor brāhmaṇa Śrutadeva and King Bahulāśva at the same time.

Arjuna, disguised as a sannyāsī, stays in Dvārakā, wins Subhadrā's heart and carries her off in his chariot.

The poor brāhmaṇa Sudāmā visits his boyhood friend Bhagavān Kṛshṇa in Dvārakā with a gift of flattened rice and returns to find a palace.

A brāhmaṇa boy sold as the sacrificial victim of King Hariścandra is freed by his own stotras and becomes Devarāta, son of Viśvāmitra.

Bhagavān Kṛshṇa clears a false charge by finding the Syamantaka jewel, which Sātrajit had from Sūrya, and later brings it out of hiding from Akrūra.

Bhagavān Rudra burns the three flying cities of the dānava Maya with one arrow, in which Bhagavān Vishṇu himself becomes the shaft.

Bhagavān Kṛshṇa sends Uddhava to comfort Nanda, Yaśodā and the gopikās in Gokula, where a gopikā speaks the Bhramara Gīta to a bee.

The apsaras Urvaśī and King Purūrava of the Lunar dynasty: their union, her conditions, their parting, and how his longing gave the three Vedic fires.

Bhagavān Kṛshṇa enters Uttarā's womb and shields the unborn Parīkshit from the brahmāstra of Aśvatthāmā.

Bhagavān Vishṇu is born as the dwarf brāhmaṇa Vāmana, asks King Bali for three paces, measures the worlds in two strides, and grants Bali the realm of Sutala.

The Bhāgavata's description of the rainy season and autumn in Vṛndāvana, where each sign of nature is matched to a quality of the sādhu or the seeker.

At Samantapañcaka the great ṛshis come, Kṛshṇa teaches that a sādhu purifies more than a tīrtha, and Vasudeva performs a great yajña before Nanda returns to Vraja.

Parīkshit asks how the Vedas can describe Brahman, and Śuka answers with the Veda Stuti spoken by Sanandana in Janaloka and carried by Nārada to Vyāsa.

King Vena turns tyrant and is killed by the ṛshis, and Pṛthu, an aṃśa of Śrī Hari, is born from his arms, milks the earth and rules as the first king.

As Kṛshṇa plays his flute in the Vṛndāvana forest in autumn, the gopikās speak of what they see and hear, and all nature stands still to listen.

Vidura meets the grieving Uddhava on the Yamunā bank, hears of Bhagavān Kṛshṇa's departure, and is sent to Maitreya Maharshi at Gaṅgādvāra.

The asura Vṛka won from Bhagavān Śiva the vara that anyone whose head he touched would die, then tried it on Śiva, and Bhagavān Vishṇu ended him.

The gopas move from Gokula to Vṛndāvana, and Bhagavān Kṛshṇa kills the asuras Vatsāsura and Bakāsura and begins to herd cows.

Indra's pride, Viśvarūpa's death, the birth of Vṛtrāsura, Dadhīca's gift of his bones, the great battle on the Narmadā, and Vṛtra's merging into Bhagavān Vishṇu.

Though he had divided the Veda and composed the Purāṇas and the Mahābhārata, Vyāsa was uneasy until Nārada sent him to write of Bhagavān Kṛshṇa.

At Prabhāsa the whole Yādava lineage destroys itself, Balarāma departs, and Kṛshṇa is left alone before his own departure from the world.

The wives of brāhmaṇas at a yajña bring food to hungry Kṛshṇa and Balarāma, while their husbands refuse, then repent.

Yayāti tells Devayānī the parable of the goat, says desire is never satisfied by enjoyment, and leaves for the forest.

Yogamāyā slips from Kaṃsa's hands, shows her eight-armed form, and tells him his destroyer is already born.

Bhagavān Kṛshṇa enters the mouth of the python Aghāsura, grows inside him, kills him and brings the gopa boys and calves back to life.

King Purūravas runs naked after Urvaśī, wakes up to the truth, sings the Aila Gītā and finds freedom, as Bhagavān Kṛshṇa tells Uddhava.

A brāhmaṇa of Kānyakubja falls from dharma, calls his son Nārāyaṇa at death, and is saved by the Vishṇudūtas and reaches Vaikuṇṭha.

Bhagavān Kṛshṇa sends Akrūra to Hastināpura to see how the Pāṇḍavas fare, and Akrūra reports Dhṛtarāshṭra's partiality and Kuntī's grief.

Ushā loves Aniruddha from a dream, Citralekhā brings him to Śoṇitapura, and Kṛshṇa fights Bāṇāsura and Śiva, as told in the Bhāgavata and Vishṇu Purāṇas.

Arjuna fails to protect a brāhmaṇa's newborn sons in Dvārakā, and Kṛshṇa takes him beyond the dark edge of the cosmos to Bhagavān Purushottama.

Aśvatthāmā kills the five sons of Draupadī at night, aims the brahmāstra at Uttarā's womb, is captured by Arjuna, and is spared by Draupadī's mercy.

As the Kurukshetra war nears, Balarāma goes on a long journey to the tīrthas, kills Romaharshaṇa and the asura Balvala at Naimiśāraṇya, and returns to Prabhāsa.

Balarāma visits Nanda's Gokula for two months, comforts the gopīs, drinks the wine of Varuṇa, and pulls the Yamunā with his plough.

King Bharata loses his meditation to an orphaned fawn, is reborn as a deer, and then as Jaḍabharata, who teaches King Rahūgaṇa and finds liberation.

A miserly brāhmaṇa of Avantī loses all his wealth, becomes a wandering bhikshu, and sings that the mind alone is the cause of joy and sorrow.

Bhīshma lies on a bed of arrows for fifty-eight days, then sings his hymn to Bhagavān Kṛshṇa at Uttarāyaṇa and leaves his body, as the Bhāgavatam tells.

The ṛshis at a satra on the Sarasvatī send Bhṛgu to test Brahmā, Śiva and Vishṇu, and they conclude that Bhagavān Vishṇu is the most exalted.

Brahmā gives the Bhāgavata teaching to his dear son Nārada, who then gives it to Vyāsa on the Sarasvatī, as the second skanda of the Bhāgavata Purāṇa tells.

At the start of creation Brahmā hears the word tapas, does tapas for a thousand divine years, sees Vaikuṇṭha and is taught by Bhagavān Nārāyaṇa.

Brahmā hides the cowherd boys and calves to test Bhagavān Kṛshṇa. Kṛshṇa becomes them all for a year, and Brahmā bows and sings a stotra.

King Citraketu loses a son, is taught by Aṅgiras and Nārada, sees Bhagavān Saṃkarshaṇa, receives a śāpa from Pārvatī, and is reborn as Vṛtrāsura.

Daksha insults Bhagavān Śiva, Satī gives up her body, Vīrabhadra destroys the yajña, and Bhagavān Vishṇu appears when it is restored.

Yaśodā ties little Kṛshṇa to a mortar with ropes that are always two finger-widths too short, and he gets the name Dāmodara.

Right after Śālva falls, Dantavaktra of Karūsha attacks Kṛshṇa on foot with a gadā and is killed. His brother Vidūratha dies by the Sudarśana Cakra.

King Yadu meets the joyful avadhūta Dattātreya, who tells him of his twenty-four teachers taken from nature and the world.

Twice, Kṛshṇa saves the gopas and cows of Gokula from a forest fire by swallowing it while they have their eyes shut.

Bhagavān Kapila teaches his mother Devahūti the path to moksha, and she attains it at Bindu-sara.

Devakī asks Kṛshṇa and Balarāma to bring back her six sons killed by Kaṃsa, and they fetch them from Sutala.

Balarāma and Kṛshṇa kill the donkey-asura Dhenukāsura and his kin and free the Tālavana palm grove.

Dhṛtarāshṭra leaves Hastināpura for the forest with Gāndhārī and Vidura, as the Bhāgavata Purāṇa and the Mahābhārata each tell it.

Prince Dhruva, hurt by his stepmother at the age of five, wins the pole-star position by tapas, as the Bhāgavata, Brahmāṇḍa and Vishṇu Purāṇas tell it.

At the hour of sandhyā Diti begs her husband Kaśyapa for union, and Kaśyapa warns her of Rudra and foretells the birth of Hiraṇyāksha and Hiraṇyakaśipu.

Diti keeps the puṃsavana vrata to win a son who will kill Indra, but Indra cuts the child in her womb into forty-nine Marudgaṇas who live.

At Samantapañchaka, Draupadī asks Kṛshṇa's wives how each came to marry him, and each queen tells her own account.

The vānara Dvivida, friend of Narakāsura, ravages the land and then insults Balarāma on Raivataka hill, where Balarāma kills him.

The elephant king Gajendra, held by a crocodile, calls on Bhagavān Hari with a lotus in his trunk and is freed and liberated.

The full account of Gajendra, the elephant king held by a crocodile in the Ṛtumat lake on Trikūṭa, and how Bhagavān Hari freed and liberated him.

The Bhāgavata account of Gaṅgā's descent: three generations of tapas, Bhagīratha's talk with Gaṅgādevī, Śiva's matted locks, and the freeing of Sagara's sons.

Garga Muni secretly names Kṛshṇa and Balarāma at night in Nanda's cow-pen, and the chapter goes on to Kṛshṇa's childhood play and Yaśodā's vision.

King Gaya, descended from Bharata, performs great yajñas, and Bhagavān Vishṇu promises to be present always at Gayā-kshetra.

Nanda celebrates the birth of the child he thinks is his son, and Vasudeva visits from Mathurā and warns him of danger.

In Mārgaśīrsha the gopikās keep the Kātyāyanī Vrata, and Kṛshṇa takes their clothes into a kadamba tree and asks them to come to him with folded hands.

Kṛshṇa persuades Nanda and the gopas to give the Indra-yajña food to Govardhana, the cows and the brāhmaṇas, and he appears as Govardhana to accept it.

After Kṛshṇa holds up Govardhana for seven days, Indra surrenders and Surabhi bathes Kṛshṇa with her milk and names him Govinda.

Bhagavān Vishṇu appears as a shining swan before Brahmā and the Sanakādi ṛshis and teaches how the mind binds and frees the ātmā.

Daksha's ten thousand Haryaśvas and a thousand Śabalāśvas hear Nārada's riddles and leave for the path of the ātmā. Daksha gives Nārada a śāpa.

Hiraṇyāksha, born with Hiraṇyakaśipu, conquers the worlds and fights Bhagavān Varāha in the cosmic ocean, where Varāha kills him.

King Janamejaya begins a snake yajña to avenge his father Parīkshit, until Bṛhaspati tells him that every being dies by its own karma.

Jarāsandha attacks Mathurā seventeen times. When Kālayavana comes too, Bhagavān Kṛshṇa builds Dvārakā in the sea and moves the Yādavas there.

Kṛshṇa, Bhīma and Arjuna go to Girivraja as brāhmaṇas, Bhīma tears Jarāsandha in two after a fight of twenty-seven days, and the captive kings go free.

The four Kumāras are stopped at the seventh gate of Vaikuṇṭha, give Jaya and Vijaya a śāpa, and Bhagavān Vishṇu names their three births.

Kṛshṇa leads Kālayavana into a cave where the sleeping king Mucukunda burns him with a glance, then Mucukunda praises Kṛshṇa and goes to Badarikāśrama.

Kṛshṇa dances on the hoods of the serpent Kāliya, who had poisoned the Yamunā, and sends him to Ramaṇaka Dvīpa after the prayer of the nāgapatnīs.

How Bhagavān Kṛshṇa went from Vṛndāvana to Mathurā, killed Kaṃsa, and freed Devakī, Vasudeva and Ugrasena, as the Bhāgavata Purāṇa tells it.

How Kardama Prajāpati won the hand of Devahūti by tapas and the grace of Bhagavān Vishṇu, and how Bhagavān Kapila was born to them.

How Bhagavān Kṛshṇa married Kālindī, Mitravindā, Satyā, Bhadrā and Lakshmaṇā, and stayed with the Pāṇḍavas at Indraprastha.

The birth of Bhagavān Kṛshṇa in the prison of Mathurā and his crossing of the Yamunā to Gokula, as the Bhāgavata Purāṇa tells it.

The last chapter of the tenth skanda shows Bhagavān Kṛshṇa's life in Dvārakā: his queens, their water play, their words to birds and clouds, and his many sons.

How Bhagavān Kṛshṇa left the world: the end of the Yādavas, Arjuna's grief at Dvārakā, and the signs by which Yudhishṭhira knew Kṛshṇa had gone.

Bhagavān Kṛshṇa sits under a pippala tree, the hunter Jarā wounds his foot, and Kṛshṇa forgives him and returns to his own dhāma before the devas.

Mārkaṇḍeya sees a pralaya flood, a divine child on a leaf, and the whole universe inside the child's body. Then Śiva and Pārvatī come to him.

Bhagavān Śrī Hari comes as a great fish at the end of a kalpa, saves the Saptarshis and the seeds of life, slays Hayagrīva and returns the Vedas to Brahmā.

Child Kṛshṇa, tied to a mortar, crawls between two arjuna trees and pulls them down. Kubera's two sons come out of them, free of Nārada's śāpa.

A great serpent seizes Nanda at night on a river bank. Kṛshṇa touches it with his foot and frees Sudarśana. Then he shows the gopas Vaikuṇṭha in a lake.

Nārada goes to Dvārakā to see Kṛshṇa married to sixteen thousand women, and finds Kṛshṇa at home in every palace, doing different duties at the same time.

Nārada was once the young son of a maidservant who served ṛshis for four months, heard their kathā, and became Nārada Devarshi in the next creation.

Bhagavān Kṛshṇa rides Garuḍa with Satyabhāmā to Prāgjyotishapura, kills Mura and Narakāsura, frees 16,100 princesses and brings the Pārijāta tree to Dvārakā.

King Nimi of Videha asks nine questions of the nine Yogīśvaras, sons of Ṛshabha, and each answers one: devotees, bhakti, māyā, avatāras and the yugas.

Yādava youths find a huge lizard in a dry well; Bhagavān Kṛshṇa lifts it out and it becomes King Nṛga.

After Bhagavān Kṛshṇa leaves the world, Yudhishṭhira, his brothers and Draupadī give up the kingdom and go on their last journey.

King Parīkshit insults Śamīka Maharshi, receives Śṛṅgi's śāpa of death by Takshaka in seven days, welcomes it, and sits in prāyopaveśa on the Gaṅgā.

Emperor Parīkshit finds Kali beating Dharma the bull and Bhūmādevī the cow, raises his sword, spares Kali and fixes the places where he may live.

After Śuka Maharshi's last teaching, Parīkshit enters brahma-laya on the Gaṅgā, and Takshaka's bite burns only the body he had already left.

Bhagavān Kṛshṇa kills Pauṇḍraka, who called himself the true Vāsudeva, and the Sudarśana Cakra burns Kāśī after Sudakshiṇa's abhicāra rite.

Piṅgalā, a courtesan of Videha, waits all night for a patron, sees that hope itself is her sorrow, turns to Bhagavān Vishṇu within, and finds peace.

The ten Pracetasas receive the Rudra Gīta from Bhagavān Śiva, do tapas in the ocean, see Śrī Hari, marry Mārisha, father Daksha and reach liberation.

Pradyumna, born as Kāmadeva, is stolen as a baby by the asura Śambara, raised by Māyāvatī, kills Śambara and returns to Dvārakā.

Nārada tells Yudhishṭhira the full account of Prahlāda: Hiraṇyakaśipu's vara, Prahlāda's bhakti, Narasiṃha from the pillar, and the Vishṇu Purāṇa version.

The asura Pralambāsura joins the gopa boys as a playmate, carries Balarāma off during a game and is killed by one blow of Balarāma's fist.

Priyavrata, son of Svāyambhuva Manu, accepts rule on Brahmā's advice, carves the seven oceans with his chariot, shares the earth among his sons and then renounces.

Nārada tells King Prāchīnabarhishat of Purañjana and his friend Avijñāta, a story of the jīva lost in the nine-gated city of the body.

Kaṃsa sends the rākshasī Pūtanā to kill the infant Kṛshṇa with poisoned milk, but Bhagavān Kṛshṇa drinks out her life and she reaches moksha.

Yudhishṭhira performs the Rājasūya yajña, Bhagavān Kṛshṇa receives the first honour, and Śishupāla is killed by the Sudarśana cakra.

After forty-eight days without food, King Rantideva gives away every portion to guests until only a cup of water is left, and gives that too.

On an autumn full-moon night Bhagavān Kṛshṇa calls the gopikās with his flute, disappears, returns, and dances the circular rāsa with all of them.

How Bhagavān Vishṇu was born as Ṛshabhadeva, taught his hundred sons, lived as an avadūta, and left his body in a forest fire in Karṇāṭaka.

Princess Rukmiṇī of Vidarbha sends a secret message to Bhagavān Kṛshṇa, who carries her away from the Gaurī temple and marries her at Dvārakā.