Janamejaya Sarpa Yāga

The Sarpa Yāga of King Janamejaya is told in the 12th Skanda of the Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa, Chapter 6. Janamejaya was the son of Parīkshit. He held a great yajña (fire ritual) to avenge his father, who had died from the bite of the serpent Takshaka. In this satra (long Vedic ritual) serpents were called one by one into the fire. The yajña took place at the turn from the Dvāpara Yuga to the Kali Yuga. It was stopped by the calm advice of Bṛhaspati, who showed that every being dies only by its own prārabdha-karma (the karma already begun) and not by the act of another.

Parīkshit’s death

Parīkshit Mahārāja had heard the Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa from Śuka Maharshi over seven days on the bank of the Gaṅgā. He had reached brahma-laya, the full merging of his awareness into Parabrahman. When Takshaka, the king of serpents, came to carry out the śāpa (a curse) of Śṛṅgi, the son of Śamīka Ṛshi, Parīkshit was already beyond fear and beyond the body.

On his way Takshaka had paid the healer Kaśyapa a great sum of wealth to turn back, so that nothing could stop his bite. Takshaka came in the dress of a brāhmaṇa and bit the king. The fire of the poison at once turned the king’s body to ash.

Earth, sky and all directions rang with weeping. The devas showered flowers. The gandharvas and apsarasas sang as witnesses from the celestial worlds.

Janamejaya’s grief and decision

Janamejaya learned that Takshaka had killed his father. He was seized with deep grief and righteous anger. He took counsel with his advisers and the brāhmaṇas. He decided to hold the sarpa-yāga, a satra in which every serpent in the three worlds would be called by Vedic mantras into a great fire. This would destroy the serpent race as the price for his father’s life.

The yajña was held on a grand scale. The fire was lit and fed. The ṛtvik priests began to recite the ākarshaṇa mantras, the mantras of calling. One by one, serpents from every part of the cosmos began to fall into the fire. They were great nāgas and small ones, serpents of the sky, of the earth and of the underworld.

Takshaka’s flight and Indra’s help

As the fire blazed and serpent after serpent fell in, Takshaka was terrified. He fled through the upper regions and took shelter with Indra, the king of the devas. He clung to Indra, trusting that Indra’s shelter would keep him safe from the pull of the fire.

For a time Takshaka did not appear in the fire, though the mantras were recited. Janamejaya asked his priests why Takshaka alone had not been drawn down. They answered that he was being held under Indra’s protection in the celestial regions.

Janamejaya then gave the order: call Takshaka and Indra together. Let both fall into the fire.

The priests raised the mantra, calling Indra’s vimāna (flying chariot) and Takshaka together into the pull of the fire. The celestial vehicle began to shake. Indra and his followers, with Takshaka, began to lose their place and sink towards the earth. Indra was greatly alarmed.

Bṛhaspati’s teaching

At this critical moment Bṛhaspati, the teacher of the devas and the son of Āṅgiras, came forward. He stood before Janamejaya and spoke with calm authority:

“O king, do not kill this serpent king Takshaka. He has drunk amṛta (the nectar of immortality). Old age and death have no power over him. Moreover, the life, the death and the passage to the next world of every being are decided only by that being’s own karma. No outside agent is the true cause of another’s death. Whether a being dies by a serpent’s bite, a thief’s blade, fire, lightning, hunger, thirst or disease, in each case only the prārabdha-karma of that jīva (embodied being) is unfolding. So the serpents already burned in this yajña carry no real guilt. Your father died because it was the time set by the unfolding of his own karma. Do not go on with this destruction.”

These words struck Janamejaya with the force of true wisdom. He saw the truth of the teaching on karma: his father’s death was not a wrong to be avenged but a movement of the cosmos to be understood. He stopped the sarpa-yāga. He honoured Bṛhaspati with great respect and gave him dakshiṇā (a gift of thanks).

The Māyā of Bhagavān Vishṇu

Sūta Maharshi told this to the assembly of ṛshis at Naimiśāraṇya. He brought out the deeper teaching. Behind the whole chain of events, Takshaka’s plotting, the śāpa, the bribed healer, Indra’s shelter, the yajña and Bṛhaspati’s words, the unfathomable Māyā of Bhagavān Vishṇu was at work. Living beings are parts (aṃśas) of Śrī Hari himself. They are bound by this Māyā and take on the false idea that they are doers and victims. Only the knowledge that Bhagavān Vishṇu is the final support (āśraya) of all this seeming cause and effect dissolves the false idea.

After the Yāga

Parīkshit’s liberation came through hearing the Bhāgavata in private. The Mahābhārata was recited in full in public at the court of Janamejaya.

Sources

• Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa, 12th Skanda, Chapter 6