Āḍi-Baka Yuddha
After King Hariścandra gained svarga (heaven), his purohita Vasishṭha came out of his tapas (austerity) and learned what Viśvāmitra had done to the righteous king. In his anger Vasishṭha laid a śāpa (a curse) on Viśvāmitra to become a bird, and Viśvāmitra returned it. Vasishṭha became an āḍi (a water-bird) and Viśvāmitra became a baka (a crane). The two fought a battle that threatened the three worlds, until Brahmā came down and made peace between them.
Vasishṭha’s tapas and anger
After Hariścandra left his kingdom, Vasishṭha had been doing tapas for twelve years, standing neck-deep in the Gaṅgā. At last he came out and ended his samādhi. He learned that Viśvāmitra had killed his hundred sons in an earlier age, and that now Viśvāmitra had brought the righteous Hariścandra down to be the slave of a caṇḍāla.
Vasishṭha knew that even the loss of his sons had not stirred such anger in him. But the sight of a king who followed dharma brought to such suffering filled him with rage. He said: “This Viśvāmitra, who has wronged a righteous man who sought no quarrel, shall know my power.”
The two śāpas
Vasishṭha cursed Viśvāmitra of the Kuśika line to become a baka. Viśvāmitra heard the śāpa and at once returned it: “And you shall become an āḍi.”
Both great ṛshis, each of measureless teja (radiance), were turned into birds by each other’s śāpa. Even in bird form, the fury of two mahātmas of equal power drove them into a war that shook the worlds.
The great battle
The āḍi was two thousand yojanas long. The baka was three thousand yojanas long. The beating of their wings threw mountains to the ground and made the earth shake. The oceans rose and flooded. The earth tilted to one side and was close to falling toward pātāla (the lower world). Countless beings died, some crushed under mountains and some killed by the shaking earth. All the worlds fell into confusion and wailing. The devas were terrified. They gathered together and cried out in distress.
Brahmā steps in
Brahmā himself came down, with all the devas around him, and went to the two great birds. He spoke to both with the authority of a father. “You have both fallen into tāmasa bhāva (a dark state of mind), and it has driven you to this war. Let go of this anger. The destruction of all the worlds that this battle causes is itself the fruit of Hariścandra’s Rājasūya yajña, an extraordinary result of karma. Viśvāmitra has done what he did to Hariścandra, but the reckoning for that belongs to dharma itself.”
Brahmā made peace between the two great ṛshis. They went back to their own forms and left for their own āśramas.
Sources
- Mārkaṇḍeya Mahā Purāṇa, Chapter 9