Padma Prādurbhāva

Chapter 39 of the Sṛshṭi Khaṇḍa of the Padma Mahā Purāṇa tells what happens at the Mahāpralaya, the great dissolution. The whole world is dissolved and only Bhagavān Vishṇu remains, asleep on the cosmic waters. The ṛshi Mārkaṇḍeya lives through the dissolution. He sees the whole creation inside Bhagavān Vishṇu’s body and then meets a shining child who says he is Nārāyaṇa. When creation begins again, a lotus grows from Bhagavān Vishṇu’s navel and Brahmā rises from it.

The Mahāpralaya

At the end of the kalpa (the age of the world), the Mahāpralaya comes in stages. The sun burns with seven times its heat and dries up all moisture. Fierce winds tear through the worlds. Fire burns what is left. The clouds pour rain in floods for countless years, and then the rain stops too. All three worlds, bhūḥ, bhuvaḥ and suvaḥ, are dissolved into the first waters. Nothing of the world that was shown remains.

Bhagavān Vishṇu as the sleeping Yogī

In this total dissolution only Bhagavān Vishṇu remains. He is not the active ruler of creation now. He is the unshown Parama-Yogī (the supreme Yogī), lying in deep yoganidrā (yogic sleep) on the surface of the endless waters. He is alone, beyond measure and beyond all words. He is the ground of all that exists, at a time when existence has paused. His form is still, yet it holds the seeds of all creation to come.

Mārkaṇḍeya inside Bhagavān Vishṇu’s body

Mārkaṇḍeya has kalpāntaka āyuḥ, a life that lasts to the end of the kalpa, given by the vara (boon) of Brahmā. He therefore lives through the pralaya. During the dissolution he finds himself inside the cosmic body of Bhagavān Vishṇu.

He wanders through the inside of that body. It is not empty. It holds the whole creation: rivers, mountains, forests, cities and beings of every kind. During the pralaya the whole world exists there in its seed form. Mārkaṇḍeya walks through this inner world in wonder. He sees all the worlds held within the Parameśvara.

The child on the fig leaf

At some moment Mārkaṇḍeya is sent out of Bhagavān Vishṇu’s body and finds himself in the first waters of the pralaya. There he sees a small, shining child. The child glows with divine tejas (radiance). He rests at ease on a single leaf of the vaṭa tree (the sacred fig), which floats on the cosmic waters. The child is at peace and smiling. The dissolution of the world does not trouble him. He rests without effort, as if the end of all creation were a natural pause.

Nārāyaṇa shows himself

Mārkaṇḍeya was full of wonder and reverence, and he went up to the child. The child was Bhagavān Nārāyaṇa in this infant form, and he is also called Vaṭapatraśāyin (the one who rests on the fig leaf). He showed himself to Mārkaṇḍeya as the supreme Brahman, the ground of all existence. He is the one who remains when all else is dissolved and who begins all new creation. He said, “I am Nārāyaṇa.” In this way he showed who he truly is, and what all that Mārkaṇḍeya had seen within the cosmic body really was. He then made Mārkaṇḍeya go back into his body, to be kept safe for the rest of the pralaya.

The lotus and the rising of Brahmā

When the time for new creation came, Bhagavān Vishṇu stirred from his yoganidrā. A great divine lotus, the Padma, grew from his navel and rose up through the cosmic waters. It blazed with the light of a thousand suns. In the golden heart of that lotus, Brahmā rose, the four-faced creator. He was ready to begin a new round of sṛshṭi (creation).

The rising of Brahmā from the lotus of Bhagavān Vishṇu’s navel is the start of new creation. It is also where the Padma Purāṇa gets its name, the Purāṇa of the Lotus.

Sources

• Padma Mahā Purāṇa, Sṛshṭi Khaṇḍa, Chapter 39