Caṇḍuka the Śabara

Caṇḍuka was a Śabara, a forest hunter. A prince gave him a pūjā for Bhagavān Śiva as a joke, and Caṇḍuka took it as a true teaching. His faith carried him and his wife Śabarī to the realm of Bhagavān Śiva. The Skanda Mahā Purāṇa tells this within the Bhasma Māhātmya, the greatness of sacred ash.

Vaṃketu’s joke

Vaṃketu, a prince of Pāñcāla, was hunting in the forest with his followers. There he met Caṇḍuka, a nishāda (hunter, a Śabara) who was also his servant. Caṇḍuka had found a small, old, broken Śiva liṅga in a ruined forest temple. He brought it to the prince with respect and asked how to perform pūjā (worship).

The prince was amused. He gave his instructions in a spirit of light mockery:

“Bathe the liṅga with fresh water every day. Seat yourself on a clean āsana. Anoint with fragrant sandal. Worship with fresh akshatas, forest leaves, and flowers. Offer dhūpa and dīpa. Citā bhasma (cremation ash) should be the first upahāra (offering). Offer food appropriate for your own meals as naivedya. Then dhūpa and dīpa again. Arrange nṛtya, vādya, gīta in the prescribed manner. Perform namaskāra. Then accept the prasāda. This is the general Śiva pūjā vidhi.”

Here āsana is a seat, akshata is unbroken rice grain, dhūpa is incense, dīpa is a lamp, naivedya is a food offering, nṛtya, vādya and gīta are dance, music and song, namaskāra is a bow, and prasāda is the blessed remains of the offering. The prince added:

“Citā bhasma particularly delights Śiva immediately.”

Caṇḍuka’s worship

The prince had not thought the Śabara would take his words seriously. Caṇḍuka heard them as the sacred words of a guru (teacher). He received them śirasā, with his head bowed, which means he accepted them with his whole heart.

He went home and set up the liṅga of Mahādeva. He began to worship it every day. Each day he took cremation ash from the cremation ground and offered it as the first upahāra. He anointed the liṅga with the sweet-smelling things he could find. He offered forest flowers and leaves, and he gave his own food as naivedya. He and his wife Śabarī did this daily pūjā together with steady devotion.

He kept this up for several years, in complete happiness.

The day there was no ash

One day Caṇḍuka was ready for the pūjā, but there was no cremation ash to be found. No one had died in the area, and all his searching gave him nothing. He came home tired and troubled, afraid that the pūjā could not be done.

He said to his wife Śabarī:

“There is no cremation ash today. Without it I cannot perform the pūjā properly. What should I do, beloved?”

He cried out:

“I cannot live even a moment without pūjā. The guru’s command must not be broken.”

Śabarī answered calmly:

“The body’s purpose is fulfilled when it is given for others. If one gives up the body for another’s sake, how much more so when given for Śiva himself? I will burn this house and enter the fire. Then there will be cremation ash.”

Caṇḍuka hesitated. She was young, they had no children yet, and she had not yet enjoyed the pleasures of life. But Śabarī’s answer was whole:

“This is the very fulfilment of birth and life. Pūrva janma tapas, dāna, and Śiva pūjā that my father and mother accumulated — let that bear its fruit here. I will be the samidha (fire-kindling) for Śiva’s sake.”

Her resolve could not be shaken. Caṇḍuka saw her steadiness and her bhakti (devotion) for Bhagavān Śiva, and he agreed.

Śabarī bathed and dressed herself. She paid respect to her guru and meditated on Sadāśiva in her heart. She walked around the fire three times, in pradakshiṇa. Before she entered, she said:

“My senses are flowers for you, O Deva. This body is your aguru dhūpa. My heart is the dīpa. My prāṇas are your havis. My actions are your akshatas. This jīva is now your pūjā-phala. I desire no rule over all the worlds, no svarga, no Brahmā’s unshakeable pada. Let me be a bee, birth after birth, drinking the honey of your lotus feet. Let my heart never move from your caraṇa-āravindas even for half a moment.”

She meant that her senses, body, heart, breath, actions and living self were all her offering. She asked for no rule, no svarga (heaven) and no place of Brahmā. She asked only to stay at the lotus feet of Bhagavān Śiva. Then she entered the fire.

Śiva’s wonder

Caṇḍuka gathered the ash with respect. He performed the pūjā of Mahādeva with full attention, keeping the form of Bhagavān Śiva in his mind.

At the end of the pūjā, it was time to take the prasāda. At that moment he remembered his wife and turned to call her. She was standing behind him, fully alive and in her own form, smiling and bowing. The house that had burned stood whole. Everything was as it had been before.

Caṇḍuka was astonished and asked how this could be. Śabarī said:

“I cannot say. I entered the fire — yet I felt no heat. It was like entering a dream. In what seemed like half a moment, I woke. And now I am here for the prasāda.”

While the husband and wife stood amazed at each other, a divine vimāna (flying chariot) appeared before them, bright as a hundred moons. Four attendants of Bhagavān Śiva came down. They placed Caṇḍuka and Śabarī in the vimāna. At the touch of Śiva’s messengers, their ordinary bodies became divine bodies in the form of Śiva’s own attendants (sārūpya), shining like the attendants themselves.

The vimāna rose and went to the realm of Bhagavān Śiva.

The Sūta’s closing words

The Sūta ends the account with these words:

“Even a nīca-born Śabara obtained the supreme gati through śraddhā. What is birth? What is vidyā? He in whose heart the Parameśa bhakti lives at all times — who in the three worlds is more fortunate than that person?”

Nīca-born means born low, gati is the final goal, śraddhā is faith, vidyā is learning, and Parameśa is Bhagavān Śiva, the Supreme. The instructions in this account were given in jest (parihāsa-rasena), yet they bore their full fruit when Caṇḍuka received them with śraddhā.

Sources

• Skanda Mahā Purāṇa, Brahma Khaṇḍa, Dharmāraṇya Khaṇḍa, Uttarārdha, Chapter 17