Svarga, also called Trivishṭapa, is the luminous loka of the devas, ruled by Indra (Mahendra). The Pāṇḍavas, the Kauravas and the great warriors of the Kurukshetra war went there after they cast off their earthly bodies.

Svarga is the home of the devas. It is also the home of all who have earned puṇya (merit) through kshatriya-dharma (the duty of a warrior), yajña, dāna (giving) and tapas. The beings who live there have shining forms that do not decay. The enmities of the mortal world end there.

The Svargārohaṇa Parva of the Mahābhārata also shows that Svarga is not the final resting place of the soul. From Svarga the puṇyātmās (souls of great merit) go on, either to the higher lokas of the great rājarshis (royal seers) or back to the source-deva whose portion (aṃśa) they were.

Svarga as Trivishṭapa

When Yudhishṭhira and his kinsmen left the mortal world, they reached Svarga, called Trivishṭapa. There Yudhishṭhira saw Duryodhana seated on a throne. Duryodhana blazed with the glory of the virtuous and shone like the sun. The devas and the Sādhyas, whose deeds were pure, waited on him.

Duryodhana had caused great sorrow. Yet he had died fearless on the battlefield, following kshatriya-dharma, and so he had reached this place. Svarga is won by keeping one’s dharma.

Svarga is full of the assembled hosts of the devas: the Ādityas, the Vasus, the Rudras, the Aśvins, the Sādhyas, the Maruts and the other dwellers of the deva-loka. All of them gathered around Yudhishṭhira, with Indra at their head. The wind that moves through Svarga is cool, fragrant and holy. It carries the pure scent of the celestial beings.

The end of enmity in Svarga

In Svarga the vairas (enmities, hatreds and rivalries) of mortal life have no place. Yudhishṭhira could not bear the sight of Duryodhana’s splendour. He turned away and refused to share Svarga with him. Nārada laughed gently and corrected him:

“Do not speak thus. When one has come to dwell in Svarga, the enmities of the former life are extinguished. Here there are no hostilities.”

The devas and the great kings honour even Duryodhana in Svarga. All who go up to Svarga go purified of the causes that divided them.

The road to Svarga and the celestial Gaṅgā

The road by which the righteous come to Svarga is auspicious and fragrant. It is the opposite in every way of the fearful southern road that leads to Naraka.

Through the realms of the devas flows the Ākāśa Gaṅgā, the celestial Gaṅgā, who makes the three worlds holy. A being who bathes in her waters sheds the mānusha-bhāva (the human condition), together with grief, tiredness and all enmity. He takes a divine body fit for the company of the devas. In this way Yudhishṭhira bathed in her stream, laid down his mortal body and rose in a shining form to join his brothers and kinsmen in their places.

The lokas of the rājarshis

Svarga also holds, arranged one above the other, the lokas of the great rājarshis: the worlds of Hariścandra, Māndhātā, Bhagīratha and Bharata, son of Dushyanta. Those who have earned merit may wander through them. Indra promised Yudhishṭhira that he would enjoy, among these very worlds, the fruits of his Rājasūya and of the merit won by his own sword and tapas.

Svarga is not the final end

The Svargārohaṇa Parva says that Svarga, though supremely blessed, is a station and not the final goal. When the heroes who live there have enjoyed the fruits of their merit, they go on. Some rise through the graded lokas. The foremost among them merge back into the deva whose portion they were born as. Bhīshma returned to the Vasus, Droṇa to Bṛhaspati, Karṇa to Sūrya, and so on. Each one rejoined his aṃśī (the source of which he was a portion).

So Svarga is the reward of the virtuous. It is also the threshold from which the soul moves toward its own source and, in the end, toward moksha.

Sources

Mahābhārata, Svargārohaṇa Parva, Chapters 1, 3 (Svarga as Trivishṭapa)
Mahābhārata, Svargārohaṇa Parva, Chapter 1 (the end of enmity)
Mahābhārata, Svargārohaṇa Parva, Chapters 3, 4 (the road, the celestial Gaṅgā, the lokas of the rājarshis)
Mahābhārata, Svargārohaṇa Parva, Chapters 4, 5 (Svarga is not the final end)