Brāhma Tīrtha (Hariścandra’s Yajña)

Brāhma Tīrtha · brāhma-tīrtha, “the tīrtha of Brahmā”

Brāhma-tīrtha has other meanings too: see all meanings of Brāhma-tīrtha. Brahma has other meanings too: see all meanings of Brahma.

Brāhma Tīrtha is one of the sacred tīrthas on the southern bank of the Gautamī that arose at the place where King Hariścandra of the line of Ikshvāku completed his yajña to Varuṇa, and where the brāhmaṇa boy Śunaḥśepa, bound as the offering, was freed by the grace of the devas and the ṛshis. Brahmā names it to Nārada among fifteen tīrthas: Viśvāmitra, Hariścandra, Śunaḥśepa, Rohita, Vāruṇa, Brāhma, Āgneya, Aindra, Aindava, Aiśvara, Maitra, Vaishṇava, Yāmya, Āśvina and Auśana. Twenty-two thousand tīrthas are there. A bath and dāna (gifts) there give the fruit of a naramedha, and one who hears the account with devotion gains a son.

Hariścandra’s wish for a son

Nārada and Parvata came to the house of King Hariścandra, and he received them with great honour. He asked: “The whole world suffers for the sake of a son. What does one gain from a son?” The two ṛshis told him: to a man without a son neither this world nor the next is open; a father who bathes at the birth of his son gains the fruit of the bath at the end of ten aśvamedhas; a son frees his father and forefathers from the three debts; svarga and moksha are hard to reach without a son, and dāna and yajña without one bear no fruit. The king asked how he could gain a son, and the ṛshis said: “Go to the Gautamī. There Varuṇa, ruler of the waters, fulfils whatever wish one holds in mind.”

On the bank of the Gautamī Hariścandra worshipped Varuṇa. Varuṇa was pleased and said: “I shall grant you a son, if you will offer him to me in yajña.” The king agreed. He gave his wife the caru (offering of cooked grain) of Varuṇa, and a son, Rohita, was born.

The postponements

Varuṇa came at once and said: “Offer the son today.” The king put him off again and again: a yajña animal is fit after ten days; then, it is useless without teeth; then, when the boy was seven, the first teeth will fall and others will come; then, a kshatriya is the best offering when he knows the science of archery. When Rohita, sixteen years old, had mastered the divine weapons, the Vedas and the śāstras and been crowned yuvarāja (heir), Varuṇa came again: “Offer your son.” The king called Rohita and said: “Come, my son, I shall offer you to Varuṇa.” Rohita heard everything, and, while Varuṇa listened, said he would first perform a yajña to Vishṇu with Varuṇa himself as the offering. Varuṇa was overwhelmed with anger. Rohita took up his divine bow, mounted his chariot and went to the forest on the bank of the Gaṅgā, the very place where his father had gained him. Varuṇa struck King Hariścandra with an illness, dropsy.

Śunaḥśepa

Five years passed. In the sixth, Rohita heard of his father’s illness and grieved that he had been the cause of it. On the bank of the Gaṅgā he met the ṛshi Ajīgarta, who wandered with his wife and three sons and had no means of living. Ajīgarta offered to sell one of them for food. He would not sell his eldest, Śunaḥpuccha, and the mother would not sell the youngest, so he sold the middle son, Śunaḥśepa, for a thousand cows, grain, gold coins and clothes. Rohita brought the boy to his father and said: “Perform the yajña to Varuṇa with him, and be free of your illness.”

Hariścandra refused: “The king must protect brāhmaṇas. They are one with the tīrthas and one with the devas, and they save those about to fall into naraka. I will not make a brāhmaṇa the offering. It is better to die of illness.” Then a voice without a body spoke: “Go to the Gautamī with your ṛtvijas and purohitas, with this brāhmaṇa boy and with Rohita. Perform the yajña there without killing Śunaḥśepa, and it will be complete.”

The yajña on the Gautamī

The king went to the Gautamī with the ṛshi Viśvāmitra, his purohita Vasishṭha, the ṛshi Vāma and others. He took dīkshā (consecration) for the naramedha, prepared the altar, the pavilion and the fire-pit, and set up the yūpa (post). Śunaḥśepa was tied to the yūpa with mantras and sprinkled with water. Then Viśvāmitra asked the devas, the ṛshis, Hariścandra and Rohita to free the boy, and asked that the brāhmaṇas bathe in the Gautamī and praise the devas one by one. All agreed. Śunaḥśepa bathed in the Gaṅgā, the purifier of the three worlds, and praised the devas who receive the offerings. The devas, delighted, said: “Let this yajña be complete without killing Śunaḥśepa,” and Varuṇa said so to the king himself. So the king’s naramedha, known in all the worlds, was completed by the grace of the devas and the ṛshis of the tīrtha. Viśvāmitra honoured Śunaḥśepa in the assembly before the devas and made him the eldest of his sons.

Brahmā says: all these events happened on the southern bank of the Gautamī, and there arose many famous tīrthas, praised by the devas, twenty-two thousand in all.

The phala

• A bath and dāna at these tīrthas give the fruit of a naramedha.
• One who reads this account, has it read, or listens to it with bhakti (devotion) gains a son if he has none, and other things dear to his heart.

Source: Brahma Purāṇa, Gautamī Māhātmya, Chapter 34

Sources

• Brahma Purāṇa, Gautamī Māhātmya, Chapter 34