Diti-saṅgama
Diti-saṅgama · diti-saṅgama, “the confluence of the Diti”
Diti has other meanings too: see all meanings of Diti.
Diti-saṅgama is the confluence (saṅgama) where a stream named Diti meets the Gaṅgā, the Gautamī, in the region of the Putratīrtha. The Brahma Purāṇa makes it the place of the chief rite of that tīrtha: one bathes at the confluence of Diti and Gaṅgā and worships Bhagavān Śiva as Siddheśvara, in the form of a liṅga, and gains sons and, at death, the city of Śiva. Brahmā tells Nārada its origin: the vrata of Diti, the mother of the daityas, the birth of the forty-nine Maruts, the stotra of Kaśyapa Prajāpati on the bank of the Gautamī, and the vara that Bhagavān Śiva granted at Diti’s request.
How the place came to be
Brahmā tells Nārada that the sons of Diti and Danu had grown weak, while the sons of Aditi rose in every way. Diti, grieving and full of rivalry, went to Danu. Counselled to please her husband, she served Kaśyapa Prajāpati in every way, and he asked her to choose a vara. She asked for a son of good qualities, conqueror of the universe, bowed to by all. Kaśyapa taught her a holy vrata of twelve years; when it was done he made her pregnant and gave her rules to keep: not to sleep at the sandhyās (dawn and dusk), not to lie with her head to the north, never to speak falsehood, and others.
Diti stayed in the āśrama of Agastya Maharshi. The daitya Maya told Indra of the child, and Indra came to serve his stepmother, waiting for a lapse. One dusk he found her asleep with her head to the north, entered her womb with his vajra, and cut the child into forty-nine pieces. They did not die, and because Indra said to them “do not cry” (mā rudaḥ), they became the Maruts. Agastya and Diti, in anger, each pronounced a śāpa on Indra.
At Brahmā’s word Kaśyapa came to the Gautamī with Indra, the Vasus and the guardians of the quarters, bathed, and praised Bhagavān Śiva with a stotra in which every line begins “Protect”: Śaṅkara, ruler of the devas, sanctifier, seated on the bull, destroyer of the three cities, crescent-crested, ruler of the Siddhas, ocean of mercy, the only refuge of beings weary of saṃsāra. Bhagavān Śiva appeared. He made the forty-nine Maruts sharers in the yajñas, ever with Indra, so that Indra with the Maruts would never be conquered, and he told Diti that her tapas had borne fruit in strong and heroic sons, and asked her to choose more varas.
Diti said that nothing, not svarga, moksha or the place of Brahmā himself, is worth more than a virtuous, glorious and long-lived son, and she asked that this gift be given to whoever bathes here. Bhagavān Śiva granted it.
Source: Brahma Purāṇa, Gautamī Māhātmya, Chapter 54
Siddheśvara
The deity of the confluence is Bhagavān Siddheśvara. The Purāṇa describes him as without beginning and unageing, all-pervading, his body existence, knowledge and bliss (sat-cit-ānanda), Maheśvara, served by the chiefs of the devas, the ṛshis, the Siddhas, the Gandharvas and the yogins, present in the form of a liṅga, radiant and free from all ills.
Source: Brahma Purāṇa, Gautamī Māhātmya, Chapter 54
The rite and its phala
Bhagavān Śiva himself gave the rite, in this order:
- Bathe at the confluence of Diti and Gaṅgā.
- Worship Siddheśvara every day with all the upacāras (offerings of pūjā).
- Be filled with bhakti.
- Perform the holy rites with the limbs and senses fully controlled.
- On the eighth (ashṭamī) and fourteenth (caturdaśī) days of the lunar fortnight, praise Bhagavān Śiva with Kaśyapa‘s stotra.
- Give gold according to one’s means.
- Feed brāhmaṇas.
Whoever does these on the Gaṅgā obtains a hundred sons and, having gained every cherished desire, goes to Śivapura, the city of Śiva, at death. The Purāṇa adds that a hundred thousand tīrthas that give puṇya are there.
Source: Brahma Purāṇa, Gautamī Māhātmya, Chapter 54
Sources
- Brahma Purāṇa, Gautamī Māhātmya, Chapter 54