Jaḍabharata and King Rahūgaṇa

Jaḍabharata was the third and last birth of the great king Bharata Cakravartī. This time he was born in a brāhmaṇa family, after two earlier lives: one as a king who became attached to a deer, and one as the deer itself. He remembered all his past lives. To keep himself from new entanglement in saṃsāra (the cycle of birth and death), he acted dull and indifferent to the world.

His moksha (liberation) came through a series of events. Thieves caught him to offer him to a devī. Devī Bhadrakālī saved him. Then he met King Rahūgaṇa of Sauvīra, and gave him one of the deepest teachings in the Bhāgavatam.

Three births

The account of Jaḍabharata follows the ātmā through three lives on the way to moksha. It teaches the power of saṃskāra (impressions left by past action), the danger of attachment, and the strength of devotion built up over many lives.

First birth, as Bharata Cakravartī. He was the great king of Bhārata-varsha and the eldest son of Ṛshabhadeva. He performed a hundred aśvamedha-yajñas (horse yajñas) and ruled with justice. Then he gave up his kingdom and went to the āśrama of Pulaha on the river Gaṇḍakī. There his deep bhakti (devotion) was broken by one act of kindness that turned into attachment. He saved a fawn that had lost its mother, and he grew very attached to it. At death his last thought was of the fawn. This is told in the Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa, 5th Skanda, Chapters 7–8.

Second birth, as a deer. He was born as a deer, but he kept full jāti-smṛti (memory of his past births). He grieved over his fall from the spiritual path. He kept away from company, lived near āśramas, and waited in repentance until that deer-life ended. This is told in the Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa, 5th Skanda, Chapter 8.

Third birth, as Jaḍabharata. He was born as the son of a learned brāhmaṇa ṛshi and a devoted mother. The father performed tapas (austerity) and yajñas. The boy was born with great gifts. Again he remembered all his past lives, because he had gathered the puṇya (merit) of countless lives of practice. This is told in the Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa, 5th Skanda, Chapter 9.

The acted dullness

From his own experience, Jaḍabharata knew that the ties of the world can pull the ātmā off the path to moksha. This is so whether they come through desire, through kindness, or through good company. So he took up the manner of an avadhūta (one who lives free of all social rules). He pretended to be mentally weak. He did no assigned duties and did not bathe properly. He did not answer instructions. He ate whatever was given to him, or did not eat. He wandered with no clear aim. He neither made nor kept any relationships.

His father tried again and again to give him Vedic teaching and the saṃskāras (sacred rites of life), but the boy stayed indifferent. His father and family were troubled. In the end they gave up and decided that he was a natural simpleton. The word for this is jaḍa, and so he got the name Jaḍabharata.

After his father died, his step-brothers kept treating him badly. They gave him the lowest work, and he took it without protest. He ate whatever grain or scraps were thrown to him. This is told in the Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa, 5th Skanda, Chapter 9.

Captured by thieves, saved by Bhadrakālī

A band of thieves wanted to make a human offering to devī Bhadrakālī. They caught Jaḍabharata as their victim. They bathed him, dressed him in fine clothes, and adorned him. They brought him before the mūrti of the devī and got ready to cut off his head.

At that moment the stone mūrti of Bhadrakālī burst open. The devī came out of it in her blazing, fearful form, shining with anger and followed by her gaṇas (attendants) and her host. She took the chief thief’s sword and killed the whole band of thieves, and drank their blood. Then she vanished.

The Bhāgavatam tells this as the devī’s own act of rescue for her great bhakta (devotee). Over countless lives he had gathered so much puṇya that even a devī in stone would not let harm come to him. Jaḍabharata himself stayed unmoved through all of it. He was as calm after it as before. This is told in the Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa, 5th Skanda, Chapter 9.

Meeting King Rahūgaṇa

The meeting that brought his third life to moksha was with King Rahūgaṇa of the Sauvīra kingdom. Rahūgaṇa was travelling in his royal palanquin to see the ṛshi Kapila. The palanquin-bearers were short of men, so they forced Jaḍabharata to serve as a bearer.

Jaḍabharata carried the palanquin. But he took care never to step on any living being, even an ant or an insect. So he often stepped aside and walked unevenly, and the palanquin lurched and tilted. The king was annoyed by the rough ride. He called out in mockery. He asked why the man was tired already, when he carried no load, had a strong body, and looked well fed. Had he carried for too long and needed rest?

Jaḍabharata answered with a speech of great depth. He asked who it was that was tired, and who carried the palanquin. He asked who the king was and who he himself was. He said that “tired”, “bearer” and “king” are only labels laid by the mind over the one undivided Ātman. He said that the earth carries the mountains and the water carries the fish, yet neither is burdened, for both are supports, not bearers with ego. He said that he was not the body and the king was not the body. The body is earth, and earth carries everything without complaint. What is tiredness to the Ātman? This is told in the Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa, 5th Skanda, Chapters 10–11.

The teaching on the mind

King Rahūgaṇa was not angry at all. He was deeply moved. He came down from the palanquin and fell at the feet of Jaḍabharata, with his crown touching the ground. He humbly asked to be taught. He saw that the man before him was no common labourer, but a great perfected soul.

In the talk that followed, Jaḍabharata taught the highest truth about the manas (mind) as the root of both bondage and moksha. The main teachings are these.

The suffering of beings in saṃsāra is like a dangerous journey through a forest. It is not caused by outside forces. It is caused by the manas, which makes up the false ideas of “I” and “mine”.
When the manas takes itself to be the body through ahaṃkāra (the sense of “I”), it becomes the tool of all karma (action) and so the cause of all suffering.
When the manas is made pure by sādhu-saṅga (the company of the wise), by śravaṇa (hearing) the glories of Bhagavān Vishṇu, and by nididhyāsana (deep meditation), it becomes the tool of moksha.
The guṇas (qualities) of Prakṛti, which are sattva, rajas and tamas, make saṃsāra. The jīva (living being) becomes free only by going beyond them, through knowing the Paramātman.
The whole world of experience is like a merchant’s journey through a dangerous forest, full of temptations, hunters and false shelters. Only the śreya-mārga (the path of the highest good) leads out of it.

Jaḍabharata went on to describe the Paramātman as the only reality. The Paramātman is in all beings and is all beings, beyond time, cause and limit. He spoke of himself as that pure Ātman. Bharata, the great king, and the deer were only successive costumes. The one who wore them was always the deathless, unborn consciousness.

King Rahūgaṇa was deeply changed by this teaching and reached freedom of mind by hearing it. He became a jīvanmukta (one freed while still living), free even in the body of a king. This is told in the Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa, 5th Skanda, Chapters 11–14.

Moksha

At the end of his third birth, all the karma of countless lives was used up. These were the lives of the king, the lover of the fawn, the deer, and the dull brāhmaṇa. Jaḍabharata had stayed in the state of the pure witnessing Ātman through his whole life as a brāhmaṇa. He left the body with no bond remaining.

The Bhāgavatam teaches through his life that even the purest devotee can slip through one act of misplaced attachment. It teaches that puṇya is never lost and carries the ātmā toward its goal across many births. It also teaches that the grace of Bhagavān Vishṇu and of Devī Bhadrakālī watches over every sincere sādhaka (seeker).

The forest allegory of saṃsāra

In his teaching to Rahūgaṇa, Jaḍabharata described saṃsāra through a long allegory of a forest. The life of a householder who wanders through the world without spiritual discernment is like a merchant who wanders through a huge and dangerous forest.

The forest is full of wild beasts. These are the uncontrolled senses and their objects.
The forest has seeming friends who cannot be trusted. These are worldly relationships.
There are thieves and robbers. These are karma and its results.
There are thorns and brambles. These are the troubles of life.
There are false shelters that look like homes but lead deeper into the forest.
The merchant finds his way out only by taking the guidance of a true guru who knows the path.

This is told in the Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa, 5th Skanda, Chapter 14. The allegory pictures saṃsāra-vairāgya (turning away from saṃsāra).

The Vishṇu Mahā Purāṇa account

The Vishṇu Mahā Purāṇa, Dvitīyāṃśa, Chapters 13–14, tells the same three births with some points of its own.

In this account Bharata performs tapas on the Śālagrāma mountain. This is the holy hill on the Gaṇḍakī where the sacred śālagrāma stones are found. A doe, frightened by a lion, gives birth in the river. The fawn is left without its mother. Bharata saves it and becomes attached to it. He dies thinking of the deer and is reborn as a deer with memory of his past birth (jāti-smara). He repents, and is born again as a brāhmaṇa with full jñāna (knowledge) from birth.

In the palanquin talk with Rahūgaṇa, Jaḍabharata uses the palanquin-wood-tree example. A palanquin is called a palanquin only because wood has been shaped into that form. The wood was once a tree. The tree, the wood and the palanquin are the same substance under different names, and none of these names is “I”. In the same way the body is made of earth, water, fire, air and space, and no arrangement of these can be “I”. The pure ātmā has no name and carries no load.

The Vishṇu Purāṇa also says plainly that Kapila Maharshi, who is an avatāra of Bhagavān Vishṇu born to free beings from moha (delusion), now stood before Rahūgaṇa in the form of Jaḍabharata. The account ends with Jaḍabharata telling the Ṛbhu-Nidāgha Saṃvāda (the dialogue of Ṛbhu and Nidāgha) as a further example. In that same birth Rahūgaṇa gained memory of his past life (pūrvajanma-smṛti) and apavarga (final moksha).

Sources

Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa, 5th Skanda, Chapters 7–8 (first birth)
Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa, 5th Skanda, Chapter 8 (second birth)
Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa, 5th Skanda, Chapter 9 (third birth, the acted dullness, the thieves and Bhadrakālī)
Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa, 5th Skanda, Chapters 10–11 (the palanquin and the speech to Rahūgaṇa)
Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa, 5th Skanda, Chapters 11–14 (the teaching on the mind)
Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa, 5th Skanda, Chapter 14 (the forest allegory)
Vishṇu Mahā Purāṇa, Dvitīyāṃśa, Chapters 13–14