Tretā Yuga

Tretā Yuga, “the age of the triad”

Yajña has other meanings too: see all meanings of Yajña. Araṇi has other meanings too: see all meanings of Araṇi. Aśvattha has other meanings too: see all meanings of Aśvattha. Vaiśākha has other meanings too: see all meanings of Vaiśākha. Citraratha has other meanings too: see all meanings of Citraratha. Janamejaya has other meanings too: see all meanings of Janamejaya. Parīkshit has other meanings too: see all meanings of Parīkshit. Puṇḍarīka has other meanings too: see all meanings of Puṇḍarīka. Sahadeva has other meanings too: see all meanings of Sahadeva. Sindhu has other meanings too: see all meanings of Sindhu. Kuru has other meanings too: see all meanings of Kuru. Nala has other meanings too: see all meanings of Nala. Kratha has other meanings too: see all meanings of Kratha. Nabha has other meanings too: see all meanings of Nabha. Nabhasya has other meanings too: see all meanings of Nabhasya. Sudyumna has other meanings too: see all meanings of Sudyumna.

The Tretā yuga is the second of the four yugas, coming after the Kṛta and before the Dvāpara. In the Brahma Purāṇa it is the age of yajña: what dhyāna won in the Kṛta yuga, yajña wins in the Tretā. Dharma in this age lacks one of its four quarters in time, yet in the tīrthas it is still whole. The Purāṇa sets in the Tretā yugas the birth of Daksha at Brahmā‘s yajña, the tapas of Rāvaṇa, and the avatāra of Bhagavān Vishṇu as Śrī Rāma, the son of Daśaratha.

The means of the age

Vyāsa tells the munis that the fruit gained by twelve years of tapas in the Kṛta yuga is gained by one year in the Tretā, by one month in the Dvāpara and by one day-and-night in the Kali. The fruit gained in the Kṛta by dhyāna is gained in the Tretā by yajñas, in the Dvāpara by arcana (pūjā), and in the Kali by singing the names of Keśava alone.

In the Gautamī Māhātmya, Gautama Maharshi, asking Bhagavān Śiva for varas for the Gautamī, recalls the same order: in the Kṛta yuga tapas was praised, in the Tretā yajña, in the Dvāpara yajña and dāna, and in the Kali dāna alone.

Source: Brahma Purāṇa, Chapter 230; Gautamī Māhātmya, Chapter 6

Dharma and the tīrthas in the Tretā

At the close of the Gautamī Māhātmya, Brahmā tells Nārada that dharma rests on two supports, deśa (place) and kāla (time). Dharma that rests on time wanes quarter by quarter through the yugas, but in the sacred places it stays whole. In the Tretā yuga dharma lacks one pāda (quarter) in time, but in deśa it is complete, with all four quarters.

The tīrthas too follow the yugas. In the Satya yuga a tīrtha with three presiding devatās is adored in all the worlds; in the Tretā, one with two presiding devatās. And of the four kinds of tīrtha, the one that is Daiva (of the devas) in the Kṛta yuga is Āsura (of the asuras) in the Tretā.

Source: Brahma Purāṇa, Gautamī Māhātmya, Chapter 105

A land where time runs like the Tretā

Lomaharshaṇa tells the munis that in the seven varshas of Plaksha-dvīpa there is no order of yugas: time there always runs like the Tretā yuga. The people of those lands live with the devas and gandharvas, without mental pain or illness, and from Plaksha-dvīpa to Śāka-dvīpa they live five thousand years, free of disease.

Source: Brahma Purāṇa, Chapter 20

Accounts set in the Tretā yugas

  • Daksha. Brahmā tells the munis that Daksha’s birth took place earlier, in the Tretā yuga of Vaivasvata Manu, at the yajña that Brahmā performed taking a form whose devatā was Varuṇa (Chapter 34).
  • Rāvaṇa. When the second Tretā yuga came, Brahmā tells, Rāvaṇa of great vīrya was born. For ten thousand years, without food and with the senses conquered, he performed fierce tapas, and Brahmā gave him the vara that he would be unslayable by devas, daityas, nāgas and rākshasas (Chapter 176).
  • Śrī Rāma. Vyāsa tells the munis that in the twenty-fourth Tretā yuga, with Viśvāmitra at the forefront, Bhagavān Vishṇu, the lotus-eyed Kamalāksha, took avatāra as the son of Daśaratha. He made himself fourfold, shining like Sūrya himself, and became famous as Rāma; he came for the grace of the world, the restraint of the rākshasas and the full growth of dharma, and he slew Rāvaṇa (Chapter 213).

Source: Brahma Purāṇa, Chapters 34, 176, 213

Sources

  • Brahma Purāṇa, Chapters 20, 34, 176, 213, 230; Gautamī Māhātmya, Chapters 6, 105