Haryaśvas and Śabalāśvas: Nārada and Daksha

The Haryaśvas and Śabalāśvas were the sons of Daksha Prajāpati. Daksha first had ten thousand sons, the Haryaśvas, and then a thousand more, the Śabalāśvas. The Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa tells of them in the 6th Skanda, Chapter 5. Each group went to Nārāyaṇa-saras to do tapas (austerity) so that they could bring forth beings. Nārada Maharshi met them and taught them. They turned to the path of the ātmā (the self) and never came back. Daksha then gave Nārada a śāpa (a curse).

The Vāyu Mahā Purāṇa tells the same narrative in a shorter form. Its account is given at the end.

Daksha’s marriage and sons

Daksha Prajāpati did tapas at the Aghamarshaṇa tīrtha (holy place) and saw Bhagavān Vishṇu. Bhagavān Vishṇu told him to marry Asikni, the daughter of Pañcajana Prajāpati. Daksha was filled with the power of the māyā-śakti of Bhagavān Vishṇu. He had ten thousand sons by Asikni, called the Haryaśvas. They were sons of noble character.

The Haryaśvas at Nārāyaṇa-saras

The Haryaśvas obeyed their father’s order to bring forth beings. They went to the holy lake Nārāyaṇa-saras. Bathing in its waters took away mahāmālinyas (deep impurities of the heart) and gave a firm understanding of ātma-dharma. Even so, they were bound by their father’s order, and they began tapas in order to have children. While they were doing this tapas, Nārada Maharshi came and saw them.

Nārada’s nine riddles

Nārada spoke to the Haryaśvas as if blaming them: “Alas! You call yourselves Prajāpatis, yet you are fools. You have not yet seen the end of the earth. How can you bring forth beings?”

He then gave them nine riddles. Each one holds a deep teaching about how saṃsāra (the cycle of birth and death) and karma are empty without ātma-jñāna (knowledge of the self).

“See the end of the earth” (bhūmi-anta). Know the deha-indriya-mano-saṃghāta, the joining of body, senses and mind that binds the jīva (the embodied being). The one who has abhimāna (pride of “this is I”) for this body is bound by it. What use are karma actions to one who has not cut this bond?
“The country with only one purusha“. Know Īśvara. He is advaita (one without a second). He is full of aiśvarya (lordship), śrī (fortune), jñāna (knowledge) and vairāgya (detachment). He holds himself up, is beyond prakṛti, and is the turīya-ātma-tattva, beyond the three states of waking, dream and deep sleep, in all beings. If one does not see Īśvara as the ātmā, what use are karma actions?
“The tunnel with no way out”. Know the inner ātma-jyoti (light of the self). One who knows this ātmā does not return to birth. Without that ātma-tattva, what do karma actions that give false results gain?
“The young woman of many forms”. Know buddhi (the intellect). Its nature is to take many forms all the time, changing like a fickle woman. The sādhaka (seeker) must use viveka (discrimination) to end the tādātmya (taking oneself to be one with it) with the buddhi. If he does not, what use are karma actions that only stir the mind?
“The husband of the kulāṭā (the fickle woman)”. The jīva that takes itself to be this buddhi loses its own svātantrya (freedom, its state of being unattached). Like the husband of such a woman, it is carried through the sorrow of saṃsāra by the ups and downs of that buddhi. Karma of this kind keeps ignorance going and is empty.
“The river flowing in two directions”. Know māyā-śakti, which makes and dissolves the world in two movements. Bhakti and jñāna are like the two banks that let one cross out of the river. The current of kāma (desire) and krodha (anger) blocks the way to those banks. If one does not know māyā, what use are karma actions to the ignorant one who is proud in saṃsāra?
“The wonderful house of twenty-five”. Know the ātmā. The twenty-five tattvas (principles) are mūla-prakṛti, mahat, ahaṅkāra, the five sūkshma-bhūtas (subtle elements), manas, the five jñānendriyas (senses of knowing), the five karmendriyas (organs of action), the five sthūla-bhūtas (gross elements), and the paricchinna-jīva-bhāva (the limited state of the jīva). The ātmā is like a wonderful mirror. It gives sattā (being) and prakāśa (light) to this whole gathering. That sat-cid-ātmā is a person’s innermost svarūpa (true nature). If one does not know this ātmā, what use are karma actions that hide the svarūpa?
“The haṃsa that tells wonderful stories in one place”. Know the adhyātma-śāstra. These are the scriptures that reveal Īśvara, teach bondage and liberation, and use viveka to tell the pure dṛk (the seer) from the dṛśya (the seen), as the haṃsa (swan) separates milk from water. If one does not study such śāstra and know the true nature of the ātmā, what use are karma actions that turn outward?
“The wheel that turns by itself, cutting with swords and vajras“. Know kāla (time). It is the self-turning wheel that destroys everything in all worlds with its sharp teeth. If one does not know kāla and how it eats up all things, what use are karma actions, which throw one further into the stream of time?

The Haryaśvas’ decision

All ten thousand Haryaśvas heard Nārada’s teaching. Together they used their own power of viveka and came to niścaya-buddhi, a firm understanding of the teaching. They walked around Nārada, then turned to the path of ātma-jñāna and moksha. This moksha, which comes from knowledge, is one in which there is no punarjanma (rebirth). They left on the path of no return, like nights that have passed and never come back.

The Śabalāśvas

Daksha was full of grief. He lamented that such fine sons had vanished from family life. Svāyambhuva Brahmā comforted him. Daksha then had a thousand more sons by Asikni, the Śabalāśvas. Their father told them to bring forth beings. They also went to Nārāyaṇa-saras and bathed, and their inner impurities were cleansed. They began japa (repeating a name) of the supreme Oṃkāra: “Oṃ Nārāyaṇa is the pūrṇa (the full one), the ātmā of all, who shows himself in the pure antaḥkaraṇa (inner mind) and lives in the form of the paramahaṃsas.” They did great tapas. For some months they drank only water. For other months they took only air.

Nārada came to them too. He spoke to them briefly: “O sons of Daksha! Your love for your elder brothers is great. Hear my teaching and know the path your brothers followed.” He then said: “A righteous younger brother who walks the same excellent path as his elder brother, together with puṇya (merit), will rejoice in svarga (heaven) with the Marutas, who love their brothers.”

The Śabalāśvas understood. They also followed their brothers’ path, and like them they never came back.

Daksha’s śāpa on Nārada

Daksha heard again that Nārada had drawn his sons away from gṛhastha-dharma (the duty of a householder). He was overcome with grief and then with anger. He spoke sharply to Nārada: “O wicked one in the dress of a sādhu! You have done harm to good people. You taught the life of the wandering renouncer to children. O one full of pāpa (sin)! My sons were not yet free from the three debts, to the devas, the pitṛs and the ṛshis. They had not done the karmas they had to do. They had not looked into the passing fruit of karma by proper inquiry. You have robbed them of happiness in this world and the next. You have spoiled the minds of my sons without pity. You wander among the followers of Śrī Hari, and so you also destroy Śrī Hari’s good name. You have no shame.”

Then he spoke the śāpa (a curse): “O fool who has cut the thread of my line! You have again done me harm. Therefore, you who wander through the worlds, let you have no fixed home.”

Nārada, who is praised by good people, took the śāpa with one word: “Sobe”, which means “so be it”. He was fully able to strike back, yet he did not.

The Vāyu Purāṇa account

The Vāyu Mahā Purāṇa tells the narrative in a shorter form.

Nārada’s question

In the Vāyu Purāṇa, Nārada asks the Haryaśvas one pointed question about how far the earth extends. He says to them: “You are children. You do not know the earth. How can you make beings without knowing the end, the upward reach or the downward reach of existence? Whatever you make, great or small, a fault is seen in it.”

The ten thousand Haryaśvas heard this and went away with the wind (vāyutā cerī) in all directions, and they never came back. The text says they went by the way of the wind, vāyu-mārga, and still wander there.

Nārada’s rebirth

The Śabalāśvas then followed the same path. Daksha gave Nārada a śāpa: he would live again and again in the womb, garbha-vāsa. Nārada took it calmly.

Daksha then spoke with Brahmā: “Let your son Nārada be born again from my daughter.” Brahmā agreed. Nārada was born again from Daksha’s daughter through Brahmā. The Vāyu Purāṇa says that Nārada thus became Brahmā’s second mānasa-putra (son born from the mind). Brahmā had first made Nārada as a mānasa-putra. Nārada’s rebirth through Daksha’s daughter made him the second mānasa-putra of the same Brahmā in this manvantara (age of a Manu).

Sources

Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa, 6th Skanda, Chapter 5
Vāyu Mahā Purāṇa, Uttarārdha, Chapter 4