Ṛshabhadeva Charitra
Ṛshabhadeva is an avatāra (descent) of Bhagavān Vishṇu who came as the son of King Nābhi. The Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa tells his life in chapters 3 to 6 of the fifth Skanda. The account begins with the yajña of Nābhi and Bhagavān Vishṇu’s promise to be born as his son. It goes on through his childhood, his schooling, his marriage and his hundred sons, and his great teaching to those sons, the Ṛshabha-Gītā. It ends with his life as a naked wanderer (avadūta) and his final liberation (moksha) through yoga-maraṇa (a yogī’s chosen death) in a forest fire in Karṇāṭaka.
The yajña of Nābhi and the promise of birth
Nābhi was the ruler of Bhārata-varsha. He performed a great yajña with his queen Merudevī. The yajña was perfect. All seven things needed for a flawless yajña were present without fault: the fitness of the priest, the holy ground, the time, the tools, the materials, the ritual acts and the ṛtvij priests. The priests who led the yajña made a heartfelt stotra (hymn of praise) to Bhagavān Vishṇu and prayed that he would come down as Nābhi’s son.
Bhagavān Vishṇu appeared. He had the Śrīvatsa mark, four arms, a conch, a disc, a club and a lotus, and he wore the Vaijayantī garland. He praised the perfection of the yajña. He said that no one is equal to him or above him, so a “better son” could not be asked for. But out of his own grace he himself would become Nābhi’s son.
Source in the Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa: 5th Skanda, chapters 3 and 4.
Birth and childhood
Bhagavān Vishṇu was born from the womb of Merudevī as Ṛshabhadeva. The child had all the divine marks and good qualities: the Śrīvatsa mark on his chest, hands and feet like lotuses, and every sign listed in the Lakshaṇa-śāstra. His divine qualities grew day by day. Even as a young prince his radiance, wisdom and rare powers could be seen.
Indra, king of the devas, saw Ṛshabhadeva’s growing power with envy. Out of jealousy he held back the rains from Bhārata-varsha. Ṛshabhadeva knew this and brought rain by the power of his own tapas (austerity). He gave water to his father’s kingdom without needing Indra. This showed that even the ruler of svarga (heaven) could not block the purpose of Bhagavān Vishṇu.
Source: 5th Skanda, chapter 4.
Education and marriage
Nābhi sent Ṛshabhadeva to Brahmā’s school, the gurukula education for princes. There he learned all the vidyās (branches of knowledge): the Vedas, the helping sciences, the arts of war, the skill of ruling, and knowledge of the self. When his studies were complete, Brahmā himself honoured him with the highest ritual of completion.
Ṛshabhadeva was married to Jayantī, the daughter of Indra. This marriage of the avatāra of Vishṇu to Indra’s daughter showed the order of the worlds, in which even Indra’s family was meant to be joined to the divine descent. One hundred sons were born of this marriage.
Source: 5th Skanda, chapter 4.
The hundred sons
The hundred sons of Ṛshabhadeva and Jayantī stand for the whole range of callings in dharma.
- Bharata was the eldest and the most famous. He was to become the supreme king of Bhārata-varsha, and the whole land is known by his name.
- The nine Nava-yogeśvaras are Kavi, Hari, Antarīksha, Prabuddha, Pippalāyana, Āvirhotra, Drumila, Camasa and Karabhājana. These nine became great jñānīs (knowers of the truth) and paramahaṃsas (the highest renunciants). They wandered the three worlds and taught supreme wisdom. They appear again in the eleventh Skanda of the Bhāgavata as the great teachers of bhāgavata-dharma.
- The remaining eighty-one sons were righteous kings, rulers and leaders who governed different regions and kept dharma in the world.
Source: 5th Skanda, chapters 4 and 5.
The Ṛshabha-Gītā: his teaching to the hundred sons
The best known part of the Ṛshabhadeva Charitra is the teaching that Ṛshabhadeva gave to his hundred sons before he gave up everything. The Bhāgavata records it with great care. Its main teachings are these.
The purpose of human life. A human birth is the most precious of all births. Among all the things of the senses and all pleasures, none is worth chasing for its own sake. The body is the means for sādhanā (spiritual practice), and the goal of sādhanā is liberation, not enjoying the pleasures of the body.
The folly of the householder lost in pleasure. A person drunk on worldly enjoyment, who has not woken to the difference between the lasting and the passing, lives like an animal: eating, sleeping, mating and fearing. The Vedic path of yajña and ritual, when done without jñāna (knowledge), can lead to higher births but not to liberation.
The path of the avadūta. There is a highest path beyond ordinary dharma. It is the path of the nishkāma (free from desire) sant, who has given up all sense of being the body. He wanders without belongings and eats whatever comes without seeking it. He sleeps on the ground and bears every condition with an even mind. This is the path Ṛshabhadeva himself was about to walk.
The sādhu as the gateway. The company of holy people (sādhu-saṅga) is the strongest help to liberation. The company of even one realised sant, even for a short moment, is worth more than all wealth, all ritual and all worldly success.
The mark of a true sādhu. A true sādhu is kind to all beings. He is at peace with enemies and friends alike. He has no enemy and is the friend of all. He is wholly absorbed in Bhagavān Vishṇu and finds joy in inner silence, not in the outer world.
Naishkarmya. Action that leaves no mark of karma behind is the highest action. This is not doing nothing. It is action done without feeling oneself the doer, without desire for the fruit, and with a full offering to Bhagavān Vishṇu. Such action does not bind. It makes pure.
Source: 5th Skanda, chapter 5.
Renunciation as an avadūta
After this teaching, Ṛshabhadeva crowned Bharata king of Bhārata-varsha. He shared out the rule among his other sons and gave up everything. He did not take the formal vows of a sannyāsī in the usual way. He carried no staff, wore no clothes, spoke no word and took no one as a disciple. He became a fully naked avadūta (one who has shaken off all ordinary labels).
He began to wander through Bhārata. He kept no fixed home. He ate nothing, or took whatever food came by chance, even what others had thrown away. He slept on the ground wherever night found him, and he acted in ways that looked mad or animal-like to those who watched. He made no difference between pleasant and unpleasant, between food and refuse, between honour and insult. People who did not know him mocked him, spat on him, threw stones at him and abused him. He met all of it with complete calm.
Source: 5th Skanda, chapter 6.
Wandering through South India
Ṛshabhadeva wandered through regions that the Bhāgavata names: Koṅkaṇa, Veṅkaṇa, Kuṭaka, Dakshiṇa and Karṇāṭaka. These are all regions of southern India, especially the western coast and Karnataka. He moved through them in complete freedom from all social rules. In his own person he showed that a liberated being can move through the world without belonging to it.
Source: 5th Skanda, chapter 6.
Yoga-maraṇa: liberation in a forest fire
In Karṇāṭaka, Ṛshabhadeva entered a deep forest of bamboo. The bamboo stalks rubbed together in the wind and made a fire, which spread through the dry forest. Ṛshabhadeva entered the fire in full yoga. He gathered his prāṇa (life breath), drew his awareness away from the body, and let his ātmā rest in Brahman. His body was burned in the forest fire. The Bhāgavata calls this yoga-maraṇa, the aware departure of a great yogī from the body.
The sign of his liberation was wonderful. For hundreds of yojanas in every direction the air was full of a sweet scent, beyond compare, that came from his body as the fire burned it. The whole southern country was filled with this divine scent. The Bhāgavata names it as the scent of agaru (agarwood), the finest and highest of all earthly scents. This scent was the last gift of the avatāra to the land through which he had wandered.
Source: 5th Skanda, chapter 6.
The meaning of Ṛshabhadeva’s avatāra
The Bhāgavata names Ṛshabhadeva as a full avatāra of Bhagavān Vishṇu who came down to show the paramahaṃsa path. This is the path of one who has gone beyond every social label, every ritual frame, every rule of respectability, and all the ordinary ways in which people sort their experience. His life is the fullest showing of the teaching that liberation does not depend on following any outer standard. It depends on knowing the Ātmā within.
The Jaina tradition also honours Ṛshabhadeva, as Ādinātha, the first Tīrthaṅkara. The Bhāgavata gives him within the Vaishṇava frame as an avatāra of Vishṇu.
Sources
- Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa, 5th Skanda, chapters 3 to 6
- Chapters 3 and 4: the yajña of Nābhi, the promise of birth, birth and childhood, education, marriage and the hundred sons
- Chapters 4 and 5: the hundred sons
- Chapter 5: the Ṛshabha-Gītā
- Chapter 6: renunciation as an avadūta, the wandering in the south, and yoga-maraṇa in the forest fire