Sudevā and Maṅgalā

The Bhūmi Khaṇḍa of the Padma Mahā Purāṇa tells how Sudevā was freed from an animal birth. Sudevā was the first wife of the brāhmaṇa Śivaśarma. Maṅgalā, his second wife, was a mahāpativratā (a woman of great devotion to her husband). Maṅgalā gave her own puṇya (merit) to Sudevā, and Sudevā rose to svarga (heaven).

Sudevā’s failings and her birth as a boar

Sudevā was the first wife of the brāhmaṇa Śivaśarma. In her lifetime she gave up the duties of a wife. She was careless in patī-śuśrūshā (devoted service to her husband). She took no care of the sacred duties of the household. She did not live as a sādhvī (a virtuous wife) should, as is expected of a brāhmaṇa’s wife.

The Purāṇa does not describe her acts one by one, but it names the result. After her death Sudevā was born again as a śūkarī (a female boar). She wandered in the forest as a forest animal, carrying the weight of her past failings. The Padma Mahā Purāṇa tells this in chapter 51 of the Bhūmi Khaṇḍa.

Maṅgalā, the faithful wife

Maṅgalā was Śivaśarma’s second wife. In every way she was the opposite of Sudevā. She was a mahāpativratā of rare quality. Her whole life was ordered around the service and welfare of her husband. Her patī-śuśrūshā was not only outer conduct but her true inner purpose. Her husband was her devatā (her chosen deva), her tīrtha and her yajña, all in one.

The Bhūmi Khaṇḍa says that over many years of married life she gathered a great store of puṇya by this devotion (chapter 51).

The boar is recognised

At one point the śūkarī that wandered near them was recognised as the reborn Sudevā. This moved Maṅgalā to compassion. Sudevā was held in an animal birth because of the failings of her earlier life.

Maṅgalā gives her puṇya

Maṅgalā felt compassion for Sudevā’s helpless state. She made a decision that the Purāṇa presents as the highest act of generosity. She offered to the śūkarī all the puṇya she had gathered through her lifelong patī-śuśrūshā.

This was not a symbolic or partial gift. Maṅgalā took the whole store of merit from the virtue that most defined her life, and made a formal puṇya-dāna (a gift of merit) to Sudevā. It is like tīrtha-dāna and anna-dāna (the gift of food): just as a person may give material things, a person may give spiritual wealth to one who needs it more.

Sudevā is freed

The effect was at once and complete. The moment Maṅgalā’s puṇya passed to the śūkarī, the animal body fell away. Sudevā rose in her own original divine form, cleansed and freed, and went up to svarga (chapter 52).

Sources

• Padma Mahā Purāṇa, Bhūmi Khaṇḍa, chapters 51–52