Nāgas in the Brahma Purāṇa
Nāga · nāga, “the serpent being”
The Brahma Purāṇa tells of the Nāgas from the milking of the earth to the tīrthas of the Gautamī: Vāsuki and Takshaka as their lords, the pātālas, Kārtavīryārjuna and the sons of Karkoṭaka, the nāgas with the devas, Śesha and Balarāma, and Kadrū‘s sons revived by the Gaṅgā water of Pātāla. The full accounts of the last two are on Garuḍa, the Nāgas and the River Vañjarā and Śesha Receives the Triśūla.
Their place in creation
When Pṛthu milked the earth, each class of beings milked her in its own vessel and lived by it; for the nāgas the calf was Takshaka, the milker the nāga Airāvata, the milk poison, and the vessel a bottle-gourd. When Brahmā gave each class of beings its ruler, he made Vāsuki lord of the nāgas and Takshaka lord of the serpents. In the pātālas below the earth there are hundreds of kinds of daityas and dānavas and great kinds of serpents; Nārada Maharshi told the sabhā of svarga that the pātālas, with their gems, the ornaments of the nāgas and their riches enjoyed by the dānavas, daityas and nāgas, are lovelier than svarga. Below them shines Śesha, the body of Vishṇu, and the hari-candana that the nāga maidens apply to him is blown by his breath as fragrant powder to all the directions.
Source: Brahma Purāṇa, Chapters 2, 4, 21
The nāgas and Kārtavīryārjuna
In his city Māhishmatī, Kārtavīryārjuna conquered the nāgas, the sons of Karkoṭaka, and settled them in the city among men. When he stirred the ocean with his thousand arms, thousands of nāgas rose up as in fear at the churning for amṛta, saw the best of kings, bowed their hoods and, trembling like plantain stems in the evening wind, took refuge with him.
Source: Brahma Purāṇa, Chapter 13
With the devas
The nāgas bowed and praised Bhagavān Sūrya with the hosts of vidyādharas, yakshas and rākshasas, saying “Śam be to the two-footed, śam to the four-footed,” and asking that all beings might be able to bear his tejas. They were among those who had come to Daksha’s yajña when Rudra drove them all away. At the wedding of Bhagavān Śiva and Devī Pārvatī, Nāgendra came with a thousand gem-hoods on a fire-coloured vimāna with his nāga retinue, and the nāgas came to the wedding maṇḍapa with auspicious instruments; in the Gautamī Māhātmya too the serpents were present at that wedding. They sat in order with the devas and gandharvas to receive their shares at Bali‘s aśvamedha. They came to the Gautamī for the sake of Soma, and were invited to the mountain afterwards named Devagiri. They came with the oceans and rivers to see Yama when he lay dead on the bank of the Gaṅgā, and they joined the devas and ṛshis in bathing Indra with the sacred water.
Source: Brahma Purāṇa, Chapters 32, 34, 36; Gautamī Māhātmya, Chapters 3–4, 24, 26, 35
In the teachings and stotras
The nāgas dwell with the devas, gandharvas and all beings at the Purushottama-kshetra in Utkala. The phalaśruti of Daksha‘s stuti to Bhagavān Śiva promises that yakshas, piśācas, nāgas and vināyakas cause the devotee no obstacle. Devas, asuras, gandharvas, nāgas and the other classes of beings meditate on the paramapada, and at the end of the kalpa the fire of pralaya burns devas, asuras, gandharvas, nāgas and rākshasas alike. When Akrūra had his vision in the Yamunā, he saw gandharvas, munis, siddhas and nāgas praising Balarāma and Kṛshṇa. Brahmā‘s vara made Rāvaṇa unslayable by devas, daityas, nāgas and others, and when Hiraṇyakaśipu was granted his vara, the devas, nāgas, gandharvas and munis went to Brahmā and asked him to consider how the asura would be slain. Among the births through which a jīva passes are those of the nāgas, and the perfected yogī enters the nāgas among all beings.
Source: Brahma Purāṇa, Chapters 40, 42, 51–52, 176, 192, 213, 229, 239
Balarāma and Śesha
At Prabhāsa, when the Yādava line had come to its end, a great serpent with many hoods came out of the mouth of Balarāma, seated at the foot of a tree, and went to the ocean, worshipped by siddhas and nāgas. In the Gautamī Māhātmya, Śesha, the great Nāga, ruler of the nether worlds, was driven out of Rasātala by rākshasas, daityas and dānavas; at Brahmā‘s word he praised Bhagavān Śiva on the Gautamī, received a triśūla from him, and went back to Rasātala surrounded by all the Nāgas to slay his enemies.
Source: Brahma Purāṇa, Chapter 210; Gautamī Māhātmya, Chapter 45
Kadrū’s sons and the Vañjarā-saṅgama
The Gautamī Māhātmya names Kadrū, wife of Kaśyapa, the mother of the nāgas. Brahmā tells Nārada that Garuḍa had become a slave of the serpents because his mother Vinatā had become Kadrū’s slave through Kadrū’s deceit. Kadrū asked Vinatā to take her sons to see Sūrya, the guru of the three worlds; Vinatā said she could not, but that her son would carry them. Garuḍa said “So be it” and the serpents mounted him; but as they came near Sūrya they were scorched by the fierce heat and begged him to turn back. Garuḍa sped on towards the sun, and hundreds and thousands of the serpents fell on the island Vīraṇa, their bodies burned. Kadrū heard her sons’ cry and came to console them, and Vinatā, rebuking her son, asked how the serpents, seized by old age, might be healed. Kadrū said that the Gaṅgā water of the nether worlds would bring them peace. In a moment Garuḍa brought water from Pātāla and sprinkled the serpents, and at his word Indra made the clouds rain; the serpents were revived and freed from old age, because it was the water of Gaṅgā. That water became the river Vañjarā, joining the Gautamī on its southern bank, and the place where the serpents were sprinkled is the land of the Nāgas. The Vañjarā-saṅgama dispels old age, poverty, mental distress and bodily pain; remembering it destroys all pāpas, and the learned count a hundred and twenty-five thousand tīrthas there.
Source: Brahma Purāṇa, Gautamī Māhātmya, Chapters 30, 89
Sources
- Brahma Purāṇa, Chapters 2, 4, 13, 21, 32, 34, 36, 40, 42, 51–52, 176, 192, 210, 213, 229, 239; Gautamī Māhātmya, Chapters 3–4, 24, 26, 30, 35, 45, 89