Maṅkaṇaka

Maṅkaṇaka

Maṅkaṇaka is a ṛshi and a devoted worshipper of Bhagavān Śiva. He did hard tapas (austerity) at the Saptasārasvata tīrtha (holy place), and repeated Bhagavān Śiva’s five-syllable mantra until his body shone with tapas-tejas (the glow of austerity).

Once a thorn pierced his hand. Plant sap flowed from the wound in place of blood, and he began to dance with joy. Bhagavān Śiva then showed him sacred ash flowing from his own thumb, and Maṅkaṇaka was humbled. In the Kūrma Mahā Purāṇa, Bhagavān Śiva also showed his viśvarūpa (his form as the whole universe), and then taught Maṅkaṇaka the three tattvas (basic principles) and the path of bhakti-yoga.

The Vāmana Mahā Purāṇa tells much more of him. There he is Maṅkaṇa, the mind-born son of Kaśyapa Maharshi, a siddha and a tapasvī whom Bhagavān Śiva calls the best of munis and of brāhmaṇas, one who walks the path of dharma. By his prayer and his dhyāna he drew six of the seven Sarasvatīs, Suprabhā, Kāñcanākshī, Viśālā, Manoharā, Suveṇu and Vimalodakā, to Kurukshetra, and the seventh came there at the stotra of Mārkaṇḍeya Muni; there they flow as one in the Saptasārasvata tīrtha. Seven Maruts were born from his seed: in the Cākshusha manvantara, when the apsarā Vapu, sent by the Tushita devas, broke his tapas and he pronounced a śāpa on her; and in the Saro Māhātmya, from the seed he caught in a water pot, the seven Marut-gaṇas Vāyuvega and his brothers, who uphold the world. When the śāka-rasa flowed from his hand his dance shook the whole earth, until Bhagavān Śiva held him still and showed him bhasma flowing at a touch of his finger. Maṅkaṇa bowed, praised Bhagavān Śiva as the highest of all, and asked that his tapas should not perish; Bhagavān Śiva promised to dwell with him always in his āśrama, and sent him, after he had set up a mūrti in Kurukshetra, to Brahmaloka.

Tapas at Saptasārasvata

Maṅkaṇaka lived at the Saptasārasvata tīrtha, the holy place of the seven Sarasvatīs. The Brahmarshis have always lived there. At this very holy tīrtha he did tapas with the pañcāksharī (five-syllable) mantra of Bhagavān Śiva:

Namaḥ Śivāya

The mantra means “Bow to Śiva.” He repeated it with such strength and one-pointed love that his body blazed with tapas-tejas. The practice changed him deeply. (Kūrma Mahā Purāṇa, Uttarārdha, Chapter 34)

The sap and the dance

While he did tapas, a thorn pierced Maṅkaṇaka’s hand. Plant sap (śāka-rasa) flowed from the wound instead of blood. This showed the great power of his tapas. He was filled with joy at this sign and began to dance with great delight.

Parameśvara watched his devotee dance, came before him and asked, “Why do you dance like this?” Maṅkaṇaka saw Bhagavān Śaṅkara and heard the question. But his ego was not yet fully gone, and he could not hold back his proud joy. He kept on dancing. (Kūrma Mahā Purāṇa, Uttarārdha, Chapter 34)

Bhagavān Śiva humbles him and shows the viśvarūpa

Parameśvara saw tapas-garva (pride in his tapas) in Maṅkaṇaka’s dance and decided to remove it. He pressed his own thumb. From the wound came not blood but a stream of bhasma, sacred ash. Ash is the essence of fire and the mark of pure consciousness.

Then, to overwhelm Maṅkaṇaka completely, Bhagavān Śaṅkara showed his thousand-armed viśvarūpa. It had a thousand heads, a thousand eyes and a thousand feet. It had terrible fang-like teeth in a vast face. It was ringed with flames and blazed with the light of a thousand suns.

Beside him stood Devī Pārvatī in her own vast and shining form. She had the radiance of ten thousand suns, a calm face and beauty past telling.

Maṅkaṇaka saw this double form, the fearful viśvarūpa of Bhagavān Śiva and the unmatched light of Devī Pārvatī. He was struck with fear and trembled. All his pride vanished at once. He fell on the ground, sang the Śatarudrīya, and gave himself up fully. (Kūrma Mahā Purāṇa, Uttarārdha, Chapter 34)

The teaching of three tattvas

Bhaktavatsala Tryambaka (Bhagavān Śiva, loving to his devotees) was pleased by Maṅkaṇaka’s bow and by the end of his pride. He drew back the viśvarūpa and took his own natural form again. Devī Pārvatī also vanished. Parameśvara embraced Maṅkaṇaka and said, “Do not fear. What do you wish?”

Maṅkaṇaka, now humble, spoke to Bhagavān Śiva with love. He asked about the nature of the great viśvarūpa and about the radiant woman who had stood beside Bhagavān Śiva. Bhagavān Śaṅkara then taught him the highest teaching.

The whole cosmos rises, is held and melts away through three first tattvas:

  • Pradhāna, the first unmanifest Nature.
  • Purusha, the cosmic Person, the 25th tattva.
  • Īśvara, the Supreme Controller.

The śruti names these same three as Vishṇu, Brahmā and Kāla-rūpa Rudra. All three are ādyanta-rahita (without beginning or end) and rest within Brahman.

The Devī beside him is no stranger. She is his own māyā-śakti (power of māyā). The ṛshis call her “Śakti,” “Jagad-yoni” and “Sanātanī.” This Parāmāyā-Prakṛti makes, holds and dissolves the whole jagat (world). As he is Parameśvara, she is Parāśakti. They are in the end not different, for she is his own ātmā and his ānanda (bliss) shown in form.

Bhagavān Śiva said: “Know me alone as the Pariśuddha Paratattva. Worship me with bhakti-yoga and you will have darśana of the Paramapurusha.” (Kūrma Mahā Purāṇa, Uttarārdha, Chapter 34)

Life after the teaching

After Bhagavān Maheśvara finished and went out of his sight, Maṅkaṇaka stayed at the Saptasārasvata tīrtha. He kept offering ārādhanā to Bhagavān Śaṅkara with bhakti-yoga.

The Kūrma Purāṇa says this makes the Saptasārasvata kshetra (holy ground) most holy. Brahmarshis live there, and groups of Brahmarshis visit it. Any wise brāhmaṇa who comes to do pūjā and snāna (holy bathing) there loses all pāpa (sin). One who offers ārādhanā to Bhagavān Śaṅkara at Saptasārasvata gains the phala (fruit) of an Aśvamedha yajña (fire ritual). (Kūrma Mahā Purāṇa, Uttarārdha, Chapter 34)

The account in the Vāmana Mahā Purāṇa

In the Vāmana Mahā Purāṇa, Maṅkaṇaka is at the Saptasārasvata tīrtha doing tapas. One day his hand is wounded, and plant sap (śāka-rasa) flows in place of blood. He is overjoyed at this proof of his tapas-siddhi (success in tapas) and begins to dance. He rolls on the ground and jumps and spins like a child. The earth shakes under him.

At that time Bhagavān Śiva had left his usual home on Mount Mandara. The devas had lost the power to see him there because of their pāpa. He had gone to do tapas, and the world was shaken. When the devas had kept the taptakṛcchra vrata (a vow of purification), they found him standing as Sthāṇu in the waters of Kurukshetra, and at their prayer he gave up that severe vrata, whose fire of tapas was shaking the three worlds. Still the earth shook. Bhagavān Śiva found Śukra in severe tapas on the bank of the Oghavatī river and granted him the Sañjīvanī vidyā, and still the earth with its mountains and oceans shook. Then Bhagavān Śiva came to the Saptasārasvata tīrtha and saw Maṅkaṇaka dancing in joy.

Bhagavān Śiva went up to him smiling, took his hand and held him still, and asked, “O Maharshi, why do you dance like this? Tell me what delights you.” Maṅkaṇaka showed him the wound and the sap and said, “Look! Through my tapas, plant sap now flows in place of blood. What greater wonder can there be?”

He called Bhagavān Śiva Viprendra, best of brāhmaṇas, and said that this was the fruit of the tapas he had done for many years for kāya-śuddhi (purity of body). No joy could be greater, and that was why he danced.

Bhagavān Śiva answered him: “Look here. Merely by striking with my finger, pure bhasma comes out. Yet I do not dance, forgetting myself, because of it. Truly, you seem to be intoxicated.”

Maṅkaṇaka was humbled at once. He saw that the tapas-tejas before him was far greater than his own. Astonished, he bowed his head in shame, grew quiet and fell before Bhagavān Śiva in salutation. Bhagavān Śiva was pleased with his humility and blessed him: “You will go to Brahmaloka.” He also declared the Saptasārasvata tīrtha equal in holiness to Pṛthūdaka. In this Sārasvata tīrtha, he said, the suras, asuras, gandharvas, vidyādharas, kinnaras and others will always be present; it will be a mainstay of dharma and will destroy all the impurities of pāpa.

Its seven streams are Suprabhā, Kāñcanākshī, Suvenu, Vimalodakā, Manoharā, Oghavatī and Viśālā. With the Sarasvatī herself, each gives the phala of a soma yāga (Soma ritual). Whoever bathes in it and visits it gains the fruit of drinking soma, and these seven Sarasvatīs are always there.

Bhagavān Śiva told Maṅkaṇaka to establish a mūrti of great power there before going to the rare Brahmaloka. By his command the tapasvī established a mūrti in Kurukshetra and went to Brahmaloka, and when he had gone the earth stopped shaking and returned to its natural state. Bhagavān Śiva went back to his own abode, Mandara. It was while he was away for this tapas, Pulastya tells Nārada, that the daitya Andhaka went to Mandara and fought with Parameśvarī, Devī Pārvatī. (Vāmana Mahā Purāṇa, Chapter 36)

The seven Maruts of the Cākshusha manvantara

Pulastya Maharshi told Nārada Maharshi who the Maruts were in each of the earlier manvantaras. In the Cākshusha manvantara, he said, a tapodhana named Maṅki, truthful (satyavādī) and pure in his vratas (śucivrata), was in severe tapas at the Saptasārasvata tīrtha. To obstruct his tapas, the Tushita devas sent a beautiful woman named Vapu. She came to the river bank and stirred his mind, and his seed fell into the waters of the Saptasārasvata. Maṅkaṇaka, blazing with anger, looked at Vapu and pronounced his śāpa: “Foolish woman, you will surely suffer the fruit of your pāpa. Go! While you are at the vedi of a yajña assembly, a horse will destroy you.” Then the ṛshi went back to his āśrama, and from those Saptasārasvata waters seven Maruts were born. Pulastya closes the account of the Maruts of the manvantaras with its phala: hearing the account of their birth removes pāpa and brings the growth of dharma. (Vāmana Mahā Purāṇa, Chapter 46)

Bringing the seven Sarasvatīs to Kurukshetra

The Saro Māhātmya of the Vāmana Mahā Purāṇa tells how the Saptasārasvata tīrtha came to be, the place in Kurukshetra where the seven Sarasvatīs come together and flow as one. The seven, in the order of its list, are Suprabhā, Kāñcanākshī, Viśālā, Mānasahradā, the Sarasvatī named Ogha, Suveṇā and Vimalodakā. Each had come to some holy place at the call of a ṛshi or a king, and it was Maṅkaṇaka who drew six of them to Kurukshetra:

  1. Suprabhā. When Brahmā was performing a yajña at Pushkara, the ṛshis told him that a yajña without the Sarasvatī, the crest-jewel of rivers, does not give its true fruit. Brahmā remembered her, and she came to Pushkara as Suprabhā. The mahātmā Maṅkaṇa brought that Sarasvatī of Pushkara to Kurukshetra.
  2. Kāñcanākshī. At Naimiśāraṇya, where Śaunaka and the munis asked Lomaharshaṇa how to gain the fruit of yajña, the ṛshis of the sattra-yāga meditated on the Sarasvatī and she came to their place of yajña. When Maṅkaṇa Maharshi meditated on her, the Sarasvatī named Kāñcanākshī came from Naimisha to Kurukshetra.
  3. Viśālā. King Gaya began a great kratu at Gayā and invited the Sarasvatī there; there she is called Viśālā. Honouring Maṅkaṇa’s prayer, she too came to Kurukshetra.
  4. Manoharā. When the muni Uddālaka meditated, the Sarasvatī came to the holy land of Uttara Kośala, where munis wearing bark and deer-skin worshipped her; there she was called Manoharā, remover of all pāpas. Accepting Maṅkaṇa’s prayer, and out of regard for the ṛshis, she came to Kurukshetra.
  5. Suveṇu. The Sarasvatī at the Kedāra tīrtha, served by ṛshis and siddhas, is called Suveṇu. The same muni worshipped Parameśvara and brought her too to Kurukshetra, for the good of the ṛshis.
  6. Vimalodakā. Daksha, consecrated for a yajña at Gaṅgādvāra, brought the Sarasvatī forth there in the form of Vimalodakā. Answering the call of the mahātmā Maṅkaṇa, she reached Kurukshetra, the place of King Kuru‘s yajña.
  7. The seventh. Pleased with the stotra of Mārkaṇḍeya Muni, the Sarasvatī of holy waters came to the middle of the lake.

“In that Sapta Sārasvata kshetra,” the Purāṇa says, “the siddha Maṅkaṇa, restrained by Mahādeva, is dancing in bliss.” (Vāmana Mahā Purāṇa, Saro Māhātmya, Chapter 16)

His birth, his sons the Maruts, and the dance, in the Saro Māhātmya

The brāhmaṇas asked: “How did Maṅkaṇaka become a siddha? Whose son is he? When that maharshi was dancing, why did Śiva stop him?” The answer is this.

The muni Maṅkaṇa is the mānasa-putra (mind-born son) of Kaśyapa Maharshi. One day, wearing garments of bark, he went to bathe. Rambhā and other beautiful apsarās came there and bathed with him. Seeing them, the muni’s mind was moved and his vīrya (seed) fell into the water, and the tapasvī caught it in a kalaśa (water pot). The vīrya in the kalaśa became seven parts, and from it arose the seven Marut-gaṇas of great vīrya: Vāyuvega, Vāyubala, Vāyuhā, Vāyumaṇḍala, Vāyujvāla, Vāyureta and Vāyucakra. These seven sons of the ṛshi uphold the world of the moving and the unmoving.

Once the siddha Maṅkaṇaka cut his hand with the tip of kuśa grass, and from the wound śāka-rasa flowed out. Seeing it, he began to dance with joy, and by the force of that dance all beings, moving and unmoving, began to dance; enchanted by his tejas, the whole world danced with him. Then Brahmā, the devas and all the ṛshis rich in tapas went together to Mahādeva and prayed: “Prabhu Śaṅkara, stop this muni from dancing.”

For the good of the devas, Bhagavān Śiva asked the muni: “O best of munis, best of brāhmaṇas, you walk the path of dharma. Tell me the cause of this excess of joy.” Maṅkaṇa answered: “Bhagavān Śaṅkara, do you not see the śāka-rasa flowing from my hand? Seeing it, I am leaping with joy.” At this Parameśvara laughed and said: “O muni, deluded by attachment, I see nothing to wonder at in this!” And the greatly radiant Devadeva struck his thumb with the tip of his finger, and from it came bhasma, white as snow.

Seeing that, Maṅkaṇa was ashamed, fell at the feet of Parameśvara and praised him:

  • “Prabhu Śaṅkara, I do not think there is any deva beyond you.”
  • “In the moving and unmoving world, you, Śūlapāṇi, are the highest.”
  • “All these devatās, Brahmā and the rest, live by taking refuge in you.”
  • “O Anagha, the first place among the devas is yours.”
  • “You are the one who created this whole world and runs it.”
  • “By your grace alone do all the devatās live without fear from anyone.”

Holding the feet of Parameśvara, the ṛshi said: “Bhagavān Śaṅkara, by your grace may my tapas not perish. Bless me so.” And Bhagavān Śiva said: “I too will always dwell with you in this āśrama. For one who bathes in the Sapta Sārasvata kshetra and worships me, there is nothing that cannot be gained, in this world or the next.” By Śiva’s grace such fortunate ones attain the highest state and enjoy the joys of the Sārasvata svarga. (Vāmana Mahā Purāṇa, Saro Māhātmya, Chapter 17)

The account in the Mahābhārata

The Śalya Parva (Chapter 38) also has an account of Maṅkaṇaka. It is told as an upākhyāna (a side story) during Balarāma‘s journey to the tīrthas of the Sarasvatī. Maṅkaṇaka’s hand is pierced, plant sap flows, and he begins to dance with joy. The devas and ṛshis are troubled as the earth trembles. Bhagavān Śiva appears and humbles Maṅkaṇaka by showing ash in place of blood.

This account is told at one of the tīrthas on the Sarasvatī. It is part of the series of upākhyānas that make up the holy geography of the tīrtha-yātrā (journey to holy places). (Mahābhārata, Śalya Parva, Chapter 38)

Sources

  • Kūrma Mahā Purāṇa, Uttarārdha, Chapter 34
  • Vāmana Mahā Purāṇa, Chapters 36, 46; Vāmana Mahā Purāṇa, Saro Māhātmya, Chapters 16–17
  • Mahābhārata, Śalya Parva, Chapter 38