46 - Results of activity

Garuda said:

1. The different kinds of heavenly enjoyments, worldly pleasures, strength, nourishment and valour men acquire by the power of merit. 

2. All these happen to meritorious persons here or there, it is true, definitely true. The lord's statement cannot be otherwise. 

3. Virtue triumphs, not evil. Truth triumphs not false hood. Forgiveness wins, not anger. Vishnu conquers not the asuras. 

4. I have understood this truth that everything auspicious results from merit. When our merit is at the peak we are devoted to lord Krishna. 

5-6. There is still a query. What is that action by which one takes sinful births? How does one become a victim of hell? O lord of deities, please tell me briefly what I desire to know; how and what are the forms taken by him?

Lord Krishna said: 

7. O Tarkhya, men indulge in activities which result in meritorious or inauspicious fruits. O Kashyapa, now listen how men derive traits from their particular activities. 

8. The preceptor guides the seeker, the king chastens the wicked, Yama regulates and rectifies the person of secret sins. 

9-10. When the expiatory and deterrent tortures in hell cease, the living beings are born again in human form with the characteristic traits of their sins. O foremost among birds, I shall tell you what these signs are. 

11. Having suffered and crossed tortures in hell they return to the world of mortals marked with the characteristic signs. 

12. If a person has been guilty of falsehood in speech, he becomes a stammerer, a teller of lies or dumb. The brahmin slayer is born consumptive or leprous; the wine-addict becomes black toothed. 

 13. The thief of gold becomes bad-nailed; the defiler of the preceptor's bed becomes ugly-skinned; he who associates with sinners is born in a low family. 

14. He who takes meals at another's house without prior invitation is born a crow. A brahmin who performs a sacrifice for low castes is born a village-pig. He who performs many such sacrifices is born an ass. 

15. He who eats unscrupulously becomes a tiger in wilderness. He who scolds others without a cause becomes a cat; he who burns dry wood is born a glow-worm. 

16. He who imparts knowledge to the undeserving¹ becomes a bull. He who offers stale food to a brahmin becomes a hunchback. He who is malicious to others is born blind. He who steals a book is born similarly.

1. Imparts knowledge to the unworthy 

Compare a shruti text quoted by Yaska in his Niruktam a treatise on etymology: 

Vidya ha vai brahmanam ajagama

Gopaya mam shevadhişhteham asmi /

Asuyakayanrujave' yataya

Na ma bruya viryavati yatha syam //

17. He who habitually steals fruits is born a monkey or alternatively suffers from goitre. 

18-19. He who takes food offered unwillingly becomes impotent. He who is averse to thinking on self is born a stupid trader. He who is ignorant of the truth of virtue falls in a deep ocean. He who steals gold is born an alligator. He who poisons others becomes a snake. 

20-21. O bird, he who has sexual intercourse with an ascetic lady assumes a ghostly form. He who steals water becomes a Chataka.² He who steals grams becomes a mouse. He who rapes an immature girl becomes a serpent. He who covets his preceptor's wise becomes a chameleon. He who interferes with the flow of water becomes a fish.

2. Chataka-a bird which is supposed to live only on rain drops.

22. He who sells the forbidden articles becomes deformed in the eye. He who censures others is born of defiled womb. He who deceives a woman becomes an owl. 

23-24. He who takes food on the fast day after a relative's death becomes a dog. He who does not pay the promised sum to a brahmin becomes a jackal. He who kills a serpent becomes aboar. He who slanders brahmins becomes a tortoise. He who subsists on the worship of idols becomes a Chandála.¹

1. The statement would seem absurd but priesthood and idol-worship have often been the target of criticism from very early time. They have become the object of derison even in modern age, at the hands of social reformists among the Arya-samája-a sect which is very popular in northern India now-a-days. 

Compare an oft-quoted verse from the Panchatantra:

Narakaya matis to cet paurohityam samáchara /

Varsham yavat kimanyena mathachinta-dina-trayam //

25. The seller of forbidden fruits becomes indigent. He who keeps a Shudra woman as concubine becomes a bull. He who kicks the sacred fire becomes a cat. He who cats another's meat becomes a patient. 

26. He who indulges in sex at the prohibited time becomes a eunuch. A stealer of scents becomes a soul-smeller. A stealer of other goods becomes a swallow. 

27. O lord of birds, these and other signs brought about by their actions are seen in men and others. 

28. Persons who commit such sins fall into hell and are reborn in different species of animals. 

29. After passing through these births men and women are re-born in human form when their merit and demerit are equalized. 

30. When men and women unite in sexual act and both the semen and the blood are mixed, the child born will be nourished with all the elements in proper proportion. 

31-32. The receptivity, the inducement, misery, desire, death, effort, feature, complexion, love, hatred, birth, death these are attributed to the beginningless soul that seeks for its beginning (by entering the womb). 

33-34. Bound by its own action the soul takes up body after body and undergoes series of births. This is what I have told you already. This is how the circle whirls in the four species of being. Thus, O Garuda, do the birth and death of living beings rotate. The rise in the course is due to virtue and the fall is due to evil. 

35. O bird, all these take place in all castes according to their previous actions. In deity hood or manhood, the acts of benevolence and indulgence recur due to their previous karman. 

36-37. O son of Vinata, whatever is observed is the fruit of action. If a person indulges habitually in evil actions due to passion, it is certain that he will fall into a terrible hell from which there is no escape.