Jalandhar – Part 2

In the first part, we read about Jalandhar challenging Lord Indra and subsequently winning Lord Vishnu on his side. The gods then approached Lord Shiva to help them out.

When the gods approached Lord Shiva to bail them out, Shiva with the help of Narada, hatched a plot. As part of the plot, Narada went to meet Jalandhar.

Narada was received with great respect. Narada was quite pleased with the splendour and grandeur of Jalandhar, but then he went on to say, that all the grandeur was nothing in comparison to that of Lord Shiva’s. Also, all the grandeur was meaningless without a consort like Parvati. Jalandhar asked Narada as to where could he find her. Narada immediately advised him to seek Parvati at Mount Kailash. Hearing the celestial ascetic say this, Jalandhar fell in the trap and immediately sent a messenger, Rahu, to Lord Shiva asking for Parvati.

Some versions say that once Jalandhar was praising the beauty of Vrinda. Feeling both flattered and embarrassed, she told him, that if he was smitten by just her beauty, then what would he do, if he saw the celestial beauty of Parvati. It was this statement of hers that made Jalandhar get curious about Parvati and longed to see her.

As soon as Shiva heard the message from Rahu, he got angry and in his rage a dangerous devouring being emerged from his eyebrows. This being was breathing fire and raging with terror. The sight put fear in the heart of Rahu and he begged Shiva to save him. Seeing this Shiva ordered the being to leave Rahu. But the being was created to devour Rahu and so was hungry and asked Shiva that his hunger had to be satiated and since he was the creator, he needed to resolve the same. Hearing this, Shiva simply said – “Go ahead and eat yourself”. No sooner had Shiva said this, that the being started eating itself starting from its feet, to body and then arms. Just when only the face was left, that Shiva stopped him and was so impressed with his devotion towards his creator, that Shiva blessed it and named it Kirti-mukha or the face of glory and gave it a place of honour on the ramparts of the temple. (To read more about the meaning of such symbols, please refer to my article - Mahashivratri - Part 2 )

Rahu went back and narrated the whole incident. This angered Jalandhar and he decided to wage a war on Shiva and a fierce battle took place between the two armies. When Jalandhar realised that the army of Shiva was gaining ground, through his powers, he created beautiful apsaras, to distract the army of Shiva. Soon Shiva’s armies were busy staring at the lovely damsels and started losing focus on the battle.

Taking advantage of this, Jalandhar assumed the form of Lord Shiva and approached Parvati. When Parvati saw the lustful eyes of Jalandhar, she immediately recognised him and was angry and upset. She managed to immobilise him, but was hurt and felt violated. She approached Lord Vishnu and urged him to teach Jalandhar a lesson for this single act of his.

We will next see what Lord Vishnu does on the request of Parvati. Keep reading…

The Mythical explanation of an Eclipse - Indian

The Hindu myth has its origins in the famous episode of samudra manthan. As per the myth, the gods and asuras got together to churn the ocean to get the wealth from the bottom of the sea. Amongst this wealth, the most coveted and awaited of all was the amrita (nectar of life) consuming of which would grant immortality. Both the gods and the asuras were after it, but both knew that they needed each others might to churn it out of the sea.

When they finally got the nectar, Lord Vishnu took the form of Mohini, the enchantress and asked all of them to stand in a queue and she would serve it to one and all, with the idea of not serving it to the asuras at all. All the asuras were too enchanted to see thru the deception, except for one of them, by the name of Swarbhanu. Swarbhanu could sense something amiss and so he disguised himself like the gods and managed to get a sip.

Sun and the Moon came to know about it and informed this to Lord Vishnu, who immediately cut Swarbhanu with his Chakra into two. However, since Swarbhanu had already consumed it, nothing much could be done. So the top half of Swarbhanu came to be known as Rahu and the tail became Ketu, with no body in between.

Rahu and Ketu came to dislike Sun and Moon, and so once in a while they try to swallow them. Since there is no body, every time the mouth (Rahu) swallows the Sun or the Moon, it slips out of the tail (Ketu). During the time that the Sun and the Moon pass thru Rahu and Ketu, there is darkness all around. This is the mythical reason of a Solar eclipse and a Lunar eclipse!

Rahu and Ketu have a lot of astrological significance (negative impact) on the mortals, which is a different subject altogether.

The picture shows Rahu swallowing the Sun and causing an eclipse. This Rahu Temple (Named Wat Srisathong) is in Nakhon Chaisi 65 kms from Bangkok.