Shri Guru Leelamrit
(The Nectar of Teacher’s Sport)
by
Pujya Shri Rang Avadhoot
Put into English by:
Shri Shantilal Thaker, M.A. B.T.,
Vidya-Bhasker
CHAPTER III
SATI ANASUYA AND THE BIRTH OF LORD DATTATREYA.
The God Creator produced seven Sages, who were his mental
sons. They were Marich, Atri, Angiras, Pulastya, Pulaha,
Kratu and Vasishthe. But of these, Atri, the second son of
Brahma, had attained self-knowledge. He composed the fifth
Mandal of the Rig-Veda, the science of medicine –
Harit-Samhita, and a Smriti laying down rules of conduct. He
married Anasuya, the daughter of Sage Kardama, the sister of
the Sage Kapil who promulgated the Samkhya system of
philosophy. The Saga Atri was practicing penance on the
Riksha mountain, Brahma, Vishnu and Mahesh – the gods of
creation, protection and destruction were pleased by his
austerities. The Triune godhead appeared before the Sage
Atri and asked him to choose a boon. He chose the state of
absolute spiritual liberation and their closest proximity.
They granted him the boon, and said that he would get a son,
combining in his consciousness the divine Trinity.
Then Atri and Anasuya came in Gujarat and built a
hermitage on the holy bank of the river Narmada. As a result
of his severe austerities and the chastity of Anasuya, the
hermitage and its surroundings were quiet, peaceful, full of
divine bliss. The moon showered the nectar of its rays on
that lovely spot. Mother earth became soft. Soft breezes
blew. All seasons were favorable. It rained there gently and
in necessary measure. The sun shone, not very hot. Due to
the perfect vow of non-violence of the sagely pair, there
played the tiger and the lamb together, the mouse gambled
with the cobra, the crane fondled the fish. Gods were afraid
of the austerities of Sage Atri. They repaired to God
Vishnu, who told them not to worry, as the Sage Atri had no
worldly desire in his heart, not even of the heavenly
kingdom. Then God Vishnu thought of his divine play to be
born of Anasuya’s womb in his triune divine form. He also
wanted to remove the pride of Laxmi, Savitri and Uma – the
wives of Vishnu, Brahma and Mahesh – of their being
unrivaled and unsurpassed women of chastity.
The Sage Narada, who is the divine mind of Lord Vishnu
incarnate, wanders over all the three worlds, singing the
Lord’s name and praise on his lute given by the Lord. Once
he came to earth and went to the hermitage of Sage Atri. He
was struck by the peace pervading all over, the holiness of
the atmosphere, the pleasantness of the surrounding, and
above all the quiet peaceful lustre and aura of the Sati
Anasuya. He was glad to have her holy sight. He could not
withdraw his sight from her face, so enrapturing and
purifying was Anasuya’s physical frame and subtle body. When
he returned to the Vaikunth, the goddess Laxmi received him
well and asked if he had come across anything extra-ordinary
in his wanderings all over the three worlds. Narada replied
that he was blessed by the sight of Sati Anasuya, who was
the holiest, the most peaceful and divinely charming lady he
had seen in his life. Laxmi asked him if she was more chaste
and charming even than she. Narada, undaunted, replied, ‘By
all means. You cannot compare with Anasuya even in a slight
degree.’ Then he went to Savitri and then to Uma. The same
conversation took place with them two also. The three
goddesses became jealous of Anasuya and decided to pull her
down from her high pedestal of chastity. They met together
and resolved to exhort their husbands to pull Anasuya down
from her superb chastity by any means.
The three gods assumed the forms of mendicant ascetics
and went to the hermitage of the Sage Atri to defile the
chastity of Sati Anasuya. But none of them dared to enter
the hermitage first. Each goaded the other to enter first.
At last they all three entered simultaneously, shouting for
alms of food. Anasuya gave them seats, bowed down before
them, and said, ‘Please wait for a while. My husband shall
be returning soon from his ablutions and meditations on the
banks of the holy river Narmada’. But they were in a hurry
for fear of being detected and cursed by the Sage Atri. So
they pleaded great hunger and consequent inability to wait
longer. Anasuya was confident of her husband’s faith in her,
and she went into the kitchen to prepare three dishes for
the mendicant ascetics. When the dishes were ready, the gods
shouted, ‘We belong to the sect of Aghori mendicants, and
dine from the dish that is served only by a naked lady. Do
so or here we depart ! ‘
Anasuya began to doubt that they must be gods come to put
her to test. She was pure at heart, a chaste woman. So she
had neither fears nor doubts. She knew that no trouble would
come from the side of her husband. She did not like the idea
that the mendicants should go without food from her house.
So she removed her clothes, and said, ‘Whoever these three
mendicant ascetics may be, let them become small children by
my power of chastity,’ Lo ! the three gods became small
children forthwith and she came out of the kitchen naked.
Milk began to flow from her breasts and the three gods were
drinking it with gladness. In the meantime, Sage Atri
arrived on the scene and was highly delighted for he knew
everything by his supernatural yogic powers. Anasuya put the
three god-children in the cradle and they vied with one
another to be first to be rocked and sung a lullaby too. The
joy of Atri and Anasuya knew no bounds, for the presence of
the three god-children made their hermitage more blissful
than the divine abodes of the three gods.
Months passed, and the three divine consorts of the
gods-Vishnu, Brahma and Mahadeva saw neither the return of
their husbands nor got any news about them. So their minds
were filled with anxiety. They met together and came down to
earth near the hermitage of Sage Atri. Nobody of them dared
to enter it, for they had wronged the Sati Anasuya without
any cause of provocation. They approached the goddess of the
river Narmada with a request to intercede on their behalf.
The The goddess Narmada readily acceded to their request,
for noble souls have always a compassionate heart. She took
the three goddesses to mother Anasuya and told her the
reason why they had gone there. The goddesses stood
trembling in the corner behind the door. The kindhearted
Sati Anasuya requested the three godchildren to assume their
original forms and accompany their divine consorts back
home. They began to weep and requested mother Anasuya not to
be so hardhearted as to drive them away from her, for in her
vicinity they had found greater and diviner bliss than in
their heavenly abodes. Anasuya requested them to understand
the pain in the hearts of their consorts and go. The three
gods requested her to be kind to allow them to be born of
her womb, for that was the boon granted by Lord Vishnu to
her husband, Sage Atri. The mother Anasuya gladly agreed,
and they went to their abodes with Laxmi, Savitri and
Uma.
Days passed and the full-moon day of the month of
Marg-Shirsha arrived. Mother Anasuya was pregnant. She held
in her womb the lustrous seed of Sage Atri’s lifelong
austerities. On that holy day, she gave birth to three sons
– Durvasa, the moon and Dattatreya. Durvasa, who was
destined to be a great ascetic, went away to the forest for
practicing penance’s and austerities. The moon went over to
the sky and took there its station to illumine the world
with its cool rays. The third was so called, because the
three gods had given themselves away completely to the
devotee soul, Anasuya, and because he was the son of the
sage Atri (Datta and Atreya). He was a born Yogi. He began
to roll in the holy ashes as soon as he was born. He sat in
meditation, while lying in the cradle. His gaze was steady
and fixed, as it were, in the vacuum of the sky. The mother
would give him a bath, and the next moment he would throw
earth and mud over his body and make it dirty. Great Yogis
try to find the Lord in the heart by practicing hard
austerities, but they do not have his sight even in the
dream. The same Lord took great delight in lying in the lap
of mother Anasuya. Datta became eight years old, and the
sage Atri invested him with the sacred thread. He went to
Panchaleshwer, on the bank of the river Goda, to do
austerities. The next moment he would come back to Mahurgadh
and prostrate before his parents. Some times he would put on
a loincloth, and the next moment he would throw it away, and
go and sit naked in the cemetery-grounds. Sometimes he would
appear fat and well-nourished in body, the other day he
would appear lean and thin, emaciated, only a skeleton.
Sometimes he would appear a celibate with only a gourd in
his hand, the next day he would appear like a rich
householder; the third day he would appear like a sannyasin
who has renounced the world. He acted beyond all scriptural
commands, throwing away to the winds all commands and
prohibitions. He sometimes behaved like a child, at other
times like a mad man or like a tipsy man. Who can bind the
Lord ! By his supernatural yogic powers, he would stay on
the Sahya mountain, sleep in Mahurgadh, take his morning
bath in the Ganges, do achaman ceremony (sipping holy water)
in Kurukshetra, do meditation in Ganagapur, apply holy ashes
to his body in Dhoot-papeshwer, would do his evening worship
in Karhat, would beg for food-alms in Kolhapur, would do the
holy mark in the forehead in Pandharpur, would eat his lunch
in Panchaleshwar, would drink water in the rive Tunqabhadra,
and would hear the religious discourse in Badari-Narayan.
Then h would rest on the mount Girnar and do his evening
worship in the Western Deccan. He taught self-knowledge to
the great devote Prahlad and the cobra Pingal.
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