Namasthe- Jarasandha

May 16, 2009

Dear all,

Magadha was ruled by a king called Brihadratha. He had married the twin daughters of the king of Kashi. They did not beget children even after many years of marriage. They went to the forest for penance and met sage Chandrakaushika.

Chandrakaushika gave a divine fruit to the King and asked him to give it to his wife. Sage did not know that he had two wives. Brihadratha was a loving husband and he was in a dilemma thinking of whom to give the fruit. Finally he decided to cut it in half and give one half to each. He divided and gave the fruit and his wives took the prasadam with utmost Bhakthi. In due course, both his wives became pregnant and gave birth. They were grief stricken to see two lifeless halves of a baby. King ordered to discard the body in the dumpster and the order was carried out.

During night time a demoness by the name Jara experienced the smell of new born flesh and came to the dumpster to eat it. She saw these human baby halves and before eating tried to join the pieces together. As soon as she put them together, it became a live boy and started crying very loud. King and his servants came out and saw the live baby and Jara gave the baby back to the King.

King named him Jarasandha because two halves of his body were put together by the demoness Jara. Jarasnadha, as prophesied by Chandakaushika became a big devotee of Lord Shiva. Later Jarasandha gave his two daughters Asthi and Praapthi in marriage to Kamsa, King of Madhura.

When Lord Krishna killed his son-in-law Kamsa, , Jarasandha became number one enemy of Krishna and he attacked Madhura 17 times and every single time he was defeated by Yadavaas. Lord Krishna could have killed him effortlessly, but he wanted to kill as many evil kings as possible and 17 attacks gave him ample opportunity to kill most of Jarasandha's friends. This freed Bhoomidevi of most of the evil people. (Also Bhima was destined to kill him later by tearing his body in to two halves.)

Regards and prayers

Savitri