Srimadbhagavatham skandha8-chapter24-Mathsyavathara

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Chapter24.Mathsyavathara

 

Parikshith asked Suka to tell him about the

Matsyavathara expressing his doubt why should the Lord take the lowliest form

of creation. Suka replied that it was for the protection of all beings, cows,

Brahmins, devas, the good and the vedas, of which He is the Lord. Like the

wind, moving in and out of all beings, the defects of the body do not adhere to

Him. Then Suka started telling him about the story of mathsyavathra.

 

At the end of naimitthika pralaya which occurs when

it is night for Brahma, Hayagreevasura stole the Vedas while Brahma was

sleeping. The Lord took the form of the Great Fish and retrieved them. Then

Suka told Parikshith the origination of the Mathsya.

 

Once there was a king named Sathyavratha, who was

doing penance with his mind fixed on Lord Hari, taking only water as food. One day

when he was offering libations of water in the river, he found a small fish in

the water in his cupped hand. He was about to drop it back in the river to save

it when the fish told him not to do so as the bigger fish will eat it. Then

sathyavrata took it to his asram in his kamandalu. Soon it grew and filled the kamandalu

and requested the king to put him in a bigger abode. Then one by one the fish

filled up the places wherever the king put it in and when the king took it to

the sea, the fish told him not to put it in there as large fish like whales and

sharks may eat it. Then the King understood that it was no ordinary fish and

asked who it was. Sathyavratha surmised that it was the Lord Himself who had

taken the form of a fish to save the world.

 

The Lord told him that in seven days from then the

world would sink into the cosmic waters. Then

He said that He would come there with a boat attached to His horns. The Lord

told Satyvrata to gather all the herbs,

all beings and saptharishis and get into the boat. The Lord blessed him with

jnana which would remove all his doubts that may arise in his mind about

Brahman as given in the Vedas. The Lord disappeared

and sathyavrata was awaiting the time mentioned by the Lord.

 

At the specified time the earth was drowning with

floods and as told by the Lord a boat came there and Sathyavrata got into it as

directed earlier and the Lord came there as mahamathsya 1 lack yojana long and

golden in colour with one horn. Sathyvratha tied the boat to the horn of the

Mathsya form of the Lord and they were taken to a safe place to wait till the

floods receded. Sathyavratha praised the Lord by hymns and the Lord gave him

upadesa, while he Himself was playing in the pralayajalam.

Thus the skandha 8 of Srimadbhagavatham ends.