Devarāja: Freed by Listening

Śaunaka's question

Śaunaka thanks Sūta for what he has just heard about the Śiva Purāṇa. Now we know for certain, he says, that nothing on earth does as much good as this story. Then he asks a pointed question: in the Kali age, which sinners does it actually purify? Tell us, and let the world be the better for it.

Sūta's answer is a long and deliberate list. Those sunk in desire and anger; the greedy and the untruthful; those who hate their own mother and father; hypocrites and the violent; those who have given up the duties of their station; the envious, the deceitful, the cruel and the pitiless; those who live off a brahmin's wealth or use up what belongs to the gods; the unfaithful, the crooked, the restless and the ill-minded — all of them, he says, are made clean in this age by hearing this Purāṇa.

He calls the telling a jñāna-yajña, a sacrifice of knowledge, which gives both enjoyment and liberation, destroys every sin and pleases Śiva. And to show what he means, he says, the sages give an old history as an example.

The brahmin of Kirātanagara

Long ago a brahmin named Devarāja lived in Kirātanagara. He was ignorant and poor, a seller of liquors, and had turned his back on the Vedic way of life. He had dropped his bathing and his daily prayers and made his living by trade.

He cheated the people who trusted him. On one pretext or another he killed brahmins, kṣatriyas, vaiśyas, śūdras and others, and took what they owned. In this way he piled up a great deal of money, and the Purāṇa notes that not the smallest part of it was ever spent on anything good.

Śobhāvatī

One day he went to bathe at a pond and saw there a courtesan named Śobhāvatī. He was completely taken with her, and she was glad to find a rich brahmin so much in her power. They talked, an attachment grew, and they agreed to live as husband and wife. They did so for a long time, sitting, eating, sleeping and passing their days together like a married couple.

His mother, his father and his wife tried again and again to stop him. He would not listen.

Then one night, in a fit of resentment, he killed his parents and his wife as they slept and took everything they had. All of it, with his own money, he gave to Śobhāvatī. He began to eat what is forbidden and to drink, and he always ate from the same dish as she did.

A fever at Pratiṣṭhānapura

In the course of his wanderings he happened one day to come to Pratiṣṭhānapura. There he saw a temple of Śiva where many holy men had gathered, and he stopped there.

In the temple he came down with a fever, and it caused him great pain. A brahmin there was reciting the Śiva Purāṇa. Lying in his fever, Devarāja heard that story of Śiva from the brahmin's lips, day after day, without a break.

After one month, worn out by the fever, he died.

Yama's city

Yama's messengers came, bound him with their nooses and dragged him off to Yama's city.

At that very moment Śiva's own attendants arrived from Śivaloka. Their bodies were white as camphor and bright with ash; they carried tridents and wore strings of rudrākṣa. They entered Yama's city in anger, beat and threatened Yama's messengers, and took Devarāja out of their hands. They seated him on a wonderful aerial car and made ready to leave for Kailāsa. A great uproar rose in the city.

Hearing the noise, Dharmarāja came out of his palace. He saw the four messengers, each looking like another Rudra, and, knowing what was right, he worshipped them with due honour. With his eye of knowledge he saw the whole story for himself. Out of awe he did not ask those great attendants of Śiva a single question.

Honoured and entreated by Yama, they went on to Kailāsa and handed the brahmin over to Śiva, the ocean of compassion, seated with the Mother.

What Sūta draws from it

Blessed is this story of the Śiva Purāṇa, Sūta concludes: by hearing it even sinners become fit for liberation. The knowers of the Veda call Sadāśiva's abode the highest of all worlds — and to that abode came Devarāja, who had killed many people out of greed, who had killed even his mother, father and wife, a drinker who kept a courtesan. By the power of this story he reached it and was freed at once.