Death

Created by Jijith Nadumuri at 23 Jul 2011 10:31 and updated at 23 Jul 2011 10:31

VISHNU PURANA NOUN

vp.1.19	On hearing this, Hiranyakasipu started up from his throne in a fury, and spurned his son on the breast with his foot. Burning with rage, he wrung his hands, and exclaimed, "Ho Viprachitti! ho Rahu! ho Bali 2! bind him with strong bands 3, and cast him into the ocean, or all the regions, the Daityas and Danavas, will become converts to the doctrines of this silly wretch. Repeatedly prohibited by us, he still persists in the praise of our enemies. Death is the just retribution of the disobedient." The Daityas accordingly bound the prince with strong bands, as their lord had commanded, and threw him into the sea. As he floated on the waters, the ocean was convulsed throughout its whole extent, and rose in mighty undulations, threatening to submerge the earth. This when Hiranyakasipu observed, he commanded the Daityas to hurl rocks into the sea, and pile them closely on one another, burying beneath their incumbent mass him whom fire would not burn, nor weapons pierce, nor serpents bite; whom the pestilential gale could not blast, nor poison nor magic spirits nor incantations destroy; who fell from the loftiest heights unhurt; who foiled the elephants of the spheres: a son of depraved heart, whose life was a perpetual curse. "Here," he cried, "since he cannot die, here let him live for thousands of years at the bottom of the ocean, overwhelmed by mountains. Accordingly the Daityas and Danavas hurled upon Prahlada, whilst in the great ocean, ponderous rocks,
vp.3.3	Twenty eight times have the Vedas been arranged by the great Rishis in the Vaivaswata Manwantara in the Dwapara age, and consequently eight and twenty Vyasas have passed away; by whom, in their respective periods, the Veda has been divided into four. In the first Dwapara age the distribution was made by Swayambhu Brahma() himself; in the second, the arranger of the Veda Veda( vyasa) was Prajapati (or Manu); in the third, Usanas; in the fourth, Vrihaspati; in the fifth, Savitri; in the sixth, Mrityu Death(, or Yama); in the seventh, Indra; in the eighth, Vasishtha; in the ninth, Saraswata; in the tenth, Tridhaman; in
vp.5.38	of all; and your end is also nigh at hand, since he has withdrawn from you strength, splendour, valour, and preeminence. Death is the doom of every one who is born: fall is the end of exaltation: union terminates in separation: and growth tends but to decay. Knowing all this, wise men are susceptible of neither grief nor joy; and those who learn their ways are even as they are (equally free from pleasure or pain). Do you therefore, most excellent prince, understand this truth, and, along with your brothers, relinquish every thing, and repair to the holy forest. Go now, and say from me to Yudhishthira, that he to morrow, with his brethren, tread the path of heroes."
vp.6.5	But not in hell alone do the souls of the deceased undergo pain: there is no cessation even in heaven; for its temporary inhabitant is ever tormented with the prospect of descending again to earth. Again is he liable to conception and to birth; he is merged again into the embryo, and repairs to it when about to be born; then he dies, as soon as born, or in infancy, or in youth, or in manhood, or in old age. Death, sooner or later, is inevitable. As long as he lives he is immersed in manifold afflictions, like the seed of the cotton amidst the down that is to be spun into thread. In acquiring, losing, and preserving wealth there are many griefs; and so there are in the misfortunes of our friends. Whatever is produced that is most acceptable to man, that, Maitreya, becomes a seed whence springs the tree of sorrow. Wife, children, servants, house, lands, riches, contribute much more to the misery than to the happiness of mankind. Where could man, scorched by the fires of the sun of this world, look for felicity, were it not for the shade afforded by the tree of emancipation? Attainment of the divine being is considered by the wise as the remedy of the threefold class of ills that beset the different stages of life, conception, birth, and decay, as characterized by that only happiness which effaces all other kinds of felicity, however abundant, and as being absolute and final 3.

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