In this episode, we’re talking about Parshuram’s origin story. I have had a listener specifically request this tale, so here we are!
First of all, I should mention who Parshuram is. He’s an avatar of Vishnu. But there are some unique things about him. He is the only avatar of Vishnu who’s still around. He’s a Chiranjeevi, which means he’s immortal. Yes! He’s alive today. In fact, I just had lunch with him last week. Obviously, I can’t reveal where he is. He likes his peace and quiet. He’s meditating someplace secret. He has a major role to play in the future. I’ll come to that later.
Let’s start with a little family history and we’ll see what made Parshuram Parshuram.
It all starts with my father. Yes! My father is usually at the beginning of every story. It’s hard to avoid that if you have single-handedly created the Universe. You see my father is Brahma the creator in the Holy Trinity, together with Vishnu the Preserver and Shiva the destroyer.
Besides myself, he created a bunch of other people. One of them was Bhrigu, from whom Parshuram was descended. So that means in a way I am Parshuram’s great-great-uncle or something. I often kid him about it. Anyway, back to the story. Which begins with the Rishi Richika. Richika had married Satyavati who was a Princess. This is not the same Satyavati whom we have met in the Mahabharat episodes. It was probably a common name back then. Open any class register in any school and chances are, you’d find a couple of Satyavatis in the list.
There’s a little anecdote of King Gadhi, Satyavati’s conversation with Richika.
Gadhi really did not want her daughter to marry this financially challenged Rishi. So what if he was spiritually rich? But he didn’t have the guts to say so outright. It might anger Richika, and bring down a curse upon himself. The way out, was to set an impossible task for Richika as a condition for the marriage.
So he asked Richika: “I have no objections to the marriage he said” even though he certainly had. “As a show of good faith, can you get me some horses?”. He was certain that there’s no way Richika could get them at short notice.
Richika was quick to reply that sure, no problem.
Gadhi was surprised but proceeded cautiously: “I don’t want toy horses. I want real living, breathing statuesque horses”
“No problem” said Richika again. “How many do you need?”
“Err… a hundred.” replied Gadhi and seeing Richika’s confident smile quickly added “No, did I say hundred? I meant a thousand”
Richika was still confident. “Sure. Any other specifications?”
Gadhi was getting desperate now as he realized that somehow Richika could in fact deliver those horses. He decided to up the stakes. “I want them all to be white but with black ears. I want the first one to have purple eyes and a mole on his right foreleg. The second one should have a green tail and an orange mane. On the third one….” and he went on and on.
Several boring hours later, when Gadhi had concluded his list, Richika simply closed his eyes and prayed to Varuna. Varuna, the god of the Sea and gladly helped out. And they weren’t seahorses. They were real horses, exactly according to Gadhi’s specifications. Gadhi had no choice. He had to let his daughter Satyavati marry Richika.
In contrast with her namesake from the Mahabharat who had married into royalty, the Satyavati from today’s story had married out of it. After her marriage to Richika, she went to live with him in his humble little home, not the other way around. Nevertheless she kept in touch with her parents. Even more so after it turned out that Satyavati and her mom were bump buddies! Yes, they were both expecting a child about the same time. And if you’re wondering, yes there was a very real possibility that Satyavati’s child would actually be older than his or her uncle or aunt.
One day, Satyavati asked Richika to work his magic. He clearly could manage to pull a thousand horses out of thin air. Surely that meant he could also do other kinds of magic. Like ensuring that their child had certain characterics.
“I don’t see the connection. What does procuring horses have to do with how children turn out. Buuuut as it happens, I do have just the solution for that. I’ll make some porridge for you. If you drink it, our child will become one of the smartest people around”
“That settles the Nature vs Nurture debate.” Satyavati said. “But will you be a dear and make some for mom too?”
“I don’t see why I should do anything for my mother in law. It’s not like she’s nice to me or anything!”
But Satyavati pleaded with Richika until finally he gave in. But, he made two different porridges.
You might be wondering – why make two? Instead of making double the quantity of the same thing. The answer is that they were made with two different recipes. Satyavati’s mom was the Queen and what she needed was a child who was naturally belligerent. A good warrior like quality for a Prince to have.
But Richika and Satyavati’s son needed to be smart, knowledgeable and patient.
That made sense, and everything would have been fine if it had gone to plan, but it didn’t. Satyavati’s mom in a very un-guest like manner did not simply accept the porridge that was given to her. She was sure that Richika had reserved the best for his own wife. And so, she secretly switched her porridge with Satyavati’s.
But it’s near impossible to trick a Rishi with magic on his side. Richika realized what had happened. But when he sought to intervene he discovered that the ladies had already finished the porridge. This was worse than if he hadn’t. Who wanted to deal with a Rishi who would constantly challenge people to a duel instead of teaching them new bits of knowledge? Or with a calm King who was all too eager to brush off the welcome mat for invaders, instead of fighting them?
He looked up books from his library all night until finally, he found a solution. Kind of. At least he could execute this without the intervention or even knowledge of his mother in law. It was a quick ritual so he completed it. Effectively he had transferred the attributes from one fetus to another. Somehow he was able to extract the belligerence from his own unborn son and stockpile it for his unborn son’s unborn son, effectively his grandson – Parsuhuram.
Richika also transferred some scholarly attributes from his mother-in-law’s unborn son to his own child. So his own child Jamadagni become a very famous Rishi. Jamadagni was in fact part of the 7 rishis or Saptarishi or Great Bear or Ursa Major constellation. But there was a bit of a residual effect in Satyavati’s brother when he was born. That child was Vishwamitra. We have encountered Vishwamitra as one of the two warring parties in Episode 15 – Rishi vs Rishi: Un-civil war!
But we’ll leave Vishwamitra alone and focus back to Jamadagni who after several years had grown up and married a princess, Renuka, just like his parents before him. The couple had 5 kids. And yes, just as predicted the youngest, Parshuram was a warrior.
There’s one incident in Jamadagni’s life that was to have a huge impact on what is to follow.
Jamadagni and Renuka were out for a walk. They were out in the open, but they assumed they had privacy. No one was around for miles. Or so they thought. In the middle of that conversation, when Renuka made a joke they were both shocked to hear a snicker. Jamadagni whirled around and looked everywhere, and finally identified the eavesdropper. It was the Sun god, Surya himself. Jamadagni flew into a rage and cursed the Sun!
“Surya, you dared to eavesdrop, I curse you to be hidden from sight!”
Renuka intervened “No, no! Apocalyptic hellish landscape! No crops, no heat. New ice age and mass extinction! Pick a different curse”
“Okay, then I curse you to be hidden from sight half the time” said Jamadagni
Renuka rolled her eyes “That happens every night” she said
“I mean I curse you to be hidden from sight sometimes during the day”
Renuka added “and it happens every time it’s cloudy”
“I mean I curse you to be hidden from sight during a cloudless day”
That seemed to satisfy Renuka. And that my dear friends is why we have solar eclipses!
Surya wasn’t one to grin and bear it. He was a god, he wasn’t going to take this nonsense from a mortal. He cursed Jamadagni in turn. That he would meet his end at the hands of a King.
Jamadagni was just readying his next curse, and so was Surya. So this was high time for someone to intervene. It was my dad – Brahma who decided to intervene.
Jamadagni and Surya walked away from each other. Not as friends. Not as even tolerable acquiantances. But they walked away without any further cursing.
Unfortunately for Jamadagni Surya’s curse was soon going to come about. It started in a very unexpected way. With Renuka when she was fetching water one day. You see Jamadagni had made a special pot for his wife to fetch water every day. It looked just like an ordinary clay pot but it had one special property. If Renuka ever thought of someone in an…. immoral way, the pot would disintegrate.
So… it was not enough that Jamadagni handed Renuka the task of fetching water every day. He had used his magic to police her thoughts.
So one day when she was at the river, filling the pot with water, she saw a passing Gandharva who was passing by. “Look at the muscles on the guy” she told herself. It was just a split second but that was all it took for the magic to shatter into thousands of little pieces.
Instantly, Jamadagni back home was alerted to what had happened. He was talking to his children at that moment. Maybe his curse-off with Surya had had a dramatic effect on him. But Jamadagni did something very unwise in that moment. He ordered his eldest child to go punish his mom.
Renuka had been fetching water for years, and this was the first time something like this had happened. I was almost inclined to think it might just have been regular wear and tear on the pot. But Jamadagni was convinced she had breached the acceptable level of morality that he had arbitrarily chosen for her. Well, he had been policing her, and now he had just played the role of judge and jury as well. He ordered his oldest son to execute her.
“No way! Are you crazy, old man? I’m not doing it” replied the oldest.
Jamadagni took this calmly, and issued the same order to the next child and then the next. They all refused. Except the 5th and youngest son. Parshuram.
Parshuram definitely did not want to commit a crime, but he figured that refusing to obey your father is a worse sin. So, with an axe he walked off towards the river.
He returned, not long after. One look at his appearance was enough to convince everyone that he had in fact done the deed.
Not satisfied with this, Jamadagni next ordered Parshuram to punish his brothers. For having refused to obey. And the punishment was the same as Renuka’s. It was instant execution.
Following a gruesome order a second time was still just as hard as the first time. But Parshuram did it.
At which, Jamadagni was pleased with his son’s obedience. He may even have let out a whoop of joy. But Parshuram was dead serious. Pun not intended.
Jamadagni asked him for a boon. “Anything you want Parshuram, its yours” he said.
Well, there was only one thing that Parshuram wanted more than anything else.
Bring back Mom and my brothers” he said quickly.
And Jamadagni obliged! Within seconds, Renuka and her other children were back and cleaning themselves up hastily after their gruesome experience.
Truth be told Renuka wasn’t even sure what she had done wrong. But she decided never ever to fetch water from the river again. And Parshuram’s brothers? They never put a toe out of line again.
So that’s Parshuram’s origin story. There’s a second story as well which starts off remarkably similar to one we’ve covered before.
It’s still at Jamadagni’s home. Jamdagni had a cow, a special cow called Surabhi. She could grant any wish! Did you want a chauffeured Rolls Royce? A lear jet? The Moon? You got it. You only had to whisper it to Surabhi. She was a gift from Indra, the King of the Devs.
At this exposition, Renuka looked angrily at her husband and asked “You made me fetch water when we could have just asked Surabhi?”
But she was ignored. Jamadagni didn’t wasnt to dignify her question with a response. In his eyes, she had fallen terribly low ever since the day she’d thought of the Gandharva. It’s further proof of her husband’s remarkably chauvinistic mentality that he didn’t think of that as the day she was executed or reborn, but it was just the day she had done something wrong.
A King – Kartavirya Arjun, not to be confused with the Mahabharat Arjun, was hanging around the forest when he happened on the Jamadagni and Renuka’s home.
They welcomed him in with open arms. It didn’t matter that he was a complete stranger. It was just part of the custom.
Well, what Kartavirya Arjun did was certainly not part of custom or tradition. He was a guest in their home. After observing Surabhi’s miracles, he decided that he must have her.
But he did not accept their polite refusal. Instead he snatched the cow and took her away from the couple. And he did something worse. He killed Jamadagni.
Parshuram was not at home at that moment or he’d have done something. But he did do something the moment he returned. Armed with just a bow and arrow and his axe, he launched himself on Kartavirya Arjun’s huge army. Single handed!
As expected it was a totally one-sided affair. But not the outcome you might expect in a fight between one man and five thousand.
Parshuram routed them and moments later, Kartavirya Arjun was no more.
Parshuram returned home. But he had a pleasant surprise in store for him. His father was alive! His great-grandfather, the sage Bhrigu, saw what had happened and quickly intervened to bring Jamadagni back to life.
But Jamadagni was not proud of what his son had done.
“You have killed the King of this land” he told his son sternly
“Dude! What did you expect? He killed you, he took away Surabhi”
“Yet, ending a life is a sin. Especially that of an administrative head of state. Never mind the anarchy that will follow. Just think about the act itself. No this won’t do. You must go undo the damage”
“Can’t we just bring him back to life? You seem to be good at that?” asked Parshuram
“No, he’ll just take Surabhi again. Just go pray on a mountain top or something. That is better”
Actually it wasn’t better. Because while Parshuram was away praying to the gods, Kartavirya Arjun’s children decided that revenge was a dish best served warm and toasty. Especially when Parshuram was away. They attacked Jamadagni and killed him. And this time, Bhrigu was not around to undo the damage.
Renuka who was forced to witness Jamadagni’s execution, screamed out loud for Parshuram. But he was waaaay out of earshot.
Parshuram did return a year later. If you thought that a year of penance would have changed his attitude towards violence, you’d be wrong.
Parshuram realized as he heard the story of his father’s demise that he could not accept Royalty as a noble thing. He set about systemically ridding the Earth of every royal he could find. He did slow down later in life though. Instead of killing Kings and Princes, he resorted to not teaching them instead.
Some notes on the show
Similar to another avatar of Vishnu – Ram from the Ramayana, there’s a strong element of obedience to father’s orders in today’s story as well.
Parshuram plays an important role in the Mahabharat, including as Bheesma’s teacher.
There’s a bigger role in store for him though as he’s hanging around waiting to train Kalki. Kalki if you didn’t know is Vishnu’s 10th avatar which is yet to happen.
We’ll stop here.
Next Time
In the next episode, we’ve had a listener request stories of Shivaji Maharaj. Shivaji was a real historical emperor from the 17th century. There are many legends associated with him, we’ll cover some of them.
We have done one Shivaji episode before: Episode 39 – Food Fight!