Chapter 27 of 43 · Koti Rudra Samhita · Overall chapter 298 of 464
Greatness of Tryambakeshvara Continued
Ganga descends and briefly vanishes rather than reveal herself to the very rishis who deceived Goutama, until Goutama's intercession on their behalf - again citing the principle that repaying harm with good is itself purifying - wins them conditional access through further penance, establishing the Kushavarta tirtha.
The rishis asked
Lord, where did Ganga originate in the form of water? How did she gain her special greatness? And the evil brahmanas who harmed Goutama, what became of them? You who have Vyasa for your guru, tell us.
Suta replied
Brahmanas, when Goutama himself asked Ganga, she came swiftly down from Brahmagiri. The flow came out from the branches of an udumbara tree. The famous sage Goutama bathed there, rejoicing, and other great sages who were his disciples came and bathed with delight. The place became known as Gangadvara, lovely, and seeing it destroys sins. Then the rishis who had challenged Goutama came to bathe, but as soon as she saw them Ganga vanished. Goutama went at once and praised her again and again, hands joined, head bowed: "They were blind with arrogance and prosperity. They may be good or not, but by your sacred power you should show yourself to them." Ganga's voice came from the circle of the sky: "Best of rishis, hear my words. They are evil-souled and ungrateful. They injured their own lord. They are rogues and heretics, and their sight is always to be avoided." Goutama said, "Mother, listen to the great words Bhagavan spoke, and make them true: 'If a person does good to one who has injured him, I am purified by that.'" Ganga's voice came again: "Goutama, what you say is true and auspicious. Even so, for the sake of protection they must do atonement. Under your command and control let them go round the mountain a hundred and one times. Only then will these evildoers have the right to see me. I have spoken the truth." They did exactly as she said. Dejected, they begged Goutama, "Pardon our crime." Obeying her command, Goutama made the place called Kushavarta just below Gangadvara, and for his pleasure she came out again from there. Kushavarta became a famous tirtha. A man who bathes there becomes fit for liberation, casts off all sins and gains the hard-won vijnana. Goutama and the other rishis met, ashamed of their former ingratitude.
The rishis said
Suta, we have also heard another account, in which an angry Goutama cursed the brahmanas. Please explain.
Suta replied
That too is true. The differences occur because events happened in different kalpas. Ones excellent in vows, I will tell that account as well. The great-souled Goutama saw the rishis suffering in famine and practised hard austerity for Varuna, who arranged an inexhaustible supply of water for him. With it he had much rice and barley sown. In this way Goutama did good to others and, by the strength of his austerity, arranged food for them. Once the wicked wives, feeling insulted over water, spoke angrily to their husbands, full of envy toward Goutama. With their minds turned from him, the brahmanas made an artificial cow, and crooked in mind, made it graze on his grain. Seeing it eat his grain, Goutama gently struck it with a blade of grass to stop it. The moment the grass touched it the cow fell to the ground, and by the force of karma it died on the spot. The crooked rishis gathered and cried, "Goutama has killed a cow." Goutama, with Ahalya and his Shiva-devoted disciples, was frightened because he had killed a cow. But when he learned the truth, he was filled with rage and cursed the rishis.
Goutama said
All of you are evil-souled, and you have especially caused me misery. I am always devoted to Shiva, so you will always turn away from the Vedas. From now on you will have no faith in the virtuous path the Vedas teach, especially the path of devotion to Shiva that leads to liberation. You will believe in wicked paths, be driven always from the way of liberation and live outside the pale of the shrutis. Your foreheads will be smeared with mud, and so smeared you will fall into hell. Shiva will no longer be your single divinity: though he has no second, you will treat him on a par with other gods. You will lose love for rites of Shiva's worship, for devotees absorbed in Shiva, and for all his parva days. The curse I lay on you today will cause you misery, and let it always apply to your descendants too. Your sons and grandsons will not be Shiva's devotees. You and your sons will certainly live in hell, and afterward you will be chandalas, suffering sorrow and poverty. All of you will be deceitful and given to censure, and so you will be marked with hot coins.
Suta concluded
So Goutama cursed all the sages and went back to his hermitage, devoted to Shiva and very pure. All the rishis were distressed. Expelled from the dharma of Shiva's devotees, they settled in Kanchi, and their sons too were driven out of Shiva's dharma. In the coming kali yuga many of them will be born as crooked people. Supreme sages, I have told you the whole account, and you have lovingly heard the earlier one as well. I have told you the origin of the river Goutami and her excellent greatness, which destroys all sins, and the greatness of the Tryambaka jyotirlinga. Hearing it frees a person from all sins. Next I will speak of the greatness of the Vaidyanatheshvara jyotirlinga, which destroys sins when heard.
Retold in our own words from Bibek Debroy's English translation of the Shiva Purana (Penguin Classics). Names, numbers and the order of events follow the source.