Vayu continued:
1. A person who has come thus (to this stage) due to knowledge, should not perform any action due to passion. After experiencing the Rajasic and Tamasic fruits, he becomes attached there.
2. Similarly the man who has performed meritorious actions enjoys the fruits in heaven. Fallen from that region, he is born again as a human being.
3. Brahman is therefore, supreme and subtle. Brahman is said to be eternal. One should devote oneself to Brahman as Brahman is the supreme bliss.
4. There is great exertion in performing sacrifice requiring great deal of (expenditure of) wealth. Moreover he (the sacrificer) is subject to death. Salvation therefore is the greatest bliss.
5. But he who is engaged in meditation and devoted to the sacrifice of Brahman cannot be reached even in hundreds of Manvantaras.
6. He visualizes the divine Purusha that is called the Vishva (all-pervading). He appears in various forms. He has feet, heads and necks everywhere (pervades the Universe). He is the Lord and the creator of the Universe. He has the cosmic fragrance, is garlanded cosmically and robed in cosmic apparel. He is the Ruler of all.
7. By means of their sense-organs people endeavour to visualize him who is the winged noble soul, the most excellent and the greatest Soul. But it is not with the eyes but with the mental concentration called Yoga that they can see the omniscient, ancient governor (Teacher) who is subtler than the subt lest, greater than the greatest, the Purusha of golden complexion, devoid of sense-organs.
8. They always see Purusha who is golden in colour, endowed with or without exterior symbols, devoid of attributes, conscious, eternal, all-pervading and pure. By means of Yoga, they see the steady light.
9. Manifested thereby He shines in his own refulgence. He is devoid of heads, feet, belly, sides and tongue, but he, though beyond the ken of senses, though still extremely subtle and alone, can see without eyes and hear without ears.
10. There is nothing that is not known to him; yet he has no intellect. He knows all, yet he is not known to the Vedas. They call him the foremost or the first Purusha, the great, the sentient, all-pervading and very subtle.
11. All sages call that Prakruti, which gives birth to living beings in this world. Those who are engaged in Yoga, can visualize it mentally.
12-13. Those who are engaged in Yogic meditation on the eternal Purusha who is endowed with hands and feet, eyes, heads and faces (mouths), ears on all sides and who stays after permeating everything in the world (who is both immanent and transcendent) and who governs everything, does not become deluded.
14. One does not get deluded after meditating on the supreme Brahman, the Soul of all living beings, the imperishable, noble, supreme soul, the soul of all.
15-16. Just as the (presence of) the wind is to be admitted as evident through its movement in clouds, so is that of the Atman that moves through the bodies of all. Since the Soul abides in the body, it is named Purusha. When the merit is exhausted due to specific Karmans he is born and re-born in the womb by the mixture of semen and blood as a result of the mixture of male and female flesh.1
1. Verses 16-25 give Puranic (Mediaeval) ideas on Embryology.
17. Then, at the time of conception, Kalana, the embryo at its first stage (in the form of a drop) is formed. In due course the Kalana develops into bubbles.
18-19. Just as a lump of clay pressed by the wind in the potter’s wheel and shaped by the hands (of the potter) attains multifarious shapes, so also the foetus united with bones and impelled by the wind becomes a human body with proper forms, features and mind.
20. The wind assembles them together. From the wind water is generated. From the water the vital breath is formed and through the vital breath the semen gets developed.
21. Thirty-three parts of blood (female contribution) and fourteen parts of the semen mixing together form only half a Pala (two karshas) and is deposited in the womb.
22. The child in the womb is covered by the five vital breaths. From the father’s body he inherits his forms and features.
23. The food of the mother, drunk or licked, enters through the umbilical cord and sustains the foetus in the womb.
24. For nine months the child suffers in the body with his neck encircled by the inner vessels of its mother. His limbs are covered in disorder. He remains there for nine months. He then comes out through the vaginal passage with the head downwards.
25. Then (in his life on the earth) he commits some sinful actions and as a result he goes to the hell (after death), Asipatravana or Shalmali where he is cut or pierced.2
2. Verses 25-31 describe the tortures in hell.
26. In the hell, he is rebuked and threatened. He is forced to drink blood. These are the terrible tortures he has to undergo in Kumbhipaka. They are very unbearable.
27. Just as waters though parted regain their normal form, so also the hellish beings though cut and broken in torturing hells regain their original form.
28. Thus the living beings become agitated and tortured through their own sins. If there is anything left over, they take other. births.
29. Man must go alone to the abode of death. He must bear the punishments alone. Hence one should perform pious deeds.
30. None follows him who proceeds along the path of death. But the actions performed by him pursue him.
31. The hellish beings always cry in the abode of Yama when they are pierced or when tortures are inflicted on their bodies. Their bodies being tortured get withered up and suffer extreme pain caused by evil harassments.
32. The sin may forcibly remove everything desirable resorted to by him mentally, verbally or physically. Hence one should perform meritorious deeds.
33. In accordance with the sinful actions committed by him previously, the embodied being undergoes six types of worldly transmigrations of Tamasa nature.1
1. The life in hell and evolution through six stages upto that of man show the acceptance of the principle of redemption. No sinner is condemned to eternal hell.
34-35. They are: Birth as human beings; as domestic animals (Pashu); from the state of Pashu (he becomes) a wild animal; from that stage (he goes to) the birds; from ‘bird-hood’ to reptiles; from reptilehood he certainly becomes an immobile. He who has attained the immobile state evolves into a human being. He thus rotates like one propelled by the potter’s wheel.
36. Thus in this migration six types of birth beginning with that as man and ending with that as plant are known as Tamasa. He undergoes many changes there.
37. The transmigrations beginning with Brahma and ending with Pishacha are known as Sattvika. Only in the celestial regions the embodied beings experience these.
38-39. In the world of Brahma, there is only Sattva; in the world of immobile beings there is only Tamas. In between the two there is Rajas, that supports the fourteen lokas. How can he think of the great Brahman when he is distressed by pain and his vitals are being torn? It is due to the impressions of the previous pious actions that he attains human birth. Hence one should devote oneself entirely to Brahman.