NAGALOK

  NAGASA race of advanced beings who helped us shape up our civilization... 

snake worship

The Sanskrit literature abounds with stories of other worldly beings. For example, the Mahabharata tells the story of how the Naga princess Ulupi abducted Arjuna while he was bathing in the Ganges River . Ulupi pulled Arjuna down not to the riverbed, as we would expect, but into the kingdom of the Nagas (celestial snakelike beings), which exists in another dimension.

      Mystical travel explains how the worlds of the devas are connected with our world. In particular, it explains how Jambudvipa, as a celestial realm of devas, is connected with Jambudvipa as the Earth or part of the Earth. Thus the double model of Jambudvipa makes sense in terms of the Puranic understanding of the siddhis.

Arjuna pulled down to Naglok
(reclaim of Nagas)

In the great epic Mahabharata, the depiction of Nagas tends toward the positive. An epic calls them "persecutors of all creatures", and tells us "the snakes were of virulent poison, great prowess and excess of strength, and ever bent on biting other creatures" (Book I: Adi Parva, Section 20). At some points within the story, nagas are important players in many of the events narrated in the epic, frequently no more evil nor deceitful than the other protagonists, and sometimes on the side of good.

An old Indian painting of Lord Vishnu resting on Ananta-Sesha, with Lakshmi massaging His feet.

The epic frequently characterizes Nagas as having a mixture of human and serpent-like traits. Sometimes it characterizes them as having human traits at one time, and as having serpent-like traits at another. For example, the story of how the Naga prince Sesha came to hold the world on his head begins with a scene in which he appears as a dedicated human ascetic, "with knotted hair, clad in rags, and his flesh, skin, and sinews dried up owing to the hard penances he was practising." Brahma is pleased with Shesha, and entrusts him with the duty of carrying the world. At that point in the story, Shesha begins to exhibit the attributes of a serpent. He enters into a hole in the Earth and slithers all the way to bottom, where he then loads the Earth onto his head. (Book I: Adi Parva, Section 36.)

                                                                  Garuda and a naga

[edit]Enmity with Garuda

The great nemesis of the Nagas in the Mahabharata is the gigantic eagle-king Garuda. Garuda and the Nagas began life as cousins. The sage Kasyapa had two wives (amongst his 13 wives, all prajapati Daksha's daughters), Kadru and Vinata, the former of whom desired many offspring, and the latter of whom desired few but powerful offspring. Each got her wish. Kadru laid 1000 eggs which hatched into snakes, and Vinata laid two, which hatched into the charioteer of Surya the sun god and Garuda. Through a foolish bet, Vinata became enslaved to her sister, and as a result Vinata's son Garuda was required to do the bidding of the snakes. Though compliant, he chafed and built up a grudge that he would never relinquish. When he asked the snakes what he would have to do in order to release his mother, Vinata, from her bondage, they told him he would have to bring them amrita, the elixir of immortality. Garuda stole the elixir from the gods and brought it to the serpents in fulfillment of their requirement, but through a ruse prevented them from partaking of it and achieving immortality. From that point onward, he regarded them as enemies and as food. (Book I: Adi Parva, Sections 16ff.)

Kadru

Kadru, the ancestral mother of snakes, made a bet with her sister Vinata, the stakes being that the loser would be enslaved to the winner. Eager to secure victory, Kadru requested the cooperation of her offspring in order to fix the bet so that Kadru would win. When her offspring balked at the request, Kadru grew angry and cursed them to die a fiery death in the snake-sacrifice of King Janamejaya, the son of Parikshit, who was the son of Abhimanyu the son of Arjuna. The king of the snakes Vasuki was aware of the curse, and knew that his brethren would need a hero to rescue them from it. He approached the renowned ascetic Jaratkaru with a proposal of marriage to a snake-goddess, Manasa, Vasuki's own sister. Out of the union of the ascetic and the snake-maiden was born "a son of the splendor of a celestial child." This son was named Astika, and he was to be the savior of the snakes.

In accordance with Kadru's curse, Janamejaya prepared a snake sacrifice of a type described in the scriptures, the Puranas. He erected a sacrificial platform and hired priests and other professionals needed for the rites. Following the proper form, the priests lit the sacrificial fire, duly fed it with clarified butter, uttered the required mantras, and began calling the names of snakes. The power of the rite was such that the named snakes were summoned to the fire and were consumed by it. As the sacrifice took on genocidal proportions, Astika came to the rescue. He approached Janamejaya and praised the sacrifice in such eloquent terms that the king offered to grant him a boon of his choosing. Astika promptly requested that the sacrifice be terminated. Though initially regretful of his offer, Janamejaya was true to his word, and the sacrifice came to an end. (Book I: Adi Parva, Sections 13-58.)

[edit]Other mentions

• The serpent king Vasuki helped the gods to recover amrita, the elixir of immortality, from the Ocean of Milk by serving as the cord they wrapped around Mount Mandara in order to churn up the depths of the ocean.
• The naga princess Ulupi had a son Iravat by the Pandava hero Arjuna. (Book I: Adi Parva, Section 216.) Though he had the support of many nagas, Iravat was eventually slain by theRakshasa Alamvusha at the battle of Kurukshetra. (Book VI: Bhishma Parva, Section 91.)
• Matali, the charioteer of the god Indra, sought a husband for his daughter Gunakesi. He approached the naga Aryaka and proposed the marriage of Gunakesi with the naga's handsome grandson Sumukha. Alas, Aryaka replied, Garuda had already declared his intent to devour the comely youth, having previously murdered his father. Matali, however, persuaded Indra andVishnu to give Sumukha a draught of amrita, the elixir of immortality. Sumukha drank the potion, and thus was rendered impervious to any assault by the lord of the birds. The young couple were happily married. (Book V: Udyoga Parva, Section 103.)

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Sumeru

                                               

Sumeru (Sanskrit) or Sineru or Kangrinboqe is the name of the central Universal-mountain in Hindu,Zorastrianism and Buddism. Etymologically, the proper name of the mountain is Meru, to which is added the approbatory prefix su-, resulting in the meaning "excellent Meru" or "wonderful Meru”.     We can also understand Bhu-mandala as a map of the celestial realm of the demigods, or devas. One curious feature of Jambudvipa is that the Bhagavatam describes all of the varshas other than Bharata-varsha as heavenly realms, where the inhabitants live for ten thousand years without suffering. This has led some scholars to suppose that Indians used to imagine foreign lands as celestial paradises. 

                                          Base of Sumeru

But the Bhagavatam does refer to barbaric peoples outside India, such as Huns, Greeks, Turks, and Mongolians, who were hardly thought to live in paradise. One way around this is to suppose that Bharata-varsha includes the entire Earth globe, while the other eight varshas refer to celestial realms outside the Earth. This is a common understanding in India.
      But the simplest explanation for the heavenly features of Jambudvipa is that Bhu-mandala was also intended to represent the realm of the devas. Like the other interpretations we have considered, this one is based on a group of mutually consistent points in the cosmology of the Bhagavatam.
      First of all, consider the very large sizes of mountains and land areas in Jambudvipa. For example, India is said to be 72,000 miles (9,000 yojanas) from north to south, or nearly three times the circumference of the Earth. Likewise, the Himalayas are said to be 80,000 miles high.