Divine Interview

Divine Interview

Siddhi B Ranjitkar

A few days after the “Haribodhani Ekadashi,” I made an annual pilgrimage to “Bhuyu-jasi Narayan” means Buddhanilkantha. I always avoided the crowd of devotees visiting Lord Vishnu only after a few days of the peak day of pilgrimage on the Ekadashi day. Even on the third day of the Ekadashi that also in the afternoon still devotees were flowing in to line up to the pond shrine where Lord Vishnu (Buddhanilkantha) in a black stone was peacefully lying on the bed of thirteen serpents called nagas plaited together, and floating on the water of the pond. Devotees had an access to the stone feet covered with the silver shoes for touching with their foreheads or hands.

Devotees shed their footwear before entering the shrine, and two policewomen were there to manage the devotees standing on line. Devotees were in the constant movement. None was allowed to take time to touch the silver shoes Lord Vishnu had put on. They needed to move on to come out of the next exit.

I was the devotee, who rarely would visit or enter any shrine where I needed to take off my shoes. So, I rested on the steel bench in front of the main entrance watching the devotees entering the shrine. I had some time to look around. I saw the tin sheds and two brick buildings, which looked, like hostels.

Several loud speakers blared out the religious discourse a saint or a wise person was delivering with the intermittent songs. I had such experience in this environment for the first time even though I used to visit the lord every year in this season. I felt it disgusting because it was so noisy and not compatible with the so peacefully lying stone deity.

The corrugated tin sheds and brick buildings had extensively disfigured the holy area. Those tin sheds standing on the steel pipes were so ugly that pilgrims must be feeling awful. I really wondered who permitted to construct such dreadful structures in such a holy place. I knew that this holy area had been pleasant and nice because of the natural environment with so many trees around, and birds nesting in them in those days. My mind immediately asked how Lord Vishnu could reside on such a noisy and human-made structures all around.

Such corrugated tin structures were built on the premises of Pashupati, too in the past. Then, some wise folks must have complained about those unpleasant structures. Then, all those horrible structures were bulldozed and the area was cleared of the human-made litters returning back the area to its original state. The Pashupati area had been far better than when it was with so many appallingly structures. Lord Shiva must be resting and enjoying the peaceful nights and days in the sanctum of the Nepal-styled temple.

My mind again questioned why and who made those structures with whose permission to turn the so beautiful and peaceful area into the noisy and crowed with so many dreadfully ugly human-made structures. I felt that the lord must have been terribly suffering from the so crude human noise, and so repulsive structures. Again my question was who allowed such things to encroach on the holy land.

Then, the road leading to the holy shrine came to my mind with the feeling of the road had been made a commercial hub. Pilgrims could buy shoes, winter clothing, and many other items of daily uses. Those commercial stalls had encroached on the road making hardly enough room for the pilgrims to walk to the shrine and then back. The local government must have allowed these traders to keep their commercial stalls to earn some revenue. It was terribly disgusting to see such commercials for the pilgrims coming here to have the blessing of Lord Vishnu.

I felt that I needed to talk to the lord about these things but the lord was lying on the bed of the stone nagas, and the lord himself was in stone, which did not talk. So, an alternative was to imagine Lord Vishnu and put questions and then answer. Thus, I conducted an interview with the lord, and the results follow.

Lord Vishnu in stone was peacefully resting while the attendant was pouring milk on the mouth surely disturbing the peace of the lord. Lord Vishnu does not need to drink or eat because it is the stone image even if it is real one the lord does not need such human foods or drinks.

Lord Vishnu in stone was wearing silver ornaments all over the body. Silver anklets covered both the stone legs whereas silver bracelets almost reached the elbow, and other silver ornaments covered some portions of the upper arm, too. A huge silver crown with thirteen silver serpents braided together was decorating the stone head of Lord Vishnu.

Interview

Reporter: I am a reporter representing a very reputed newspaper in Kathmandu, and I make a pilgrimage to your so famous shrine every year at this time of a year. Seeing so many unusual things happening here some curiosities arose in my mind, I wanted to talk to you, my Lord Buddhanilkantha after you wake up from the four-month hibernation. You have thousands of names: one of them is Buddhanilkantha.

Nilknatha: Wait a minute before going to the details of business, let me first make it clear to you that I did not hibernate but I went to stay with King Bali Raja. Probably, you know him: one of the most pious and generous demon kings anybody ever has known. To save the kingdom of Lord Indra, I went to Bali in the guise of a dwarf. Bali was happy to see me, as he had the weakness of giving anything anybody wished for. He asked me to sit next to him but I told him, “I am not here to sit but to ask a humble thing if the king would grant me. “What is that thing you want to have from me?” he said. Then, I made it sure that he was serious to give me even a small thing without hesitation.  “I need a piece of land to put on it my three steps,” I said. “Are you joking? It is nothing. Take it anywhere you like,” said Bali. “Are you sure, you are giving me that piece of land?” I questioned. “Of course, why not, put your so tiny feet on it now; all will be yours.” Bali almost ordered me.

Then, I started off expanding myself in such a cosmic speed that soon my first foot covered the world, then the second foot the sky, then I asked him where to put my third tiny foot. He bowed and asked me to step on his head. My leg became so heavy; it pushed him down to the underworld within a millisecond. Look, how sincere the demon king had been he kept his words and gave his head to put my third foot on it. He paid for the sincerity and generosity by life.

Then, I filled with remorse and even felt shame for what I did sending the so generous king down to the underworld only for the benefit of the heavily king Indra. I cannot help Bali undoing the entire process. King Indra was saved from losing his throne to Bali but I certainly did the thing, which is short of being justifiable by any moral standard.

So, I apologetically asked Bali what he really wanted from me. At least I wanted to pay something back to him for his generosity and sincerity. I really regretted what I had done to him. He was really worthy to be the heavenly king but the divinities did not want outsiders reigning over the heavenly kingdom. So, I have to put him down even though he was one of the best living beings anybody could find in any world.

Then, Bali clasped his hand at his chest and step up to me, and said. You really would not believe; I even cannot believe, too what he asked for. He wanted me to be with him forever in the dark underworld. He would use me as a light to illuminate even such a dark world.

What can I do? I have already given my words that I would meet whatever he has in his mind. Okay, I said; but I cannot stay with you forever because I have to save the human world, then work for the heavenly world, then even the cosmic world Kailash whenever Lord Shiva goes mad and goes to the mundane world and be with animals as an animal wearing golden horns leaving his divine spouse Parvati in despair. Of course, then I have to be in my own cosmic world Baikuntha. But I have given my words to Bali. So I have to do something for him. Then, I said to him, “I would partially meet your wish. I will stay with you for the four months of the darkest period of a year.” That is why I have to be with Bali Raja for four months of every year.

Some folks like you: reporters wrote that I went to guard Bali in the underworld for four months. Others said I hibernated for four months. All these things were just the crafts of reporters. The truth is what I just have said.

Reporter: Would you mind if I call you in short Nilknatha instead of god?

Nilkantha: I am a Nilkantha. That is what I am where you and I stand now. God is an abstract world. Nothing like god is ever existed. Instead you see the universe where billions of cosmic worlds exist, and divinities like all of us reside following their own merits in the cosmic worlds. So, how could I mind when you correctly spell my name?

Reporter: Why did you have to take the guise of a dwarf to trick Bali Raja to give you a tiny piece of land only to trick him again to get down to the underworld?

Nilkantha: You have just said that you are the representative of a reputed newspaper but to me you still needed to keep up the reputation of that so highly regarded newspaper because you obviously did not know a dwarf was of my incarnation. That was the fifth incarnation of my ten famous incarnations.

I took the form of a fish to guard and rescue the entire marine lives from disaster and destruction. Then, I took the birth of a tortoise to be the base of a huge mountain for the divinities and the demons to churn the ocean for finding elixir, which came up; and the demons so smartly took away. Then, I have to trick them to give it to the divinities. I became a wild boar to bring back your world from the demons, who took down to the ocean and tried to store it there forever. Then, I have to come out as Narsimha: a half lion and a half human to finish of Hiranya Kasaya-pu: the demon king to save my devotee Prahald, who happened to be his son. The fifth of my incarnation is Baman means a dwarf to just let Indra live as the king in the heaven sacrificing the so benevolent Bali Raja, who had earned so much of merits that shook the heavenly throne of Indra, who was about to fall from it. The sixth one was of course the improved person of the wild folks. He was a tall man with an axe as his weapon. You could call him Persuram. I took his form to do away with some disagreeable characters in the universe. His mission was completed. The next version was a well polished human called Rama, who did a lot of good things but not all because he did a great injustice to his own spouse not to mention his father but again he was not my last incarnation. The next one was Lord Krishna, who played a role of so many different characters in discarding all the immoral beings in the mundane world.

All these things had been the evolution of the life in your world. Thus, I played the role of different personalities at different time in teaching the evolution of life on earth well before anybody even could imagine of such things. Your human world has 8.4 million different living beings. You have been revolving around the circle made up of those 8.4 million different lives. That is in short how the lives on earth evolved in course of time following the movement of earth, moon and sun.

Reporter: I learned a lot from the lord in such a short time but my mission is to record what the lord Nilkantha has to say after waking up.

Nilkantha: Again, I am not waking up. I simply came back to your world completing my mission to Bali Raja. I hope you correctly understand me.

Reporter: I apologized to you my lord for not correctly putting up the questions. Now, I hope I can make right questions. How did you cope with the world of so much noise coming from at least two loud speakers: one posted on above your head and another on down to your legs playing so many strange things, and telling different stories?

Nilkantha: I really don’t think that the folks coming to me for blessing do really like such things. It has been a recent development. It is so noisy but I am still surviving against the so loud sound coming out of the two powerful loud speakers. I don’t think these folks have been doing any good to anybody even to themselves making so much of noise.

Bringing so many fruits and flowers and other foods, and polluting the area, added to the noise pollution; and burning so many oil-soaked wicks even at the day time have made the living condition worst for me and for all those who live with me here.

The priest even pours milk into my mouth of stone image. How could a stone image drink the milk? Again, I have already told you that the divinities needed not to eat because they did not have the macrobiotic bodies as you folks do. You folks could perish anytime but the divinities live forever in the cosmic world.

I am so amazed that these folks have not learnt yet that divinities don’t need to eat anything nor they need to drink any drinks. They even don’t need any human wear. They were celestial bodies and they could move from one planet to another in milliseconds. So, they have so many cosmic worlds where they could move from one world to another in a fraction of human time. So, there is no need for making offerings of human foods or other things to gratify the deities. The heavenly deities become happy with anybody trekking through the path of dharma means be disciplined and follow any divine and worldly rules and regulations. Anybody not following the dharmric path would be punished severely.

Reporter: Bhagvan, did you bless everybody who comes to you, and meet everyone’s wishes?

Nilkantha: For what I have to bless them for offering the flowers, bananas, apples, and burning the wicks lamps again causing the environmental deterioration? I don’t bless anybody for that trifle offerings. I don’t think that they had any wish in their minds. They simply visited me here because it was the season to visit this nice place.

Even if I wanted to bless them I cannot because I could not accept the offerings they made. You folks read out an Svasthani story in the month of Magha (January/February) for an entire month. Obviously, none of you folks did understand the story. If you think a little bit then you will find that Lord Shiva had given Ganesh the rights to enjoy the first offerings before making any offering to any other deities.

You have seen that none of the folks cared about going first to Ganesh, and then make offerings or even just to hand gesture of namastay. Ganesh is there since I have been here for the folks making first offerings to him but none of the folks goes there before coming to me. Everybody rushes to me, to throw flowers, bananas and what not.

None of the divine community members accepts any offerings made without first offering to Ganesh. So, I cannot accept any offerings made without making offerings first to Ganesh. Consequently, hundreds of thousands of the folks coming to me have wasted their offerings, and of course the time and energy. I have seen some folks going to Ganesh and making offerings later on. That was not the correct offerings, too. The divine community so concerned with the established rules want the earthly folks to follow the rules either Shiva or Vishnu or any other deities had crafted.

So, your question of meeting the wishes of those folks first coming to offer me ignoring Lord Ganesh does not make sense. So, you reporters had to go back to the Svasthani story and write those things Lord Shiva had made Ganesh the first deity to be worshiped before worshipping any other deities of the divine community. Ganesh enjoys the privilege of having the first offerings before any other deities.

Reporter: Bhagban, did you find pleasant to have the tin sheds on your premises?

Nilkantha: Of course not, all those sheds had already disfigured this pleasant natural site. Those sheds were not better than any sheds some folks had constructed at their crematoriums. Those sheds should go immediately, and they should stop holding any great fire worship or reading out the Bhagabat or anything on the loud speakers causing unbearable noise even to my stone image.

The large buildings whatever you folks called them needed to go, too. Those buildings had disfigured my premises. This area needed to be made as natural as possible. Remove all those sheds and buildings, and rather plant trees to make shade to my stone image so that it would not weathered under the sun and the rains, and of course under the heavily polluted air. Remove the slab of stone with inscription and the flags of Nepal and India crossing each other posted on the large building. I don’t feel comfortable with so many unnatural things encroaching on my premises.

Reporter: How come you became Buddhanilkantha even though you are Narayan or Vishnu?

Nilkantha: Buddhanilkantha is really the fusion of three religions: Buddhism, Shaivism and Vaisnavism. I was a Buddha at one time, then of course Shiva, and finally Vishnu. I had been so strong that no Tantrik could set me in the tantric net and made me one of the tantric deities. I had the three divine spirits of three different religious sects.

You know what Buddha means. Buddha had been for meditating forever and got the universal peace before retiring to the cosmic world. Buddha did so and he never came back to the human world again.

Nilkantha is another name of Lord Shiva. He became Nilkantha when the divinities and the demons together churned the ocean for amrit (elixir); unfortunately, the deadly poison called kalkuta surfaced. Nobody could dare to go even near not to mention touching it. It could dissolve the entire world.

Then, Lord Shiva descended from his cosmic world Kailash, and took the poison and put it in his mouth, and held it on his neck, swallowing it would have burned him down, too. Even at the neck it burned so much that Shiva had to go to Himalaya and break the mountain with his trident to get the icy water on his neck to cool it down. The poison caused him blue-necked means Nilkantha.

I am Narayan means born of water. My correct name is Jalasaya Narayan but you folks have been used to calling me Buddhanilkantha. I lie down on the bed of thirteen serpents braided together for making a cozy bed and their thirteen heads together forming a hood over my head. You must have seen the huge thirteen stone serpents braided together, and on them I rest forever. Actually, lying on the thirteen-serpents bed, I really float on the cosmic ocean. You folks have only the stone images of the serpents and me. I descend on the human world whenever you need me.

Reporter: Prabhu, previously, the kings were believed to be the human incarnations of Buddhanilkantha; so, they did not visit you fearing to die immediately because Prabhu would take back the divine spirit in them. Is it really so?

Nilkantha: How could an earthly folk be a divine? How could I take away the divine spirit in them when they had not anything like that?

It is really a made-up story to make the common folks believe that the king is really a divine. You have seen that the kings had been slayers. In fact, you have the kings starting from Prithvi Narayan Shah down to Jung Bahadur, Mahendra, then Birendra and finally currently most of the elected ones much like the kings had been killers and looters in the past. So, none of the rulers had any divine spirit in him or her rather most of the rulers had earned the power of killing so many innocent folks in the wars or in the course of destroying the opposition.

Prithvi Narayan Shah killed many innocent folks, and even forced out his foster father King Ranajit Malla of his Bhaktapur kingdom. He had cut off the noses and ears of his opponents in Kirtipur, and then he put the opponents in bags and then threw them in rivers in the eastern Nepal if you believe in the history. Some of the current cabinet ministers including the prime minister had been fans of Prithvi Narayan because his atrocities suited them.

Then, you know Jung Bahadur, who had killed a number of courtiers in two deadly incidents and became the prime minister making the king a puppet. Mahendra killed many cadres of the Nepali Congress after he took over from the elected government. His son Birendra killed many communist and congress cadres, who had just advocated for the fundamental human rights, then came the elected rulers, who had the background of killing the so-called landlords and feudal lords, and even common innocent folks on one pretext or another.

So, in conclusion you could say that most of the so-called rulers had been with the background of criminal acts, and some of them became criminals after becoming ministers indulging in legally or illegally looting the state treasury and the people’s pockets. Then, how could you equate those rulers with the divinity like me? I administer universe, and punish the culprits. So, you will find how those killers no matter whether they were kings or prime ministers ended their lives.

Reporter: Prabhu, now, I am asking the personal question. How long had you been here?

Nilkantha: Again the question is wrongly asked. I am omnipotent and omnipresent. I am everywhere. I am the universe.

Your question might be how long the stone image of the serpents forming my bed and me had been in this place.

Reporter: Yes, Prabhu. Please forgive me for the slip of the tongue.

Nilkantha: Gopalas had crafted this inimitable image in stone. It must be three thousands years ago. You could imagine how skillfully it was sculptured even at that time. Some folks in Kathmandu claimed to be the descendents of Gopalas.

The stone was brought from Nakhu. You could imagine how expertly they brought the stone from there when they did not have any energy-powered machine. They had to do everything with their hands and muscle power.

They believed that it was the right place for my stone image to be lying on my back on the bed of thirteen serpents. You can see the valley from here. It was a nice place for anybody to be. So, they made a place for me here at the foothill of the Shivapuri hills. They made a pond suitable to keep the image floating. Then, they invoke me, and set me up in the stone image. Then, they thought that I am in the huge stone image for the mankind.

As years passed by, monsoons after monsoons brought the heavy rains, which weakened the hills, and then caused a huge landslide that enveloped the human settlement and me, too. My stone image remained under the debris for thousands of years.

Folks forgot about me and about the area being the holy place for my devotees. It was and is the foothill, and then the stone image remained there without any trace of the deity. Trees and other vegetation competed each other to grow here. It became a forestland for a millennium or two.

Later on, folks came in to cut the trees and cleared of the vegetation and started crop farming. It became a farmland. Folks began to multiply every year to grow in number. They built houses for the families. As they went on digging the ground for farming they hit me incidentally. Thus, they discovered me after two millenniums.

They built the pond again, and they planted trees around the pond protecting the stone image floating on it. As the time passed by, folks had been different. They had different interest and different views to make me more pleasant to stay in the stone image. They cut down the trees leaving a single banyan tree.

Even the single banyan tree protected my stone image for quite many years. But the time came when even the banyan tree was cleared of leaving me in the stone directly exposed to the sun. The earthly stone image had hard time to withstand sun, wind and rain. It gradually was worn down in part.

Now, you could see a linen canopy has been hanging over the stone image to protect it from the sun. Natural protection had been the most appropriate one but some folks did not like it, and removed the evergreen banyan tree. When my stone image was exposed to sun and wind of polluted air, the stone started of disintegrating threatening the stone image to disfigure, and ultimately make it worthless. So, they hurriedly put up a canopy.

Reporter: Prabhu, that much for today. I would come to talk to the lord next year. Then, we will see how much improvement would have been done removing the ugly structures and the powerful loud speakers for bringing back the lord’s area to its natural shape and size.

Bless me, Prabhu.

Nilkantha: Live long my dear; be sincere and honest, and be happy as long as you have time in this human world. Then, we will see where you will go to dwell in your next life depending on the merits you have earned doing good things to everybody.

Bless you to be good and happy.

Then, Lord vanished spontaneously.

Then, I walked down from the pond shrine to the road crowded with so many commercial stalls made for selling everything any human needs. Some of my companions walked ahead of me.

Then, I asked them to wait for me at the point where the commercially crowed road met with the main road, and I went for my car, and then I drove them back to Kathmandu. We are back home again in the human world where everybody competes with each other for everything forgetting that everybody needs to leave whatever s/he has made or earned behind for going to the cosmic world after the body becomes no longer useful to live in this world.

December 6, 2019