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Srimad Bhagvata Mahapurana: Book 10: Chapter 87: Verses 11-16
Though equal in point of learning, askesis (self-abnegation) and practice of virtue, and although friends, foes and neutrals were alike to them, they treated one (of themselves, viz., Sanandana) as an expounder (of truths),while the rest remained inclined to listen. (IC) Sanandana said : At the end of Pralaya (the period of Dissolution of the universe) the deities presiding over the Sruti texts ( and sprung up from His very first breath) awakened the Supreme, who had been lying asleep (as it were all the time) alongwith His (innumerable) potencies (Prakrti, Purusa, Time and so on), having swallowed this universe evolved by Himself-through (the following) hymns indicating His true character in the same way as bards depending for their subsistence on an emperor call on him, while he is (still) asleep, at daybreak and awaken him with songs of praise celebrating his exploits that contribute to his excellent fame. The Srutis prayed : Manifest Your glory, reveal Your exalted nature, 0 unconquered Lord ! Root out the nescience, which has no beginning, of (all) the Jivas invested with an immobile or mobile body-nescience which has assumed the (three) Gunas (Sattva, Rajas and Tamas) for an evil purpose (viz., obscuring the blissful nature of the Jivas and there by throwing them into bondage), possessed as You are of all divine attributes by virtue of Your own essential nature, 0 Awakener of all the powers in those souls I The Veda is able to describe You (only) when during the period of creation You sport in conjunction with Your Maya (beginningless divine energy) or exist in Your absolute state.
The wise recognize this known (seen and heard of) universe to be (no other than) Brahma (Yourself), because it is Brahma (alone) that remains (when all else is dissolved) and because it is from and into Brahma (the material cause)--which remains unchanged-that the universe (Its evolute) emanates and returns (even) as the earthenware are evolved out of and disappear into clay. Hence (because of Its being the material Cause of and, therefore, comprising the entire universe) the Vedic texts have concluded as referring to You whatever is contemplated with the mind (that is, the import of words,) and uttered with the tongue (viz, the names). How could the feet of men placed anywhere (on earth) be regarded as not placed on the earth (itself) Therefore, 0 Lord of Maya (consisting of the three Gunas), the wise have taken a plunge into the ocean of nectar in the shape of Your stories-that wash away the impurities of all men (who sing them)-and (thereby) shed their (threefold) . sufferings What wonder, then, that they should get rid of their afflictions, who, having conquered by dint of their Self-Realization the tendencies (evil) of their mind (in the shape of attraction. and repulsion etc.) as well as the effects of Time (such as old age). O) Supreme, contemplate . - on Your essential character consisting of eternal consciousness and bliss.
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