Curses to God

When I was writing about the boons and curses of Raavan, my little grandson asked me - "Amma, Can somebody curse Bhagavaan also?" Reflexively I replied - "How Bhagavaan can be cursed? Who has the courage to curse Him? Who is above Him? No, No, It is not possible." He then said - "But Amma, what is the curse? When somebody does not like anybody's particular action or behavior so much that he cannot tolerate it, he curses the other; or maybe somebody has harmed somebody so much that he is also compelled to wish bad for him, that is curse. Isn't it?" 
"Yes." I said. 
"Then many people must be there who do not like Bhagavaan's some actions for which they are compelled to curse Him." My grandson suggested.
"Yes. There may be, but human beings normally do not do that for two reasons - one, that since He is the giver of all things, they cannot curse Him, otherwise if they will ask Him something in future, He will not give that to them; two, they do not have that much power that their words come true. And not only God, they normally do not curse even gods (Devtaa)."

But then immediately it came to my mind that really He had been cursed several times by several people, so I thought to write about them here, because nobody can think of cursing God or gods. Here are some curses to God.

(1) Curse By Maharshi Bhrigu
The first case is of Maharshi Bhrigu, Brahmaa Jee's son, by whose curse Vishnu had to incarnate on Prithvi 10 times. This story comes in Bhavishya Puraan.
 
Once in the beginning of the Sat Yug, Maharshi Bhrigu and his wife Divyaa were living in an Aashram. She used to work hard for her house. Once, at the time of Dev-Asur war, Asur got very afraid of Vishnu so all Asur came to Bhrigu Rishi. He gave them shelter in his Aashram, handed over his work to Divyaa and he himself went to northern part of Himaalaya to obtain Sanjeevanee Vidyaa. He wanted to please Shankar Jee to make Asur always victorious by obtaining Sanjeevanee Vidyaa.

At the same time Vishnu came there riding on His Garud and started killing Asur. He killed most of them in a few moments. At this Bhrigu's wife Divyaa got angry and was ready to curse Vishnu. Vishnu immediately cut her head by His Chakra (Divine disc). In the meantime Bhrigu also came there after obtaining Sanjeevanee Vidyaa from Shiv Jee. He saw that all Daitya have been killed and his wife has also been killed. Filled with rage he cursed Vishnu - "You will have to be born ten times on Prithvi." That is why Vishnu had to come to Prithvi 10 times. He has already come on Prithvi nine times in different incarnations, and His tenth incarnation, Kalki Incarnation, still remains.

(2) Curse by Gaandhaaree 
When Vishnu came as Krishn in Dwaapar Yug, Gaandhaaree had cursed Him.Gaandhaaree was a very powerful woman. I think she was the only powerful woman in the whole Mahaabhaarat. She had pleased Shiv Jee with her Tap and got the boon of having 100 sons. Even if other characters of Mahaabhaarat were powerful they were only powerful because of the human intervention, but she was the only one who was powerful because of her Tap. If you remember, she could even change her son's body into metallic body.

So after the Mahaabhaarat war was over, all, men and women, went to the battlefield to see the dead bodies of the warriors. (Mahaabhaarat) There Gaandhaaree weeps a lot and blames Krishn for all this. Then she curses Him - "Paandav's and Dhritraashtra's all kinsmen and relatives are dead. I don't know why were you indifferent to them? You were capable to stop this war, you had the power to bring peace because you had a large force behind you, but you deliberately did not stop it, let it happen, you will reap the fruit of this act. Through my little power I have acquired by being faithful to my husband, I curse you that since you were indifferent between Kuru and Paandav while they slew each other, you will be the killer of your own kinsmen. In the 36th year from now, after killing your own people you will die in a very disgusting way in the wilderness. Your women will also weep and cry like Bharat Vansh women."

Krishn replied - "Nobody else, except myself is able to kill Vrishni, I know that. By cursing me like this you have made my work easier. Vrishni are incapable of being killed  by any human being or Devtaa. The Yaadav now will be slained by each other."
[And that is what happened, all Vrishni were killed fighting among themselves, and Krishn died in the widerness in a disgusting way.] 

(3) Curse by Naarad Jee
This is the most important curse by a Rishi to Vishnu. This story comes in Tulasee's Maanas. He gives this story as a reason of Raam Avataar, as why did He incarnate as Raam. Once Naarad Jee did some Tap which, as usual, troubled Indra. He sent Kaam Dev to disturb his Tap, but he could not do it. This made Naarad Jee very proud that he had won Kaam Dev. He expressed his pride to Shiv Jee and Brahmaa Jee and in spite of being warned by them he told it to Vishnu also. Vishnu thought to remove this pride from His Bhakt.

He created a Maayaa city on the way, with its King and his beautiful daughter. The King was organizing his daughter's Swayamvar. Naarad Jee reached there and found that the Princess was destined to marry God, but he wanted to marry her himself. So he went to Vishnu, as he considered Him his best counselor, to ask for beauty so that the Princess can marry him. Vishnu gave him a monkey's face which, of course, other could not see except the Princess. So seeing his monkey face, she did not choose him as her husband.

Vishnu also came there as her suitor, and she chose  Him as her husband. There were two Shiv's Gan around who could see Naarad's monkey face, they made the mockery of his face and asked him to see it in some mirror. Naarad Jee got very angry to see his monkey face and went ditrectly to Vishnu. He met Him on the way and cursed him that, "You go and be born as a human being. You also suffer in your wife's separation as I am suffering. because you have given me monkey's face, that is why only monkeys will help you."

That is why, Vishnu incarnated as a human being (Raam), tolerated wife's separation (when Raavan abducted Seetaa), and monkeys helped Him to recover Her.

(4)  Vrindaa
There was a Raakshas named Jalandhar. His wife Vrindaa was a very faithful wife. Because of his faithful wife he used to do many bad deeds, so Devtaa requested Vishnu to do something for them. Vishnu promised to help them. Vishnu knew that Vrindaa was a faithful woman and Jalandhar was doing all that with her powers, so once He went to Vrindaa and had her assuming her husband Jalandhar's form.

During the process, Vrindaa knew that the man was not her husband but was Vishnu, so she cursed Him to turn into a black stone. Vishnu accepted her curse, and said - "I accept your curse, but since my Darshan does not go waste I bestow you two boons,
--you would turn into a river and I would live in your heart. So Vrindaa turned into Gandakee River and Shaaligraam stones are found in that river.
 --that you would turn into a plant named Tulasee and I will not accept any food without you. That is why Vishnu's Bhog (Naivedya) is always incomplete without a Tulasee leaf. You will grow abundantly in a place where I will incarnate as Krishn, so she did. That place is called Vrindaa Van


Sushma Gupta
www.sushmajee.com