February 19, 2026
yena prāptena loke ‘smin na prāpyam avaśiṣyate
tatkṛtaṁ sukṛtaṁ manye śeṣaṁ karma viṣūcikā (17)
At Rāma’s request, VASIṢṬHA narrated the story:
Once upon a time there was a king named Bhagīratha who was devoted to dharma. He gave liberal gifts to the pious and holy ones and he was terror to the evil-doers. He worked tirelessly to eradicate the very causes of poverty. When he was in the company of the holy ones, his heart melted in devotion.
Bhagīratha brought the holy river Gaṅgā from the heavens down to the earth. In this he had to encounter great difficulties and propitiate the gods Brahmā and Śiva and also the sage Jahnu. In all this he suffered frequent frustrations and disappointments.
He, too, was endowed with discrimination and dispassion even at an early age, O Rāma. One day while remaining alone he reflected thus: “This worldly life is really essenceless and stupid. Day and night chase each other. People repeat the same meaningless actions again and again. I regard only that as proper action which leads to the attainment beyond which there is nothing to be gained; the rest is repeated foul excretion (as in cholera).” He approached his guru Tritala and prayed, “Lord, how can one put an end to this sorrow and to old age, death and delusion which contribute to repeated birth here?”
TRITALA said: Sorrow ceases, all the bondages are rent asunder and doubts are dispelled when one is fully established in the equanimity of the self for a long time, when the perception of division has ceased and when there is the experience of fullness through the knowledge of that which is to be known. What is to be known? It is the self which is pure and which is of the nature of pure consciousness which is omnipresent and eternal.
BHAGĪRATHA asked: I know that the self alone is real and the body, etc., are not real. But how is it that it is not perfectly clear to me?
TRITALA said: Such intellectual knowledge is not knowledge! Unattachment to wife, son and house, equanimity in pleasure and pain, love of solitude, being firmly established in self-knowledge – this is knowledge, all else is ignorance! Only when the egosense is thinned out does this self-knowledge arise.
BHAGĪRATHA asked: Since this egosense is firmly established in this body, how can it be uprooted?
TRITALA replied: By self-effort and by resolutely turning away from the pursuit of pleasure. And by the resolute breaking down of the prison-house of shame (false dignity), etc. If you abandon all this and remain firm, the egosense will vanish and you will realise that you are the supreme being!