Story of Mandhata (Part 1)

Introduction to Mandhata

Rishi Lomesh took the Pandava princes on a long pilgrimage; they visited many mysterious and holy places. One day he took them to see a very auspicious part of the river Yamuna, the place where Sri Krishna did tapas. He informed them that even King Mandhata, a great archer, and Somak had performed yagnas to the gods in that place. Yudhisthira asked Rishi Lomesh to narrate to them the story of Mandhata.

The rishi said that in the dynasty of kings known as Ishkavaku, there was a wise and just king known as Yuvanashva, who had performed more than a thousand Ahwamedha yagnas. The king remained childless despite performing so many yagnas and giving charity to thousands of Brahmins. The disappointed king then left his kingdom in the hands of his faithful ministers and went into the forest to meditate upon the divine.

Once while he was severely fasting he felt thirsty at night. Nearby was Rishi Bhrigu’s ashram and he went there in search of water. The king was unaware that the pious rishi had, that very day, concluded a yagna so the king could have a son. In the yagna the rishi had, with mantras, divined a jar of water to be given to Yuvanashva’s wife. By drinking that water, she would bear the king a son greater than Indra, the lord of the gods.

The pot of water was kept safely in a room and everyone in the ashram had gone to sleep. The king found this pot of divine water and being extremely thirsty drank it all up. In the morning when the rishi saw that the pot was empty he started enquiring who had drunk the water. The king told the rishi that at night his throat was parched and burning, and he had no option but to drink the water.

The rishi told the king what a grave error he had committed and how it was beyond the rishi’s power to change the resolution he had divined in the water to give birth to a powerful son. He told the king that very soon he would have an illustrious child. The rishi told the king that he would do tapas for him so that he would not have to undergo the pain and scars of childbirth.

After a hundred years had passed, a child came out of the king’s left ribs. All the gods came to see the child. As the queen had not borne the child, the gods asked Indra who would suckle him. Indra volunteered and put his finger in the child’s mouth. Immediately the baby started suckling Indra’s finger. Indra called the boy Mandhata. The words ‘mam’ and ‘dhava’ together mean suckled by me. The minute the child started sucking Indra’s finger he grew up immediately and turned into a handsome young prince.

The young prince immediately sat crossed legged in deep meditation and in a flash acquired the knowledge of all the scriptures, the art of war, the use of all divine weapons, and the duties of a king.