Stories 15
Tradition: Vaishnava · clear
Anasuya tests the three gods
Narada provokes the three consorts into sending their husbands to test Anasuya's virtue; she turns them into infants and nurses them; the consorts beg for their husbands and she asks for sons — one three-headed Dattatreya, or three sons.
Bhrigu tests the three gods
Sages on the Saraswati bank ask Bhrigu to find which god is greatest.
Bhrigu tests the three gods
Sages send Bhrigu to find out which god is greatest. Brahma swallows his anger, Shiva raises his trident until his consort calms him, and Vishnu apologises after being kicked; the sages choose Vishnu. Temple and popular tellings add Lakshmi's departure, the Tirumala descent and curses on Brahma and Shiva.
Daksha's sacrifice and the death of Sati
At a gathering Shiva stays seated when Daksha enters; Daksha reads it as contempt.
Ganga comes down through Shiva's hair
King Sagara's sixty thousand sons, hunting his stolen sacrificial horse, accuse the sage Kapila and are burnt to ash by his glance.
Madhu and Kaitabha
Two demons born from Vishnu's ear-wax threaten Brahma and steal the Vedas; who saves the day depends on the sect — Vishnu as Hayagriva in the epic line, or the Goddess who must first leave Vishnu's body in the Devi Mahatmya.
Prahlada and the man-lion
The asura boy Prahlada survives his father's every attempt to kill him; Vishnu bursts from a pillar as Narasimha and kills Hiranyakashipu in a way that slips past every clause of his boon.
Shiva drinks the poison
Gods and demons churn the ocean of milk for the nectar.
The boon that had a loophole: Hiranyakashipu
Hiranyakashipu performs long austerities to win power over the gods.
The burning of the three cities
The gods build Shiva a cosmic chariot with Brahma as charioteer and Vishnu as the arrow to destroy the three cities of Taraka's sons; the Shaiva prelude has Vishnu send a heretical teacher to strip the cities of merit, while the Bhagavata has Vishnu as a cow and Brahma as a calf drink the demons' reviving well dry.
The churning of the ocean of milk
Gods and demons churn the milk ocean with Mount Mandara on the tortoise's back; poison, treasures, Lakshmi and the nectar emerge, and Vishnu as Mohini keeps the nectar for the gods.
The gatekeepers who chose three hostile births
Vaikuntha's doorkeepers bar the Kumaras, are cursed to be born away from Vishnu, and choose three lives as his enemies over seven as his devotees.
The release of the elephant king
An elephant seized by a crocodile lifts a lotus and calls on Vishnu, who arrives on Garuda and frees both animal and captor with the discus.
Two origins of the discus
The Sudarshana is either Shiva's gift at Kashi after Vishnu offers his own eye in place of a missing lotus, or Vishvakarma's work from the radiance shaved off the sun.
Vamana and King Bali
The generous asura king Bali grants a dwarf brahmin three paces of land; two strides cover heaven and earth, Bali offers his own head for the third and is sent to rule Sutala with Vishnu as his doorkeeper.