The Story of Markandeya's Vision of Maya

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SB 12.9.4: The sage Markandeya said: O Lord of lords, all glories to

You! O Lord Acyuta, You remove all distress for the devotees who

surrender unto You. That you have allowed me to see You is all the

benediction I want.SB 12.9.5: Such demigods as Lord BrahmÄ

achieved their exalted positions simply by seeing Your beautiful lotus

feet after their minds had become mature in yoga practice. And now, my

Lord, You have personally appeared before me.SB 12.9.6: O

lotus-eyed Lord, O crest jewel of renowned personalities, although I am

satisfied simply by seeing You, I do wish to see Your illusory potency,

by whose influence the entire world, together with its ruling demigods,

considers reality to be materially variegated.SB 12.9.7: SÅ«ta

GosvÄmÄ« said: O wise Åšaunaka, thus satisfied by MÄrkanÌ£dÌ£eya's praise

and worship, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, smiling, replied, "So

be it," and then departed for His hermitage at BadarikÄÅ›rama.SB

12.9.8-9: Thinking always of his desire to see the Lord's illusory

energy, the sage remained in his ÄÅ›rama, meditating constantly upon the

Lord within fire, the sun, the moon, water, the earth, air, lightning

and his own heart and worshiping Him with paraphernalia conceived in

his mind. But sometimes, overwhelmed by waves of love for the Lord,

MÄrkanÌ£dÌ£eya would forget to perform his regular worship.SB

12.9.10: O brÄhmanÌ£a Åšaunaka, best of the BhrÌ£gus, one day while

MÄrkanÌ£dÌ£eya was performing his evening worship on the bank of the

PusÌ£pabhadrÄ, a great wind suddenly arose.SB 12.9.11: That wind

created a terrible sound and brought in its wake fearsome clouds that

were accompanied by lightning and roaring thunder and that poured down

on all sides torrents of rain as heavy as wagon wheels.SB

12.9.12: Then the four great oceans appeared on all sides, swallowing

up the surface of the earth with their wind-tossed waves. In these

oceans were terrible sea monsters, fearful whirlpools and ominous

rumblings.SB 12.9.13: The sage saw all the inhabitants of the

universe, including himself, tormented within and without by the harsh

winds, the bolts of lightning, and the great waves rising beyond the

sky. As the whole earth flooded, he grew perplexed and fearful.SB

12.9.14: Even as MÄrkanÌ£dÌ£eya looked on, the rain pouring down from the

clouds filled the ocean more and more until that great sea, its waters

violently whipped into terrifying waves by hurricanes, covered up all

the earth's islands, mountains and continents.SB 12.9.15: The

water inundated the earth, outer space, heaven and the celestial

region. Indeed, the entire expanse of the universe was flooded in all

directions, and out of all its inhabitants only MÄrkanÌ£dÌ£eya remained.

His matted hair scattered, the great sage wandered about alone in the

water as if dumb and blind.SB 12.9.16: Tormented by hunger and

thirst, attacked by monstrous makaras and timińgila fish and battered

by the wind and waves, he moved aimlessly through the infinite darkness

into which he had fallen. As he grew increasingly exhausted, he lost

all sense of direction and could not tell the sky from the earth.SB

12.9.17-18: At times he was engulfed by the great whirlpools, sometimes

he was beaten by the mighty waves, and at other times the aquatic

monsters threatened to devour him as they attacked one another.

Sometimes he felt lamentation, bewilderment, misery, happiness or fear,

and at other times he experienced such terrible illness and pain that

he felt himself dying.SB 12.9.19: Countless millions of years

passed as MÄrkanÌ£dÌ£eya wandered about in that deluge, his mind

bewildered by the illusory energy of Lord Viṣṇu, the Supreme

Personality of Godhead.SB 12.9.20: Once, while wandering in the

water, the brÄhmanÌ£a MÄrkanÌ£dÌ£eya discovered a small island, upon which

stood a young banyan tree bearing blossoms and fruits.SB

12.9.21: Upon a branch of the northeast portion of that tree he saw an

infant boy lying within a leaf. The child's effulgence was swallowing

up the darkness.SB 12.9.22-25: The infant's dark-blue

complexion was the color of a flawless emerald, His lotus face shone

with a wealth of beauty, and His throat bore marks like the lines on a

conchshell. He had a broad chest, a finely shaped nose, beautiful

eyebrows, and lovely ears that resembled pomegranate flowers and that

had inner folds like a conchshell's spirals. The corners of His eyes

were reddish like the whorl of a lotus, and the effulgence of His

coral-like lips slightly reddened the nectarean, enchanting smile on

His face. As He breathed, His splendid hair trembled and His deep navel

became distorted by the moving folds of skin on His abdomen, which

resembled a banyan leaf. The exalted brÄhmanÌ£a watched with amazement

as the infant took hold of one of His lotus feet with His graceful

fingers, placed a toe within His mouth and began to suck.SB

12.9.26: As MÄrkanÌ£dÌ£eya beheld the child, all his weariness vanished.

Indeed, so great was his pleasure that the lotus of his heart, along

with his lotus eyes, fully blossomed and the hairs on his body stood on

end. Confused as to the identity of the wonderful infant, the sage

approached Him.SB 12.9.27: Just then the child inhaled, drawing

MÄrkanÌ£dÌ£eya within His body like a mosquito. There the sage found the

entire universe arrayed as it had been before its dissolution. Seeing

this, MÄrkanÌ£dÌ£eya was most astonished and perplexed.SB

12.9.28-29: The sage saw the entire universe: the sky, heavens and

earth, the stars, mountains, oceans, great islands and continents, the

expanses in every direction, the saintly and demoniac living beings,

the forests, countries, rivers, cities and mines, the agricultural

villages and cow pastures, and the occupational and spiritual

activities of the various social divisions. He also saw the basic

elements of creation along with all their by-products, as well as time

itself, which regulates the progression of countless ages within the

days of BrahmÄ. In addition, he saw everything else created for use in

material life. All this he saw manifested before him as if it were real.SB

12.9.30: He saw before him the HimÄlaya Mountains, the PusÌ£pabhadrÄ

River, and his own hermitage, where he had had the audience of the

sages Nara-NÄrÄyanÌ£a. Then, as MÄrkanÌ£dÌ£eya beheld the entire universe,

the infant exhaled, expelling the sage from His body and casting him

back into the ocean of dissolution.SB 12.9.31-32: In that vast

sea he again saw the banyan tree growing on the tiny island and the

infant boy lying within the leaf. The child glanced at him from the

corner of His eyes with a smile imbued with the nectar of love, and

MÄrkanÌ£dÌ£eya took Him into his heart through his eyes. Greatly

agitated, the sage ran to embrace the transcendental Personality of

Godhead.SB 12.9.33: At that moment the Supreme Personality of

Godhead, who is the original master of all mysticism and who is hidden

within everyone's heart, became invisible to the sage, just as the

achievements of an incompetent person can suddenly vanish.SB

12.9.34: After the Lord disappeared, O brÄhmanÌ£a, the banyan tree, the

great water and the dissolution of the universe all vanished as well,

and in an instant MÄrkanÌ£dÌ£eya found himself back in his own hermitage,

just as before.

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