Varaha Purana 53.3: Adhyaya 53, Shloka 3
The Origin Account of Saptamūrti Svara and the Emergence of Saṃbhūti through Vibhūti
तस्यां सम्भूतिमिच्छन् यस्तस्योपायं स्वयं परम् । पशुपालात् समुत्पन्नो यश्चतुष्पाच्चतुर्मुखः ॥ ५३.३ ॥
tasyāṃ saṃbhūtim icchan yas tasyopāyaṃ svayaṃ param | paśupālāt samutpanno yaś catuṣpāc caturmukhaḥ || 53.3 ||
Derjenige, der die Manifestation in ihr (der Erde) begehrte und selbst zum höchsten Mittel dieser Manifestation wurde—der aus einem Kuhhirten hervorging und der, vierfüßig, viergesichtig wurde.
Varāha (default dialogue framework; speaker not explicit in excerpt)
FAQs
It preserves a compact Purāṇic-style etiological formula linking manifestation (saṃbhūti) with symbolic bodily markers (e.g., four-faced), a common technique used to encode cosmological and genealogical ideas in early medieval Sanskrit narrative traditions.
No explicit geographic toponym appears in this verse; it is framed as a cosmological/genealogical statement rather than a site-specific (tīrtha) description.
The verse is primarily descriptive rather than prescriptive; its philosophical emphasis is on causality and manifestation—how agency and ‘means’ (upāya) are narrated as integral to cosmic emergence.
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