Shloka 196
Tīrtha-yātrā: Phalaśruti and Sacred Geography from Lohitya to Prayāga
Pulastya’s Instruction
तत्र स्नात्वा च पीत्वा च स्वर्गलोके महीयते । अमावास्यां तु तत्रैव राहुग्रस्ते दिवाकरे,राजन! उसमें स्नान और जलपान करके मनुष्य स्वर्गलोकमें प्रतिष्ठित होता है। जो सूर्यग्रहणके समय अमावास्याको वहाँ पितरोंका श्राद्ध करता है, उसके पुण्यफलका वर्णन सुनो--। भलीभाँति सम्पन्न किये हुए सहस्र अश्वमेध यज्ञोंका जो फल होता है, उसे मनुष्य उस तीर्थमें स्नानमात्र करके अथवा श्राद्ध करके पा लेता है। स्त्री या पुरुषने जो कुछ भी दुष्कर्म किया हो, वह सब वहाँ स्नान करनेमात्रसे नष्ट हो जाता है; इसमें संशय नहीं है। वह पुरुष कमलके समान रंगवाले विमानद्वारा ब्रह्मलोकमें जाता है
tatra snātvā ca pītvā ca svargaloke mahīyate | amāvāsyāṃ tu tatraiva rāhugraste divākare |
Ghūlastya said: “By bathing there and drinking its water, a person is honored and established in the heavenly world. And if, on the new-moon day, at that very place—when the sun is seized by Rāhu (during an eclipse)—one performs the ancestral śrāddha, then hear of its merit: the fruit that comes from a thousand well-performed Aśvamedha sacrifices is obtained merely by bathing at that sacred ford, or by performing śrāddha there. Whatever wrongdoing a woman or a man may have committed is destroyed simply by bathing there—of this there is no doubt. Such a person proceeds to Brahmaloka in a lotus-hued celestial chariot.”
घुलस्त्य उवाच
Educational Q&A
The passage teaches the purificatory and merit-generating power attributed to a sacred tīrtha: bathing and drinking its water, especially when combined with śrāddha on amāvāsyā during a solar eclipse, is said to yield extraordinary spiritual merit—comparable to many grand sacrifices—and to cleanse wrongdoing, culminating in an exalted posthumous destination (Brahmaloka).
A speaker named Ghūlastya praises a particular pilgrimage site, describing the benefits of bathing there and performing ancestral rites at an astrologically potent time (new moon and solar eclipse). He amplifies the site’s sanctity by equating its results with the fruit of a thousand Aśvamedhas and by promising ascent to Brahmaloka in a celestial chariot.