Skanda Purana — Avanti Khanda, Shloka 103
सर्वदेवमया गावः सर्वे देवास्तदात्मकाः । शृङ्गाग्रेषु महीपाल शक्रो वसति नित्यशः
sarvadevamayā gāvaḥ sarve devāstadātmakāḥ | śṛṅgāgreṣu mahīpāla śakro vasati nityaśaḥ
โคทั้งหลายเป็นที่แผ่ซ่านด้วยเทพทั้งปวง; เทพทั้งปวงสถิตเป็นรูปอยู่ในโคนั้น. ข้าแต่ผู้พิทักษ์แผ่นดิน ณ ปลายเขาโค ศักระ (อินทรา) ประทับอยู่เป็นนิตย์.
Mārkaṇḍeya (section context)
Tirtha: Revā (Narmadā) tīrtha sphere (contextual)
Type: kshetra
Listener: māhīpāla / nṛpa (king addressed as ‘protector of the earth’)
Scene: A sacred cow stands calm and radiant; at the tips of her horns a small, luminous Indra is envisioned as eternally seated, suggesting the cow as a living shrine of the gods.
FAQs
Reverence to the cow is framed as reverence to the entire divine order, supporting the exaltation of go-dāna.
The teaching appears within Revā-kṣetra’s dāna-vidhi, reinforcing why go-dāna there is praised.
It supports the practice of go-dāna by describing the cow as a vessel of the devas.