[Advaita-l] Bhagavatam Genealogy and a question

[V. Krishnamurthy]

Namaste

This is to draw your attention, if you don’t mind, to the
following presentation of Genealogy from the Creator Brahma
downwards, as presented in the first half of Shrimad
Bhagavatam.  I have tried to put them all in one chart (as
an Excel document).  I would appreciate your comments.  I
shall welcome suggestions for improvement of either the
content or the manner of presentation or in my use of
software. This is part of my work of preparation for some
lectures on Bhagavatam.

http://www.geocities.com/profvk/VK2/BhagavatamGenealogy.html

Well, I have one substantial question for those who want to
get into the details of the content.  Those who are not
interested in the details or who have no emotional
attachment to Bhagavatam may not have to read further.

Kashyapa and Diti are parents of Hiranyaksha and
Hiranyakashipu.  Diti was the daughter of  Daksha-Prajapati
and was one of the 13 daughters he gave in marriage to
Kashyapa (Bhagavatam VI – 6 – 25).  But this Daksha is the
second birth of the famous Daksha Prajapati who quarelled
with Shiva and was the cause of his daughter Sati’s
immolation (Bh. IV -4, 5, 6).  This second Daksha came in
the line of Dhruva – Vena – Prachetas; in fact he came 13
generations after Dhruva. Dhruva himself was Svayambhuva
Manu’s grandson.  All this means Diti was given in marriage
to Kashyapa,  almost 15 generations after Svayambhuva  Manu
started as Manu and contributed to the creative work of
Brahma.  But it is said in  III – 13- 15 by Svayambhuva
Manu that the earth is submerged in waters and it has to be
redeemed. We know the story of Varahavatara and how the
Lord redeemed the earth from Hiranyaksha.  Thus it
transpires that at the very first attempt of  Svayambhuva
Manu’s  creative work, the earth was not there and
Hiranyaksha had done his mischief of hiding away the earth
under waters.  

So now my question is this:   Before Hiranyaksha’s birth
there have been at least thirteen generations of people. 
At least some of them, like Dhruva himself, like Vena and
like Prachetas, all have lived on earth.   If they did not
live on earth, shall we take it that they all lived and
toiled in Janoloka or Tapoloka?  Something is not being
rightly interpreted here.  My understanding of the
chronology is the following sequence of events:

1.	Jaya-Vijaya story.
2.	Hiranyaksha and Hiranyakashipu are born
3.	Hiranyaksha hides the earth in waters
4.	Svayambhuva Manu finds no place for his people to live
5.	Fifteen generations after start of creation, the parents
of Hiranyaksha (Kashyapa and Diti) are married.
6.	Diti asks Kashyapa to mate with her during Sandhya time
and consequent to this sacrilege, the two demons are born.

Do you see the relevance of my question?  Can some one help
me understand this? I am not questioning the internal
consistency of Bhagavatam.  I am sure the Iskcon devotees
know it right.   Instead of discussing this on the list,
please write to me off the list to my email id.  Thank you.

PraNAms to all students of Shrimad Bhagavatam.
Profvk
 



Prof. V. Krishnamurthy

Ongoing new series of pages on my  website: 'Bhagavatam and Advaita Bhakti'  starting with
http://www.geocities.com/profvk/VK2/Bhagavatam_Introduction.html