Category Archives: Hindu Mythology

As time is a great imponderable, it is related to death. The two words, time and death, are the same in Sanskrit. Kala is popularly known as Yama. Born from the union of Surya (the sun god) and Samjna, daughter of Kassyapa-prajapati, Yama (Kala) was given the duty to retrieve the souls of those whose allotted time was at an end. After death the spirit of the body was taken by the attendants of Kala to his court, and there the spirit was judged according to the virtue (dharma, punya) … Continue reading →

Kakshivatasuta was one of two daughters of the brahmin Kakshivan. Kakshi- vatasuta (also known as Ghosha) contracted leprosy. She had mastered hymn writing and composed a mantra that praised the physicians of the gods, the Asvins. They responded to her praise and cured her. She then was able to marry. Bhadra, Kakshivatasuta’s sister, married King Vyushitashva, who died before they had children. Her lamentations were so great that Vyushitashva was called from the dead, and she was able to have six sons because of her austerities (tapas).

King Kakshasena, praised as an examplar in the Mahabharata, was the son of King Parikshit and grandson of King Avikshit. Kakshasena achieved an honored place in Hindu mythology because of his generous support of the priesthood. The lists of such donors included great kings of the epic period: Shibi, Pratardana, Rantideva, Ambarisha, Parassu-Rama, (Sri Rama, and a few others. King Kak- shasena was said to have attained heaven because of his generosity to the brah­min Vasishtha.

There are two versions of the origin of Kaitabha and his brother Madhu. The ver­sion in the Puranas said that Madhu and his brother Kaitabha were born from the earwax of Vishnu. Vishnu was ending his cosmic sleep reclined upon the ser­pent Sesha (also called Ananta) floating on the Milky Ocean. Brahma emerged from the lotus that grew from Vishnu’s navel. Some earwax emerged from each of Vishnu’s ears, which became the two demons known as Madhu and Kaitabha. According to the Mahabharata version, the two demons were born from … Continue reading →

The Mahabharata describes the location of Kailasa. Kailasa is situated on the southern side of Mahameru (Maha-Meru), the great mountain. It is said that there are two celestial abodes on Mount Kailasa, one of Siva and Parvati and the other of Kubera, god of wealth.

Kaikeyi was one of the three (some versions say five) wives of King Dasaratha. She had been a princess of the kingdom of Kekaya, seven day’s journey from Ayodhya. When Dasaratha was summoned to svarga (heaven) to help the devas (gods) in a war with the asuras (demons), Kaikeyi rode with him in his war char­iot and helped him. The asura Sambara used sorcery (black magic) to attack Dasaratha and the devas from ten thousand directions at the same time. So Dasaratha had to fight in ten thousand directions at … Continue reading →

The asuras (demons) had become invincible in war because their priest, the brahmin (Sukra, knew the art of bringing the dead back to life (mritasanjivini). No sooner would the devas (gods) kill the asuras than Sukra would perform the mritasanjivini and they were alive again. The devas dispatched their chief priest’s son, Kaca, to learn this magic. Kaca presented himself so humbly in ask­ing to become his disciple that Sukra could not refuse. Even Sukra’s daughter, Devayani, fell in love with Kaca. They became an inseparable couple. However, the asuras … Continue reading →

Ka is the first consonant in the Sanskrit alphabet, although, since Sanskrit is a syllabic language, one should say that it is the first consonantal-syllabic. Ka is also the ordinary word for who. It was used in an agnostic hymn of the Rigveda that asked “who” created all this, and when it had become inconceivable that a Vedic hymn should be agnostic, it became a symbol of and word for the creator: Prajapati according to the Mahabharata and Brahma according to Agni Purana.