The festival of Nagapanchami is celebrated on the fifth day of the bright fortnight in the month of Shravana (11th august this year). The Nagas i.e. snakes are worshipped on this day and there is a ritual of placing food items like milk etc. near the snake holes to please the snakes. Serpents are worshipped of alleviating the fear of snakebite. Some worship snaks booking the superme selfk in them.
As we can find from the available accounts of early history the glory of serpents is extolled by people from all quarters of the world. The ‘Varaha Purana’ hold that it was on this pious day that Lord Brahma had accorded his prassda his blessings to shushing and the people had sung praises to his glory in show of gratitude for his grand series of supporting the Earth upon his head. Since then this festival is celebrated as a mark respect of whole species of serpents.
The serpents \have been accorded a special place of importance in the Indian culture since the very begriming .Lord Vishnu looks after the needs of the whole by creation while reclaiming on the whole creation body of shesfhnaga. Then the fact of nagaraja Vasuki giving away his body to be used as a rope I the churning of the ocean for the purpose of deriving neater the from ,is know over. Even Lord Shiva I Known a Nagenendrahara (one who wears the Lord of Nagas around His neck). Numerous verses of the Vedas contain therapies jot the as also the rules and ritual of worshipping them. Nagas are worshipped in virtually every state a
Why are the Nagas Worshipped?
A serpent is generally considered to be a onerous creature that bites a man right at sight. However, this conception is not tire. Only a of breeds of snakes are actually venomous and more other than not a snake tends jot bite an man when it is stepppepon or disturbed in someway or the other. If people observe a little factiousness while walking in the jungle or corp. fields, they would not be bitten by a snake. The misconceptions abnout snakes have made such a stronghold in our hearts that we have come to take their whole species as jour arch enemy and consequently the sight of a snake sends a chill of fear down one’s spine as one is naturally inclined to search for a stick to kill it. The moment one fells like killing it this negatives into threat of that snake as well this alone turns the reptile violet.
The ritual of worshipping the serpents eliminated these negative feelings and misconceptions. The smakes are worshipped like duties with devotional faith offering fragrant flowers and milk on this auspicious day. Listening to the paeans sung in praise of their glorious attributes gradually purifies our hearts of the negative feelings against the serpents. This paves the way for us to forget all hostility and confide them as yet another species in the creation of God just like us. And then we will never get frighten or the festival of Naga Panchami has been instituted with view to eradicating that phobia of snkes form land awakening a pious sense of good will of them in the minds of people at large.
This legend is popular amongst the Sindhi brethren:
A poor girl had a great greed fro wealth. One night the god of serpents appeared in her deem and said, A large amount o wealth is lying buried at such and such place. Go there and take it I have no sister and you have no brother; form today onwards you are my sister and I am your brother.”
The girl found a great deal of wealth at the place indicated by eth snake god thus become rich overnight. The after she maze it a daily routine to place an artful of milk fro her snake brother. The snake god would come and dip its tail in to the milk before deicing it. One day out o hurry; the sister served the milk for her snake brother without cooling it properly. When the serpent came and sipped his tail into the milk it got scalded. He thought that he gave his sister so much wealth and yet she didn’t care to even sever milk to him in inappropriate manner. So he decided to teach her a lesson.
Once in the month of Shravana, the sister was playing wither relatives. The serpent her contemplated killing her husband to let her know as to how dreadful the results of carelessness an be. The snake gods hid himself fear her husband’s shoes. In the mean time the occurred a misunderamong the player about placing a four Anna coin; an order to prove the veracity of her words the sister said, I swear by the name my heloved brother the smake god that what I have said is true.”
As he heard his sister swearing by his name like people so by the name of God his other deities the snake god was very much impressed by her love and respect offer him. So he immediately appeared before her and said well you certainly had coated a faulty but I was going to make a greater mistake. However in fond recognition your love form I give you this boon that mad y sister who shall remember me on this day would find husband safeguarded against ankle bite ad untimely death.” Since then woman observes that day man worship the snake god or Naga devata.
Whatever may be the rationale behind the celebration of the nagapanchami festival, on thing is pretty clear that our colure has taught u not to harbor animosity and to develop good will even for the violent creatures so that they may move about fearlessly. The system of offering milk to the sankes and the vision of seeing God in then are unique features of sanatana dharma. A snake around the neck Lord Shiva that around the waist of Lord Ganesha and Shoshanna serving as the bed of Lord Vishnu singular point to the fact that if someone looks lovingly at a snake beholding this own self in it the snake is bound to forget its violent nature and behave like a somas dictated creature. All creatures other than human are too have their tendencies according to they lower nature. The nature and tendencies are subject to change, but on who is able to discover the dispassionate witness there of and there by to realize one ‘s true self become on with Lord Shiva and also gets established in the fearless self. This festival grieves us the pious message of beholding God even in a creature ins the religious system of the supreme ideal of turning death into like hatred into love and self will into liberation giving thoughts!
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