4.THE BIRTH OF CELESTIALS AND THEIR INCARNATIONS

Continuing the story vaisampayana tells Janamejaya about the birth of the celestial objects of which very few are described here.The question that occurs is that if Parshuram cleared the earth of the kshatrias(warrior class) 21 times, then how could the kshatrias be existing afterwards.according to him once there were no kshatrias left ,their wives went to the sages during their menstrual periods in order to seek for the children although this was totally free of any sort of lust.As the time passed on, when the sons of danu and diti started to make the earth burdened by their evil deeds the devatas were asked to incarnate onto the earth.It is said that brahma had 6 spiritual sons viz. Marichi, Atri,Angiras, Pulastya, Pulaha and Kratu . Kashyap was the son of marichi and these creatures are said to be of him.On the other hand Daksha one of the prajapatis had 1000 sons and 50  daughters among which he married 13 to Kashyapa, all the creatures on the earth (animals,birds,reptiles etc. and all th celestials including sun)are sons of kashyapa .Yama ,the lord of death and MANU were the sons of sun and yamuna his daughter.Manu the son of sun is known to be the parent of human being and hence human beings are also known as manav (the descendants of manu).Abhimanyu was incarnation of Varchas,the son of the moon who said that as he could not part from his son for long time he should come back early to him once his work on earth is over leaving the mark of his bravery on the earth by fighting the greatet warriors on the earth in the absence of arjun(incarnation of nara) and vasudeva (incarnation of vishnu).So he was dead at the age of 16.Rukmini the wife of vasudeva was incarnation of lakshmi and other 16000 apsaras that incarnated on the earth by indra's order became the wives of vasudeva.Draupadi was incarnation of sachi(the queen of celestials).Kunti and madri the mothers of pandavas were incarnations of siddhi and dhriti respectively.There are descriptions of the birth of almost all celestial bodies and their incarnations in the real text.