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THE COMING OF THE MESSIAH.
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again. At last, frightened by the devastating desolation of calamity, the despot half-heartedly agrees to set the Chosen One' free. But he soon repents of his weakness, and makes one more effort to recapture the Emancipated Soul, but, God having manifested Himself, miracles are performed to baffle the enemy; the sea parts dry, letting the favoured one pass, but entombing the tyrant and completely destroying all traces of him.
The story of the rescue of Prahlada, which is celebrated annually in many places by the Hindus, is the Puranic counterpart of the legend of the emancipation of Israel. Hiranya-Kasipu, the asura-king and the bitterest enemy of Vishnu, had a son named Prablada, who took to worshipping the god in defiance of the wishes of his august father. The distressed parent resorted to various devices to wean the unruly child from the love of the deity, but in vain. At last he resolved to destroy the boy, but failed in the various attempts he made on his life. He then sought the help of his sister who was supposed to enjoy immortality, as a divine gift, and prevailed upon her to enter a burning pyre, taking the lad with her. The roaring pile was, however, turned into a garden at the touch of Prahlada, but the sister of Hiranya-Kasipu was destroyed by the flames. This exasperated Kasipu so much that he resolved to destroy the boy with his own hand. Tying him securely with a rope to one of the solid masonry columns in his palace, he addressed him thus: “Thou hast defied me thus far, but I am now going to destroy thee. Thou knowest well that I cannot be killed by man or beast; neither the weapons that have been manufactured by devas or
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