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256
VISHNU.
LXXXV, 1.
LXXXV. 1. A Sraddha offered at the (Tirtha or place of pilgrimage called) Pushkaras confers eternal bliss upon the giver ;
2. And so does the muttering of prayers, the offering of burnt-oblations, and the practice of austerities in that place.
3. Even by merely bathing at Pushkara he is purified from all his sins.
4. The same effect may be produced at Gayâsîrsha;
5. And near Vata (Akshayavata); 6. And on the Amarakantaka mountain; 7. And on the Varâha mountain ;
LXXXV. 1. Pushkara, according to the common acceptation of the term, is the name of a celebrated place of pilgrimage near Agmîr, the modern Pokur. See Lassen, Indian Antiquities, I, 113. Nand. quotes a Smriti passage to the effect that there are three Pushkaras, and a passage of the Mahâbhârata, in which it is stated that one Pushkara is sacred to Brahman, another to Vishnu, and a third to Rudra.
3. Nand. asserts with regard to the use of the name Pushkara in the singular number in this Sûtra, that it means even a single bath has the consequence here mentioned.
4. Gayâsîrsha is the name of a mountain near Gayâ in Bihar, a celebrated place of pilgrimage. Compare Yâgñavalkya I, 260.
5. There exists one Akshayavata in Bihar (Nand.) and another in Prayaga (Allahabad). The 'undecaying banyan-tree' (Akshay Bat) is an object of worship at Allahabad even now, and was so already in the times of Hwen Thsang. See Cunningham, Ancient Geography of India, p. 389; St. Julien, Voyages des Pèlerins Bouddhistes, II, 278.
6. Nand. states that both the Tîrtha called Amarakantaka on the Mekalâ mountain in the Vindhya range and the whole mountain of that name are meant.
7. This is a certain boar-shaped mountain. (Nand.) It seems very probable that the Tîrtha of Bâramúla, the ancient Varaha
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