Vashishtha Tries to Drown Himself but is Saved by Hope
After his sons are killed, the sage Vashishtha tries twice to drown himself. The rivers Vipasha and Himavati refuse to take his life, washing him ashore or splitting into a hundred streams. His despair breaks only when he hears Vedic chants from his unborn grandson.
Vashishtha's hermitage was bereft of his sons. The grief-stricken sage left it and saw a river swollen with the new water of the rainy season, sweeping away trees along its banks. The miserable one thought he would certainly be killed in this water.
He bound himself with strong ropes and, struck with great grief, flung himself into the waters of that great river. But the river tore those ropes away and, unfettered, washed the rishi up onto the bank. Freed from the bindings, the great rishi arose. He gave the river the name of Vipasha.
His mind, obsessed with grief, did not stay in any one place. He went to mountains, rivers, and lakes. Seeing once more the terrible river Himavati, full of fierce animals, he flung himself into its waters.
That best of rivers, thinking the Brahmana was fire, immediately fled in a hundred directions. From then on, it came to be known as Shatadru.
Finding himself once again on dry land, he exclaimed that he was unable to die at his own hands. He turned back toward his hermitage.
As he returned, his daughter-in-law Adrishyanti followed him. As she came near, he heard the sound of Vedic incantations, embellished with the fullness of meaning of the six branches.
"Who is following me?" he asked.
"I am Adrishyanti, Shakti's wife," his daughter-in-law answered. "O illustrious one, I am austere, engaged in austerities."
Vashishtha said, "O daughter, who is reciting the Vedas and their angas that I hear? It is just as I have heard it from Shakti earlier."
Adrishyanti said, "In my womb, there is a son begotten by Shakti. He has been there for twelve years. O sage, you have heard his recitations."
Having been thus addressed by her, Vashishtha was greatly delighted. Exclaiming that there was a son, he refrained from death.