________________
244
RELIGIOUS SECTS
These mythological fancies have been principally disseminated by the Puráňas, in all which Prakriti, or Máyá, bears a prominent part. The aggregate of the whole is given in the Brahma Vaivartta Purana, one section of which, the Prakriti Khanda, is devoted to the subject, and in which the legends relating to the principal modifications of the female principle are narrated.
According to this authority, BRAHMA, or the supreme being, having determined to create the universe by his super-human power, became twofold, the right half becoming a male, the left half a female, which was Prakriti. She was of one nature with BRAHMA. She was illusion, eternal and without end: as is the soul, so is its active energy; as the faculty of burning is in fire'. In another passage it is said, that KŘISHŃA, who is in this work identified with the Supreme, being alone invested with the divine nature, beheld all one universal blank, and contemplating creation with his
सैषा मायात्मिका शक्तिः साकारा सनातनी।
विश्वरूपं महेशस्थ सर्वदा संप्रकाशयेत् ॥ "His Energy, being the universal form of all the world, is called Máyå, for so does the Lord the best of males and endowed will illusion cause it to revolve. That Sakti, of which the essence is illusion, is omniform and eternal, and constantly displays the universal shape of Mahéśa.” ___ योगेनात्मा सष्टिविधौ द्विधारूपो बभूव सः।
पुमांश्च दक्षिणााङ्गो वामाा प्रकृतिः स्मृता ॥ "He, by the power of Yoga, became himself in the act of creation two-fold; the right half was the male, the left was called Prakriti." [1, 9. See Aufrecht, Catal. I, p. 23, a.]
