Story of Sri Krishna with Jambavati for Janmastami Festival 2013. The name Jambavati is a patronymic which means the daughter of Jambavan. The story of Jambavan appears with slight differences in the Ramayana, Mahabharata, Bhagavatapurana, Vishnupurana and Devibhagavata.
The story of Krishna’s marriage with Jambavati is closely linked with the well-known story of Syamantaka. Syamantaka was a precious diamond which belonged to the Sun God. A nobleman named Satrajit, belonging to the Yadavas community, prayed to Lord Surya to obtain this dazzling diamond. Pleased by the prayer of his devotee, Sun presented him with the diamond. Satrajit returned along with the jewel to Dvaraka, the capital of the Yadava kingdom. Sri Krishna requested him to present the jewel to Ugrasena, the supreme leader of the Yadavas. Satrajit did not comply.
Satrajit presented Syamantaka to his brother Prasena, who was the ruler of a Yadava province. Once Prasena went for hunting in the forest wearing the diamond. He was attacked by a lion and was killed. The lion fled with the jewel. It entered into the mountain cave of Jambavan. The lion was attacked by Jambavan. He killed it and took the diamond. Jambavan gifted it to his young son who used to play with it.
Following the incident, there escalated a rumour that Sree Krishna who had an eye on the Syamantaka jewel, murdered Prasena and stole the jewel. Srikrishna felt annoyed by this false allegation and decided to find out the truth. Lord Krishna, his brother Balarama and other kinsmen set out in search of Prasena. They followed the same trail that Prasena had taken and discovered the corpses of Prasena and his horse. In the mouth of the horse, pieces of teeth and nails of a lion were seen. They then followed the trail of the lion and reached the cave, where the dead lion was lying. Sri Krsna entered the cave alone. He saw a child playing with the priceless jewel. The child was Jambavan’s son. As Srikrishna was nearing the child cried aloud which alerted Jambavan. There took place a fierce combat for several days between Srikrishna and Jambavan.
Jambavan finally realised that Srikrishna with whom he was fighting was none other than Lord Vishnu, who was his benefactor Srirama in the Tretayuga. Jambavan gave up his fight and returned the jewel to Srikrishna. As a token of gratitude and devotion to Srikrishna, Jambavan offered his maiden daughter Jambavati in marriage to him along with the Syamantaka jewel. Srikrishna accepted both and went back to Dvaraka along with his brother and kinsmen.
Jambavati had no progeny of Srikrishna for a long time. On the request of Jambavati, Srikrishna prayed to Lord Shiva and he blessed them. A son was born to Jambavati who was named Samba. Samba grew up and married Lakshana, the daughter of Duryodhana.
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