Bala-Rama, Balarama, Balabhadra-Rama – Balarama Avatar Story in English

bala-rama, balarama, balabhadra-rama

This myth is nested within the great myth cycles of Lord Vishnu and Shri Krishna. BalaRama was involved in many episodes as an adoring, supportive older brother of Krishna. It was a role deserving of a divine lineage, demonstrat­ing the kind of person who deserved to be near so great an incarnation as Krishna, and how important it is to live one’s own dharma (duty). Bala-Rama’s birth was particularly miraculous.
On the day of the marriage of the Yadava king Vasudeva to Devaki, a voice was heard from the sky that the eighth child of this couple would kill Kamsa, the wicked brother of Devaki. Kamsa immediately jailed both Devaki and Vasudeva. He killed the first six children born to them. The seventh child was the incarnation of Ananta, Vishnu’s serpent. Vishnu, in order to protect him, ordered Mayadevi to take the child from the womb of Devaki and to place it in the womb of Rohini, another wife of King Vasudeva in the city of Madhura. Rohini gave birth to Balabhadra-Rama. The eighth child was Krishna.
Bala-Rama was the constant companion in all the boyhood adventures of
Krishna in Madhura, killing demons and demonesses and even his uncle Kamsa at a Capa-puja (worship of the bow).
According to the Bhagavata Purana, Bala-Rama was the partial incarnation of Vishnu, and Shri Krishna is a full incarnation. Other Puranas identified Bala- Rama as the incarnation of Ananta, the serpent on which Vishnu reclined upon when floating on the milky ocean. In versions where Bala-Rama was considered a partial incarnation, another figure was inserted in the list of the ten incarna­tions of Vishnu, such as Buddha. When Bala-Rama died of disappointment with the Yadava clan and all of their failures at kingship, his spirit left his body through his mouth as a white serpent and was welcomed into the netherworld by the Naga kingdom.
In art and iconography Bala-Rama is exactly the same in appearance as Krishna except he is white and Krishna is black or dark purple.

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