Chapter 178

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Now Shrî is the daughter of Bhrigu, one of the Prajâpatis and Rishis, the chief of the Bhrigus, the “Consumers,” the Aërial Class of Gods. She is Lakshmî, the wife of Vishnu, and she is Gaurî, the “bride of Shiva,” and she is Sarasvatî, the “watery,” the wife of Brahmâ, because the three Gods and Goddesses are one, under three aspects. Read the explanation by Parâshara, in Vishnu Purâna (I. viii., Wilson’s Trans., i. 119), and you will understand. “The lord of Shrî is the moon,” he says, and “Shrî is the wife of Nârâyana, the God of Gods”: Shrî or Lakshmî (Venus) is Indrânî, as she is Sarasvatî, for in the words of Parâshara: “Harî [or Îshvara, the ’Lord’] is all that is called male [in the Universe]; Lakshmî is all that is termed female. There is nothing else than they.” Hence she is female, and “God” is male Nature.