Upanishads · Jābāladarśana 3.7
॥
Devanāgarī
गुल्फौ तु वृषणस्याधः सीवन्याः पार्श्वयोः क्षिपेत् । पार्श्वपादौ च पाणिभ्यां दृढं बद्ध्वा सुनिश्चलम् । भद्रासनं भवेदेतद्विषरोगविनाशनम्
Transliteration (IAST)
gulphau tu vṛṣaṇasyādhaḥ sīvanyāḥ pārśvayoḥ kṣipet | pārśvapādau ca pāṇibhyāṃ dṛḍhaṃ baddhvā suniścalam | bhadrāsanaṃ bhavedetadviṣarogavināśanam
Word-by-word
SanskritIASTMeaning
गुल्फौ तु वृषणस्य अधःgulphau tu vṛṣaṇasya adhaḥthe ankles, however, beneath the scrotum
सीवन्याः पार्श्वयोः क्षिपेत्sīvanyāḥ pārśvayoḥ kṣipetat the sides of the perineal seam, let him place
पार्श्व-पादौ च पाणिभ्यांpārśva-pādau ca pāṇibhyāṃand the side-feet, with the hands
दृढं बद्ध्वा सु-निश्चलम्dṛḍhaṃ baddhvā su-niścalamhaving bound them firmly, quite motionless
भद्र-आसनं भवेत् एतत्bhadra-āsanaṃ bhavet etatthis will be the auspicious sitting-posture
Translation
"The ankles, however, let him place beneath the scrotum, at the sides of the perineal seam, and bind the side-feet firmly with the hands, quite motionless; this will be the auspicious sitting-posture, destroying the disease from poison."
Version
afb4f54073a3 · published Aug 12, 2026, 5:00:00 AM UTC
Available inRUENPage between verses with
The description has become entirely bodily, and this must be said directly, without false modesty. The book calls the parts of the body by their own names — vrishana, "scrotum," sivani, "the perineal seam" — and does so without any embarrassment, in the midst of a discourse on brahman. The absence of embarrassment here is not coarseness, but a trait of thought. The body in these books is not an object of shame and not the spirit's adversary; it is an instrument, and one speaks of an instrument as a carpenter speaks of a plane.
This attitude is, one must say, healthier than the later one, where it is customary to speak of the body either with revulsion or with rapture, but almost never simply, as a matter of business. The Vaishnava side counts the body as the property of the One served, and hence treats it neither with contempt nor with indulgence. Its rule is stated in the well-known verse on yukta-vairagya: use everything that is useful for His sake, and this is not attachment; to reject what is useful merely because it is material is phalgu-vairagya, "false renunciation."
The promise "destroys the disease from poison" is of the same order as the earlier ones; the measure of such promises has already been discussed. The phrase dridham baddhva, "having bound firmly," deserves noting as a trait of the whole section: in the description of postures, the chief thing is fixation. The body is set so that it stops calling attention to itself; and everything that here looks like fussiness is aimed at one goal — that it not begin to ache half an hour later.