In all the hells the sinners are always hungry and thirsty or too hot or too cold.
And if one is hungry? A good-looking, cooked meal is thrown in brackish water with fishes ready to jump up and bite.
Everywhere there are heaps of hair, blood, flesh, marrow, bones etc. Crores (billions) of dead bodies are scattered everywhere and eaten by bacteria, viruses, fungus, insects, birds, jackals…..
The sinners live in fearful darkness, have nooses around their necks, and their backs, heads, necks, bones broken. Throats choked, they are exclaiming: “Father, mother, brother, dear one.”
Hell has only pain, for all the 5 senses: it has very bad smells, it is covered with thorns etc. There is always, everywhere the crying sound of the distressed, the great noise of the crows, insects, jackals etc. and the torturing instruments.
Adhah-sirah-sosana or Adhomukha hell (head-inverted)
Where the sinner is kept topsy-turvy, and dried and starved. A brahmana who takes back the things
once given and gets the sacrifices performed by those who
have no right to do so, and one who shows the naksatras (for material purposes)
falls in the Adhomukha hell.
He who takes unlawful gifts, one who offers sacrifices to improper objects, and an observer of the stars (for the prediction of events).
He who may be an espouse of an unchaste
woman, he who officiates as a priest in the
sacrifice on behalf of an ineligible person and
he who subsists by planets. He who accepts monetary gifts from evil men, he who officiates as a priest in the Yajfia on behalf of an ineligible man and the man who maintains himself by stellar calculation.
One who receives a gift from a crook. He who takes bribes. As a punishment, here the head is down and legs up. (for those who do everything upside down, in disorder, vice-versa - ed.)
Andhatamisra hell:
Complete darkness, double size (16.000 yojanas) of tamisra ( = darkness) (8.000 yojanas).
Here, an ungodly man who deceives another man and enjoys his wife or children is tormented to the extent he loses his consciousness and sight, hence andha – tamisra, blinding darkness. When the sinners reawaken they are again tortured till a swoon. The torture is described as cutting the tree at its roots.
One is roasted. One’s vitals are struck, pecked and pierced by beasts and birds like horses, crows etc.
This hell is also for the husband or wife who only treat each other well when they get profit or pleasure from them. Those who forsake their wives and husbands for no apparent reasons are also sent here. The punishment is almost the same as Tamisrama, but the excruciating pain, suffered by the victims on being tied fast, makes them faint sometimes and regularly. In Tamisra one has taken another's property by force, in andhatamisra by deception.
Andhakupa hell (dark well of ignorance): It is the hell where a person who harms others with the intention of ungodliness malice such as harming insects is confined. Or if one snatches or destroys the means of subsistence of a brahmana or cow. He is devoured by worms, jackals and dogs with flames in their mouth. Creatures
such as bugs, mosquitoes and other such insects are destined to live on human
and animal blood. These creatures are unaware of the misery they cause to
others. A person, unmindful about others' livelihood, who kills such creatures,
enters this hell Andhakupa where the same types of insects that were formerly killed
by him, now sting him again and again. He is killed for his flesh. He is attacked by birds, animals, reptiles, mosquitoes, lice, worms, flies and others, who deprive him of rest and compel him to run hither and thither, in pitch darkness.In Andhakūpa his suffering is just like that of a leper's or any diseased body.
The bugs and mosquitoes are destined to subsist on human and animal blood by God,
however are unaware of the pain they inflict on others. Human beings know
the rules and regulations, however, and are aware of the pains of others, thus
they cannot be pardoned.
Angara-sayya-bhramana hell:
(śayyā bed, couch, sofa. āṅgāra heap of charcoal)
Here a sinner has to roll on a bed of fire. If a person does not perform the Mahalaya Sraddha rite on the thirteenth day, Kamadeva shall be averse to him and shall destroy women and (other) means of enjoyment. He casts him into the Naraka named Angara-Sayya-Bhramana.
Aprathistha hell (lit.: perpetual whirling):
Series of potter’s wheels move around constantly: humans are bound up and whirled around so fast that the eyes are suspended by the muscles and nerves. Vomit, blood, intestines come out of the mouth.
Asipatravana or Asipatrakanana hell: (lit.: sword-leaf-forest)
He who wantonly cuts down trees goes to the Asipatravana hell. Also the person who digresses from the religious teachings of the Vedas and indulges in heresy. The Yamadutas, the "lords of hell", beat them with whips as the sinners run in the forest where there is palms, talavana, with leaves like double edged knives or swords which are on fire, with fumes. One is whipped and dragged through this palm forest, and gets mutilated till there is no flesh on one`s body. Also due to the blowing wind do the sword-leaves cut the sinner. He drops down unconscious at every step from the agony. The forest is full of tigers, bears, worms, ants and scorpions. The sinner is always oppressed by awful hosts of diseases (diseases are personified, these are persons full of a particular contagious disease. Or the Deities or directors of a disease). He is fainting at every step due to the foul odor of pus and blood. There is no means of getting any happiness, not even a little; no relief either. Afflicted with injuries of whips and swords, they faint and cry out for help in vain. At other places of this hell, the sinner is roasted in hot iron vessels or on stones. At times, gets to eat what is vomited or eat pus and blood or feces. There is also an area of 1000 yojanas, where there are big trees with cool moist leaves. The sinner runs for shelter but there are also big tigers like dogs; the sinners are bitten by the dogs from head to foot and their limbs torn off.
Some of Yama’s servants use whips made of these asipatra sharp-edged sword-shaped leaves.
Astibhanga hell:
(asthibhaṅga = fracture of the bones)
This is a place for one who solely eats sweet puddings.
Avata-nirodhana hell (confined in a suffocating hole): People who imprison others in dark wells, crannies or mountain caves are pushed into this hell. It is a pitch dark well or pit engulfed with hot poisonous fumes, fire, fire mixed with poison and smoke that suffocates them.
Avici- or avicimat-naraka hell:
(waterless/waveless, vichi is a wave (of air or water). The
place where there is no such wave is Avichi): A person, who lies on oath or in business, is repeatedly thrown head-first from a 100 yojana high mountain down, to a stone area which looks like a river with waves, but these are stone waves; there is no water. His body is broken everywhere, but it is restored. And one is made to fall again.
Ayahpana hell (iron - or lava-drink): A brahmana or anybody under oath, who drinks alcohol is punished here. For a brāhmana, wine is always forbidden. For warriors and merchants it is
forbidden sometimes. The Yamadutas stand on their chests and force them to drink molten iron or lava, for every time they consumed an alcoholic drink in their earthly lives.
Dandasuka hell (snakes always prone to biting): Filled with envy and fury, some people harm others like snakes, inflicting pain through words, mind and actions. These are destined to be bitten and devoured like rats by five or seven hooded serpents in this hell.
Dhuma Rauruva Niraya (the hell of smoke)
This hell is very dreadful and fiery, here the sinner eats his own flesh. He is put in stinking clay. This hell is completely engulfed in very thick smoke. Sinners suffer the agony as described in Rauruva, except that hell-fire is replaced with hell-smoke. Thus this hell is known as Dhuma Rauruva Niraya, the hell of smoke.
Dipanadi hell (means flame river or hot water):
This hell has rivers with hot poisons, from which flames shoot forth.
It is for he who destroys a bee-hive, pillages (plunders) a hamlet (village), etc.
Kakola hell:
Three types.
Beings thrown in this hell are dragged about by flocks of ravens, vultures and hawks, and eaten alive. This hell is mainly full of ravens – kaka is raven, after the sound it makes.
The hell named Kakola is flooded with putrescent fluid infested with germs. Those wicked persons who partake of sweet food alone (without sharing it with others) are hurled into that hell. Kakola can also mean black poison; there is a bottomless pit of black poison.
A person who eats sweets alone goes to Kakola and is fed only worms.
Kalasutra hell: (kala is a floor where grains are roasted and thrashed)
This is a kind of thrashing-place. One is beaten again and again, as one separates husks of wheat. One is stricken with whips. The hells surface is made of copper which is burning hot, heated by fire from below and the red hot sun from above and measuring 10,000 yojanas. Here, the sinner burns from within by hunger and thirst and the smouldering heat outside, whether he sleeps, sits, stands or runs.
It is full of mires and pools of bubbling blood, filled with roaming insects. These mires and pools have a bad odor and are foamy with pus.
One is plunged face down into it up to one's navel. One becomes breathless, head stuck in the mud. This hell is for the murderer of a brahmana (the priestly caste), and for a person who disrespects his parents, elders, ancestors or brahmanas. One sinner relates his experiences:
“From above my body was being eaten up by great vultures and crows and downwards my body parts were being cut off by insects.”
He must stay there for the number of years equaling the number of
hairs on the animals he killed; it is also for animal killers.
Kantaki salmali hell:
Being dragged through a dense forest of thorny salmali trees one has to suffer great injuries.
Karapatra or Krakacadarana hell:
Karapatra means to saw; the sinner is constantly sawn into pieces just like wood for fire. Father and son, priest and their clients as also who promise to first give their daughters to a man but thereafter commit breach of trust by solemnising their marriage with other men are split into two parts by saw (Karapatra) by the executives of Yama.
Krimi, Krimibhaksa or Krimibhojana hell (worms - or insects-food):
In this hell one’s food is worms. This hell is for those who spoil gems. He, who practises
magic rites to injure others.
And for a person who does not share his food with guests, elders, children, needy or the gods, and selfishly eats it alone, and he who eats without performing the five yajnas (pancha-yajna). Also the one who loathes his father, brahmanas or the gods is punished here. This hell is a 100,000 yojana lake filled with worms and insects of all sorts. The sinful person also becomes a worm or insect, who feeds on other worms and insects, who in turn devour his body. Unless he atones for his actions before his death, such a sinful man remains in the hellish lake of Krimibhojana for as many years as there are yojanas in the width of the lake; he stays in the pit of worms until the completion of his sin, as long as his evil lasts. Without sharing the food with others and without offering it to demigods, one is equal to a crow. Just as a thief is confined to a cell, here, the sinner is also confined to the small place where he suffers greatly. Once their bodies are completely eaten up, the sinners are provided with new bodies, which are also eaten up.
Krishna hell:
He who causes impotence, trespasses on others' lands, who lives by fraud or is impure is punished in the hell called Krishna (black, dark), where one is constantly in darkness and attacked by ferocious animals.
Ksarakardama hell: (acidic/saline mud/filth)
Face downwards, thrown into this hell, with pits, wells, pools, oceans of acid, salt juice, salt paste, saltish and burning fluids, and mud, the sinners have to suffer for disregarding elders or superiors. If one has eaten flesh – in this hell one has to eat his own flesh.
Ksaranadi hell:
Here is a corrosive river in which one is destroyed slowly by the chemical action of acid.
Ksarasevana hell: (ksara is alkali, sevana is served)
Where alkaline liquid is administered for drink.
Ksarodapana hell: (ksara is alkali, udapana is well)
In this hell the sinners are dunked into a well of alkali. A lowly person, by his habits and knowledge, who does not respect holy persons and on the other hand insults them, comes to this hell. It is a pit filled with a paste of salt and other burning material. Here Yama’s servants immerse them upside down. He endures great pain.
Kudmala hell: (=bud)
In this hell the sinners are put into sacks which are tied up at the end. They have to suffer a similar condition like a child in the womb or like a plant folded up in a bud.
Kumbhipaka hell:
A person
who torments other creatures and animals and is so cruel as to cook them alive, is put in a big
pot of oil and cooked and suffocated as he did to the animals. Kumbhi means a big pot. Also if one nourishes one’s own body only and doesn’t care for anyone else, he is fried again and again in the oil vessels and also roasted in the charcoal of fire under the vessel of oil.
Lalabhaksa hell: (saliva, seawater, semen as food)
The vile wretch who eats his meal before offering food to the gods, to the manes, or to guests, he who eats food keeping his wife, friends and daughter starving, those who have abandoned the five great sacrifices, fall into this foul-smelling hell. The sinners are roasted here again and again.
Also, a brahmana, a ksatriya or a vaisya husband, where his wife drink his semen in a fit of lust and infatuation, or for the sake of accomplishing crooked siddhis - siddhi-vashikarana. There is a river of semen, sukranadi, on this planet, where these sinners are forced to drink.
Lavana hell:
One who insults his guru, is cunning as a jackal, criticizes the Vedas or sells the karma-kanda knowledge of the Vedas, and one who has illicit relations with women will be cut and buried in salt at Lavana, the hell of salt. (it is because of selling the part of the Vedas used for materialistic purposes that one will have to go to the Lavana hell - ed.)
Lohikaraka hell:
Iron fetters.
Lohasanku hell:
A hell associated by its name with red hot iron nails, iron-spiked clubs, iron stakes, iron-pointed-arrows, -spears and -darts, which the yamadutas use here for beating and piercing. The sinner is shackled with iron chains with bolts.
Mahajvala hell: (that of great flame)
He who commits incest with a daughter-in-law or a daughter is cast into the Mahajvala hell.
Maharaurava (lit.: very terrible):
The surface, 35.000 yojanas, of the Maharaurava hell is made of hot copper. Beneath it is fire, heating the copper and causing an intense, severe light. Hands tied above the head, feet also tied, the sinner is rolled about on its surface. One is preyed upon by crows, cranes, mosquitoes, scorpions, wolves, owls and vultures. Sometimes the sinners are buried under the ground, impaled on pikes, cast down from a great height, chipped with sharp knives. The Yamadhutas are breaking the bones by beating the sinner with sticks. The sinner, with bruised heads and bodies, smeared with blood, stays there for 100.000.000 years. One hears pitiable cries everywhere, some are fuel for fire, some are put in cauldrons filled with smolten lime. There are salmali trees with metallic, conical nails one is thrown in by the followers of Yama. Goblins in it pounce upon them, and eat them. Crushing sounds are all around. The goblins sip the last liquids from the bodies and then throw down the skeletal form. The sinner gets a fleshy form again for more torment. There are showers of stones and dust and the sinner rushes to these trees for shelter. Wicked persons, who do not caution religious festival days or who have intercourse with other men's wives, are bound upon a terrible salmali tree, which is very hot and has sharp, conical thorns. In this tree there are many serpents, insects etc. The sinner asks cold drinking water and is led to an attractive pond with…. boiling water, and is forced to drink this burning boiling water. The Yamadhutas continuously chastise the sinner: “Ungrateful, avaricious adulterer.” All the while the sinner is walking on rugged ground, strewn with hot iron nails. There is only dark sky, covered with birds with fiery tongues. In this hell there is much howling, it is the double size (4000 yojanas) of the Raurava hell (2000 yojanas).
Rauravam is torment by snakes, Maharauravam means death by snakes.
Here there are also the Ruru serpents but they are fiercer. Those who deny the legitimate heirs, their inheritance and possess and enjoy others property will be squeezed and bitten by these terrible serpents coiling around them. Those who steal another's lover will also be thrown here.
Maruprapatana hell:
Consisting of deserts and precipices (very steep cliffs).
One is trampled over by elephants.
Musala-mardana hell:
Here, the sinner is thrashed with thrashing rods.
Panthah hell:
The sinner is made to walk without break.
Pasanayantrapida hell:
Where pain is inflicted with and through stone machines.
Paryavartana or Akshiparyavarta (returning the glance): A householder who welcomes guests and beggars with casting a disregardful, cruel and sideways glance, as if to burn them to ashes, and abuses them is restrained in this hell. A guest is one who is not known earlier. Abhyagata is one who is known earlier and invited. Hard-eyed vultures, herons, crows and similar birds, as Kankas, birds who live on the carcasses of dead animals, gaze on them and suddenly fly up and pluck out their eyes.
Pranardana hell:
A place where one is breathless i.e. where breathing is not possible, and which is very fierce.
Prananirodha (destruction to prana, loose life): Some of the higher classes: brahmanas, ksatriyas and vaisyas with their dogs and donkeys, hunt in the forest, resulting in wanton killing of animals. Yamadutas play archery sports with the former hunters as the targets in this hell, when the sinner almost loses his breath and life. When he looses his life, he gets a new body or revived to be killed again. For
this reason it is called Prananirodha. A cruel or poisonous animal may be killed for the
welfare of the people, but other than that, it is an evil act. Killing of carnivorous animals in a place of pilgrimage or some other holy
place is not an evil, since it is intended for the welfare of others. Killing, however,
of such animals in other places, such as the forest, is evil.
Purisalepana hell: (smearing with fecal matter)
Where filth is smeared, inside and outside.
Purisanabhojana hell:
Where sinners are compelled to eat feces.
Put gandha samakula hell:
Here one is agitated by putrefying smells, tortured in hot waters and his skin and flesh is peeled off till he becomes a skeleton.
Puti-mrttika hell:
Of putrid stinking clay.
Puyavaha hell: (where foul rivers flows)
He who rears cats, cocks, goats, dogs, hogs, or birds; who eats by himself sweetmeats mixed with rice; a brahmana who vends flesh, liquors etc all kinds of forbidden things or one who commits violence, falls into the hell where rivers of foul material flows, or Puyavaha.
Puyoda (water of pus): Brahmana's etc who marry sudra-women, husbands or paramours of lowly women, prostitutes, outcaste women, women in their periods, minor girls, women belonging to one's own clan or family, another's wives and those who live like animals, devoid of cleanliness, worship and good behaviour – fall in Puyoda, a pit or ocean-like pond filled with pus, excreta, urine, mucus, saliva, dirt and other repugnant things. Here, they are forced to eat these nasty things.
Raksah-gana-bhojana (to be eaten by a host of Rakshasas): Those who worship the god Bhairava, goddess Bhadrakali and others with human-sacrifice and cannibals are condemned to this hell. The same persons killed earlier are a group of rakshasas
here. Or a host of Raksasas having the form of their desire. These cut, slit them with sharp knives and swords. The raksasas feast on their blood and sing and dance as cannibals dance in joy, just as the sinners slaughtered their victims.
Raktapuya hell:
This is the hell of six bad smells, where those who ate prohibited things or engaged in backbiting or wickedness are to smell dirt face-down and then roasted, pierced and killed.
Raurava hell:
Dreadful hell (root: ru “to howl”: place of howling. Or ruru: worse than serpent-like beasts, full of poison). Raurava is the hell of wailing sinners. Hell-fires burn furiously and snakes enter the sinners' bodies from the nine openings. The sinners suffer from intense agony and wail loudly. This is for a false witness or one who lies or a person who cares only about his own and his family's good, and gets such exclusively through hostility and harm to other living beings and is always envious of others. The animals killed by him do not become Rurus,
for they do not have such a karma to be born as Rurus. But the misdeeds
themselves take the form of savage serpent-like beasts called rurus and torture this person. Rurus are very cruel animals
with many sharp, heavy horns, and which is more cruel than serpents.
Maharaurava is like Raurava except that in Maharaurava the class of Rurus called Kravyadas, flesh-eaters by nature,
attack the person for the sake of his flesh. One who is intent only on nourishing
his own body comes to this hell.
Retahpanam hell:
Where sinners are compelled to drink semen.
Rinishi hell:
Here, like in a frying pan, sinners are roasted with a little oil
Rodha hell: (obstruction)
He who causes abortion, plunders a town, indulges in arson (burning
of towns etc.), kills a cow or strangles a man goes to the Rodha hell.
Rudhirandha hell: (whose wells are of blood).
Performers misleading the public, wrestlers or boxers etc. who commit violence for entertainment, fishermen, the follower of one born of adultery, a poisoner, an informant/ gossip, one who lives by his wife's prostitution, one who attends to secular affairs on the days of the Parvas ( full and new moon) or on sacred taboo days, an incendiary, a treacherous friend, a traitor, a soothsayer or fortune-teller, one who performs religious ceremonies for rustics, go to the Rudhirandha hell.
Sandamsa hell: (hell of pincers)
The violator of a vow, a person with the vow of holy rites and celibacy, breaking those vows by discharging semen even in dreams, a person who robs a brahmana, one who steals jewels or gold from someone, one who breaks the rules of his order - asrama, a king or his officer who take away the wealth of others (illegally), he is tortured by means of tongs and balls heated in fire pits full of red hot iron tongs and balls. His body is torn and separated in parts by red-hot iron balls, pincers, tongs, nippers; they remove parts of the skin and flesh by tongs. In this way, his entire body is cut to pieces.
Yama's servants
hold him by red hot tongs and drag him about. Yama's servants pluck his skin and flesh with red hot tongs. (property is as one's body, one's instruments for activities, which was taken - ed.)
Sandhisha-dahana hell:
Where the joints are burned.
Samghitani hell: (pressing together)
Here, increasingly larger numbers of individuals are packed up closely in a very narrow space.
Sampratapani hell:
Parching (very dry and hot).
Sanghata hell:
The sinner is compressed in a place smaller than his size. Big iron rollers crush sinners who are planted waist-deep into burning iron sheets, nine yojanas long. The big iron rollers come from four directions and crush them, back and forth. They suffer this repeatedly till their bad karmas are exhausted or purged.
Sanjivani hell:
Here one perishes after torture, is restored to life and tortured anew.
Sarameyadana hell: (literally, "eaten by dogs")
Those who are thieves, those who set fire, who are wicked, who administer poison to kill someone or who plunder villages are put into the hell known as Sarameyadana, the hell of the sons of Sarama, seven hundred and twenty ferocious dogs, representing the 360 days and 360 nights. Also kings and other government officials who grab money of merchants, mass murder or ruin the nation, are cast into this hell. The sons of Sarama, with razor-sharp teeth, prey on them at the behest of the Yamadutas. These dogs, also servants of Yamaraja, pounce upon, violently attack, munch on them, tearing
them into pieces and devour them.
Shulaprota (pierced by sharp pointed spear/dart/trident):
Those who cheat innocent animals living
in the village or forest by placing traps with baits or by making them fall
from a height and inflict violence on them; who take them captive and play with them by piercing
ropes into their body for controlling them, are treated in the same way here.
In addition to that, they are tied or
woven to a pillar where cruel birds as quails and vultures with long beaks as sharp as diamonds, cause
them great pain by attacking them. Also for those who win a person's confidence, but then kill him with sharp tridents or lances. The bodies of such sinners, fatigued with hunger and thirst, are pierced with sharp, needle-like spears. Ferocious carnivorous birds like vultures and herons tear and gorge on their flesh.
Some are impaled on a trident and they are forced to spend the whole term of their punishment in that position, suffering intense hunger and thirst, as well as enduring all the tortures inflicted on them.
Sucimukha (needle-face etc): An ever-suspicious man is always wary of people trying to grab his wealth. Proud of his money, he sins to gain and to retain it. The Yamadutas stitch threads through his whole body, beginning with his mouth, and there the most, like weavers manufacturing cloth. (the sinner was weaving webs to catch men and goods, now he becomes weaved and caught in a web - ed.)
Sukara hell: (hog)
For a murderer of a brahmana, a stealer of gold or an alcoholic and all those associated with them, thieves and killers of cattle, killers of ksatriyas and vaisyas, and for persons who, out of delusion or ignorance take food without performing the worship of the deities,
Sukaramukha hell: (hog's mouth)
Here animals called Sukra, resembling a boar, bite him in all his limbs and tear him apart.
A government official who penalizes the innocent or grants corporal punishment to a brahmana are assigned to this Sukramukha hell. Here he is also afflicted by being crushed like a sugar cane in a sugar cane juicer-machine; crushed and powered between two rollers, and also the most powerful hands of the Yamadhutas, he will yell and scream in agony, just as the guiltless suffered. And he becomes unconscious time and again.
If a brāhmana commits a crime, he can be punished by confiscating his money,
shaving his head or face etc., or banishing him from the city or kingdom,
however, he should not be physically punished, means
beating or cutting the limbs.
Svabhojana hell: (food of dogs)
A religious student who sleeps during the day, and is, though unconsciously, defiled by lust; and they who are instructed in sacred literature by childish, foolish men, receive punishment in the hell called Svabhojana where one has to eat dogs and is eaten by dogs.
Tala hell: (chain bound)
The murder of a ksatriya or a kaisya and adultery with wife of a religious leader leads to here. One is locked in chains.
Tamah hell: (=dark, dull, cold)
This hell is bitterly cold and awfully dark. Cold hearted slaughterers of cows also get this hell for some time. The regulars here are the egotistical members in family and society as well as destroyers or hoarders of food and drink. They are cast into that cold hell. Afflicted with the cold, they run about seeking refuge, clasping one another, teeth clattering, in pain from the cold and pained by hunger and thirst.
A cutting wind laden with particles of snow pierces them up to their bones; pressed by hunger, they eat the marrow and blood, trickling down from their own bones.
Tamisra hell:
Darkness (double size, 8000 yojanas) of maharaurava (4000 yojanas). A person who steals another's money, wife or possessions is arrested at the time of death by the fierce Yamadūtas,
who bind him with 'Yama's ropes' and forcibly throw him into the hellish
planet known as Tāmisra. On this very dark planet only darkness abounds, and the sinful man is chastised and beaten
by the Yamadūtas. He is starved, and he is given no
water to drink. Thus the wrathful assistants of Yamarāja cause him severe
suffering. They are given a thrashing until they bleed. When they sometimes faint then when they recover, the beating is repeated.
In Andatamisra he will
be subjected to so much punishment that he becomes unconscious
very often. Unconsciousness is what distinguishes Andhatamisra from Tamisra. And in Andhatamisra there is no vision at all because
of the blinding total darkness.
In Andha Tamisra the eyes are inoperative because of the darkness.
Tamrabhrastra hell (tamra is copper, bhrastra is a frying pan):
Here the body is fried, while pieces, minute as gingelly seeds, are cut off the body.
Tapa hell:
A dreadful hell of a chilly atmosphere (beneath the Raurava hell).
Tapana hell:
Tapana is the incinerating hell. Here sinners are pierced with burning red hot iron stakes the size of a palm tree.
Tapani hell:
Burning flames hell.
Tapta kumbha (lit.: burning pitcher):
The sinner is blooped in cauldrons with hot oil, continuously heated by fire. The body and bones burst, disintegrate and liquefy, and the brew is stirred with a ladle. Vultures pull out the bodies and throw them back in the pitchers. They sometimes tear the sinner’s bodies and throw them on hard and burning rocks. Incest with one's sister and murdering of an ambassador results in torment in this hell. This hell is also for cookers, eaters, etc all involved, in the godlessness of the killing of animals and plants.
This is one of the maha papa's, great ungodliest sins. Those who committed maha papa's stay in each of the main hells for a maha-yuga (one cycle of satya-, treta-, dvapara-, kali yuga or 4.320.000 years).
Taptalosthas hell:
Those who waste foodstuffs are cooked here. And get hot stones in their mouths.
Taptaloha hell: (red hot iron) A wife-seller, a jailer and one who abandons his followers is tortured here.
Taptasurmi/Taptamurti (red-hot iron statue): A man or woman who indulges in illicit sexual relations with a woman or man is beaten by whips and forced to embrace red-hot iron figurines of the opposite sex.
Tarani hell: ( boat hell)
One must eat flesh and drink blood in this hell, if one violated the rules of the Veda`s. The
Yamadhutas administer all kinds of cruelties from within a boat, to the sinner in the river or lake.
Ugra Gandha (the hell of strong odours).
A man who had neglected to offer cakes of obsequies to the souls of his departed manes on earth, is consigned to smell the filthy odours of this hell.
Vahnijvala hell: (fiery flame)
Those potters who make vessels for demoniac purposes; hunters and eaters of deer etc. go to this hell.
Vajrakantaka-salmali (the thorny silk-cotton tree with thorns hard like thunderbolts or diamonds - vajras): A person who has sexual intercourse with animals, like donkeys or who has any illicit sex is dragged down from the top to the bottom of these trees again and again, whereby he is cut all over.
Vaitarani
Vitarana means dana or charity. Thus the river which
can be crossed if charity is given to the worthy is called Vaitarini.
Rulers who abuse their power or transgress the bounds of peity, and adulterers are thrown here. It is a most terrible place of punishment. It is a river, like a trench, encircling all the other hells. They are carried by the winds and waves. They do not die, but float in the river by the help of their own sin or
breath. They recollect the sins they performed by which they landed there. The river is of human excreta, blood, hair, bones, nails, flesh, fat and all kinds of dirty substances. There are various kinds of terrible beasts as well. Those who are cast into it are attacked and mauled by these creatures from all sides. The sinners are to subsist upon the contents of this river.
Vedhaka hell:
Piercing hell, for one who makes arrows for materialistic purposes.
Vimohana hell:
Place of bewilderment. A thief or those who despise prescribed observances are tormented here.
Visashana hell: ( cutting up)
Those in charge of this infernal region, the officers of Yama, put to great torture and then hack to pieces, those hypocrites who kill animals in sacrifices to eat, but performed for mere show to deceive others. Yama's servants slit them with sharp
knives as they did to goats and other animals during their sacrifices. This hell is also for the makers of spears, swords, and other weapons.
Vishama panthini hell:
With rough or uneven roads.
Other Hells for which no particular name or place was given:
The sinners are trashed and dismembered repeatedly, causing injuries in thousands of places, all over the body. Then owls with sharp tongues break the sinner’s bones. After all this, one is pounced upon by tigers and rats, who devour what is left, leaving the skeleton.
Squeezed and crushed by mechanical devices, blood spouts. This hell is pervaded with the sound of blood pouring down from sinners who are being cut asunder.
Yama’s culi is a big fire place, 10 yojanas round, blinding with smoke. Held on tridents, the sinner is baked over glowing cinders.
- The river Yama. The sinner is thrown in a flowing molten lead river. On the banks one is knocked with fists, whipped, bones cut, fried in big pots with decomposed ghee, stuck with pikes fresh from fire, caught by the feet, hurled and whirled up, seized again on coming down, stricken against rocky slabs, until the sinner is bloody and motionless.
At other places here one is agitated by and running for fearful troops of tigers. Or one is pounded with pestles and ground down in iron or stone vessels. One is sometimes eaten by insects with fire like mouths. In another place one is suspended from trees with a rope. And somewhere else dragged by his legs, while his head, shoulders, back etc is fractured by beating.
People misappropriating the trust fund are tied here to hot iron bars and left for starving, without water to drink.
One hell is full of thorns along with bones and chaff (hay, straw) on fire, and leeches, resembling serpents. Here, Yama's servants pull out the hairs of the sinners. They repeatedly insert 1000's of heated needles into the mouths, joints and nails of certain sinners. They put some on the tip of a heated pike. Yama's servants, after tying a stone round the necks of the sinners, repeatedly throw some into ditches full of blood and into ditches full of pus. They push masses of iron nails into the chest of some.
Limbs and organs are extracted with hooks. The noses of some are filled with scorpions. Yama's servants tie the feet of some with ropes to the branch of a tree and burn fire with dense smoke at the root of the tree. The sinners inhale smoke as long as the moon and stars shine in the sky (the end of the kalpa). (this may be for the inventors and users of the engines running on gaz, oil, petroleum as cars - ed.). Some sinners are repeatedly beaten with pestles and mallets; they vomit blood. Some must eat ash; some insects; some ill-smelling flesh; some pus. The chests of some are being torn asunder by the horns of buffaloes. The yamadhutas crush a mass of heated iron balls and stone with a cutting weapon into some sinner’s mouths. Yama's messengers sow the nostrils and mouths of some in order to suppress breathing.
Somewhere one is locked in blazing iron boxes.
Some sinners are made to drink saline water or bile or mucus resembling thick milk flowing from the nose of some of Yama's servants placed there. On some sinner's chests big heated stones are placed. Some are forced to drink very salty water through their mouth or nose. Some must eat only salts. Some are forced to sink in the water, bearing weighty stones, some lay on thorns, taking in excessively bitter things, drinking extremely hot oil, eating the most pungent things, drinking astringent water, bathing in excessively hot or extremely cold water. Some get the teeth dashed.
Some naraka area is surrounded by a very cold climate as there are many glaciers.
In some hells the sinners are cut into pieces and cooked.
In some hells the sinner is made to eat iron balls heated in fire, or eat thorns or sand made as hot as fire. At other places some are made to drink wine, which is like liquid fire.
In one hell Yama’s servants cut off the person’s skin and leave them there so that the dogs can eat them.
The sinners are always terrified with fear (comment: many hellish planets look like NASA’s pictures of some parts of the moon or mars; dark deserts, but here in hell with very painful surprises).
In one hell there are big serpents and worms eating one’s flesh from the inside, by entering their nose, eyes, ears and mouths.
Somewhere else the yamadhutas cut one's skin into small pieces like sesame. At another place persons got a mouth like a needle and are thus tortured very much by hunger (comment: if due to mismanagement, we can’t feed everyone on this planet and allow so much suffering to go on; we will suffer similarly).
Others are pounced and powdered and then cooked in vessels of iron (comment: even vegetarians are ungodlier sinners and go to hell. What we do to the plants will be done to us. You may think the wheat plant had a quick or natural death and the bread flour is dead. No! The world is the external body of God and we exploit or use Mother Nature and Mother earth. Similarly all our interactions with the material energy as walking, building, creating is exploitation, using or taking from Nature. We only get free from reactions if we do everything for Krishna, and take what we need.)
In one place sinners are tied to a pillar and then arrows are shot at them. Somewhere the sinners are rolled in thorns.
Some are mounted on stakes. Some are buried in the ground. Some are tossed upwards by engines. Some are powdered. Some are dried up. Some are burnt again and again. Some are cooked out.
Hell is divided into two groups: suksa (dry)- sins without intention. Adra (wet) - sins with intention. (Skanda purana 2.4.29)
- There is a hell where a sinner is pulled and stretched between many wooden machines. A hell where he is hit with the tusks of elephants. One where acid and corroding liquids are poured into the mouth or nostrils, where saltish water is to be drunk, where heated iron needles are thrust into the mouth, where a sinner has to enter holes and pits filled with alkaline fluids, where a sinner is compelled to eat feces, where one’s bones are crushed, where bile is to be drunk, where extremely bitter liquids are administered, where a sinner is forced to drink very hot boiling oil, where a sinner has to drink astringent water, to eat heated pebbles, showered/bathed with extremely hot sand particles, where the teeth of a sinner are pulled out and shattered, where a sinner has to lie down on a bed of sharp edged weapons.
- There is a hell where a sinner is compelled to fall down from a tree top into a pit filled with foul smelling rubbish.
- There is a hell where sinners are tightly fettered around their hands with red hot chains, and then are hung from the branches of great trees by Yama's servants. Sometimes they bewail their own karma, hanging like that, lonely, quiet and motionless. At other times they are struck all over the body by means of clubs (with spikes, blazing like fire), iron rods (fitted with thorny projections), and lashes. Sometimes they are taken down and thrown all around.
According to the severity of the sins, after some suffering in hell, one has to go through all the 8,400,000 species of life forms or a part of them. At the end they come back to earth, and at the end of several births there, in the human form of life, the karma-ksetra; the field of karma; from here you can go to liberation or again into the cycle of birth and death.
Better chant
Hare Kṛṣṇa Hare Kṛṣṇa
Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Hare Hare
Hare Rāma Hare Rāma
Rāma Rāma Hare Hare
or any of God's name whether you love it or not, it will become lovable. Then you will stop godless sinning, and go back to Godhead, the spiritual planets.
heaven.
- One who grows trees by the roadside, one who digs public tanks and lakes: The highway to Pitrloka is very happy and playful. After death, generally, all souls go there, to be judged.
Note: Pitrloka is the heavenly capital of Yama, as an embassy or enclave, amidst hell. There is another Pitrloka at the other side of the moon; the side always turned away for mortals on earth. Both lokas are invisible for gross material senses. They are higher–dimensional or subtle, of the same invisible substance as is our mind, intelligence and false ego, or as ghosts, aliens, witches, fairies are ultra-fine, intangible. These entities can sometimes become gross materially visible.
- Give fuel on earth: one is not tortured by snowfall, ice, chillness on the path to the court of Yamaraja; his way to Yamaraja is warm and pleasant.
- Give land: go along that road fully satisfied, decorated and richly adorned by fragrant flowers.
- Give a bed: next life one will have a bed in heaven till the end of the day of Brahma or andha-pralaya. (Then the material heavens will be destroyed, and the residents will go to Mahar-loka. The activities in the universe will be stopped during the night of Brahma.)
- Give a daughter to brahmana: with the whole family one will go to Indraloka.
- Give to a grhasta brahmana: house, cow, ornaments etc. : will go for 35 million years to heaven.
- If a woman can do the sati rite: he, she plus 3 generations will go to heaven.
– A woman entering with the body of her dead husband the flaming funeral pile, she enjoys in heaven as many hundreds of years as there are hairs on the human body
- One giving just a morsel of bread to a needy: one will go to heaven, in a vimana.
- Offer betelnut - one will in one’s next life have a healthy, red throat and a voice sweet like nectar.
- Give shoes and palanquins to brahmana’s - will go to Pitraloka, along a path in the sky seated within a flying vimana.
- Give garments - one will go to Pitrloka wearing divine garments.
- Give even gifts of the measure of what fits on the tip of the hair - this godliness will give immeasurably multiplied good fruits.
- Give food - one will get the fruit of having given everything; giving food is the best and godliest of all gifts.
- One practicing religion, with the practices of penance, truth, forgiveness, charity, avoiding sleeping in the day, studying of the Vedas etc - will go to heaven.
- Those who are averse to all kinds of harm, who help everyone and give shelter to all, who are averse to accepting any gift for oneself – such a person will go to heaven.
- One who never speaks of other’s faults even of those of their enemies, but on the contrary describes their virtues, who is not distressed through jealousy on seeing the wealth of others but are delighted and congratulates them – will go to heaven.
- Who never speak disagreeable words, who even oppressed with hunger and thirst, share their food, who are truthful with liars, straightforward with the crooked, equanimeous or friendly even with enemies – will go to heaven.
- Protect like their own sons even insects like lice, bugs, gadflies and so on that prick the body – go to heaven.
– Those who do not dally with other’s wives, physically, mentally or in speech – go to heaven.
- By giving a cow one will always prosper with desired objects (wealth, health, pleasure).
- Give gold – one will in one’s next life have a good complexion, be rich, heroic and an enjoyer of gems and gold.
- One giving sesame seeds at the time of death – will go to Visnu’s world.
- Carry or maintain a helpless person, poor brahmana or one who is dependent - he will be honoured in heaven by the demigods and demigoddesses, for this godlikeness, for as many thousands of years as the number of hairs on the bodies of the persons that are born in his family.
- Those doing the 5 yajna's (to the deva’s, rsi’s, pitrs, guests and general living beings), who dig wells etc. ; do all the prescribed acts of charity and are always full of compassion – go to heaven.
- Brave ksatriyas, on whose faces there is never sadness, who died in battle – go to heaven.
- A person who makes a gift of Brahman (i.e the Veda) will attain Brahma's world for his godlikenesses.
– One who builds a temple and installs the.
- He who receives gifts with faith and he who gives away with faith, both will get heaven.
– One who builds a temple and installs the Deities - he definitely gets the respective world of that Deity and as much as the things given e.g. the building materials, furniture, he enjoys wealth in that heaven. As many glorious temples a man builds for that many number of births he shines with fame in heaven for this godlike acts. If one builds a temple for Krishna or Visnu, one goes beyond the material universes, to Krishna's or Visnu's planet.
By making paintings for or painting in a temple, he will enjoy in the company of gandharvas or artisans, laborers in the respective heaven of that temple murti.
By renovating the temple - he becomes free from diseases.
By sprinkling, cleaning the temple - one gets free from mental agonies, the dust in the mind, for these godly acts.
By gifting decorations or flowers to temples - one gets much wealth.
By making the temple lovely to the sight - one is born beautiful.
By bathing the murti with oil or ghee - one becomes free from diseases.
By offering water to the Deity – one gets mental satisfaction.
By feeding the cows of others during the winter season, one gets heaven for 600 years.
One who supplies water for the cows, on the cows pasturing grounds - gets Varunaloka for ten thousand years, and complete satisfaction wherever he is born afterwards; after descending from heaven.
– One who feeds cows and then only, afterwards, himself eats, for a year – gets Goloka for as long as the manvantara continues. (this Goloka is situated above Brahmaloka, mostly cows live here. It is a material planet, a heavenly planet with demigods and demigoddesses.)
By saving someone from a lion or tiger or from drowning - gets enjoyment in heaven till the end of the creation.
By giving medicine to a cow - he is born healthy.
Those who are happy in the happiness of others and unhappy in the unhappiness of others, thus following the religious principles, for their godlinesses – go to heaven.
-Those who abstain from 1. madhu (=wine) or panam, taking any intoxication,
2. suna, meat,
3. striya, illicit sex,
4. dyutam, gambling,
will go to heaven.
