Maa Vaishno Devi
The world famous and ancient temple of Vaishno Devi is located on the hills near Katra city in the Jammu region of the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir. These hills are called Trikuta Hills. Matarani's temple is situated here at a height of about 5,200 feet. It is the second most visited religious pilgrimage site in India after Tirumala Venkateswara Temple.
Introduction-
The building is the place where Mata killed Bhairavnath. Bhairo's body is present in front of the ancient cave and his head flew away to Bhairo Valley, three kilometers away and the body remained here. The place where the head fell is today known as 'Bhaironath Temple'. The trek to Vaishno Devi starts from Katra itself, which is about 13 kilometers to Bhawan and 14.5 kilometers to Bhairo Temple.
Mythology of the temple: There are many types of stories prevalent in relation to the temple. Once seeing a beautiful girl on the hill of Trikuta, Bhairavnath ran to catch her. Then the girl changed into the form of air and flew towards Trikuta mountain. Bhairavnath also ran after him. It is believed that then Pawanputra Hanuman reached there to protect the mother. When Hanumanji felt thirsty, Mother, on his request, shot an arrow at the mountain with a bow and brought out a stream of water and washed her hair in that water.Then the mother entered a cave and performed penance for nine months. Hanumanji kept guard.
Then Bhairav Nath came there and threatened. During that time a sage told Bhairavnath that the one whom you are considering as a girl is Adishakti Jagadamba, hence leave the pursuit of that supershakti. Bhairavnath did not listen to the sage. Then Mother made a path from the other side of the cave and came out. This cave is still famous by the name of Ardhkumari or Adikumari or Garbhjoon. Before Ardhkumari there is also Mother's Charan Paduka. This is the place where Mother turned back while running and saw Bhairavnath.
Finally, after coming out of the cave, the girl assumed the form of a goddess and went into the cave again asking Bhairavnath to return, but Bhairavnath did not agree and started entering the cave. Seeing this, Hanumanji, who was guarding Mata's cave, challenged him to a fight and the two fought. Seeing no end to the war, Mother Vaishnavi took the form of Mahakali and killed Bhairavnath.
It is said that after his murder, Bhairavnath repented his mistake and begged for forgiveness from his mother. Mata Vaishno Devi knew that Bhairav's main intention behind attacking her was to attain salvation. Then he not only freed Bhairav from the cycle of rebirth, but also gave him a boon and said that my darshan will not be considered complete until some devotee will see you after me.
Story of the temple: The above story is also linked to Shridhar, a devotee of Vaishno Devi. More than 700 years ago, Shridhar, a great devotee of Mother Vaishnavi, lived in Hansali village, located at some distance from Katra. He was childless and poor. But he used to think that one day he would keep Mata's Bhandara.One day Shridhar invited all the nearby villagers to receive Prasad and on the day of Bhandara, Shridhar requested everyone to go to everyone's house one by one so that they could get the ingredients for cooking and after preparing the food, he would feed it to the guests on the day of Bhandara. Could. The number of people who helped him was not enough because there were too many guests.
He was wondering how the Bhandara would be organized with so few items. A day before the Bhandara, Sridhar was unable to sleep even for a moment thinking how he would be able to feed the guests. He was surrounded by problems till morning and his only hope was from Mother Goddess. He sat outside his hut for puja. By noon, guests had started arriving. Seeing Shridhar performing the puja, they sat wherever they could find a place. Everyone sat easily in Shridhar's small hut.
Sridhar opened his eyes and wondered how he would feed them all, then he saw a little girl coming out of the hut whose name was Vaishnavi. She had come by the grace of God, she was serving delicious food to everyone, the Bhandara was very well done. After the Bhandara, Sridhar was curious to know about the little girl Vaishnavi, but Vaishnavi disappeared and was not seen by anyone after that. After a long time, Shridhar had a dream of that little girl and it became clear that she was Mother Vaishnodevi. The girl who came in the form of Mata Rani told him about the cave and blessed him with the boon of four sons. Shridhar once again became happy and set out in search of mother's cave and after a few days he found it. Since then devotees started going there to have darshan of the Mother Goddess.
-Tanvi
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