The Churning of the Ocean of Milk

Weakened by a sage's curse and hard-pressed by the asuras, the gods took Vishnu's counsel: rather than fight, entice the demons into churning the ocean of milk for the nectar of immortality. The two hosts tore up Mount Mandara for a churning rod and wound the serpent king Vasuki around it as the rope—the devas gripping the tail, the asuras the head. When the mountain began to sink, Vishnu became the great tortoise Kurma and bore it on his shell at the bottom of the sea.

A thousand years of churning brought up first not nectar but halahala, a poison fit to burn the three worlds. Shiva drank it down; Parvati clutched his throat and the venom lodged there, staining it blue-black. Then the treasures rose in sequence—fourteen in the common count: Kamadhenu the wish-granting cow, the seven-headed white horse Ucchaihshravas, the four-tusked elephant Airavata, the Kaustubha jewel, the celestial parijata tree, the moon, the wine goddess Varuni, the dancing apsaras, and Lakshmi, goddess of fortune, who rose on a lotus and chose Vishnu for her husband on the spot. Last came Dhanvantari, physician of the gods, bearing the pot of amrita. The asuras seized it; Vishnu took the form of the enchantress Mohini and, while the demons stood spellbound, served all the nectar to the gods. The asura Rahu slipped into the divine ranks in disguise and got a mouthful; the sun and moon betrayed him, and Vishnu's discus took off his head—which, already immortal, has chased and swallowed sun and moon ever since, causing eclipses.

The churning is one of the grandest motifs of Hindu art: on the east gallery of Angkor Wat a relief nearly fifty metres long sets 88 asuras against 92 devas along the serpent's body, and a sculptural group in Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi airport restages the scene. The Kumbh Mela, which gathers tens of millions of pilgrims every twelve years, takes its name from that kumbha—the pot of nectar.