Rama Ekadashi

King Muchukunda was a devotee of Vishnu, and in his kingdom the Ekadashi fast was kept by the whole household. His daughter Chandrabhaga had kept it since she was eight. She was married to Shobhana, the son of King Chandrasena. When Shobhana came to the palace and the Ekadashi arrived, Chandrabhaga told him plainly how it was in her father’s house: on Vishnu’s day nobody eats. She asked him to be resolute. He resolved to keep it, and he was not strong. Through the night the household kept vigil and worshipped Vishnu while he suffered with hunger, and at sunrise, the fast completed, he died. Chandrabhaga did not die with him. She performed his funeral rites and stayed in her father’s house. Shobhana, by the power of the Rama vow, reached a divine city on Mount Mandara, where the gandharvas sang his praise. A brahmana named Somasharman came through that city on pilgrimage and recognised him. Shobhana told him the city had come from the Ekadashi fast — and that it was unstable, because he had kept the vow without faith. He asked Somasharman to carry word to Chandrabhaga. She asked to be taken to him. At the hermitage of the sage Vamadeva, near Mount Mandara, Vamadeva sprinkled her with water while reciting the Vedic hymns, and by that and by her own vow she became able to go. She came to Shobhana and told him she had kept the Ekadashi with faith since she was eight years old. By the merit of that keeping, the city would stand until the final deluge. Krishna ends by saying that the Ekadashis of both fortnights are to be kept equally, and that whoever hears the importance of these vows is freed of all sins.