15. He rose out of the ocean, as a huge mountainous rock; and then flew into the air with his big flapping wings, extending over and enclosing the whole space of infinite vacuity.
16. I knew him from a distance, and by the indications of his triple eyes and trident, to be the Lord Rudra himself; and then bowed down to him, as the great God of all.
17. Ráma asked:—Why sir, was the Lord Rudra of that form, why was he of such gigantic form and of so dark a complexion? Why had He ten arms and hands, and why had He the five faces and mouths upon his body?
18. Why had he his three eyes, and so fierce a form; was he absolute in himself or delegated by any other? What was his errand and his act; and was it a mere shadow or having a shadow (helpmate) of its substance (i.e. máya or Illusion)?
19. Vasishtha replied:—This being is named Rudra or fierce, for his being the aggregate of Egoism. He is full of his self-pride, and the form in which I beheld him, was that of a clear vacuity.
20. This lord was of the form of vacuum, and of the hue and resplendence of vacuity; and it is on account of his being the essence of the vacuous intellect, that he is represented as the cerulean sky.
21. Being the soul of all beings, and being present in all places, he is represented in his gigantic form; as his five faces, serve as representations of his five internal organs of sense.
22. The external organs of sense (together with their objects and faculties), and the five members of his body, are represented by his ten arms on both sides of his body.
23. This Lord of creation together with all living bodies and mankind, are resorbed in the supreme One at the final dissolution of the world; and when he is let out to pass from the unity, he then appears in this form.
24. He is but a part of the eternal soul, and has no visible body or form of his own; but is thought of in the said form by the erroneous conception of men.