A son born to the sage Jaralkaru, whose wife shared his name. He disrupted Janamejaya’s sarpa satra and saved the snakes.

Once, mankind suffered from a snake menace and took refuge in Kashyapa. Kashyapa sought Brahma’s advice. Brahma decreed that several mantras should be created to diminish the snake menace and a goddess should be created as a custodian for these mantras. According Kashyapa created the mantras and their custodian – Manasadevi. She is called so because she was created from Kashyapa’s mind. She is also called Jaralkaru, Jagalgauri, Sidhayogini, Vaishnavi, Nagabghagini, Shaivi, Nageshwari, Jaralkarupriya, Aastikamata, Vishahara, Mahajnanayuta. At a young age, she went to Kailash to meditate. She prayed to Shiva for a thousand years after which Shiva appeared and imparted the knowledge to her. As per Bhagavata Navamaskanda she returned, a wise soul.

Meanwhile, a sage named Jaralkaru was traveling through the forest when he saw his ancestors hanging from a cliff on blades of grass, and its roots were about to give away. He asked them the reason and they said that though their descendant Jaralkaru was a powerful sage, he was unmarried and likely to remain so, and so the ancestors couldn’t go to heaven. Jaralkaru decided to get married for their sake, but wanted to marry a girl who shared his name. Then, Vasuki told him that he had a sister named Jaralkaru and his family would be happy if the sage married her.

They got married, but when they started living in Pushkaratheertha, an incident disrupted their peaceful life. One evening, the sage was relaxing with his head on his wife’s lap. The sun was about to set and the wife was anxious about the sage still being asleep because not worshipping the sun at dawn and dusk was equivalent to a brahmahatya. Though it was not proper, she woke her husband up. He was irritated and left her. She pleaded with him and in the end he said that an able, wise, pious, illustrious and famous son would be born to her.

She left for Kailash where Shiva and Parvati consoled her. She became pregnant soon and the child, who overheard Shiva, Parvati and Jaralkaru’s discussions became quite knowledgeable even in the womb. Later, Manasadevi (Jaralkaru) gave birth to a child who was named Aastika for his devotion to the gods and his teachers, as per Bhagavata Navamaskanda. The Mahabharata Adiparva also has a mention that his name came from his father uttering ” Asti te subhage garbha” when he left his mother.

Aastika learned the vedas from Shiva, and left for Pushkaratheertha with his blessings. There, he prayed to Vishnu, who eventually blessed him. He then returned to Kailash and stayed with his mother for a while. They then left to visit Kashyapa who was delighted to see them. Kashyapa gave a a free meal to 100 lakh brahmins for his descendants’ prosperity, as per Bhagavata Navamaskanda. Aastika then stayed with Vasuki, and there Chyavana taught him Sangaveda as per Mahabharata Adiparva Chapter 48 verse 18.

During that time, Abhimanyu’s son Parikshit was hunting in the forests and there, he took a dead snake and kept it on the shoulders of the sage Shamika. Shamika’s son Shringi heard about it and cursed that Parikshit would die of Thakshaka’s bite in a week. On hearing this, Parikshit built a fortress that Thakshaka couldn’t breach. He also called physicians and magicians from all around to help him survive the threat. Six days passed. On the seventh day, Thakshaka decided to strike. he took the form of an old brahmin and made his way to Parikshit’s fortress. On the way he met Dhanwantari whose destination was the same, but who wanted to save Parikshit. (Mahabharata Adiparva Chapter 42 says this was Kashyapa) They began talking and became friends. Thakshaka gave him many jewels and Dhanwantari went back. Thakshaka got inside the fortress in the form of a small worm hiding inside a fruit meant for the king. As soon as the king took the fruit in his hand, Thakshaka took his original form and bit Parikshit, who died on the spot.

Parikshit’s son was Janamejaya who conducted his father’s last rites. He then called brahmins to conduct a sarpa satra to kill snakes in order to avenge his father’s death. Many snakes fell into the special sacrificial fire and snakes were on the verge of becoming extinct. Thakshaka was still missing. He was hiding behind his friend Indra. The brahmins were angry and decided to chant mantras that would drag Indra along with his bed and Thakshaka hiding beneath it into the fire. The devas approached Manasadevi for help, who asked Aastika to get Janamejaya to stop the sacrifice. Aastika went to Janamejaya and asked him to spare Indra’s and Thakshaka’s lives. Janamejaya relented on the advice of the sages present. Thus the remaining snakes survived too, as per Devibhagavata Navamaskanda and Mahabharata Adiparva.