38:13 We must have recourse here also to other Puráńas, for the elucidation of this term. The Kaumára creation is the creation of Rudra or Nílalohita, a form of Śiva, by Brahmá, which is subsequently described in our text, and of certain other mind-born sons of Brahmá, of whose birth the Vishńu P. gives no further account: they are elsewhere termed Sanatkumára, Sananda, Sanaka, and Sanátana, with sometimes a fifth, Ribhu, added. These, declining to create progeny, remained, as the name of the first implies, ever boys, kumáras; that is, ever pure and innocent; whence their creation is called the Kaumára. Thus the Váyu: ###. And the Linga has, 'Being ever as he was born, he is here called a youth; and hence his name is well known as Sanatkumára.' This authority makes Sanatkumára and Ribhu the two first born of all, whilst the text of the Hari Vanśa limits the primogeniture to Sanatkumára. In another place, however, it enumerates apparently six, or the above four with Sana and either. Ribhu or another Sanátana; for the passage is corrupt. The French translation ascribes a share in creation to Sanatkumára: 'Les sept Prajapatis, Roudra, Scanda, et Sanatkaumára, se mirent a produire les etres repandant partout l’inepuisable energie de dieu.' The original is, Sankshipya is not 'repandant,' but 'restraining;' and Tisht́hatah being in the dual number, relates of course to only two of the series. The correct rendering is, 'These seven (Prajápatis) created progeny, and so did Rudra; but Skanda and Sanatkumára, restraining their power, abstained (from creation).' So the commentator: ###. These sages, however, live as long as Brahmá, and they are only created by him in the first Kalpa, although their generation is very commonly, but inconsistently, introduced in the Váráha or Pádma Kalpas. This creation, says the text, is both primary (Prákrita) and secondary (Vaikrita). It is the latter, according to the commentator, as regards the origin of these saints from Brahmá: it is the former as affects Rudra, who, though proceeding from Brahmá, in a certain form was in essence equally an immediate production of the first principle. These notions, the birth of Rudra and the saints, seem to have been borrowed from the Saivas, and to have been awkwardly engrafted upon the Vaishńava system. Sanatkumára and his brethren are always described in the Saiva Puráńas as Yogis: as the Kúrma, after enumerating them, adds, 'These five, oh Brahmans, were Yogis, p. 39 who acquired entire exemption from passion:' and the Hari Vanśa, although rather Vaishńava than Saiva, observes, that the Yogis celebrate these six, along with Kapila, in Yoga works. The idea seems to have been amplified also in the Saiva works; for the Linga P. describes the repeated birth of Śiva, or Vámadeva, as a Kumára, or boy, from Brahmá, in each Kalpa, who again becomes four. Thus in the twenty-ninth Kalpa Swetalohita is the Kumára, and he becomes Sananda, Nandana, Viswananda, Upanandana; all of a white complexion: in the thirtieth the Kumára becomes Virajas, Viváhu, Visoka, Víswabhávana; all of a red colour: in the thirty-first he becomes four youths of a yellow colour: and in the thirty-second the four Kumáras were black. All these are, no doubt, comparatively recent additions to the original notion of the birth of Rudra and the Kumáras; itself obviously a sectarial innovation upon the primitive doctrine of the birth of the Prajápatis, or will-born sons of Brahmá.