01Teaching his mother
The third Skandha of the Bhagavata tells how Kardama Muni, after long tapas, was granted a son who would be Bhagwan himself. When Kardama left for the forest, Devahuti asked her son how to be free of the bonds of the senses. His answer, called the Kapila Gita, lays out the twenty-four tattvas of Sankhya, Prakriti and Purusha, and then leads to bhakti as the surest way. Devahuti attained liberation at the place later called Siddhapada. The Bhagavad Gita (10.26) has Shri Krishna say: among siddhas I am Kapila Muni.
02The sons of Sagara
The Ramayana (Bala Kanda) and the Puranas tell how King Sagara of Ayodhya performed an Ashvamedha and the horse vanished. His sixty thousand sons dug down to the underworld and found it grazing near Kapila, who sat in meditation. They took him for the thief and rushed at him, and the fire of his glance burned them to ash. Generations later Bhagiratha brought the Ganga down from heaven to flow over their ashes. That is why the Ganga flows to the sea at Sagar island, and why lakhs bathe at Gangasagar on Makar Sankranti and pray at the Kapil Muni temple there.
