Every Serpent in Hindu Mythology Explained in 12 Minutes

Every Serpent in Hindu Mythology Explained in 12 Minutes Shesha is not simply a serpent. He is what remains when everything else ceases to exist, and his name says exactly that, because in Sanskrit, Shesha means the remainder. Also known as Ananta, meaning the endless, Shesha is the most primordial being in Hindu cosmology, a serpent so vast that all the planets of the universe rest upon his thousand hoods like trinkets balanced on outstretched palms. He exists before creation and after it, coiled across the dark cosmic ocean during the intervals between worlds, with Vishnu reclining upon his body in a state of divine sleep called Yoganidra, the sleep of eternity. The Vishnu Purana and the Bhagavata Purana both describe this image, one of the most iconic in all of Hindu tradition, a golden god at rest on an infinite white serpent, a lotus blooming from Vishnu's navel from which the creator Brahma himself emerges.