There can be no greater delight to a virtuous father than to have an equally worthy son. In the case of Kooratazhvan, his son Parasara Bhattar’s scholarship exceeded even that of his father. It was said of him that if he described a dead tree, so beautiful would be the description that one would get the feeling that the tree was alive and loaded with flowers! Kavi, whose story is narrated in the Srimad Bhagavatam, was also a lucky parent, for his son Ambarisha had all the qualities that a father would desire in a son, said Kidambi Narayanan in a discourse. Seldom are a father and son so aligned in temperament as were Kavi and Ambarisha.
Ambarisha finds place in a list of devotees that includes Narada, Vyasa, Prahlada, Parasara (the author of the Vishnu Purana), Suka, Sounaka, and Bhishma. Krishna had given a high status to Bhishma. When Yudishtra finds Krishna doing dhyana, he asks Him of whom He is thinking. Krishna replies that His dhyana is of Bhishma! Ambarisha thus ranked with someone like Bhishma, showing what a great bhakta he was.
Ambarisha was generous, but never felt he had given enough. Ambarisha was a king and a sage, but more importantly he was a gnani. A king has power, but he has worldly desires. A sage does penance and he uses his penance to reach Him, but is not devoid of worldly desires. But the gnani never thinks of anything as his own. He knows the atma belongs to the Supreme One. He may live in the middle of riches, but is indifferent to them. His existence is like water on a lotus leaf. The water is there on the leaf, but it rolls off easily. The gnani is like a ball of butter put in a vessel of water. The butter remains the same and does not dissolve in the water. So too does the gnani live in the middle of various attractions of life, but is not tempted by any of them. Such a person was Ambarisha — a model son and a model king.
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