Vyasa, who is aware of the past, present and future, while narrating the Devi Bhagavata Purana to Janamejaya, clarifies many perplexing issues in Krishna avatar to him. Some of the explanations for the baffling happenings are traced to other purana stories which deal with the trajectories of the past lives of the characters, pointed out Sri K. Srinivasan in a discourse.
For instance, Janamejaya wants to know why the six children born before Balarama and Krishna to Devaki were killed by Kamsa. It is said Vasudeva handed over the first child as soon as it was born to Kamsa; but that Kamsa was moved by pity, and, at the spur of the moment, he remembered the asariri voice that warned him of the threat to his life by the eighth child of Devaki. So he decided to spare this child. But then Narada told him that it was not a wise move. Enemies like fire, if not eliminated completely, can begin to haunt one just as even a single latent live spark in the ashes can grow unobtrusively to cause destruction. Moreover, none can gauge the ways of the celestials and from his angle all the eight are to be considered as his enemies.
The point here is that the six children, like the seven children in the Santanu episode, are under a curse to die as soon as they are born. In this case, they have to get release from the curse and Narada acts as the catalyst. Originally these six infants were the sons of Marichi who had inadvertently incurred Brahma’s curse and took birth as the sons of Kalanemi. In another birth as sons of Hiranyakasipu, they won his displeasure and were subject to his curse by which they were to be born to Devaki and Vasudeva only to be killed by their previous father Kalanemi who was born as Kamsa.
