Rishi Kapila was born to Kardama Prajapati and his wife Devahuti (daughter of Manu).
He is mentioned in many Puranas, Ramayana and multiple vedic hymns.
There are multiple Kapila rishis over many generations.
Narada Purana enumerates two Kapilas, one as the incarnation of Brahma and another as the incarnation of Vishnu. The Puranas Bhagavata, Brahmanda, Vishnu, Padma, Skanda, Narada Purana and the Valmiki Ramayana mentions Kapila is an incarnation of Vishnu. The Padma Purana and Skanda Purana conclusively call him Vishnu himself who descended on earth to disseminate true knowledge. Bhagavata Purana calls him Vedagarbha Vishnu. The Vishnusahasranama mentions Kapila as a one of the names of Vishnu.
Kapila, born to Karmada and Devahuti, went on to teach his own parents. Bhagavata Purana, Chapter 3 mentions about Rishi Kapila explaining Sankhya Philosophy.
After answering all questions of his mother, Kapila travels towards North-East and Ocean offers him a place to reside.
At that time, Land on this planet was called Akhanda-Bhu-Mandala (Undivided Mass of Land), where continents were not formed yet and was ruled by one emperor.
So, Kapila must have moved towards North-East Asia (near Japan-Korea) and settled in North America (when Pacific Ocean did not divide land yet).
Svetasvatara Upanisad has hailed (5.2) Kapila as the ‘the first human being who came into the world fully endowed with knowledge (of self)’. Mahabharata refers to him as Maharshi, the great sage. In Gita, Krishna calls himself as Kapila (10.26) ‘the greatest among the adepts’.
Prior to that, evil king Vena abandoned the Vedas, declared that he was the only creator of dharma, and broke all limits of righteousness, and was killed.
Kapila advises hermits to churn Vena’s thigh from which emerged Nishadas, and his right hand from which Prithu originated who made earth productive again.
Kapila was only son to his parents Kardama and Devahuti. They had nine daughters, namely Kala, Anasuya, Sraddha, Havirbhu, Gita, Kriya, Khyati, Arundhati and Shanti who were married to Marici, Atri, Angiras, Pulastya, Pulaha, Kritu, Vasistha, and Atharvan respectively.
So, in this way Kapila was connected to other Rishis like Marici, Atri, Angiras, Vasishta etc as brother-in-law.
On of his brother-in-law Pulastya, who was married to Havirbhu was grandfather of Ravana. Pulatsya Rishi had son Visrava who in turn had two wives: one was Kaikesi who gave birth to Ravana, Soorpanakha, Kumbhakarna and Vibhishana; and another was Ilavida who had a son named Kubera.
This Rishi Pulastya was medium for some puranas to be communicated to mankind.
He received the Vishnu Purana from Brahma and communicated it to Sage Parasara (father of Vyasa), who made it known to mankind.
Kapila is said meditating for 24 hours in a day but only when sunlight was present.
It is possible only if he was at either north or south pole for 6 months.
But Kapila was in a forest. So, he must have travelled along with Sun and continued his meditation in different parts of earth throughout the day.
King Sagara of Ikshvaku dynasty had 60000 sons (here 60000 is not exact number but it means numerous), who were searching for their lost Aswamedha Yaga Horse, they saw Kapila and blamed him to be thief.
They were burnt to Ashes by Sonic energy of Sage Kapila.
Later, Anshuman (grandson of Sagara) comes in search of his lost 60000 men and meets Kapila, who advises him that, bringing them back to life is possible only by his grandson Bhageeratha.
2 generations later, Bhageeratha comes to know about his great-grandfathers being burned to Ashes.
He brings down Akasa Ganga, through Lord Siva’s head and it splits earth into continents.
Bhageeratha leads Ganga to Kapila-Aranya and brings back dead men to life.
Coincidentally, North America has two places named Horse Island and Ash Island.
While Horse Island is in Riverside county, CA, Ash Island is in Oregon.
Even today, Wild Horses inhabit this Horse Island.
In between these two places, there is one Mount Shasta.
In sanskrit, Shasta (शस्त) means beautiful, fortunate, auspicious, excellent, praiseworthy and commendable. It also means Eulogy.
There used to be a head of the native American Shasta tribe with name, Sambho (शम्भो).
This is a common male name in India connected with Lord Siva.
Shasta tribe inhabited the area close to the Klamath River. This Klamath River was known to them by the name ‘Ish-Keesh‘ (ईश-कीश).
In Sanskrit ‘Ish-Keesh’ (ईश-कीश) translates as ‘Lord Sun‘.
It is possible that Utah mountains also derived their name for Utyah-ku.
California being Kapila-Aranya, was disclosed by Kanchi Sankaracharya Sri Chandrasekarendra Saraswathi during October 1932 in Chennai.
Kapila achieved realization known as kaivalya, which is complete eradication of all kinds of sufferings for all times. Such eternal peace as kaivalya must be achieved through adoption of the purest practices viz. non-violence, truth, non-stealing, continence, non-acquisitiveness, cleanliness (in body and in mind), contentedness, and then becoming proficient in samadhi or concentration, and finally in discriminative enlightenment. The pioneer sage Kapila was the first to accomplish all these without the help of a fellow human, which is why he is called the greatest of all adepts.
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