Verse 4

In plain words

34. The Avatāra of Śrī Kṛṣṇa Śuka, smiling, said: "Mahārāja! The līlās of that cowherd boy are truly, as you said, supremely wondrous, full of sweetness and rich in depth of meaning; but they are not bound up with outward show. People see only the outward, and so they regard Kṛṣṇa's doings as utterly ordinary, and some of them as improper. The inner meanings of the Avatāras are not so easily grasped by everyone. They never do a deed without meaning. They act for the uplift of the world and for the restoration of the Vedas; they take account of the ripening of the merit of former births; they act on the basis of boons granted, in accordance with the time, the place and the recipient in each case, wishing to bestow grace. Who can conceive the meaning that truly fits the special līlās they perform? Śrī Kṛṣṇa's Līlās Are Beyond Perception As the saying goes, 'Hari's wondrous līlā is known to Hari alone': what is His belongs to Him alone. But these are not baseless deeds. One thing alone is certain. The Avatāras never undertake even the smallest act for their own desires or for their own sake! Every action they resolve upon, they resolve upon for the sake of the world! They behave as though there were no connection at all between themselves and the world — and yet without them there would be no world at all. Even in the quite ordinary tasks they do,

one can come to know the selfless essence. For the great souls who hold the very world in their hand, what work of their own could there be in the world? Fools, the faithless, atheists, the ignorant, and innocents who cannot understand take those acts to be self-interested acts and deeds of infatuation; but true devotees regard them as līlā. How could such people know the farther shore of the Shoreless One? Mahārāja! The līlās of the Lord of Kosala and the ways of Kṛṣṇa are wholly contrary to each other. When the world was oppressed by Daityas and Dānavas, to remove its burden — just as there is black and white among the hairs of the head — Kṛṣṇa and Balarāma took on black and white forms and performed deeds beyond our understanding. No one at all can understand Kṛṣṇa's līlās. His movements, His walk, His smile, His gestures, His words, His songs — all of them are joined with strange qualities; they look contrived. He behaves like a rascal. Walking toward the east, He keeps looking toward the west. He converses with His eyes alone; with glances of the eye alone He holds conversation. Shame or shyness He does not regard. New or old, there is no such thing for Him. He does not stop to consider the proprieties of kinship. Wherever He goes, He stirs up some strange commotion. As the sea has its ebb and flow, so wherever He goes He stirs up quarrels, turmoil and tears like a storm. Śrī Kṛṣṇa's Free Ways Whichever house He goes to, the people of that house need not set out a seat and invite Him. Treating it as His own house, whether things are hidden up on the sling or inside the pot, no matter! He goes in by Himself, fearlessly takes it, eats it and goes on His way.

To everyone He is an old relative! Not stopping there, He shares things out, as though they were His own property, among the boys who come from outside; though the people of the house raise an uproar, He pays no heed, and gives their things away in charity as though they were His very own. There is no check to His play or His words. If anyone dares to scold Him, the torments He then puts them through are beyond description! Yet in every little thing He does, an exceeding sweetness lies hidden. Even in His punishments there is sweetness. No one ever feels anything like anger. Rather, one feels only that one must play with Him, talk with Him, be with Him. However many troubles and jests He makes, no one grows weary of Him. Śrī Kṛṣṇa's Sweet Principle of Prema That was the principle of Prema within Him. Even gopikās who set out in great anger to beat Him became full of Prema at heart the moment they saw Him, and went away praying to Him. Whatever He does is only ever līlā. Now, shall we look at His words? All of them are tricks! Before everyone's eyes He eats earth, and then tells His mother, 'I didn't eat it,' and shows His mouth. He makes everyone else's words out to be untrue, and shows even His own untruth to be the truth. Every day He goes to Vṛṣabhāpura (that is, to the village where Rādhā lives). Many people see Him along the way. When His mother calls Him back and scolds Him — 'Why, boy, do you go so far every day? If you want to play, are there no boys here?' — He says He does not know that village, or even the way there. In everyone's house He makes mischief, sets mothers-in-law and daughters-in-law quarrelling, and stands in the middle laughing. From daybreak until He lies down at night, He does not keep both feet in one place even for a minute. Ceaselessly making the rounds from house to house — that is this Kṛṣṇa's occupation.

For all that He does, the villagers cannot bear to go a single minute without seeing Kṛṣṇa. If on some day He happens not to go toward their houses, those gopikās watch the roads all that day, waiting and looking out from the windows and from the rooftops. This indeed is a sample of the sweet Prema within God; His doings are exceedingly sweet and filled with inner meaning. Kṛṣṇa, the blue-hued one, knows what is true and what is false. He does not yield to superficial words or games, nor is He puffed up by them. Hence, Pūtanā came in the form of a mother, saying she would give Him milk; He, acting the part of a son, sucked out her blood and felled her to the ground. Though asuras took many forms and came in the guise of gopikās and gopālas, He recognized their true nature and in a moment kept dispatching them to Yama's city. When an asura became a calf and roamed among His calves, that tender boy of three, still green at the nose, seized the calf by the tail, whirled it round and killed it with a single blow. Śrī Kṛṣṇa's Wondrous, Superhuman Deeds How contrary these powers and capabilities were to that boy's form! He went on demonstrating such superhuman deeds by the crore. Those who were deceitful at heart — whether women, children or the old, or even, in the end, His own people — He did not spare: He taught them good sense, put them in straits, ripped open bellies and pierced flanks. His own maternal uncle Kaṃsa, though endowed with great valour and power, He seized by the hair in a moment, dragged down, took his life and dragged through the market streets all the way to the bank of the Yamunā. To the people of Mathurā this boy's actions seemed astonishing, wondrous, sweet, beautiful and most graceful. Already in childhood He slew Pūtanā, Tṛṇāvarta and Śakaṭāsura. He stole butter. When His mother in anger tied Him to the mortar, the twin arjuna

trees — going between them, He uprooted them. He humbled the pride of Kāliṅga, who had made the whole Yamunā river poisonous, and protected the gopikās. When His mother tied a cord round His waist, He showed His cosmic form and struck His parents and the people of Gokula with supreme astonishment. In a yawn He showed the aṇḍāṇḍa, the piṇḍāṇḍa and the brahmāṇḍas. To His beloved gopālas and gopikās He showed His divine Goloka-Vaikuṇṭha. He had Nanda perform the worship of the mountain and stopped the worship of Indra, and so acted that Indra grew angry; then, to protect the people of Gokula from the rain of stones Indra poured down in his wrath, He lifted the mountain on His little finger and protected the people of Gokula and the cows from the onslaught of the rain. The Rāsa-Plays: Acts That Carried the Gopikās Across With the gopikās and gopālas He played games of every kind and sang songs, making them intoxicated with Prema. To take all this as base conduct is sheer want of Buddhi, is it not! That He played the rāsa-krīḍā with the gopikās gives no ground at all for thinking it was wantonness. Whatever games a boy of five or six may play with the gopikās, to think them contrary to the world's ways is itself a meaningless notion! Only if Gopāla, who is beyond the guṇas, had guṇa could there be any enjoying of the experiences of these deeds! For the one of infinite svarūpa, who has no guṇa at all, these līlās are but an atom; one may take them to be nothing other than acts of sādhana that carried the gopas and gopikās across. Through the fruit of the merit of their other births, and through boons and grace, He was only fulfilling their longings — nothing else. Only if one took that Gopāla, who assumed a human form through Māyā, for a mere human could there be any ground for calling the actions in this wantonness and thievery! Or, granted, even if one thinks He was only human — can ordinary humans do these superhuman deeds?

Śrī Kṛṣṇa's Slaying of the Rākṣasas Protects the World Nor did He stop there. Pralamba, Dhenuka, Baka, Keśi, Cāṇūra, Ariṣṭa, Muṣṭika, Kuvalayāpīḍa, Kaṃsa, Naraka, Pauṇḍraka, Dvivida, Jarāsandha, Dantavakra, Śambara, Kāmbhoja, Kuru, Matsya, Kaikaya and others — mighty ones endowed with great valour and power — He deprived of life in a moment, and so protected the world. Can these be called human deeds? In this extraordinary Avatāra all the līlās are supremely wondrous. Even in His wrath it was His Prema alone that kept being revealed. In śṛṅgāra He made a stream of compassion flow. By His mere sight, touch and conversation He brought Vimukti from the bondage of saṃsāra. On those who remember His name He bestowed immortality. In His doings, strange as they appear outwardly, He made them taste the divine rasa. The Stories of All the Avatāras Are the Bhāgavata! Mahārāja! The Bhāgavata is not made up merely of the stories of Mathurā, Bṛndāvana, Vrēpalle, the bank of the Yamunā, Yaśodā, Nanda, Devakī and Vasudeva. The stories of all the Avatāras are called the Bhāgavata story. That is, the name 'Bhāgavata story' belongs to every tattva in which God and His devotees come together. All the Avatāras came from Gopāla alone, who dwells in Goloka. The one sole Avatāra of them all is Śrī Kṛṣṇa, who is Vāsudeva. The stories of all the Avatāras are born in Vāsudeva alone and dissolve in Vāsudeva alone. Not only for all the Avatāras, but for all living beings, that divine power alone is the foundation. The Ten Avatāras Mahārāja! God is all-powerful. For Him there is no possible and impossible. His Māyā, His sport, His līlā and His diversions cannot be conveyed in words.

Though He is beyond compare, He can take on the virāṭ form. Though He is one alone, He can become divided into many forms. O King! People regard only the Matsya, Kūrma, Varāha, Nārasiṃha, Vāmana, Paraśurāma, Rāma, Kṛṣṇa, Buddha and Kalki Avatāras as His divine Avatāras. But it cannot be so narrow. All forms are His! The consciousness in all beings is His very breath. In short, the whole visible world is nothing but His saṅkalpa; there is not a single thing that is not He. However, for the protection of the world, for the establishment of Dharma and to fulfil the wishes of devotees, He Himself, of His own accord, willed it, took on a particular form, moved about in the world, displayed divine vibhūtis, granted devotees divine experiences and carried them across. Because the forms in which He did this are the divine forms named above, people believe that these forms alone are the Avatāra forms, worship them, and are crossing over. Śrī Kṛṣṇa's Aṃśāvatāras "There are also many who, at certain times, for certain urgent tasks, incarnated and, for the protection of the world, bore divine powers and incarnated in partial forms." Even as the great ṛṣi Śuka was saying this, King Parīkṣit lifted his joyful face and said, "Ah! Did that beautiful form take on separate partial forms as well? I pray that you will tell me what forms that līlā-avatāra took on for the protection of the world, and so delight me," and he bowed to the revered Śuka. Then the revered Śuka said: "O King! Listen. In the form of sages such as Kapila, Dattātreya, Sanaka, Sananda, Sanatkumāra and Sanatsujāta, and with the forms and names of Nara-Nārāyaṇa, Ṛṣabha, Viṣṇu, Dhruva, Hayagrīva, Pṛthu, Kacchapa, Dhanvantari, Haṃsaka, Balarāma, Vyāsa and the like, He granted the wishes of devotees, carried out the protection of the world,

established Dharma and karma, and restored them. There are many more aṃśāvatāras. But since only very little time remains to speak about them all, and since they are not such important matters, I did not consent to relate them," he said. Then King Parīkṣit prayed: "Svāmī! Purify me by telling me, even if only in the brief manner of a sūtra, the reason for the Avatāras of Kapila, Dhruva, Dattātreya, Hayagrīva, Dhanvantari and the others, and their principal tattvas." When he prayed thus, Śuka said: "O King! After nine daughters had been born to Devahūti, wife of Kardama Prajāpati, He incarnated in the tenth conception in the form of Kapila. He Himself became guru to His own mother, took His mother as His disciple, taught her the tattva that grants Mokṣa, and bestowed Ātma-Jñāna on her. Then Anasūyā, the wife of Atri, asked that God be born in her womb in the form of a son. He granted it and gave His word — 'Datta', that is, 'I have given' — and thereafter God became the son of Atri and Anasūyā and brought them joy: so it came about. Because God had first uttered the word of grace 'Datta', He was called by the name Dattātreya, with His father's name joined to it. Though Kārtavīryārjuna and Yadu were enjoying the pleasures of kingship and the rest, He bestowed on them all the wealth of yoga. This Paramātma, in this form, at the beginning of the kalpa, moved about under the names of Sanaka, Sanandana, Sanatkumāra and Sanatsujāta, in digambara forms. They always — that is, whenever one saw them — appeared as having bodies five years of age. Then, born of Mūrtidevī, the wife of Dharma, in the form of Nara-Nārāyaṇa, He grew up and lived in the Badarī forest; and, pleased with the tapas of the boy Dhruva, He gave him darśan and sanctified Dhruva's mother and father. Dhruva

He made lord of the Dhruva-loka. When the sages cursed Vena, who had gone the wrong way, in many ways and killed him, Emperor Pṛthu arose from the churning of his body in the form of a lord of the earth, and uplifted His own father, who had fallen into hell and was suffering there. Not stopping there, He uplifted the whole earth. On the earth He built cities, towns and villages, and ordained that people should carry out their respective duties in proper order. Born to the couple Nābhi and Sudevī in the form of a paramahaṃsa, He taught tyāga and proclaimed the glory of tyāga. Afterwards He incarnated in Brahmā's yajña in the form of the yajña itself; because He had the shape of a horse above the neck, He was called Hayagrīva. Through the nostrils with which He breathed, the words of the Veda kept coming forth. While this was so, a rākṣasa warrior named Somakāsura stole the Vedas that had come forth and hid in the ocean of pralaya; so, for the protection of the Vedas, God took on the form of the Fish, searched the ocean, slew the rākṣasa, brought back the Vedas and gave them to Brahmā, and restored in the world the Dharma and karma enjoined by the Veda. Hari's Wondrous Līlās Are Known to Hari Alone Mahārāja! There are countless tales of how He took on such timely Avatāras beyond count, embraced the earth, removed its sorrows and bestowed grace on devotees. Everything is His saṅkalpa alone; to inquire into reasons is mere ajñāna! Those who inquire into the reasons for God's saṅkalpas, or who fix limits to His power and resourcefulness, those who lay down that God must behave only in this way, and those who decide 'the divine tattva is like this, not like that' — all of them can only be called fools. To His will there is no obstacle. To His power there is no limit. If He wills it, He can do anything whatever. He can take on any form at all. He alone is His own equal. He alone is His own witness.

Once, pleased with Nārada's feelings of Bhakti, Hari incarnated in the form of a Haṃsa; so that devotees might cross the ocean of becoming, He taught the tattva of the Bhāgavata; and until the end of the manvantara He bore the Sudarśana and ruled without hindrance. By His lovely fame He made the seven worlds pure. At the time of the churning of the ocean He took on the Kūrma Avatāra, did He not! At that same time the Lord, bearing the pot of amṛta, incarnated as Dhanvantari, taught the people the means of curing disease, and made human beings healers. He brought it about that they became renowned in the world as vaidyas, as the foremost of bhiṣaks, and as healers. O King! Not only this: formerly physicians had no share in the yajña. Thereafter it was He who had a share in the yajña given to them. Do you see? Such are the līlās of God! Hari's wondrous līlās are known to Hari alone. To others they are not intelligible; they cannot even be imagined. Because human beings are in the grip of ajñāna, they go by their own Buddhi, power and capabilities, engage in disputes, and incur needless sins. Those who do not doubt the works of God, who do not twist those works to suit their own notions but instead change their own feelings to fit those divine works — such human beings can receive the grace of God. But if they do not do so, they cannot become fit vessels of grace. They cannot attain Ānanda. The Kṛṣṇa Avatāra Captivates the Heart Now, the tattva of the Kṛṣṇa Avatāra, that Sweet Form, captivates the citta. That form, in which beauty, sweetness and Prema have become condensed, is a mass of Ānanda, an ocean of virtues. Ah! How great His innocence was! His superhuman nature is greater still. It is enough to see Him, enough to hear His words, enough to touch Him: one's birth crosses over. Yajñas, yāgas and such rites are, one may say, this

attainment of darśan, touch and conversation. The fruit that lies in this sacred darśan, touch and conversation is not in yajñas, yāgas and such rites — it is not, it is not; thrice over, it is not. Ah, Sweet Form!" Saying this, Śuka, shedding streams of tears, in that very absorption became like one possessed and merged in the form of Kṛṣṇa. The sages who were watching this, and King Parīkṣit, were supremely astonished. The radiance of the revered sage's bhāva-samādhi bewildered them; all stood stock-still. When some time had passed in this way, Śuka opened his eyes and said: "O King! How fortunate the gopas and gopikās of that time were, were they not? How radiant must have been the bodies of those who were with Him, played, sang and rejoiced with Him! That His presence — not easily granted even to the gods — was obtained by those simple cowherds: this, one may say, was the merit of their other births. The gopas and gopikās are in no way ordinary people. To onlookers they look like simpletons, but the treasury of Jñāna within them is imperceptible to anyone but that Kṛṣṇa. Why, Kṛṣṇa's touch was not so easily granted even to Rukmiṇī and Satyabhāmā. That being so, the gopas and gopālas may be called far more fortunate than they. This is the fruit of the tapas of three births." So saying, he closed his eyes, and with smiles dancing on his lips Śuka sank again into samādhi. That Śuka should attain the state of samādhi in this way whenever he described that form of Kṛṣṇa filled King Parīkṣit with supreme wonder, and he too, with great eagerness, was always brimming with longing to hear of Kṛṣṇa's doings.