19891011 Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 10.2.40

The following is a lecture given by His Holiness Jayapataka Swami on October 11,1989 in New Tālavana farm, Carriere, Mississippi. The class begins with the reading from the Śrīmad Bhāgavatam, Tenth Canto, Chapter 2, Text 40.

Jayapataka Swami:  (Leads the Verse, Translation and reads the purport)

matsyāśva-kacchapa-nṛsiṁha-varāha-haṁsa-
rājanya-vipra-vibudheṣu kṛtāvatāraḥ
tvaṁ pāsi nas tri-bhuvanaṁ ca yathādhuneśa
bhāraṁ bhuvo hara yadūttama vandanaṁ te

(ŚB 10.2.40)

Translation: O supreme controller, Your Lordship previously accepted incarnations as a fish, a horse, a tortoise, Narasiṁhadeva, a boar, a swan, Lord Rāmacandra, Paraśurāma and, among the demigods, Vāmanadeva, to protect the entire world by Your mercy. Now please protect us again by Your mercy by diminishing the disturbances in this world. O Kṛṣṇa, best of the Yadus, we respectfully offer our obeisances unto You.

Purport by His Divine Grace Śrīla Abhaya Charanaravinda Bhaktivedanta Swami  Prabhupāda

Devotees: Jai Śrīla Prabhupāda!!

Purport: In every incarnation, the Supreme Personality of Godhead has a particular mission to execute, and this was true in His appearance as the son of Devakī in the family of the Yadus. Thus all the demigods offered their prayers to the Lord, bowing down before Him, and requested the Lord to do the needful. We cannot order the Supreme Personality of Godhead to do anything for us. We can simply offer Him our obeisances, as advised in Bhagavad-gītā (man-manā bhava mad-bhakto mad-yājī māṁ namaskuru), and pray to Him for annihilation of dangers.

Thus end the text 40, chapter 2, canto 10 of the Śrīmad Bhāgavatam, translation and commentary by Śrīla Prabhupāda in the matter of “Prayers by the Demigods for Lord Kṛṣṇa in the Womb.”

OM TAT SAT!!

Jayapataka Swami: The whole material world is going on automatically by the arrangements that Krsna has made at the time of the creation, with the ecological balances, with the demigods controlling, things are set up to go on like a clockwork.

But in the universe there is always some disturbances since everyone is given a freewill, although they don't have complete knowledge. So out of their ignorance for what is their real welfare, different persons influenced by atheistic or demonic desires for increasing their own sense gratification, they disturb the natural order. Just like things have been going on for thousands and thousands of years even within recorded history. But no problem with ozone layer, there no problem with greenhouse effect or anything. But in the past century, since man has become more expert in yantra-vijñāna, and they have started to exploit natural resources for increasing their profit, they have already created enough imbalance, that is very noticeable. And it's getting everybody worried. Temperatures are changing in the world. Water levels are changing. People are getting skin cancer, because the upper atmosphere is, composition is changing due to so many things going in the atmosphere.

So similarly in the past, there also been problems created by these kinds of irresponsible action. When earth fell out of its orbit, Varāha to come to put it back. At present time, we do not know what the effect is going to be, from digging miles into the earth and pulling out all the petroleum products, which takes millions of years to produce, because in the center of our planet there's constant fire that's burning. Sometimes volcano comes up we see the evidence of this fact that there's fire in the center of the earth. According to the Vedic understanding, this fire is the part of the unique balance which keeps our planet in orbit properly. So in the future sometimes down the line, all the petroleum is supposed to go to the center and feed this fire won't reach, because already we've already drained it out, and what happens, who knows what's going to happen with the orbit.

So all these things are not so amazing. Myths are amazing, how can we take the planet out of orbit, but it's not so amazing when we see what's going on today. We are just taking, exploiting the earth as if you know it’s nobody's business. We don’t think about what the future, we don’t even know how the earth works. We always hear this so much we don't know. This is a famous catch all phrase from the scientists you know. We learned a lot but so much we don't know yet. Meaning that nobody in the future will know it. Meanwhile how to fix the ozone, how to fix this, how to fix that? So there is a natural balance. Krsna's plan is perfect. But because everyone's, He gives everyone independence to do what they want in the material world, and some people they don't act responsibly, so there becomes imbalance. This creates disturbance for the whole world.

So when the devotees are feeling lot of disturbance or when they are really desirous of having Lord's mercy, then in different avatāras or incarnations, He descends. Just like Prahlāda was being disturbed, threatened by Hiranyakaśipu, so Nrsinghadeva came.

We already talked about Vāraha. Last night was the Vijaya Daśami celebration, dussehra, the victory of Lord Rāma over Ravaṇa. Today is ekādaśī. Ekādaśī means, eka means one, daśī means 10. 10 and 1 is 11th day of the moon cycle (lunar cycle). Daśami means the 10th day. So it was 10th day in lunar cycle, yesterday. Today is 11th. 15 days normally, either take one.

So there also Rāvaṇa, he was creating a lot of disturbance, he didn't care for anybody. He became very powerful by worshipping Lord Śiva. He became so powerful that he defeated all the demigods. In fact he kept them captive in on the steps going up to his throne. He put them, he put their bodies, the bodies of the nine great demigods were the stairway up to his throne. So every day when he goes to his throne, he would step on their bodies. So he was so powerful, defeated Indra, Varuna, Agni, Saturn, Jupiter everything. So apparently Nārada Muni said, "You are stepping on their back, but if you step on their belly, then it's much more painful for them. It shows your power over them even in a more dynamic way."

So he thought, like that idea. (laughter) Step on their stomach every time I go up. I mean...some steps on your back and some steps on your stomach you know it's much more painful. But because the demigods were faced down, and they were the astrological demigods, they couldn't put their influence on Rāvaṇa. But when he turned them over, then they could give all their blessings, so that his karma, his astrological future would be the worst to get possibly to bring his end to it quicker. Actually this is to his blessing, because by being brought to the end by Rāmacandra, Rāvaṇa also achieves deliverance. He was creating disturbance in the whole universe, threw everything off. So the Lord came and protected the universe because of the prayers of His devotees.

So sometimes the devotees pray for the Lord to come like the demigods were thrown out of their kingdom, the heavenly planets by Bali Mahārāja. He made interplanetary attack, and he conquered over the entire galaxies of the svarga, empire of Lord Indra, coming from the lower regions of the universe, one of the original star wars in the universe. And they have to actually flee from their planets. So the mother of Indra, she did a tremendous tapasyā to please the Lord. The Lord agreed to become her son. And He came as Vāmanadeva and delivered Bali Mahārāja, by assuming the form of Trivikrama. Then returned the universal order, and He gave Bali Mahārāja a planet in the lower regions Sutala. But made that planet so opulent that it was not less than heavenly planets, and He personally remained there, so it was like spiritual planet. In the end, everybody was happy. He pleased everyone. Established the order.

So they can only pray to the Lord to please come! Save us in this predicament. How He is going to do it, they didn't have any idea. Aditi and the devas, they didn't, they didn't know anyone in Bali Mahārāja, what was up Vamanadeva’s sleeve, so to speak. They didn't know what was the trick, what was the means He was going to use. So the Lord He comes with His own plans. Sometimes He tells what's His plan is and sometimes He just does it, takes everybody by surprise.

When the earth fell out of orbit and she prayed to Krsna, to Viṣṇu to come. And all of a sudden Lord Brahmā, He sneezed, little speck of something came out of his nose, just like a you know what you normally think a little dry phlegm or something, but instead it was actually a baby boar. But suddenly started to grow right from that little speck, grow and grow and grow, before he saw a beautiful little golden boar running around, kept growing, he got bigger and bigger, big as the house, pretty soon it got so big, it was bigger than the whole planet, pretty soon it made up planet look small, was in outer space. So Hiraṇyākṣa he was the great fighter, he wanted someone to fight. He used to just go and smash mountains with his fist, just for the heck of it. He couldn't find anyone to fight with him. So then Varāha satisfied his desire, beat the living daylights out of him. (laughter) Literally kicked him to a pulp. (Laughter) Which is what he wanted. He really wanted a good fight you know. So... He said, “Is there anybody that can give me a good fight?” So actually, the Lord satisfied his desire and at the same time satisfied mother earth's desire and put her back into orbit, somehow set everything right.

But when they just prayed to the Lord for their protection, they didn't know, even when He appeared, and when He was fighting with Hiraṇyākṣa, I mean He let Hiraṇyākṣa get a few punches in. All the demigods got worried - wow, looks like may be Varāha is not going to able to defeat this Hiraṇyākṣa. But Varāha was just giving him a good fight. Let him have a few punches in, playing around with him a little bit, then finally finished him off and he got liberated of course. He got liberated because dying in the presence of the Lord.

So like this Lord's mission is all mysterious always. So here they don't know exactly what Kṛṣṇa is going to do. They know that when He is coming, He is going to have everything under control. So they just praying to Him that protect the entire world by Your mercy. Actually the residence on the higher planetary system, they like to see the order maintained. So they pray that the whole world be peaceful, that the whole universe be peaceful, that everything be in proper order.

Actually there are people like that on this planet they have that nature little bit of demigod nature. They want to see everything peaceful, everything nice, let everyone enjoy, no disturbance. So there are great sages like that in higher planets and they want, they pray to the Lord for world peace, universal peace, universal brotherhood. Prabhupāda said that, “Actually there is a good and bad in this universe, and the good and bad fight with each other. There is a struggle going on. And sometimes, generally good wins, but sometimes the evil also wins."

So Kṛṣṇa is actually transcendental to material good and evil, but it appears that He is on good side because good generally is very submissive to God and prays to the Lord to help, but actually He is neutral. Because evil also they are willing they want to fight with the Lord, they want to, He also reciprocates with everyone and ultimately, He does good for all. Everyone benefits. But from face value it appears that He is on the good side, but that's the way it works out. Because the good asks for the help, and the evil they are against Him. So He fulfills both.”

When Kṛṣṇa left this universe, then dharma, religiosity, austerity all the good qualities they also went. That time the great sages were very concerned with, “How the universe is going to be protected? How is it going to be proper? How the people are going to make any spiritual progress since the Lord has left and all the good qualities have gone with Him?” So then Śrīmad Bhāgavatam appeared. So the Śrīmad Bhāgavatam is the literary incarnation of the Lord, the book incarnation.

We have the boar incarnation, we have a tortoise incarnation, we have half man half lion incarnation, a demigod incarnation, a horse incarnation, why not a book incarnation? So the book incarnation by reading it daily, automatically, gives us the spiritual blessings of the presence of the Lord. How to change the imbalances in the universe? If the Bhāgavatam is being read everywhere, then the whole world would be a different place. So the Lord appears in the age of Kali in form of Śrīmad Bhāgavatam. Also He appears in the form of Holy name. Nāmarūpe kali kāle avatāra. Then in the form of Holy name the Lord appears in the age of Kali. So, by chanting the Holy name we are also bringing the presence of the Lord.

Actually, when I arrived in Atlanta from London, after this recent incident happened for recuperation, then seeing that I was coming from the orient, from India, the customs directed me to go to the agricultural inspection. Maybe they thought I had some agricultural produce or something from India. But the lady who was the inspector, she said, "Oh you are a Hare Kṛṣṇa!?" I said, "Yes." She said, "I don't see you people much anymore. You still around? I used to hear you people singing in the street. Hare Kṛṣṇa Hare Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Hare Hare Hare Hare Rāma Rāma.." You know she couldn't get exactly right. She got the idea and all that, very favorable. "No, we still go out and chant." But... So actually, she was missing the chanting. She was expressing, “I don't hear you.” In other words that meant that she liked it, she was missing it, and she chanted Kṛṣṇa's name so many times.

I met another devot..,  I was sitting, I was waiting for Pāṇḍava Dāsa at Atlanta airport, and a man walked out to me and said, "I used to you know fly in and out of Miami a lot, I meet you devotees. I don't see you anymore there. Are you still...? Is your movement still expanding? I mean it's growing or it is like...? I said," No its growing." And then we talked for a while. So like so many people like this understand that, I wear that traditional dress of a Hare Kṛṣṇa, one of the rare costume. (Laughter) Then people walked up to me all the time and say, “Well, are you still around? And I used to see all chant.”

So actually by hearing the Holy name, by getting the Śrīmad Bhāgavatam, one man said he got many books, and he asked some questions from the book right in the airport. And actually they are feeling some kind of separation from Kṛṣṇa. They have already developed some kind of an attachment. Even Gokularanjana prabhu told some story, how everyday some Christian lady would walk by when he was distributing books in some university and say, “Jesus will save you and you all are so wonderful wonderful.” Just making some friendly exchange, by the end she was chanting, Hari. she said, “What you need is the some professional dancer? you know, "I’m a...” She started spinning around doing ballet and opera singer Hare....Kṛṣṇa... (Singing in opera style) (laughter) She is joking with him. But she chanted Hare Kṛṣṇa. You couldn't get away from this.

There is a devotee of Lord Caitanya who kept telling to Chand Kazi, "You have to chant Hare Kṛṣṇa." He said, "No,no,no." So one day he came really fired up, "Today you chant Hare Kṛṣṇa." He said, "No, no. I'll chant Hare Kṛṣṇa tomorrow." He said, "Hari Bol Hari bol… You chanted. You have already said Hare Kṛṣṇa. So now don't stop." Even one-time chanting means that they have begun chanting. And then yesterday Vṛkodara Prabhu told me how the superintendents of schools came here and every time they call up from the school, one has some questions and they say, "Oh they are always talking about your school, it's so nice. But Hare Kṛṣṇa… I wanted to bring my daughter down to enter into the school. Heard it's the best one. You know we are Hare Kṛṣṇa, oh I want children to be exposed to eastern culture you know." So people they can't. One way or another they have to talk about Hare Kṛṣṇa. Of course, you like them to talk favorably. Actually, the people are missing. It is so important; you don't realize the importance of going out and doing harināma and let... I am happy for you are all chanting or the importance of giving our books, giving the Śrīmad Bhāgavatam.

Actually when I first came to this zone, there was a big drive. Saṅkīrtanapur was distributing so many books and everything was gift for that. Now lot of obstacles have come up and we are surviving, but we can still see that from the preaching seeds that we have planted, so many people are still coming. We can't imagine the effect. Just like the demigods here, they are praying to the Lord to come. They don't know what His plan is. They don't know how it's going to work, but they just know of the Lord's here on the spot. So actually Kṛṣṇa has come, but He comes in the form of Bhāgavatam, coming in the form of the Holy name. And Prabhupāda put Bhāgavatam in the center of Back to Godhead, because we are giving out Back to Godhead, so people so wherever they would write and rest them at least they are getting a part of it is Śrīmad Bhāgavatam, is going on by giving four pages of Śrīmad Bhāgavatam. So in that way Bhāgavatam is going out to so many people.

One devotee said, how one man got 12th canto Bhāgavatam, he met the devotees in the Smoky mountains just a week ago. He said, "I have been looking for you people. I've got this book from you - Sri..Mad.. Bhag..va...tam. (laughter) Well that is the most interesting book I've ever got. I want to read the whole set. You have? Where's the first one? I've got No.12." (laughter) Somehow he got one of the Bhāgavatam and he wanted to read all of the Bhāgavatam. He was there had a Kṛṣṇa book and so they sold him Kṛṣṇa book and took his name and address and they are going to give him whole catalog and so he can get all the books.

Actually in the age of Kali, the Lord has appeared, appearing in different ways but, these forms of the Lord are brought to the people through the devotees. If the devotees don't chant the Holy Name, then how does the Holy name get to the people. If devotees don't distribute the books, then how will the books get to the people. So of course, the Lord is also present in the temple. So bring the people to the temples. If there's no temple then where does the devotee live and how do they, what's their base for going out and preaching? So certainly, everything is connected. It's all a part of the grand plan. But the thing which is the most dynamic in the age of Kali is in the form of books and the Holy name.

Of course, Lord Caitanya came, Kṛṣṇa Himself He came as a devotee. What did He do, but He personally chanted Hare Kṛṣṇa everywhere, and then He instructed His followers to write books. And after the books were written, then the next string of ācāryas, next realm they went on distributed them. Lord Caitanya primarily chanted; the chanting is most important. Distributing books is most important.

Of course, after the six Gosvāmīs, they also established temples and Deities, and Śrīla Prabhupāda he so kindly brought the sublime presence of the Lord. Actually, he brought Kṛṣṇa here to the west. There was no Kṛṣṇa here! There was no incarnation of Godhead present, but he directly brought the Lord in His different forms - His Deity form, His name form, His book form. And it is having a dynamic effect, we need to... māyā always tries to put on obstacles for us, but we need to keep the Lord present here in the west. That's possible by chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa, chanting here in the temple, chanting in the street. It’s possible by some devotees distributing books, and keeping on, keeping the vibration going.

In fact I was told that our devotees are faithfully going to LICU and to different universities for years together. They have some kind of free speech alley. Someone may go there, they get a chance to speak for 5 minutes. Usually, they like to hear the Hare Kṛṣṇa speak so they give him a little extension. Well there some kind of captain of the free speech alley. And then he said, "You know, every week we hear you, but you always say to us in the end of speech Hare Kṛṣṇa, but we just stand and watch, we don't say anything. So we should actually reciprocate with you. Why don't you try one more time?" So then the devotee says, Hare Kṛṣṇa. And everybody and then the captain said say everybody, “Hare Kṛṣṇa.” (laughter) So in this way they have been engaged in chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa. They actually had direct association with the Supreme Personality of Godhead. And since they all chanted together, it was a kirtan. Although it was a two word kīrtana. (laughter). They did kīrtana, so that giving them unlimited mercy.

So Śrīla Prabhupāda said, we can simply offer the Lord obeisances and pray to Him for annihilation of danger. The demigods offered their obeisances and prayers to the Lord, bowing down before Him, request the Lord to do the needful. The thing is that Kṛṣṇa was appearing at that time, He was going to be there for 100 some years and then go. But actually now the Lord is so merciful. We need Him more now in the Kali-yuga. We need the Lord's presence more than before. So we keep chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa, He will stay with us as long as we chant. In fact Prabhupāda said that, “He can even stay with us for 10000 years.” How will He stay? How will we have that golden age when the Lord will be with us 10000 years unless we chant? Of course, the Lord will will be that he can find somebody who chant. But just how wonderful merciful the Lord is we can get more association here on this planet at this time than ever before when most of these avatāras of the Lord comes and goes. Even they lived for long you know their life span was much longer than ours. Now we are only 100 years maximum usually 60, 70, 80 years then it's over. We have to go on to the next life.

So now we can have the constant association with the Lord for whole lifetime. We can get the wonderful mercy of being born in a Kṛṣṇa conscious family. They are getting association with incarnation of Godhead from the moment of their birth until the last breath in this body. Even Prahlāda Mahārāja, he got some association for days/weeks with Nṛsiṁhadeva. Varāha came and then He went back. Matsya, all the avatāras I mean, Lord Rāma was there quite a bit of time. But not... Paraśurāma was also for a long time. But of course, it depend you were a brāhmaṇa or kṣatriya, how you looked upon it. (laughter)

Here, this all-merciful presence of the Lord as Hare Kṛṣṇa mahā-mantra, the Śrīmad Bhāgavatam, we just have to keep associating with the Lord. We don't want to break that daily association. Prabhupāda was so kind giving us: for the devotees, for maṇgala-ārati right on, opportunity to associate with holy name and Śrīmad Bhāgavatam every day. I was feeling very, didn't realize, I never stayed outside of a temple even apart from your traveling saṅkīrtana which was also like taking the temple with you, with devotees chanting, it’s a different thing. I never stayed outside the temple, here I was in the hospital for so many days, so it was very dry. Then they were saying, well why don't you stay in the hotel, because the temple is far and far away, bit 2-hour drive. As soon as I got out of the hospital, I want to go back to the temple where there is chanting of the holy name. And to be without daily chanting, daily class, I was feeling lot of separation. Then all of a sudden, Śivarāma Mahārāja came and what did he bring? He brought his own personal Nitāi-Gaura deities right into the hospital room and set out, there little ārati, kīrtana. Lord personally, the temple came into temple. I mean temple came into the hospital. The Lord came into the hospital and made it into temple. So the causeless mercy of Nitāi-Gaura.

So it's the thing we can meditate upon, how the Lord is so merciful. He annihilates the danger and how we have the opportunity to keep the Lord with us every day, the whole life, even you know for generations and generations, we want to train up the future generation that they keep the Lord present, you never... Now that the Lord has given us this opportunity that we can have His direct constant association of chanting and the Śrīmad Bhāgavatam. By chanting Śrīmad Bhāgavatam then our Deity worship will also be effective, then we can have the Lord as the Deity form. So we want to maintain this association for ever, as long as possible, at least for 10000 years.

Hare Kṛṣṇa.

Śrīla Prabhupāda ki Jaya!

Caitanya Mahāprabhu ki Jaya!

Nāmāvatāra ki Jaya!

Śrīmad Bhāgavatam Grantharāja avatāra ki jaya!!