Great verses from the Srimad Bhagavatam

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In the journey of discovery of the wisdom from Srimad Bhagavatam.

(I have actually started it even before the start of the new year and below are what I discovered today).

Skhanda II Chapter 6, verse 16

He, being the material cause of all this, pervades it all, and also transcends it. Just as the sun illumines itself and spreads everywhere outside too by its heat and light, so also the Universal Spirit is in the universe and also transcends it.

II; 6, v. 33

Because I bear Sri Hari in my heart with intensity of devotion, therefore my words never prove untrue, my mind never takes a wrong turn, and my senses are never attracted to evil ways.

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The Supreme Being: His transcendent nature

Skandha II Chapter 6 verse 36
Brahma said: Neither I, nor you, nor Siva understand Him in His real nature..... Infatuated by His maya, our understanding can grasp only this created universe and even that according to the extent of our intelligence.

II.6.38
He is Pure Spirit, the original and unborn being, and the creator of all that exists at the beginning of every cosmic cycle. He is the creator, the material of creation, the created world and the one in whom the creation subsists.

II.6.40
The rishis intuit Him when serenity reigns over their body, senses and mind, but He evades the mind agitated by vain argumentation.

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His manifestations

II. 6. 41
The primary descent or manifestation of that transcendent Being is the Viratpurusha and everything distinguishable from Him are His Vibhutis, divine powers and attributes. These are: time, nature, cause and effect conditions of Prakriti, cosmic intelligence, the great elements , ego, qualities, senses and all entities moving and unmoving.

II. 6. 44

(Brahma said) ..…. In fact all that have striking endowments and attributes like, majesty, personally, strength, lustre, modesty, intelligence, patience, energy, brilliant colours, beauty, etc., are special expressions of His.

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Skahnda II. Chap. 7 The Bhagavata in brief verse: 26

He will be born as Krishna (sita-krishna kesah or one with white and black hair) with Balaram as his Kala or part in order to save the earth from the high-handedness of asuras born as kings, and he will perform actions, revealing his superhuman glory in his own mysterious way, incomprehensible to the human intellect.

II.7.27

Consider these wonderful happenings: the death of the female monster Putana at the hands of a mere infant; upsetting of a huge cart by the kick of the feet of a baby…; the uprooting of a pair of hug sky-scraping trees by the tug of a child crawling on all fours....

II.7.28

His reviving, by the blessing conveyed by the shower of his look, calves and cowherds that would have died after drinking the poisonous water of the Yamuna and his purification of the water by merely indulging in water-sports therein which had the effect of expelling the terrible poisonous and many tongued Kaliya...

II.7.29

.... would save the gopas from a forest fire while they would be lying asleep on the bank of Yamuna.... and that he along with Balaram would again transport them en masse from another forest fire, asking them to just keep their eyes closed.....

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As a GV devotee I have issue with the translation, (posted immediately above) , II.7.26: “He will be born as Krishna….. " as the use of the word “born” seems to suggest that, Krishna is not the supreme godhead because the Krishna form has a beginning and one can make an inference of the supremacy of the impersonal from the personal form . Adding to my discomfort about the translation is that the verse is under the section titled “Incarnations”.

However, RK Mission II.6.38 translation (posted much earlier), suggests the beginningless personal form of the transcendent. "He is Pure Spirit, the original and unborn being, and the creator of all that exists at the beginning of every cosmic cycle. He is the creator, the material of creation, the created world and the one in whom the creation subsists".

In Bhaktivedanta Swami’s translation the word”descent” was used and in another translation I found on the internet the word “appear” was used, making the verse clear as to the existence of Krishna in all possible worlds even as He manifests as a baby Krishna. However, I notice that SP's translation was a bit generous, so with the other translation,(quoted below).

In the preface to RK Mission edition, it was stated that their translator was helped by 2 world renowned Bhagavat scholars, so on the surface that makes the RK translation with a considerable measure of accuracy. However, we can not find fault also in SP’s translation, given that RK Mission itself, acknowledged that “ the Bhagavata is a difficult text, in many places too terse to yield to a clear meaning, and in others, so vague that one can draw any meaning that one wants to find”.

So we’ll see as we go along, if the devotional spirit is the big picture in the RK Mission’s translation.

SP’s translation:
SB 2.7.26: When the world is overburdened by the fighting strength of kings who have no faith in God, the Lord, just to diminish the distress of the world, descends with His plenary portion. The Lord comes in His original form, with beautiful black hair. And just to expand His transcendental glories, He acts extraordinarily. No one can properly estimate how great He is.

Another GM translation
Text 26
When the entire world is miserable because of the burden of soldiers of the disbelievers, He [Krishna] together with His plenary expansion [Balarâma], His beauty and His black hair, He whose glorious path of activities is so hard to recognize for the people in general, is bound to appear for the sake of the decimation of those atheists.

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II.7.30
....Mother Yasoda would find that all strings and similar binding materials that she could lay hand on would be insufficient to bind him and that he would be seeing all the worlds in his yawning mouth, at first with doubts about its reality and then with full understanding of it-- these are all indications of his divinity.

II.7.38
...when even in the places of good men, the excellences of Sri Hari cease to be heard, when Vedic teachers turn to be atheists, and Brahmanas begin to behave like sudras, when vedic mantras like svaha, svadha, and vashat connected with sacrificial rites cease to be heard anywhere, then the Bhagavan would appear at the end of kaliyuga as Sasta for suppressing the evil spirit of Kali.

II.7.47-48
The Supreme Bhagavan is the same as what is known as Brahman -- Supreme Spirit who is of the nature of unbroken bliss, untouched by sorrow, peaceful, fearless, always the same, always unaffected, of the nature of consciousness, stainless and beyond the opposites of cause and effect.

Even the vedic statements cannot describe Him fully....... Maya , the cause of impurities is ashamed even to stand before Him. The self-controlled sages, having overcome the waywardness of the mind and become established in the Supreme Self of absolute mastery, abandon even the means that took them to this state, since they realise that state as natural to them, just as Indra, the master of the clouds, need not preserve instruments to dig a well for his use.

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II.7.51

(Brahma said:) This brief account of the manifestation of the Lord is what is called the Bhagavata.....

II.7.53
Whoever describes and hears with faith this account of the Lord's Maya or His mysterious manifestations of glory, and delights in so doing, will not be infatuated by Maya.

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II.8.27-28
That sage Suka, being mightily pleased with this request of Parikshit, expounded in that assembly this great scripture Bhagavata equal to the Veda, which was first revealed to Brahma by the Bhagavan himself at the beginning of Brahmakalpa (the beginning of Brahma's life-span).



Chapter 9 - The inspiration of Brahma
Sri Suka said (answering Parikshit's questions)

II.9.1
... ... Except in the terms of the inherent deluding power of the Lord, it is not possible to explain how a spiritually conscious entity like the self can have any abiding connection with the body. This connection is parallel to the connection of the dream body with the self of the dreaming man.

II.9.2
......Delighting in the gunas of Prakriti, he thinks: 'This is mine. This is myself'.

II.9.3
When freed from infatuation with the body (through devotion), the Jiva delights in his nature as Spirit transcending Maya and Kala (time).

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II.9.4
(Suka said) I shall tell you what the Lord imparted to Brahma as instruction for attainment of illumination.......

II.9.5
When Brahma, the first of beings ......, thought about the ways and means of creation, sitting in his lotus seat, he could not get any clue as to how he should proceed.

II.9.6
... While contemplating, he heard a sound of two letters uttered twice from amidst the oosmic waters..... These 2 letters, the wealth of those who have no material wealth, are: Tapa, Tapa (concentrate, concentrate on your nature as the Spirit)....

II.9.7
.... He looked around to see who was speaking thus, but he could see none else than himself..... He reflected that this instruction must have come from a divine source....

II.9.8

He........understood the meaning of Tapas and engaged himself in it for a thousand years. Controlling the vital energies as also the external and internal organs, he practiced concentration on the subject of creation....

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The vision of Brahma

II.9.9
Worshipped in this way by Brahma, the Lord revealed His highest spiritual realm...

II.9.10
There neither rajas, nor tamas nor sattva mixed with them has any place; there even Maya, the Lord's delusive power, does not operate, and there reside the Lord's attendants whom both the Devas and the Azuras alike worship.

II.9.11
All the denizens of the realm are blue in colour, radiant, endowed with eyes like lotus petals, dressed in yellow robes, extremely attractive and handsome, having four arms, bedecked with brilliant gem-studded necklaces and other ornaments...

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II.9.15

Brahma saw Him who is extremely gracious to those who practise self-surrender to Him, who is a delight to the eyes, whose face is illumined by a gracious smile and rose-tinted eyes, and who is marked by His diadem, ear ornaments, for arms, yellow cloth, and Sri adorning his chest.


II.9.16

Brahma saw Him seated on a throne of great majesty and surrounded by the 25 expressions of His creative power (Sakti).... He was also surrounded by His own 6 divine majesties consisting in Aisvarya (lordliness), Virya (prowess), Yasa (fame), Sri (beauty-cum-auspiciousness), Jnana (omniscience) and Vairagya (renunciation).
In others these powers are very partial and impermanent, but they dance attendance on Him always, though He is never attached to or attracted by them, being ever established in His innate spiritual glory.

II.9.17
.... He fell down in prostration at His holy feet, which are attainable only through the highest form of devotion based on Jnana characteristic of Paramahamsas.

II.9.18
Then the Lord , a veritable embodiment of love, took Brahma by the hand as an expression of affection and addressed him in word surcharged with the graciousness of His face, while he, Brahma, the chosen one for the work of creation, stood before Him with a heart overflowing with devotion.


This will be my last post on this thread as I have not posted on here for a few days having been unwell. However, because I am still doing my daily reading it puts me 24 pages ahead of the page I have selected the verses I last quoted. Going back pages breaks the continuity of my reflection of the verses . Sorry, to those readers, however few.