Lamentation (SB cantos 1 - 6)

Expressions researched:
"lament" |"lamentable" |"lamentation" |"lamentations" |"lamented" |"lamenters" |"lamenting" |"lamentingly" |"lamentment" |"laments"

SB Preface and Introduction

SB Introduction:

Some unscrupulous people say that Lord Caitanya met His wife also after taking sannyāsa and offered her His wooden slipper for worship, but the authentic sources give no information about such a meeting. His mother met Him at the house of Advaita Prabhu, and when she saw her son in sannyāsa dress, she lamented. By way of compromise, she requested her son to make His headquarters in Purī so that she would easily be able to get information about Him. The Lord granted this last desire of His beloved mother. After this incident the Lord started for Purī, leaving all the residents of Navadvīpa in an ocean of lamentation over His separation.

SB Canto 1

SB 1.3.36, Purport:

The prime difference between the Lord and the living entities is that the Lord is the creator and the living entities are the created. Here He is called the amogha-līlaḥ, which indicates that there is nothing lamentable in His creation. Those who create disturbance in His creation are themselves disturbed. He is transcendental to all material afflictions because He is full with all six opulences, namely wealth, power, fame, beauty, knowledge and renunciation, and thus He is the master of the senses.

SB 1.5.4, Purport:

The Vedānta-sūtra, or Brahma-sūtra, compiled by Śrī Vyāsadeva is the full deliberation of the impersonal absolute feature, and it is accepted as the most exalted philosophical exposition in the world. It covers the subject of eternity, and the methods are scholarly. So there cannot be any doubt about the transcendental scholarship of Vyāsadeva. So why should he lament?

SB 1.5.33, Purport:

Everything is an emanation from the Supreme Spirit, and by His inconceivable power He can convert spirit into matter and matter into spirit. Therefore a material thing (so-called) is at once turned into a spiritual force by the great will of the Lord. The necessary condition for such a change is to employ so-called matter in the service of the spirit. That is the way to treat our material diseases and elevate ourselves to the spiritual plane where there is no misery, no lamentation and no fear. When everything is thus employed in the service of the Lord, we can experience that there is nothing except the Supreme Brahman. The Vedic mantra that "everything is Brahman" is thus realized by us.

SB 1.7.7, Translation:

Simply by giving aural reception to this Vedic literature, the feeling for loving devotional service to Lord Kṛṣṇa, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, sprouts up at once to extinguish the fire of lamentation, illusion and fearfulness.

SB 1.7.7, Purport:

Everyone is full of lamentation at every moment, he is after the mirage of illusory things, and he is always afraid of his supposed enemy. These are the primary symptoms of material disease. And it is definitely suggested herein that simply by hearing the message of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam one gets attachment for the Supreme Personality of Godhead Śrī Kṛṣṇa, and as soon as this is effected the symptoms of the material diseases disappear. Śrīla Vyāsadeva saw the all-perfect Personality of Godhead, and in this statement it is clearly confirmed that the all-perfect Personality of Godhead is Śrī Kṛṣṇa.

SB 1.7.13-14, Translation:

When the respective warriors of both camps, namely the Kauravas and the Pāṇḍavas, were killed on the Battlefield of Kurukṣetra and the dead warriors obtained their deserved destinations, and when the son of Dhṛtarāṣṭra fell down lamenting, his spine broken, being beaten by the club of Bhīmasena, the son of Droṇācārya (Aśvatthāmā) beheaded the five sleeping sons of Draupadī and delivered them as a prize to his master, foolishly thinking that he would be pleased. Duryodhana, however, disapproved of the heinous act, and he was not pleased in the least.

SB 1.7.41, Translation:

After reaching his own camp, Arjuna, along with his dear friend and charioteer (Śrī Kṛṣṇa), entrusted the murderer unto his dear wife, who was lamenting for her murdered sons.

SB 1.8.2, Translation:

Having lamented over them and sufficiently offered Ganges water, they bathed in the Ganges, whose water is sanctified due to being mixed with the dust of the lotus feet of the Lord.

SB 1.8.4, Purport:

By cultivating spiritual knowledge, we can realize that we have nothing to do with all this material paraphernalia. Then at once we become free from material attachment. This clearance of the misgivings of material existence at once takes place by association with the Lord's devotees, who are able to inject the transcendental sound into the depths of the bewildered heart and thus make one practically liberated from all lamentation and illusion. That is a summary of the pacifying measures for those affected by the reaction of stringent material laws, exhibited in the forms of birth, death, old age and disease, which are insoluble factors of material existence. The victims of war, namely, the family members of the Kurus, were lamenting the problems of death, and the Lord pacified them on the basis of knowledge.

SB 1.9.13, Purport:

The sufferings of Kuntīdevī are doubly lamented. She suffered greatly because of early widowhood and to get her minor children brought up in the royal family. And when her children were grown up, she continued to suffer because of her sons' actions. So her sufferings continued. This means that she was destined to suffer by providence, and this one has to tolerate without being disturbed.

SB 1.9.15, Purport:

Despite the power of pious acts, the power of personalities, the power of expert management and the power of weapons under the direct supervision of Lord Kṛṣṇa, the Pāṇḍavas suffered so many practical reverses, which can only be explained as due to the influence of kāla, inevitable time. Kāla is identical with the Lord Himself, and therefore the influence of kāla indicates the inexplicable wish of the Lord Himself. There is nothing to be lamented when a matter is beyond the control of any human being.

SB 1.9.36, Purport:

All the commanders of the parties on the Battlefield of Kurukṣetra were standing face to face, and Arjuna saw them with great compassion and lamented that he was to kill his kinsmen on the battlefield for the sake of the empire. He was not at all afraid of the giant military phalanx presented by Duryodhana, but as a merciful devotee of the Lord, renunciation of worldly things was natural for him, and thus he decided not to fight for worldly possessions. But this was due to a poor fund of knowledge, and therefore it is said here that his intelligence became polluted. His intelligence could not be polluted at any time because he was a devotee and constant companion of the Lord, as is clear in the Fourth Chapter of the Bhagavad-gītā.

SB 1.12.21, Purport:

After the disappearance of Lord Kṛṣṇa, the message was brought by Arjuna to Mahārāja Yudhiṣṭhira. Again, Arjuna visited Dvārakā, and all the widow wives of Lord Kṛṣṇa lamented before him. He took them all in the presence of Vasudeva and pacified all of them. Later on, when Vasudeva passed away, he performed his funeral ceremony in the absence of Kṛṣṇa. While Arjuna was taking all the wives of Kṛṣṇa to Indraprastha, he was attacked on the way, and he could not protect the ladies in his custody. At last, advised by Vyāsadeva, all the brothers began their mahā-prasthāna. On the way, at the request of his brother, he gave up all important weapons as useless, and he dropped them all in the water.

SB 1.13.3-4, Purport:

Her mourning over the death of Duryodhana and Duḥśāsana before Lord Kṛṣṇa was very pitiful, and Lord Kṛṣṇa pacified her by transcendental messages. She was equally aggrieved on the death of Karṇa, and she described to Lord Kṛṣṇa the lamentation of Karṇa's wife. She was pacified by Śrīla Vyāsadeva when he showed her dead sons, then promoted to the heavenly kingdoms. She died along with her husband in the jungles of the Himalayas near the mouth of the Ganges; she burned in a forest fire. Mahārāja Yudhiṣṭhira performed the death ceremony of his uncle and aunt.

SB 1.13.3-4, Purport:

Draupadī was gained in this Pāñcāladeśa by Arjuna, but by order of Kuntī all five of the Pāṇḍava brothers became equally the husbands of Pāñcālī, or Draupadī. She was married with five Pāṇḍavas in the presence of Vyāsadeva. Kuntīdevī never forgot her first child, Karṇa, and after Karṇa's death in the Battle of Kurukṣetra she lamented and admitted before her other sons that Karṇa was her eldest son prior to her marriage with Mahārāja Pāṇḍu. Her prayers for the Lord after the Battle of Kurukṣetra, when Lord Kṛṣṇa was going back home, are excellently explained. Later she went to the forest with Gāndhārī for severe penance. She used to take meals after each thirty days. She finally sat down in profound meditation and later burned to ashes in a forest fire.

SB 1.13.8, Purport:

It was an intrigue of Dhṛtarāṣṭra that the Pāṇḍavas might die all together with their mother. And by his warning the Pāṇḍavas escaped through a tunnel underneath the earth so that their escape was also unknown to Dhṛtarāṣṭra, so much so that after setting the fire, the Kauravas were so certain of the death of the Pāṇḍavas that Dhṛtarāṣṭra performed the last rites of death with great cheerfulness. And during the mourning period all the members of the palace became overwhelmed with lamentation, but Vidura did not become so, because of his knowledge that the Pāṇḍavas were alive somewhere. There are many such instances of calamities, and in each of them Vidura gave protection to the Pāṇḍavas on one hand, and on the other he tried to restrain his brother Dhṛtarāṣṭra from such intriguing policies. Therefore, he was always partial to the Pāṇḍavas, just as a bird protects its eggs by its wing.

SB 1.13.20, Purport:

During the political upsurge in India and its division into Pakistan and Hindustan, so many rich and influential Indians had to surrender life, property and honor due to the influence of time, and there are hundreds and thousands of examples like that all over the world, all over the universe, which are all effects of the influence of time. Therefore, the conclusion is that there is no powerful living being within the universe who can overcome the influence of time. Many poets have written verses lamenting the influence of time. Many devastations have taken place over the universes due to the influence of time, and no one could check them by any means. Even in our daily life, so many things come and go in which we have no hand, but we have to suffer or tolerate them without remedial measure. That is the result of time.

SB 1.13.41, Translation:

Śrī Nārada said: O pious King, do not lament for anyone, for everyone is under the control of the Supreme Lord. Therefore all living beings and their leaders carry on worship to be well protected. It is He only who brings them together and disperses them.

SB 1.13.44, Purport:

The eternal living entity transmigrates from one material body to another by the law of karma, and material bodies are perishable by their fundamental structures. Therefore there is nothing to be lamented in the case of the soul's being transferred into another body, or the material body's perishing at a certain stage. There are others also who believe in the merging of the spirit soul in the Supreme Spirit when it is uncovered by the material encagement, and there are others also who do not believe in the existence of spirit or soul, but believe in tangible matter. In our daily experience we find so many transformations of matter from one form to another, but we do not lament such changing features. In either of the above cases, the force of divine energy is uncheckable; no one has any hand in it, and thus there is no cause of grief.

SB 1.13.47, Purport:

No one is strong enough to protect himself from the onslaught of a stronger, and by the will of the Lord there are systematic categories of the weak, the stronger and the strongest. There is nothing to be lamented if a tiger eats a weaker animal, including a man, because that is the law of the Supreme Lord. But although the law states that a human being must subsist on another living being, there is the law of good sense also, for the human being is meant to obey the laws of the scriptures.

SB 1.13.59, Purport:

An offense at the feet of a Vaiṣṇava is more dangerous than an offense at the lotus feet of the Lord. Vidura was certainly very liberal to bestow mercy upon his brother Dhṛtarāṣṭra, whose past life was very materialistic. But ultimately the result of such mercy certainly depended on the will of the Supreme Lord in the present life; therefore Dhṛtarāṣṭra attained liberation only, and after many such liberated states of life one can attain to the stage of devotional service. Vidura was certainly very mortified by the death of his brother and sister-in-law, and the only remedy to mitigate such lamentation was to go out to pilgrimage. Thus Mahārāja Yudhiṣṭhira had no chance to call back Vidura, his surviving uncle.

SB 1.13.60, Translation:

Having spoken thus, the great sage Nārada, along with his vīṇā, ascended into outer space. Yudhiṣṭhira kept his instruction in his heart and so was able to get rid of all lamentations.

SB 1.14.8, Purport:

All such activities are simultaneously one and different by His inconceivable potency. When Mahārāja Yudhiṣṭhira was lamenting the possibility of His disappearance, it was just in pursuance of a custom of lamenting the disappearance of a great friend, but factually the Lord never quits His transcendental body, as is misconceived by less intelligent persons. Such less intelligent persons have been condemned by the Lord Himself in Bhagavad-gītā, and they are known as the mūḍhas. That the Lord left His body means that He left again His plenary portions in the respective dhāmas (transcendental abodes), as He left His virāṭ-rūpa in the material world.

SB 1.14.20, Translation:

The Deities seem to be crying in the temple, lamenting and perspiring. They seem about to leave. All the cities, villages, towns, gardens, mines and hermitages are now devoid of beauty and bereft of all happiness. I do not know what sort of calamities are now awaiting us.

SB 1.14.37, Purport:

Once, along with her husband, she met Draupadī, and she was anxious to be instructed by Draupadī in the ways and means of pleasing her husband. Draupadī was expert in this affair because she kept five husbands, the Pāṇḍavas, and all were very much pleased with her. On receipt of Draupadī's instructions, she was very much pleased and offered her good wishes and returned to Dvārakā. She was the daughter of Satrājit. After the departure of Lord Kṛṣṇa, when Arjuna visited Dvārakā, all the queens, including Satyabhāmā and Rukmiṇī, lamented for the Lord with great feeling. At the last stage of her life, she left for the forest to undergo severe penance.

SB 1.15.7, Purport:

The vaiśyas and the śūdras are less important than the kṣatriyas. Karṇa was known as the son of a carpenter, a śūdra. So Draupadī avoided Karṇa by this plea. When Arjuna, in the dress of a poor brāhmaṇa, pierced the difficult target, everyone was astonished, and all of them, especially Karṇa, offered a stiff fight to Arjuna, but as usual by the grace of Lord Kṛṣṇa he was able to emerge very successful in the princely fight and thus gain the valuable hand of Kṛṣṇā, or Draupadī. Arjuna was lamentingly remembering the incident in the absence of the Lord, by whose strength only he was so powerful.

SB 1.16.20, Translation:

I have lost my three legs and am now standing on one only. Are you lamenting for my state of existence? Or are you in great anxiety because henceforward the unlawful meat-eaters will exploit you? Or are you in a sorry plight because the demigods are now bereft of their share of sacrificial offerings because no sacrifices are being performed at present? Or are you grieving for living beings because of their sufferings due to famine and drought?

SB 1.16.22, Translation:

The so-called administrators are now bewildered by the influence of this age of Kali, and thus they have put all state affairs into disorder. Are you now lamenting this disorder? Now the general populace does not follow the rules and regulations for eating, sleeping, drinking, mating, etc., and they are inclined to perform such anywhere and everywhere. Are you unhappy because of this?

SB 1.16.22, Purport:

A dog can mate with a bitch before the public eyes without hesitation, but if a human being does so the act will be considered a public nuisance, and the person will be criminally prosecuted. Therefore for the human being there are some rules and regulations, even for fulfilling common demands. The human society avoids such rules and regulations when it is bewildered by the influence of the age of Kali. In this age, people are indulging in such necessities of life without following the rules and regulations, and this deterioration of social and moral rules is certainly lamentable because of the harmful effects of such beastly behavior. In this age, the fathers and the guardians are not happy with the behavior of their wards. They should know that so many innocent children are victims of bad association awarded by the influence of this age of Kali.

SB 1.16.31, Purport:

To become a brāhmaṇa by a birthright claim is not at all bona fide, although it may be a fulfillment of one of the conditions. But the real qualification of a brāhmaṇa is to control the mind and the senses, and to cultivate tolerance, simplicity, cleanliness, knowledge, truthfulness, devotion and faith in the Vedic wisdom. In the present age, consideration of the necessary qualification is being neglected, and the false birthright claim is being supported even by a popular, sophisticated poet, the author of Rāma-carita-mānasa. This is all due to the influence of the age of Kali. Thus mother earth, represented as a cow, was lamenting the regrettable condition.

SB 1.17.8, Purport:

The protection of the lives of both the human beings and the animals is the first and foremost duty of a government. A government must not discriminate in such principles. It is simply horrible for a pure-hearted soul to see organized animal-killing by the state in this age of Kali. Mahārāja Parīkṣit was lamenting for the tears in the eyes of the bull, and he was astonished to see such an unprecedented thing in his good kingdom. Men and animals were equally protected as far as life was concerned. That is the way in God's kingdom.

SB 1.17.9, Translation:

O son of Surabhi, you need lament no longer now. There is no need to fear this low-class śūdra. And, O mother cow, as long as I am living as the ruler and subduer of all envious men, there is no cause for you to cry. Everything will be good for you.

SB 1.17.27, Translation:

Now she, the chaste one, being unfortunately forsaken by the Personality of Godhead, laments her future with tears in her eyes, for now she is being ruled and enjoyed by lower-class men who pose as rulers.

SB 1.18.41, Purport:

Since Śamīka Ṛṣi was an experienced, good brāhmaṇa, he did not approve of the actions of his condemned son. He began to lament for all that his son had done. The king was beyond the jurisdiction of curses as a general rule, and what to speak of a good king like Mahārāja Parīkṣit. The offense of the King was most insignificant, and his being condemned to death was certainly a very great sin for Śṛṅgi. Therefore Ṛṣi Śamīka regretted the whole incident.

SB 1.19.3, Purport:

The age of Kali aims at killing the higher principles of life, and although Mahārāja Parīkṣit strongly resisted the domination of the personality of Kali within the world, the influence of the age of Kali came at an opportune moment, and even a strong king like Mahārāja Parīkṣit was induced to disregard the brahminical culture due to a slight provocation of hunger and thirst. Mahārāja Parīkṣit lamented the accidental incident, and he desired that all his kingdom, strength and accumulation of wealth would be burned up for not being engaged in brahminical culture, etc.

SB 1.19.21, Translation:

We shall all wait here until the foremost devotee of the Lord, Mahārāja Parīkṣit, returns to the supreme planet, which is completely free from all mundane contamination and all kinds of lamentation.

SB 1.19.21, Purport:

Beyond the limitation of the material creation, which is compared to the cloud in the sky, there is the paravyoma, or the spiritual sky, full of planets called Vaikuṇṭhas. Such Vaikuṇṭha planets are also differently known as the Puruṣottamaloka, Acyutaloka, Trivikramaloka, Hṛṣīkeśaloka, Keśavaloka, Aniruddhaloka, Mādhavaloka, Pradyumnaloka, Saṅkarṣaṇaloka, Śrīdharaloka, Vāsudevaloka, Ayodhyāloka, Dvārakāloka and many other millions of spiritual lokas wherein the Personality of Godhead predominates; all the living entities there are liberated souls with spiritual bodies as good as that of the Lord. There is no material contamination; everything there is spiritual, and therefore there is nothing objectively lamentable.

SB 1.19.21, Purport:

They are full of transcendental bliss, and are without birth, death, old age and disease. And amongst all the above-mentioned Vaikuṇṭhalokas, there is one supreme loka called Goloka Vṛndāvana, which is the abode of the Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa and His specific associates. Mahārāja Parīkṣit was destined to achieve this particular loka, and the great ṛṣis assembled there could foresee this. All of them consulted among themselves about the great departure of the great King, and they wanted to see him up to the last moment because they would no more be able to see such a great devotee of the Lord. When a great devotee of the Lord passes away, there is nothing to be lamented because the devotee is destined to enter into the kingdom of God. But the sorry plight is that such great devotees leave our sight, and therefore there is every reason to be sorry. As the Lord is rarely to be seen by our present eyes, so also are the great devotees. The great ṛṣis, therefore, correctly decided to remain on the spot till the last moment.

SB Canto 2

SB 2.9.10, Purport:

The mode of ignorance influences a living entity to the habit of lust and hankering, and this means that in the Vaikuṇṭhalokas the living entities are free from these two things. As confirmed in the Bhagavad-gītā, in the brahma-bhūta (SB 4.30.20) stage of life one becomes free from hankering and lamentation. Therefore the conclusion is that the inhabitants of the Vaikuṇṭha planets are all brahma-bhūta living entities, as distinguished from the mundane creatures who are all compact in hankering and lamentation. When one is not in the modes of ignorance and passion, one is supposed to be situated in the mode of goodness in the material world. Goodness in the material world also at times becomes contaminated by touches of the modes of passion and ignorance. In the Vaikuṇṭhaloka, it is unalloyed goodness only.

SB Canto 3

SB 3.1.41, Translation:

O gentle one, I simply lament for he (Dhṛtarāṣṭra) who rebelled against his brother after death. By him I was driven out of my own house, although I am his sincere well-wisher, because he accepted the line of action adopted by his own sons.

SB 3.1.41, Purport:

Vidura did not ask about the welfare of his elder brother because there was no chance of his well-being, only news of his gliding down to hell. Vidura was a sincere well-wisher for Dhṛtarāṣṭra, and he had a thought about him in the corner of his heart. He lamented that Dhṛtarāṣṭra could rebel against the sons of his dead brother Pāṇḍu and that he could drive him (Vidura) out of his own house on the dictation of his crooked sons. In spite of these actions, Vidura never became an enemy of Dhṛtarāṣṭra but continued to be his well-wisher, and at the last stage of Dhṛtarāṣṭra's life, it was Vidura only who proved to be his real friend. Such is the behavior of a Vaiṣṇava like Vidura: he desires all good, even for his enemies.

SB 3.2.7, Purport:

As at sunset the snakes become powerful, thieves are encouraged, ghosts become active, the lotus becomes disfigured and the cakravākī laments, so with the disappearance of Lord Kṛṣṇa, the atheists feel enlivened, and the devotees become sorry.

SB 3.2.8, Purport:

Uddhava lamented for the unfortunate persons of the world who could not recognize Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa in spite of seeing all His transcendental godly qualities. From the very beginning of His appearance within the prison bars of King Kaṁsa up to His mausala-līlā, although He exhibited His potencies as the Personality of Godhead in the six opulences of wealth, strength, fame, beauty, knowledge and renunciation, the foolish persons of the world could not understand that He was the Supreme Lord, Foolish persons might have thought Him an extraordinary historic figure because they had no intimate touch with the Lord, but more unfortunate were the family members of the Lord, the members of the Yadu dynasty, who were always in company with the Lord but were unable to recognize Him as the Supreme Personality of Godhead.

SB 3.2.8, Purport:

Uddhava lamented his own fortune also because although he knew Kṛṣṇa to be the Supreme Personality of Godhead, he could not properly use the opportunity to render devotional service to the Lord. He regretted everyone's misfortune, including his own. The pure devotee of the Lord thinks himself most unfortunate. That is due to excessive love for the Lord and is one of the transcendental perceptions of viraha, the suffering of separation.

SB 3.2.10, Purport:

Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa is the Supreme Personality of Godhead according to all the evidences of the Vedas. He is accepted by all ācāryas, including Śrīpāda Śaṅkarācārya. But when He was present in the world, different classes of men accepted Him differently, and therefore their calculations of the Lord were also different. Generally, persons who had faith in the revealed scriptures accepted the Lord as He is, and all of them merged into great bereavement when the Lord disappeared from the world. In the First Canto we have already discussed the lamentation of Arjuna and Yudhiṣṭhira, to whom the disappearance of Lord Kṛṣṇa was almost intolerable up to the end of their lives.

SB 3.2.15, Purport:

The devotees of the Lord are by nature peaceful because they have no material hankering. A liberated soul has no hankering, and therefore he has no lamentation. One who wants to possess also laments when he loses his possession. Devotees have no hankerings for material possessions and no hankerings for spiritual salvation. They are situated in the transcendental loving service of the Lord as a matter of duty, and they do not mind where they are or how they have to act. Karmīs, jñānīs and yogīs all hanker to possess some material or spiritual assets. Karmīs want material possessions, jñānīs and yogīs want spiritual possessions, but devotees do not want any material or spiritual assets. They want only to serve the Lord anywhere in the material or spiritual worlds that the Lord desires, and the Lord is always specifically compassionate towards such devotees.

SB 3.2.16, Purport:

Because Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa is the original person from whom everything and everyone has emanated—ahaṁ sarvasya prabhavaḥ (BG 10.8), janmādy asya yataḥ (SB 1.1.1) (Vedānta-sūtra 1.1.2)—nothing can be equal to or greater than Him. The Lord is supremely perfect, and whenever He enacts His transcendental pastimes as a son, a rival or an object of enmity, He plays the part so perfectly that even pure devotees like Uddhava are bewildered. For example, Uddhava knew perfectly well that Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa is eternally existent and can neither die nor disappear for good, yet he lamented for Lord Kṛṣṇa. All these events are perfect arrangements to give perfection to His supreme glories. It is for enjoyment's sake. When a father plays with his little son and the father lies down on the floor as if defeated by the son, it is just to give the little son pleasure, and nothing more.

SB 3.2.16, Purport:

Because the Lord is all-powerful, it is possible for Him to adjust opposites such as birth and no birth, power and defeat, fear and fearlessness. A pure devotee knows very well how it is possible for the Lord to adjust opposite things, but he laments for the nondevotees who, not knowing the supreme glories of the Lord, think of Him as imaginary simply because there are so many apparently contradictory statements in the scriptures. Factually there is nothing contradictory; everything is possible when we understand the Lord as the Lord and not as one of us, with all our imperfection.

SB 3.2.20, Purport:

Uddhava seemingly lamented that his own position was less than that of the warriors on the Battlefield of Kurukṣetra because they had attained to Vaikuṇṭha whereas he remained to lament the disappearance of the Lord.

SB 3.7.11, Purport:

The Supreme Soul, the Personality of Godhead, is compared to the moon in the sky, and the living entities are compared to the reflection of the moon on water. The moon in the sky is fixed and does not appear to quiver like the moon on the water. Actually, like the original moon in the sky, the moon reflected on the water should also not quiver, but because of being associated with water, the reflection appears to be quivering, although in actual fact the moon is fixed. The water moves, but the moon does not move. Similarly, the living entities appear to be tainted by material qualities like illusion, lamentation and miseries, although in the pure soul such qualities are completely absent. The word pratīyate, which means "apparently" and "not actually" (like the experience of having one's head cut off in a dream), is significant here. The reflection of the moon on the water is the separated rays of the moon and not the actual moon.

SB 3.9.6, Translation:

O my Lord, the people of the world are embarrassed by all material anxieties—they are always afraid. They always try to protect wealth, body and friends, they are filled with lamentation and unlawful desires and paraphernalia, and they avariciously base their undertakings on the perishable conceptions of "my" and "mine." As long as they do not take shelter of Your safe lotus feet, they are full of such anxieties.

SB 3.9.6, Purport:

One may question how one can always think of the Lord in regard to His name, fame, quality, etc., if one is embarrassed by thoughts of family affairs. Everyone in the material world is full of thoughts about how to maintain his family, how to protect his wealth, how to keep pace with friends and relatives, etc. Thus he is always in fear and lamentation, trying to keep up with the status quo. In answer to this question, this verse spoken by Brahmā is very appropriate.

SB 3.12.11, Purport:

The most lamentable falldown of the impersonalist is due to his false and unreasonable claim of being one with the Supreme.

SB 3.14.39, Translation:

O haughty one, you will have two contemptuous sons born of your condemned womb. Unlucky woman, they will cause constant lamentation to all the three worlds!

SB 3.14.44-45, Translation:

The learned Kaśyapa said: Because of your lamentation, penitence and proper deliberation, and also because of your unflinching faith in the Supreme Personality of Godhead and your adoration for Lord Śiva and me, one of the sons (Prahlāda) of your son (Hiraṇyakaśipu) will be an approved devotee of the Lord, and his fame will be broadcast equally with that of the Personality of Godhead.

SB 3.14.49, Translation:

He will be a virtuously qualified reservoir of all good qualities; he will be jolly and happy in others' happiness, distressed in others' distress, and will have no enemies. He will be a destroyer of the lamentation of all the universes, like the pleasant moon after the summer sun.

SB 3.23.7, Translation:

Kardama Muni continued: I have achieved the blessings of the Lord in discharging my own religious life of austerity, meditation and Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Although you have not yet experienced these achievements, which are free from fear and lamentation, I shall offer them all to you because you are engaged in my service. Now just look at them. I am giving you the transcendental vision to see how nice they are.

SB 3.23.7, Purport:

What are the graces of the Lord? It is stated here that the graces of the Lord are abhaya, free from fearfulness. In the material world, if someone accumulates a million dollars, he is always full of fear because he is always thinking, "What if the money is lost?" But the benediction of the Lord, bhagavat-prasāda, is never to be lost. It is simply to be enjoyed. There is no question of loss. One simply gains and enjoys gaining. Bhagavad-gītā also confirms this: when one achieves the grace of the Lord, the result is that sarva-duḥkhāni, all distresses, are destroyed. When situated in the transcendental position, one is freed from the two kinds of material diseases—hankering and lamentation.

SB 3.23.54, Purport:

Devahūti is lamenting her position. As a woman, she had to love someone. Somehow or other, she came to love Kardama Muni, but without knowing of his spiritual advancement. Kardama Muni could understand Devahūti's heart; generally all women desire material enjoyment. They are called less intelligent because they are mostly prone to material enjoyment. Devahūti laments because her husband had given her the best kind of material enjoyment, but she did not know that he was so advanced in spiritual realization. Her plea was that even though she did not know the glories of her great husband, because she had taken shelter of him she must be delivered from material entanglement. Association with a great personality is most important.

SB 3.24.34, Translation:

Today I have something to ask from You, who are the Lord of all living entities. Since I have now been liberated by You from my debts to my father, and since all my desires are fulfilled, I wish to accept the order of an itinerant mendicant. Renouncing this family life, I wish to wander about, free from lamentation, thinking always of You in my heart.

SB 3.24.39, Translation:

In your own heart, through your intellect, you will always see Me, the supreme self-effulgent soul dwelling within the hearts of all living entities. Thus you will achieve the state of eternal life, free from all lamentation and fear.

SB 3.24.39, Purport:

The Bhāgavatam has already enunciated that the Absolute Truth is present in three features—in the beginning as the impersonal Brahman, in the next stage as the Paramātmā in everyone's heart, and, at last, as the ultimate realization of the Absolute Truth, Bhagavān, the Supreme Personality of Godhead. One who sees the Supreme Person can automatically realize the other features, namely the Paramātmā and Brahman features of the Lord. The words used here are viśoko 'bhayam ṛcchasi. Simply by seeing the Personality of Godhead one realizes everything, and the result is that one becomes situated on the platform where there is no lamentation and no fear. This can be attained simply by devotional service to the Personality of Godhead.

SB 3.25.18, Purport:

Unless one is liberated from material contamination, one cannot engage himself in the devotional service of the Lord. In this verse, therefore, it is stated, jñāna-vairāgya-yuktena: when one is in full knowledge of one's constitutional position and is in the renounced order of life, detached from material attraction, then, by pure devotional service, bhakti-yuktena, he can engage himself as a loving servant of the Lord. Paripaśyati means that he can see everything in its right perspective. Then the influence of material nature becomes almost nil. This is also confirmed in Bhagavad-gītā. Brahma-bhūtaḥ prasannātmā: (BG 18.54) when one is self-realized he becomes happy and free from the influence of material nature, and at that time he is freed from lamentation and hankering. The Lord states that position as mad-bhaktiṁ labhate parām (BG 18.54), the real state of beginning devotional service. Similarly, it is confirmed in the Nārada Pañcarātra that when the senses are purified they can then be engaged in the devotional service of the Lord. One who is attached to material contamination cannot be a devotee.

SB 3.26.26, Purport:

One great ācārya, Narottama dāsa Ṭhākura, has lamented that when one deviates from pure consciousness of Vāsudeva, or Kṛṣṇa consciousness, he becomes entangled in material activities. The exact words he uses are, sat-saṅga chāḍi' kainu asate vilāsa/ te-kāraṇe lāgila ye karma-bandha-phāṅsa: "I have given up the pure status of consciousness because I wanted to enjoy in the temporary, material manifestation; therefore I have been entangled in the network of actions and reactions."

SB 3.28.43, Purport:

The small particles of soul are just like sparks of the larger soul. The greatest soul is the Supersoul, but the Supersoul is quantitatively different from the small soul. The Supersoul is described in the Vedic literature as the supplier of all necessities of the smaller soul (nityo nityānām). One who understands this distinction between the Supersoul and the individual soul is above lamentation and is in a peaceful position. When the smaller soul thinks himself quantitatively as big as the larger soul, he is under the spell of māyā, for that is not his constitutional position. No one can become the greater soul simply by mental speculation.

SB 3.30.2, Translation:

Whatever is produced by the materialist with great pain and labor for so-called happiness, the Supreme Personality, as the time factor, destroys, and for this reason the conditioned soul laments.

SB 3.30.17, Translation:

In this way he comes under the clutches of death and lies down, surrounded by lamenting friends and relatives, and although he wants to speak with them, he no longer can because he is under the control of time.

SB 3.30.32, Purport:

The example set herein is that the sinful person suffers just like a man who has lost his wealth. The human form of body is achieved by the conditioned soul after many, many births and is a very valuable asset. Instead of utilizing this life to get liberation, if one uses it simply for the purpose of maintaining his so-called family and therefore performs foolish and unauthorized action, he is compared to a man who has lost his wealth and who, upon losing it, laments. When wealth is lost, there is no use lamenting, but as long as there is wealth, one has to utilize it properly and thereby gain eternal profit. It may be argued that when a man leaves his money earned by sinful activities, he also leaves his sinful activities here with his money. But it is especially mentioned herein that by superior arrangement (daivenāsāditam), although the man leaves behind him his sinfully earned money, he carries the effect of it. When a man steals some money, if he is caught and agrees to return it, he is not freed from the criminal punishment. By the law of the state, even though he returns the money, he has to undergo the punishment. Similarly, the money earned by a criminal process may be left by the man when dying, but by superior arrangement he carries with him the effect, and therefore he has to suffer hellish life.

SB Canto 4

SB 4.7.28, Translation:

The members of the assembly addressed the Lord: O exclusive shelter for all who are situated in troubled life, in this formidable fort of conditional existence the time element, like a snake, is always looking for an opportunity to strike. This world is full of ditches of so-called distress and happiness, and there are many ferocious animals always ready to attack. The fire of lamentation is always blazing, and the mirage of false happiness is always alluring, but one has no shelter from them. Thus foolish persons live in the cycle of birth and death, always overburdened in discharging their so-called duties, and we do not know when they will accept the shelter of Your lotus feet.

SB 4.8.16, Translation:

This incident was unbearable to Sunīti's patience. She began to burn as if in a forest fire, and in her grief she became just like a burnt leaf and so lamented. As she remembered the words of her co-wife, her bright, lotuslike face filled with tears, and thus she spoke.

SB 4.8.24, Purport:

Both the mother and the son were lamenting Dhruva Mahārāja's having been insulted by his stepmother and his father's not having taken any step on this issue. But mere lamentation is useless—one should find out the means to mitigate one's lamentation. Thus both mother and son decided to take shelter of the lotus feet of the Lord because that is the only solution to all material problems. It is indicated in this connection that Dhruva Mahārāja left his father's capital city to go to a secluded place to search out the Supreme Personality of Godhead. It is the instruction of Prahlāda Mahārāja also that if one is seeking peace of mind he should free himself from all contamination of family life and take shelter of the Supreme Godhead by going to the forest. To the Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇava this forest is the forest of Vṛndā, or Vṛndāvana. If one takes shelter of Vṛndāvana under Vṛndāvaneśvarī, Śrīmatī Rādhārāṇī, certainly all the problems of his life are solved very easily.

SB 4.8.28, Purport:

In the Vedas it is said that the living entity is always uncontaminated and unaffected by material association. The living entity gets different types of material bodies because of his previous fruitive actions. If, however, one understands the philosophy that as a living spirit soul he has an affinity for neither suffering nor enjoyment, then he is considered to be a liberated person. It is confirmed in Bhagavad-gītā (18.54), brahma-bhūtaḥ prasannātmā: when one is actually situated on the transcendental platform, he has nothing for which to lament and nothing for which to hanker. Nārada Ṛṣi first of all wanted to impress upon Dhruva Mahārāja that he was only a child; he should not have been affected by words of insult or honor. And if he were so developed as to understand honor and insult, then this understanding should have been applied in his own life; he should have known that honor and dishonor are both destined only by one's previous actions; therefore one should not be sorry or happy under any circumstances.

SB 4.9.30, Purport:

In this verse Dhruva Mahārāja himself explains the cause of his moroseness. First he laments that to see the Supreme Personality of Godhead directly is not easy. Even great saintly persons like the four celebrated brahmacārīs headed by Sanandana-Sanandana, Sanaka, Sanātana and Sanat-kumāra—practiced the yoga system for many, many births and remained in trance before getting the opportunity to see the Supreme Lord face to face. As far as Dhruva Mahārāja was concerned, he saw the Supreme Lord personally after only six months of practice in devotional service. He expected, therefore, that as soon as he met the Supreme Lord, the Lord would take him to His abode immediately, without waiting. Dhruva Mahārāja could understand very clearly that the Lord had offered him the rule of the world for thirty-six thousand years because in the beginning he was under the spell of the material energy and wanted to take revenge against his stepmother and rule over his father's kingdom. Dhruva Mahārāja greatly lamented his propensity for ruling the material world and his revengeful attitude towards other living entities.

SB 4.9.31, Purport:

Dhruva Mahārāja was actually initiated by Nārada Muni, the greatest Vaiṣṇava, in the chanting of oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya. This mantra is a viṣṇu-mantra, for by practicing the chanting of this mantra one is elevated to the Viṣṇuloka. Dhruva Mahārāja regrets that although he was initiated in the viṣṇu-mantra by a Vaiṣṇava, he still aspired for material benefits. That was another cause for lamentation. Although he got the result of the viṣṇu-mantra by the causeless mercy of the Lord, he lamented how foolish he was to have strived for material benefits while practicing devotional service. In other words, every one of us who is engaged in devotional service in Kṛṣṇa consciousness should be completely free from all material aspirations. Otherwise we will have to lament like Dhruva Mahārāja.

SB 4.9.33, Translation:

Dhruva Mahārāja lamented: I was under the influence of the illusory energy; being ignorant of the actual facts, I was sleeping on her lap. Under a vision of duality, I saw my brother as my enemy, and falsely I lamented within my heart, thinking, "They are my enemies."

SB 4.10.4, Translation:

When Dhruva Mahārāja heard of the killing of his brother Uttama by the Yakṣas in the Himalaya Mountains, being overwhelmed with lamentation and anger, he got on his chariot and went out for victory over the city of the Yakṣas, Alakāpurī.

SB 4.10.4, Purport:

Dhruva Mahārāja's becoming angry, overwhelmed with grief, and envious of the enemies was not incompatible with his position as a great devotee. It is a misunderstanding that a devotee should not be angry, envious or overwhelmed by lamentation. Dhruva Mahārāja was the king, and when his brother was unceremoniously killed, it was his duty to take revenge against the Yakṣas from the Himalayas.

SB 4.10.16, Translation:

Dhruva Mahārāja's bow and arrows twanged and hissed, causing lamentation in the hearts of his enemies. He began to shoot incessant arrows, shattering all their different weapons, just as the blasting wind scatters the assembled clouds in the sky.

SB 4.13.8-9, Translation and Purport:

By expansion of his knowledge of the Supreme Brahman, he had already attained liberation from the bondage of the body. This liberation is known as nirvāṇa. He was situated in transcendental bliss, and he continued always in that blissful existence, which expanded more and more. This was possible for him by continual practice of bhakti-yoga, which is compared to fire because it burns away all dirty, material things. He was always situated in his constitutional position of self-realization, and he could not see anything else but the Supreme Lord and himself engaged in discharging devotional service.

These two verses explain the verse in the Bhagavad-gītā (18.54):

brahma-bhūtaḥ prasannātmā

na śocati na kāṅkṣati

samaḥ sarveṣu bhūteṣu

mad-bhaktiṁ labhate parām

"One who is transcendentally situated at once realizes the Supreme Brahman and becomes fully joyful. He never laments nor desires to have anything. He is equally disposed towards every living entity. In that state he achieves pure devotional service unto Me."

SB 4.16.25, Purport:

The word vidanti refers to one who knows something or enjoys something. When a person is properly instructed by a spiritual master and understands transcendental bliss, he enjoys life. As stated in Bhagavad-gītā (18.54), brahma-bhūtaḥ prasannātmā na śocati na kāṅkṣati. When one attains to the Brahman platform, he neither hankers nor laments. He actually partakes of transcendental, blissful enjoyment. Although King Pṛthu was an incarnation of Viṣṇu, he nonetheless taught the people in his kingdom to take instructions from a spiritual master who represents the disciplic succession. Thus one can become fortunate and enjoy a blissful life even within this material world. In this verse the verb vidanti is sometimes taken to mean "understanding." Thus when a person understands Brahman, or the supreme source of everything, he enjoys a blissful life.

SB 4.17.12, Translation:

After hearing this lamentation and seeing the pitiable condition of the citizens, King Pṛthu contemplated this matter for a long time to see if he could find out the underlying causes.

SB 4.17.29, Purport:

The spirit soul, the living entity, who is in full knowledge of his position is always engaged in chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare/ Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare and is not concerned with the bodily functions. Although the Lord is connected with the material world, He is always situated in His spiritual energy and is always unattached to the functions of the material world. As far as the material body is concerned, there are six "waves," or symptomatic material conditions: hunger, thirst, lamentation, bewilderment, old age and death. The liberated soul is never concerned with these six physical interactions. The Supreme Personality of Godhead, being the all-powerful master of all energies, has some connection with the external energy, but He is always free from the interactions of the external energy in the material world.

SB 4.22.27, Purport:

When one is completely fixed in the service of the Lord, he is a liberated person in any condition of life. He is called jīvan-muktaḥ, liberated even within this body. In such a liberated condition, there is no distinction between actions for sense gratification and actions for liberation. When one is liberated from the desires of sense gratification, he has no longer to suffer the reactions of lamentation or illusion. Activities performed by the karmīs and jñānīs are subject to lamentation and illusion, but a self-realized liberated person acting only for the Supreme Personality of Godhead experiences none.

SB 4.23.1-3, Translation:

At the last stage of his life, when Mahārāja Pṛthu saw himself getting old, that great soul, who was king of the world, divided whatever opulence he had accumulated amongst all kinds of living entities, moving and nonmoving. He arranged pensions for everyone according to religious principles, and after executing the orders of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, in complete coordination with Him, he dedicated his sons unto the earth, which was considered to be his daughter. Then Mahārāja Pṛthu left the presence of his citizens, who were almost lamenting and crying from feeling separation from the King, and went to the forest alone with his wife to perform austerities.

SB 4.23.21, Translation:

When Queen Arci saw that her husband, who had been so merciful to her and the earth, no longer showed symptoms of life, she lamented for a little while and then built a fiery pyre on top of a hill and placed the body of her husband on it.

SB 4.23.21, Purport:

After seeing all the life symptoms in her husband stop, the Queen lamented for a while. The word kiñcit means "for a little while." The Queen was completely aware that her husband was not dead, although the symptoms of life—action, intelligence and sense perception—had ceased. As stated in Bhagavad-gītā (2.13):

dehino 'smin yathā dehe

kaumāraṁ yauvanaṁ jarā

tathā dehāntara-prāptir

dhīras tatra na muhyati

"As the embodied soul continually passes, in this body, from boyhood to youth to old age, the soul similarly passes into another body at death. The self-realized soul is not bewildered by such a change."

SB 4.23.21, Purport:

When a living entity transfers from one body to another, a process generally known as death, a sane man does not lament, for he knows that the living entity is not dead but is simply transferred from one body to another. The Queen should have been afraid of being alone in the forest with the body of her husband, but since she was a great wife of a great personality, she lamented for a while but immediately understood that she had many duties to perform. Thus instead of wasting her time in lamentation, she immediately prepared a fiery pyre on top of a hill and then placed the body of her husband on it to be burned.

SB 4.23.28, Purport:

There are five kinds of liberation, and one is called sāyujya-mukti, or merging into the existence of the Supreme, or the impersonal Brahman effulgence. However, since there is a chance of one's falling down again into the material sky from the Brahman effulgence, Śrīla Jīva Gosvāmī advises that in this human form of life one's only aim should be to go back home, back to Godhead. The words sa vañcitaḥ indicate that once a person has obtained the human form of life, he is actually cheated if he does not make preparations to go back home, back to Godhead. The position of all nondevotees, who are not interested in going back to Godhead, is very much lamentable, for the human form of life is meant for executing devotional service and nothing else.

SB 4.25.57-61, Translation:

When the Queen drank liquor, King Purañjana also engaged in drinking. When the Queen dined, he used to dine with her, and when she chewed, King Purañjana used to chew along with her. When the Queen sang, he also sang. Similarly, when the Queen cried, he also cried, and when the Queen laughed, he also laughed. When the Queen talked loosely, he also talked loosely, and when the Queen walked, the King walked behind her. When the Queen would stand still, the King would also stand still, and when the Queen would lie down in bed, he would also follow and lie down with her. When the Queen sat, he would also sit, and when the Queen heard something, he would follow her to hear the same thing. When the Queen saw something, the King would also look at it, and when the Queen smelled something, the King would follow her to smell the same thing. When the Queen touched something, the King would also touch it, and when the dear Queen was lamenting, the poor King also had to follow her in lamentation. In the same way, when the Queen felt enjoyment, he also enjoyed, and when the Queen was satisfied, the King also felt satisfaction.

SB 4.25.62, Purport:

Sometimes we see that when a person is on the platform of material goodness, he is attracted more or less by the cultivation of knowledge. This is, of course, a better position, for knowledge gives one the preference to accept devotional service. Unless one comes to the platform of knowledge, the brahma-bhūta (SB 4.30.20) stage, one cannot advance in devotional service. As Kṛṣṇa says in Bhagavad-gītā (18.54):

brahma-bhūtaḥ prasannātmā

na śocati na kāṅkṣati

samaḥ sarveṣu bhūteṣu

mad-bhaktiṁ labhate parām

"One who is thus transcendentally situated at once realizes the Supreme Brahman and becomes fully joyful. He never laments nor desires to have anything; he is equally disposed to every living entity. In that state he attains pure devotional service unto Me."

SB 4.26.1-3, Purport:

The word raśmi ("rope") in this verse indicates the mind. The word nīḍa is also significant, for nīḍa indicates the nest where a bird takes rest. In this case nīḍa is the heart, where the living entity is situated. The living entity sits in one place only. The causes of his bondage are two: namely lamentation and illusion. In material existence the living entity simply hankers to get something he can never get. Therefore he is in illusion. As a result of being in this illusory situation, the living entity is always lamenting. Thus lamentation and illusion are described herein as dvi-kūbara, the two posts of bondage.

SB 4.27.25, Translation:

One who does not give charity according to the customs or injunctions of the scriptures and one who does not accept charity in that way are considered to be in the mode of ignorance. Such persons follow the path of the foolish. Surely they must lament at the end.

SB 4.28.8, Purport:

When a person becomes weak from the attack of old age, the family members, servants and secretaries do not care for him. He is then unable to counteract this. Thus he becomes more and more anxious and laments his frightful condition.

SB 4.28.22, Translation:

Although King Purañjana should not have lamented over the fate of his wife and children, he nonetheless did so due to his miserly intelligence. In the meantime, Yavana-rāja, whose name was fear itself, immediately drew near to arrest him.

SB 4.28.23, Translation:

When the Yavanas were taking King Purañjana away to their place, binding him like an animal, the King's followers became greatly aggrieved. While they lamented, they were forced to go along with him.

SB 4.28.47, Translation:

Being now alone and a widow in that forest, the daughter of Vidarbha began to lament, incessantly shedding tears, which soaked her breasts, and crying very loudly.

SB 4.28.50, Translation:

She then prepared a blazing fire with firewood and placed the dead body of her husband upon it. When this was finished, she lamented severely and prepared herself to perish in the fire with her husband.

SB 4.28.52, Translation:

The brāhmaṇa inquired as follows: Who are you? Whose wife or daughter are you? Who is the man lying here? It appears you are lamenting for this dead body. Don't you recognize Me? I am your eternal friend. You may remember that many times in the past you have consulted Me.

SB 4.29.39-40, Translation:

My dear King, in the place where pure devotees live, following the rules and regulations and thus purely conscious and engaged with great eagerness in hearing and chanting the glories of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, in that place if one gets a chance to hear their constant flow of nectar, which is exactly like the waves of a river, one will forget the necessities of life—namely hunger and thirst—and become immune to all kinds of fear, lamentation and illusion.

SB 4.29.39-40, Purport:

The cultivation of Kṛṣṇa consciousness is possible where great devotees live together and constantly engage in hearing and chanting the glories of the Lord. In a holy place like Vṛndāvana, there are many devotees constantly engaged in chanting and hearing the glories of the Lord. If one gets the chance to hear from pure devotees in such a place, allowing the constant flow of the river of nectar to come from the mouths of pure devotees, then the cultivation of Kṛṣṇa consciousness becomes very easy. When one is engaged in constantly hearing the glories of the Lord, he certainly rises above the bodily conception. When one is in the bodily conception, he feels the pangs of hunger and thirst, fear, lamentation and illusion. But when one is engaged in hearing and chanting the glories of the Lord, he transcends the bodily conception.

SB 4.29.75, Translation:

By virtue of the processes of the subtle body, the living entity develops and gives up gross bodies. This is known as the transmigration of the soul. Thus the soul becomes subjected to different types of so-called enjoyment, lamentation, fear, happiness and unhappiness.

SB 4.30.20, Translation:

Always engaging in the activities of devotional service, devotees feel ever-increasingly fresh and new in all their activities. The all-knower, the Supersoul within the heart of the devotee, makes everything increasingly fresh. This is known as the Brahman position by the advocates of the Absolute Truth. In such a liberated stage (brahma-bhūta), one is never bewildered. Nor does one lament or become unnecessarily jubilant. This is due to the brahma-bhūta situation.

SB 4.31.2, Purport:

The word brahma-satra means "cultivation of spiritual knowledge." Actually, both the Vedas and severe austerity are known as brahma. Vedas tattvaṁ tapo brahma. Brahma also means "the Absolute Truth." One has to cultivate knowledge of the Absolute Truth by pursuing studies in the Vedas and undergoing severe austerities and penances. The Pracetās properly executed this function and consequently became equal to all other living entities. As Bhagavad-gītā (18.54) confirms:

brahma-bhūtaḥ prasannātmā

na śocati na kāṅkṣati

samaḥ sarveṣu bhūteṣu

mad-bhaktiṁ labhate parām

"One who is thus transcendentally situated at once realizes the Supreme Brahman and becomes fully joyful. He never laments nor desires to have anything; he is equally disposed to every living entity. In that state he attains pure devotional service unto Me."

SB Canto 5

SB 5.1.13, Translation:

My dear Priyavrata, by the order of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, all living entities accept different types of bodies for birth and death, activity, lamentation, illusion, fear of future dangers, and happiness and distress.

SB 5.1.21, Purport:

The Vedic literatures describe that in Satyaloka there is no birth, death, old age or disease. In other words, since Satyaloka is situated next to Brahmaloka, or the Brahman effulgence, it is almost as good as Vaikuṇṭhaloka. Lord Brahmā's abode is practically indescribable from our present status. Therefore it has been described as avāṅ-manasa-gocara, or beyond the description of our words and the imagination of our minds. The Vedic literatures thus describe the abode of Lord Brahmā: yad vai parārdhyaṁ tad upārameṣṭhyaṁ na yatra śoko na jarā na mṛtyur nārtir na codvegaḥ. "In Satyaloka, which is situated many millions and billions of years away, there is no lamentation, nor is there old age, death, anxiety or the influence of enemies.

SB 5.1.35, Translation:

My dear King, a devotee who has taken shelter of the dust from the lotus feet of the Lord can transcend the influence of the six material waves—namely hunger, thirst, lamentation, illusion, old age and death—and he can conquer the mind and five senses. However, this is not very wonderful for a pure devotee of the Lord because even a person beyond the jurisdiction of the four castes—in other words, an untouchable—is immediately relieved of bondage to material existence if he utters the holy name of the Lord even once.

SB 5.1.35, Purport:

Because of the material body, every living entity in material existence is always disturbed by sad-guṇa, six waves—hunger, thirst, lamentation, illusion, invalidity and death. Furthermore, another sad-guṇa are the mind and five sense organs. Not to speak of a sanctified devotee, even a caṇḍāla, an outcaste, who is untouchable, is immediately freed from material bondage if he utters the holy name of the Lord even once. Sometimes caste brāhmaṇas argue that unless one changes his body he cannot be accepted as a brāhmaṇa, for since the present body is obtained as a result of past actions, one who has in the past acted as a brāhmaṇa takes birth in a brāhmaṇa family.

SB 5.2.7, Purport:

"They are rotting in material activities for transient material pleasure and spoiling their lives toiling all day and night simply for sense gratification, with no attachment for love of Godhead. I am simply lamenting for them and devising various plans to deliver them from the clutches of māyā." (SB 7.9.43) Karmīs who act very seriously for sense gratification are always referred to in the śāstras by such terms as pramatta, vimukha and vimūḍha. They are killed by māyā. However, one who is apramatta, a sane, sober person, a dhīra, knows very well that a human being's primary duty is to render service to the Supreme Person. Māyā is always ready to kill those who are pramatta with her invisible bows and arrows. Āgnīdhra questioned Pūrvacitti about this.

SB 5.5.10-13, Translation:

O My sons, you should accept a highly elevated paramahaṁsa, a spiritually advanced spiritual master. In this way, you should place your faith and love in Me, the Supreme Personality of Godhead. You should detest sense gratification and tolerate the duality of pleasure and pain, which are like the seasonal changes of summer and winter. Try to realize the miserable condition of living entities, who are miserable even in the higher planetary systems. Philosophically inquire about the truth. Then undergo all kinds of austerities and penances for the sake of devotional service. Give up the endeavor for sense enjoyment and engage in the service of the Lord. Listen to discussions about the Supreme Personality of Godhead, and always associate with devotees. Chant about and glorify the Supreme Lord, and look upon everyone equally on the spiritual platform. Give up enmity and subdue anger and lamentation. Abandon identifying the self with the body and the home, and practice reading the revealed scriptures. Live in a secluded place and practice the process by which you can completely control your life air, mind and senses. Have full faith in the revealed scriptures, the Vedic literatures, and always observe celibacy. Perform your prescribed duties and avoid unnecessary talks. Always thinking of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, acquire knowledge from the right source. Thus practicing bhakti-yoga, you will patiently and enthusiastically be elevated in knowledge and will be able to give up the false ego.

SB 5.5.14, Purport:

The process of liberation is brahma jijñāsā, the search for the Absolute Truth. Generally brahma jijñāsā is called neti neti, the process by which one analyzes existence to search out the Absolute Truth. This method continues as long as one is not situated in his spiritual life. Spiritual life is brahma-bhūta (SB 4.30.20), the self-realized state. In the words of Bhagavad-gītā (18.54):

brahma-bhūtaḥ prasannātmā

na śocati na kāṅkṣati

samaḥ sarveṣu bhūteṣu

mad-bhaktiṁ labhate parām

"One who is thus transcendentally situated at once realizes the Supreme Brahman and becomes fully joyful. He never laments nor desires to have anything; he is equally disposed to every living entity. In that state, he attains pure devotional service unto Me."

SB 5.6.5, Translation:

The mind is the root cause of lust, anger, pride, greed, lamentation, illusion and fear. Combined, these constitute bondage to fruitive activity. What learned man would put faith in the mind?

SB 5.6.5, Purport:

The mind is the original cause of material bondage. It is followed by many enemies, such as anger, pride, greed, lamentation, illusion and fear. The best way to control the mind is to engage it always in Kṛṣṇa consciousness (sa vai manaḥ kṛṣṇa-padāravindayoḥ (SB 9.4.18)). Since the followers of the mind bring about material bondage, we should be very careful not to trust the mind.

SB 5.6.19, Purport:

When one is self-realized, he is sufficiently satisfied due to being situated in his original spiritual position. As confirmed in Bhagavad-gītā (18.54): Brahma-bhūtaḥ prasannātmā na śocati na kāṅkṣati. This is the goal of all living entities. Even though one may be situated within this material world, he can become fully satisfied and devoid of hankering and lamentation simply by following the instructions of the Lord as set forth in Bhagavad-gītā or Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam. Satisfaction through self-realization is called svarūpānanda. The conditioned soul, eternally sleeping in darkness, does not understand his self-interest. He simply tries to become happy by making material adjustments, but this is impossible. It is therefore said in Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, na te viduḥ svārtha-gatiṁ hi viṣṇum: (SB 7.5.31) due to gross ignorance, the conditioned soul does not know that his real self-interest is to take shelter at the lotus feet of Lord Viṣṇu. To try to become happy by adjusting the material atmosphere is a useless endeavor. Indeed, it is impossible. By His personal behavior and instructions, Lord Ṛṣabhadeva enlightened the conditioned soul and showed him how to become self-sufficient in his spiritual identity.

SB 5.8 Summary:

While searching and lamenting the deer's absence, Mahārāja Bharata fell down and died. Because his mind was fully absorbed thinking of the deer, he naturally took his next birth from the womb of a deer. However, because he was considerably advanced spiritually, he did not forget his past activities, even though he was in the body of a deer. He could understand how he had fallen down from his exalted position, and remembering this, he left his mother deer and again went to Pulaha-āśrama. He finally ended his fruitive activities in the form of a deer, and when he died he was released from the deer's body.

SB 5.8.15, Translation:

If Bharata Mahārāja sometimes could not see the deer, his mind would be very agitated. He would become like a miser, who, having obtained some riches, had lost them and had then become very unhappy. When the deer was gone, he would be filled with anxiety and would lament due to separation. Thus he would become illusioned and speak as follows.

SB 5.8.19, Purport:

In the Brahma-saṁhitā (5.52), the sun is described as the eye of the Supreme Personality of Godhead.

yac-cakṣur eṣa savitā sakala-grahāṇāṁ

rājā samasta-sura-mūrtir aśeṣa-tejāḥ

yasyājñayā bhramati sambhṛta-kāla-cakro

govindam ādi-puruṣaṁ tam ahaṁ bhajāmi

As the sun arises, one should chant the Vedic mantra beginning with the Gāyatrī. The sun is the symbolic representation of the eyes of the Supreme Lord. Mahārāja Bharata lamented that although the sun was going to set, due to the poor animal's absence, he could not find anything auspicious. Bharata Mahārāja considered himself most unfortunate, for due to the animal's absence, there was nothing auspicious for him in the presence of the sun.

SB 5.8.27, Translation:

At the time of death, the King saw that the deer was sitting by his side, exactly like his own son, and was lamenting his death. Actually the mind of the King was absorbed in the body of the deer, and consequently—like those bereft of Kṛṣṇa consciousness—he left the world, the deer, and his material body and acquired the body of a deer. However, there was one advantage. Although he lost his human body and received the body of a deer, he did not forget the incidents of his past life.

SB 5.8.29, Translation:

In the body of a deer, Bharata Mahārāja began to lament: What misfortune! I have fallen from the path of the self-realized. I gave up my real sons, wife and home to advance in spiritual life, and I took shelter in a solitary holy place in the forest. I became self-controlled and self-realized, and I engaged constantly in devotional service, hearing, thinking, chanting, worshiping and remembering the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Vāsudeva. I was successful in my attempt, so much so that my mind was always absorbed in devotional service. However, due to my personal foolishness, my mind again became attached—this time to a deer. Now I have obtained the body of a deer and have fallen far from my devotional practices.

SB 5.10.10, Translation:

Fatness, thinness, bodily and mental distress, thirst, hunger, fear, disagreement, desires for material happiness, old age, sleep, attachment for material possessions, anger, lamentation, illusion and identification of the body with the self are all transformations of the material covering of the spirit soul. A person absorbed in the material bodily conception is affected by these things, but I am free from all bodily conceptions. Consequently I am neither fat nor skinny nor anything else you have mentioned.

SB 5.11.1, Purport:

Kṛṣṇa similarly chastised Arjuna. Aśocyān anvaśocas tvaṁ prajñā-vādāṁś ca bhāṣase: "While speaking learned words, you are lamenting for what is not worthy of grief." (BG 2.11) Similarly, among people in general, 99.9 percent try to talk like experienced advisers, but they are actually devoid of spiritual knowledge and are therefore like inexperienced children speaking nonsensically. Consequently their words cannot be given any importance. One has to learn from Kṛṣṇa or His devotee. If one speaks on the basis of this experience-that is, on the basis of spiritual knowledge—one's words are valuable. At the present moment, the entire world is full of foolish people. Bhagavad-gītā describes these people as mūḍhas. They are trying to rule human society, but because they are devoid of spiritual knowledge, the entire world is in a chaotic condition. To be released from these miserable conditions, one has to become Kṛṣṇa conscious and take lessons from an exalted personality like Jaḍa Bharata, Lord Kṛṣṇa and Kapiladeva. That is the only way to solve the problems of material life.

SB 5.11.16, Translation:

The soul's designation, the mind, is the cause of all tribulations in the material world. As long as this fact is unknown to the conditioned living entity, he has to accept the miserable condition of the material body and wander within this universe in different positions. Because the mind is affected by disease, lamentation, illusion, attachment, greed and enmity, it creates bondage and a false sense of intimacy within this material world.

SB 5.12.7, Translation:

It is a fact, however, that these innocent people carrying your palanquin without payment are certainly suffering due to this injustice. Their condition is very lamentable because you have forcibly engaged them in carrying your palanquin. This proves that you are cruel and unkind, yet due to false prestige you were thinking that you were protecting the citizens. This is ludicrous. You were such a fool that you could not have been adored as a great man in an assembly of persons advanced in knowledge.

SB 5.13 Summary:

Actually one simply suffers in the forest from so-called happiness and distress. Sometimes he is attacked by a snake (deep sleep), and due to the snakebite he loses consciousness and becomes puzzled and bewildered about discharging his duties. Sometimes he is attracted by women other than his wife, and thus be thinks he enjoys extramarital love with another woman. He is attacked by various diseases, by lamentation and by summer and winter. Thus one within the forest of the material world suffers the pains of material existence. Expecting to become happy, the living entity changes his position from one place to another, but actually a materialistic person within the material world is never happy. Being constantly engaged in materialistic activities, he is always disturbed. He forgets that one day he has to die. Although he suffers severely, being illusioned by the material energy, he still hankers after material happiness. In this way he completely forgets his relationship with the Supreme Personality of Godhead.

SB 5.13.7, Translation:

Sometimes, being defeated or plundered by a superior, powerful agent, a living entity loses all his possessions. He then becomes very morose, and lamenting their loss, he sometimes becomes unconscious. Sometimes he imagines a great palatial city in which he desires to live happily with his family members and riches. He thinks himself fully satisfied if this is possible, but such so-called happiness continues only for a moment.

SB 5.14.15, Translation:

In this world, family life is exactly like a blazing fire in the forest. There is not the least happiness, and gradually one becomes more and more implicated in unhappiness. In household life, there is nothing favorable for perpetual happiness. Being implicated in home life, the conditioned soul is burned by the fire of lamentation. Sometimes he condemns himself as being very unfortunate, and sometimes he claims that he suffers because he performed no pious activities in his previous life.

SB 5.14.25, Translation:

Being unable to protect himself from the threefold miseries of material existence, the conditioned soul becomes very morose and lives a life of lamentation. These threefold miseries are miseries suffered by mental calamity at the hands of the demigods (such as freezing wind and scorching heat), miseries offered by other living entities, and miseries arising from the mind and body themselves.

SB 5.14.27, Translation:

In this materialistic life, there are many difficulties, as I have just mentioned, and all of these are insurmountable. In addition, there are difficulties arising from so-called happiness, distress, attachment, hate, fear, false prestige, illusion, madness, lamentation, bewilderment, greed, envy, enmity, insult, hunger, thirst, tribulation, disease, birth, old age and death. All these combine together to give the materialistic conditioned soul nothing but misery.

SB 5.15.7, Translation:

King Gaya gave full protection and security to the citizens so that their personal property would not be disturbed by undesirable elements. He also saw that there was sufficient food to feed all the citizens. (This is called poṣaṇa.) He would sometimes distribute gifts to the citizens to satisfy them. (This is called prīṇana.) He would sometimes call meetings and satisfy the citizens with sweet words. (This is called upalālana.) He would also give them good instructions on how to become first-class citizens. (This is called anuśāsana.) Such were the characteristics of King Gaya's royal order. Besides all this, King Gaya was a householder who strictly observed the rules and regulations of household life. He performed sacrifices and was an unalloyed pure devotee of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. He was called Mahāpuruṣa because as a king he gave the citizens all facilities, and as a householder he executed all his duties so that at the end he became a strict devotee of the Supreme Lord. As a devotee, he was always ready to give respect to other devotees and to engage in the devotional service of the Lord. This is the bhakti-yoga process. Due to all these transcendental activities, King Gaya was always free from the bodily conception. He was full in Brahman realization, and consequently he was always jubilant. He did not experience material lamentation. Although he was perfect in all respects, he was not proud, nor was he anxious to rule the kingdom.

SB 5.18.21, Translation:

My dear Lord, You automatically fulfill all the desires of a woman who worships Your lotus feet in pure love. However, if a woman worships Your lotus feet for a particular purpose, You also quickly fulfill her desires, but in the end she becomes broken-hearted and laments. Therefore one need not worship Your lotus feet for some material benefit.

SB 5.19.5, Translation:

It was ordained that Rāvaṇa, chief of the Rākṣasas, could not be killed by anyone but a man, and for this reason Lord Rāmacandra, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, appeared in the form of a human being. Lord Rāmacandra's mission, however, was not only to kill Rāvaṇa but also to teach mortal beings that material happiness centered around sex life or centered around one's wife is the cause of many miseries. He is the self-sufficient Supreme Personality of Godhead, and nothing is lamentable for Him. Therefore why else could He be subjected to tribulations by the kidnapping of mother Sītā?

SB 5.19.5, Purport:

Kṛpaṇas, those who are not advanced in spiritual knowledge and who are therefore just the opposite of brāhmaṇas, generally take to family life, which is a concession for sex. Thus they enjoy sex again and again, although that sex is followed by many tribulations. This is a warning to devotees. To teach this lesson to devotees and to human society in general, Lord Śrī Rāmacandra, although the Supreme Personality of Godhead Himself, underwent a series of tribulations because He accepted a wife, mother Sītā. Lord Rāmacandra underwent these austerities, of course, only to instruct us; actually He never has any reason to lament for anything.

SB 5.19.20, Purport:

When one becomes brahma-bhūta (SB 4.30.20), spiritually realized, one understands that he is not the body and that working in the bodily concept of life is useless and misdirected. Then his devotional service begins. As Kṛṣṇa says in Bhagavad-gītā (18.54):

brahma-bhūtaḥ prasannātmā

na śocati na kāṅkṣati

samaḥ sarveṣu bhūteṣu

mad-bhaktiṁ labhate parām

"One who is thus transcendentally situated realizes the Supreme Brahman and becomes fully joyful. He never laments or desires to have anything; he is equally disposed to every living entity. In that state he attains pure devotional service unto Me." Devotional service is actual liberation. When one is attracted by the beauty of the Supreme Personality of Godhead and his mind is always engaged at the Lord's lotus feet, he is no longer interested in subjects that do not help him in self-realization. In other words, he loses all attraction for material activities.

SB 5.24.24, Purport:

Bali Mahārāja was so powerful that he fought with Indra and took possession of the three worlds. Indra was certainly very advanced in knowledge, but instead of asking Vāmanadeva for engagement in His service, he used the Lord to beg for material possessions that would lie finished at the end of one age of Manu. An age of Manu, which is the duration of Manu's life, is calculated to last seventy-two yugas. One yuga consists of 4,300,000 years, and therefore the duration of Manu's life is 309,600,000 years. The demigods possess their material opulence only until the end of the life of Manu. Time is insurmountable. The time one is allotted, even if it be millions of years, is quickly gone. The demigods own their material possessions only within the limits of time. Therefore Bali Mahārāja lamented that although Indra was very learned, he did not know how to use his intelligence properly, for instead of asking Vāmanadeva to allow him to engage in His service, Indra used Him to beg Bali Mahārāja for material wealth. Although Indra was learned and his prime minister, Bṛhaspati, was also learned, neither of them begged to be able to render loving service to Lord Vāmanadeva. Therefore Bali Mahārāja lamented for Indra.

SB Canto 6

SB 6.1.51, Translation:

The subtle body is endowed with sixteen parts—the five knowledge-acquiring senses, the five working senses, the five objects of sense gratification, and the mind. This subtle body is an effect of the three modes of material nature. It is composed of insurmountably strong desires, and therefore it causes the living entity to transmigrate from one body to another in human life, animal life and life as a demigod. When the living entity gets the body of a demigod, he is certainly very jubilant, when he gets a human body he is always in lamentation, and when he gets the body of an animal, he is always afraid. In all conditions, however, he is actually miserable. His miserable condition is called saṁsṛti, or transmigration in material life.

SB 6.2 Summary:

As they were saying this, the Viṣṇudūtas released Ajāmila from the ropes of the Yamadūtas and left for their own abode. The brāhmaṇa Ajāmila, however, offered his respectful obeisances to the Viṣṇudūtas. He could understand how fortunate he was to have chanted the holy name of Nārāyaṇa at the end of his life. Indeed, he could realize the full significance of this good fortune. Having thoroughly understood the discussion between the Yamadūtas and the Viṣṇudūtas, he became a pure devotee of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. He lamented very much for how very sinful he had been, and he condemned himself again and again.

SB 6.2.2, Purport:

In human society, properly maintaining religious principles is the duty of the king's court or the government. Unfortunately, in this yuga, Kali-yuga, the religious principles are tampered with, and the government cannot properly judge who is to be punished and who is not. It is said that in the Kali-yuga if one cannot spend money in court, one cannot get justice. Indeed, in courts of justice it is often found that magistrates are bribed for favorable judgments. Sometimes religious men who preach the Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement for the benefit of the entire populace are arrested and harassed by the police and courts. The Viṣṇudūtas, who are Vaiṣṇavas, lamented for these very regrettable facts. Because of their spiritual compassion for all the fallen souls, Vaiṣṇavas go out to preach according to the standard method of all religious principles, but unfortunately, because of the influence of Kali-yuga, Vaiṣṇavas who have dedicated their lives to preaching the glories of the Lord are sometimes harassed and punished by courts on false charges of disturbing the peace.

SB 6.2.24-25, Purport:

The bhāgavata religion teaches that the Lord and the living entity are eternally related and that the duty of the living entity is to surrender to the Lord. When one is situated on the platform of devotional service, one is freed from impediments and completely satisfied (ahaituky apratihatā yayātmā suprasīdati). Having been elevated to that platform, Ajāmila began to lament for his past materialistic activities and glorify the name, fame, form and pastimes of the Supreme Personality of Godhead.

SB 6.5.23, Translation:

The Haryaśvas, the sons of Prajāpati Dakṣa, were very well behaved, cultured sons, but unfortunately, because of the instructions of Nārada Muni, they deviated from the order of their father. When Dakṣa heard this news, which was brought to him by Nārada Muni, he began to lament. Although he was the father of such good sons, he had lost them all. Certainly this was lamentable.

SB 6.5.23, Purport:

The Haryaśvas abided by the order of Nārada Muni, but when news of this was brought to Prajāpati Dakṣa, the prajāpati, instead of being happy with the actions of Nārada Muni, was extremely sorrowful. Similarly, we are trying to bring as many young men as possible to the Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement for their ultimate benefit, but the parents of the young men joining this movement, being very sorry, are lamenting and making counterpropaganda. Of course, Prajāpati Dakṣa did not make propaganda against Nārada Muni, but later, as we shall see, Dakṣa cursed Nārada Muni for his benevolent activities. This is the way of materialistic life. A materialistic father and mother want to engage their sons in begetting children, striving for improved economic conditions and rotting in materialistic life. They are not unhappy when their children become spoiled, useless citizens, but they lament when they join the Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement to achieve the ultimate goal of life. This animosity between parents and the Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement has existed since time immemorial. Even Nārada Muni was condemned, not to speak of others. Nevertheless, Nārada Muni never gives up his mission. To deliver as many fallen souls as possible, he continues playing his musical instrument and vibrating the transcendental sound Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare/ Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare.

SB 6.5.24, Translation:

When Prajāpati Dakṣa was lamenting for his lost children, Lord Brahmā pacified him with instructions, and thereafter Dakṣa begot one thousand more children in the womb of his wife, Pāñcajanī. This time his sons were known as the Savalāśvas.

SB 6.5.35, Translation:

When he heard that the Savalāśvas had also left this world to engage in devotional service, Dakṣa was angry at Nārada, and he almost fainted due to lamentation. When Dakṣa met Nārada, Dakṣa's lips began trembling in anger, and he spoke as follows.

SB 6.10.9, Purport:

"The humble sage, by virtue of true knowledge, sees with equal vision a learned and gentle brāhmaṇa, a cow, an elephant, a dog and a dog-eater (outcaste)."

brahma-bhūtaḥ prasannātmā

na śocati na kāṅkṣati

samaḥ sarveṣu bhūteṣu

mad-bhaktiṁ labhate parām

(BG 18.54)

"One who is transcendentally situated at once realizes the Supreme Brahman and becomes fully joyful. He never laments nor desires to have anything; he is equally disposed to every living entity. In that state he attains pure devotional service unto Me." A Vaiṣṇava, therefore, is truly a perfect person because he laments to see others unhappy and feels joy at seeing others happy. A Vaiṣṇava is para-duḥkha-duḥkhī; he is always unhappy to see the conditioned souls in an unhappy state of materialism. Therefore a Vaiṣṇava is always busy preaching Kṛṣṇa consciousness throughout the world.

SB 6.11.13, Translation:

O King, when the great hero Vṛtrāsura saw Indra, his enemy, the killer of his brother, standing before him with a thunderbolt in his hand, desiring to fight, Vṛtrāsura remembered how Indra had cruelly killed his brother. Thinking of Indra's sinful activities, he became mad with lamentation and forgetfulness. Laughing sarcastically, he spoke as follows.

SB 6.12.5, Translation:

The denizens of various planets, like the demigods, demons, Cāraṇas and Siddhas, praised Vṛtrāsura's deed, but when they observed that Indra was in great danger, they lamented, "Alas! Alas!"

SB 6.12.6, Translation:

Having dropped the thunderbolt from his hand in the presence of his enemy, Indra was practically defeated and was very much ashamed. He dared not pick up his weapon again. Vṛtrāsura, however, encouraged him, saying, "Take up your thunderbolt and kill your enemy. This is not the time to lament your fate."

SB 6.12.15, Purport:

As the Lord explains in Bhagavad-gītā (18.54):

brahma-bhūtaḥ prasannātmā

na śocati na kāṅkṣati

samaḥ sarveṣu bhūteṣu

mad-bhaktiṁ labhate parām

"One who is transcendentally situated at once realizes the Supreme Brahman and becomes fully joyful. He never laments or desires to have anything; he is equally disposed to every living entity. In that state he attains pure devotional service unto Me." When one attains self-realization, the brahma-bhūta (SB 4.30.20) stage, one knows that whatever happens during his life is due to the contamination of the modes of material nature. The living being, the pure soul, has nothing to do with these modes. In the midst of the hurricane of the material world, everything changes very quickly, but if one remains silent and simply observes the actions and reactions of the hurricane, he is understood to be liberated. The real qualification of the liberated soul is that he remains Kṛṣṇa conscious, undisturbed by the actions and reactions of the material energy. Such a liberated person is always jubilant. He never laments or aspires for anything. Since everything is supplied by the Supreme Lord, the living entity, being fully dependent on Him, should not protest or accept anything in terms of his personal sense gratification; rather, he should receive everything as the mercy of the Lord and remain steady in all circumstances.

SB 6.12.30, Translation:

When the demigods, along with Brahmā, other prajāpatis and other great saintly persons, saw that Indra had been swallowed by the demon, they became very morose. "Alas," they lamented. "What a calamity ! What a calamity !"

SB 6.14 Summary:

In this Fourteenth Chapter, Parīkṣit Mahārāja asks his spiritual master, Śukadeva Gosvāmī, how such a demon as Vṛtrāsura could become an exalted devotee. In this connection the previous life of Vṛtrāsura is discussed. This involves the story of Citraketu and how he was victimized by lamentation because of the death of his son.

SB 6.14 Summary:

Citraketu, who had no sons, got an opportunity to meet the great sage Aṅgirā. When Aṅgirā inquired from the King about his welfare, the King expressed his moroseness, and therefore by the grace of the great sage, the King's first wife, Kṛtadyuti, gave birth to a son, who was the cause of both happiness and lamentation. Upon the birth of this son, the King and all the residents of the palace were very happy. The co-wives of Kṛtadyuti, however, were envious, and later they administered poison to the child. Citraketu was overwhelmed by shock at his son's death. Then Nārada Muni and Aṅgirā went to see him.

SB 6.14.29, Translation:

Thereafter, the great sage told the King, "O great King, now you will have a son who will be the cause of both jubilation and lamentation." The sage then left, without waiting for Citraketu's response.

SB 6.14.29, Purport:

The word harṣa means "jubilation," and śoka means "lamentation." The King was overwhelmed with joy when he understood that he would have a son. Because of his great jubilation, he could not actually understand the statement of the sage Aṅgirā. He accepted it to mean that there would certainly be jubilation because of the birth of his future son, but that he would be the King's only son and, being very proud of his great wealth and empire, would not be very obedient to his father. Thus the King was satisfied, thinking, "Let there be a son. It does not matter if he is not very obedient." In Bengal there is a proverb that instead of having no maternal uncle, it is better to have a maternal uncle who is blind.

SB 6.14.39, Translation:

The other queens were extremely unhappy due to their being sonless. Because of the King's negligence toward them, they condemned themselves in envy and lamented.

SB 6.14.41, Translation:

Even maidservants who are constantly engaged in rendering service to the husband are honored by the husband, and thus they have nothing for which to lament. Our position, however, is that we are maidservants of the maidservant. Therefore we are most unfortunate.

SB 6.14.48, Translation:

In great lamentation, her hair and dress in disarray, the Queen fell to the ground unconscious.

SB 6.14.50-51, Translation:

When King Citraketu heard of his son's death from unknown causes, he became almost blind. Because of his great affection for his son, his lamentation grew like a blazing fire, and as he went to see the dead child, he kept slipping and falling on the ground. Surrounded by his ministers and other officers and the learned brāhmaṇas present, the King approached and fell unconscious at the child's feet, his hair and dress scattered. When the King, breathing heavily, regained consciousness, his eyes were tearful, and he could not speak.

SB 6.14.52, Translation:

When the Queen saw her husband, King Citraketu, merged in great lamentation and saw the dead child, who was the only son in the family, she lamented in various ways. This increased the pain in the cores of the hearts of all the inhabitants of the palace, the ministers and all the brāhmaṇas.

SB 6.14.53, Translation:

The garland of flowers decorating the Queen's head fell, and her hair scattered. Falling tears melted the collyrium on her eyes and moistened her breasts, which were covered with kuṅkuma powder. As she lamented the loss of her son, her loud crying resembled the sweet sound of a kurarī bird.

SB 6.14.56, Translation:

My dear son, I am helpless and very much aggrieved. You should not give up my company. Just look at your lamenting father. We are helpless because without a son we shall have to suffer the distress of going to the darkest hellish regions. You are the only hope by which we can get out of these dark regions. Therefore I request you not to go any further with the merciless Yama.

SB 6.14.57, Translation:

My dear son, you have slept a long time. Now please get up. Your playmates are calling you to play. Since you must be very hungry, please get up and suck my breast and dissipate our lamentation.

SB 6.14.59, Translation:

Śrī Śukadeva Gosvāmī continued: Accompanied by his wife, who was thus lamenting for her dead son, King Citraketu began crying loudly with an open mouth, being greatly aggrieved.

SB 6.14.60, Translation:

As the King and Queen lamented, all their male and female followers joined them in crying. Because of the sudden accident, all the citizens of the kingdom were almost unconscious.

SB 6.14.61, Translation:

When the great sage Aṅgirā understood that the King was almost dead in an ocean of lamentation, he went there with Nārada Ṛṣi.

SB 6.15 Summary:

In this chapter, Aṅgirā Ṛṣi, along with Nārada, consoles Citraketu as far as possible. Aṅgirā and Nārada Ṛṣi came to relieve the King from excessive lamentation by instructing him about the spiritual significance of life.

SB 6.15 Summary:

The great saints Aṅgirā and Nārada explained that the relationship between father and son is not factual; it is simply a representation of the illusory energy. The relationship did not exist before, nor will it stay in the future. By the arrangement of time, the relationship exists only in the present. One should not lament for temporary relationships. The entire cosmic manifestation is temporary; although not unreal, it is not factual. By the direction of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, everything created in the material world is transient. By a temporary arrangement, a father begets a child, or a living entity becomes the child of a so-called father. This temporary arrangement is made by the Supreme Lord. Neither the father nor the son exists independently.

SB 6.15 Summary:

As the King listened to the great sages, he was relieved from his false lamentation, and then he inquired about their identity. The great sages presented who they were and instructed that all sufferings are due to the bodily conception of life. When one understands his spiritual identity and surrenders to the Supreme Personality of Godhead, the supreme spiritual person, one becomes actually happy. When one searches for happiness in matter, one must certainly lament for bodily relationships. Self-realization means spiritual realization of one's relationship with Kṛṣṇa. Such realization ends one's miserable material life.

SB 6.15.1, Translation:

Śrī Śukadeva Gosvāmī said: While King Citraketu, overcome by lamentation, lay like a dead body at the side of the dead body of his son, the two great sages Nārada and Aṅgirā instructed him about spiritual consciousness as follows.

SB 6.15.2, Translation:

O King, what relationship does the dead body for which you lament have with you, and what relationship do you have with him? You may say that you are now related as father and son, but do you think this relationship existed before? Does it truly exist now? Will it continue in the future?

SB 6.15.3, Purport:

The misunderstanding of the conditioned soul is the bodily conception of life. The body is material, but within the body is the soul. This is spiritual understanding. Unfortunately, one who is in ignorance, under the spell of material illusion, accepts the body to be the self. He cannot understand that the body is matter. Like small particles of sand, bodies come together and are separated by the force of time, and people falsely lament for unification and separation. Unless one knows this, there is no question of happiness.

SB 6.15.4, Translation:

When seeds are sown in the ground, they sometimes grow into plants and sometimes do not. Sometimes the ground is not fertile, and the sowing of seeds is unproductive. Similarly, sometimes a prospective father, being impelled by the potency of the Supreme Lord, can beget a child, but sometimes conception does not take place. Therefore one should not lament over the artificial relationship of parenthood, which is ultimately controlled by the Supreme Lord.

SB 6.15.4, Purport:

Mahārāja Citraketu was actually not destined to get a son. Therefore although he married hundreds and thousands of wives, all of them proved barren, and he could not beget even one child. When Aṅgirā Ṛṣi came to see the King, the King requested the great sage to enable him to have at least one son. Because of the blessing of Aṅgirā Ṛṣi, a child was sent by the grace of māyā, but the child was not to live for long. Therefore in the beginning Aṅgirā Ṛṣi told the King that he would beget a child who would cause jubilation and lamentation.

SB 6.15.5, Purport:

The Māyāvādī philosophers say, brahma satyaṁ jagan mithyā: Brahman, the living being, is factual, but his present bodily situation is false. According to the Vaiṣṇava philosophy, however, the present situation is not false but temporary. It is like a dream. A dream does not exist before one falls asleep, nor does it continue after one awakens. The period for dreaming exists only between these two, and therefore it is false in the sense that it is impermanent. Similarly, the entire material creation, including our own creation and those of others, is impermanent. We do not lament for the situation in a dream before the dream takes place or after it is over, and so during the dream, or during a dreamlike situation, one should not accept it as factual and lament about it. This is real knowledge.

SB 6.15.18-19, Translation:

My dear King, you are an advanced devotee of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. To be absorbed in lamentation for the loss of something material is unsuitable for a person like you. Therefore we have both come to relieve you from this false lamentation, which is due to your being merged in the darkness of ignorance. For those who are advanced in spiritual knowledge to be affected by material loss and gain is not at all desirable.

SB 6.15.18-19, Purport:

A devotee should always aspire to live in the association of advanced devotees and engage in the service of the Lord through the paramparā system. One should serve the mission of Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu through the instructions of the great Gosvāmīs of Vṛndāvana. This is called tāṅdera caraṇa sevi. While serving the lotus feet of the Gosvāmīs, one should live in the association of devotees (bhakta-sane vāsa). This is the business of a devotee. A devotee should not aspire for material profit or lament for material loss. When Aṅgirā Ṛṣi and Nārada saw that Mahārāja Citraketu, an advanced devotee, had fallen in the darkness of ignorance and was lamenting for the material body of his son, by their causeless mercy they came to advise him so that he could be saved from this ignorance.

SB 6.15.18-19, Purport:

Another significant word is brahmaṇya. The Supreme Personality of Godhead is sometimes addressed by the prayer namo brahmaṇya-devāya, which offers obeisances unto the Lord because He is served by the devotees. Therefore this verse states, brahmaṇyo bhagavad-bhakto nāvāsāditum arhasi. This is the symptom of an advanced devotee. Brahma-bhūtaḥ prasannātmā (BG 18.54). For a devotee—an advanced, self-realized soul—there is no cause for material jubilation or lamentation. He is always transcendental to conditional life.

SB 6.15.20, Translation:

When I first came to your home, I could have given you the supreme transcendental knowledge, but when I saw that your mind was absorbed in material things, I gave you only a son, who caused you jubilation and lamentation.

SB 6.15.21-23, Translation:

My dear King, now you are actually experiencing the misery of a person who has sons and daughters. O King, owner of the state of Śūrasena, one's wife, his house, the opulence of his kingdom, and his various other opulences and objects of sense perception are all the same in that they are temporary. One's kingdom, military power, treasury, servants, ministers, friends and relatives are all causes of fear, illusion, lamentation and distress. They are like a gandharva-nagara, a nonexistent palace that one imagines to exist in the forest. Because they are impermanent, they are no better than illusions, dreams and mental concoctions.

SB 6.15.25, Purport:

The fact is that the living entity, while concocting with the mind, creates the material condition. Because matter is destructible, through the material condition the living entity suffers. Otherwise, the living entity is detached from all material conditions. When one comes to the Brahman platform, the platform of spiritual life, fully understanding that he is a spiritual soul (ahaṁ brahmāsmi), he is no longer affected by lamentation or hankering. As the Lord says in Bhagavad-gītā (18.54):

brahma-bhūtaḥ prasannātmā

na śocati na kāṅkṣati

"One who is thus transcendentally situated at once realizes the Supreme Brahman and becomes fully joyful. He never laments nor desires to have anything." Elsewhere in Bhagavad-gītā (15.7) the Lord says:

mamaivāṁśo jīva-loke

jīva-bhūtaḥ sanātanaḥ

manaḥ-ṣaṣṭhānīndriyāṇi

prakṛti-sthāni karṣati

"The living entities in this conditioned world are My eternal fragmental parts. Due to conditioned life, they are struggling very hard with the six senses, which include the mind." The living entity is actually part and parcel of the Supreme Personality of Godhead and is unaffected by material conditions, but because the mind (manaḥ) is affected, the senses are affected, and the living entity struggles for existence within this material world.

SB 6.15.26, Translation:

Therefore, O King Citraketu, carefully consider the position of the ātmā. In other words, try to understand who you are—whether body, mind or soul. Consider where you have come from, where you are going after giving up this body, and why you are under the control of material lamentation. Try to understand your real position in this way, and then you will be able to give up your unnecessary attachment. You will also be able to give up the belief that this material world, or anything not directly in touch with service to Kṛṣṇa, is eternal. Thus you will obtain peace.

SB 6.16 Summary:

The living entity is eternal. Thus he has neither birth nor death (na hanyate hanyamāne śarīre (BG 2.20)). According to the reactions of one's fruitive activities, one takes birth in various species of life among the birds, beasts, trees, human beings, demigods and so on, thus rotating through various bodies. For a certain period of time, one receives a particular type of body as a son or father in a false relationship. All our relationships in this material world with friends, relatives or enemies consist of duality, in which one feels happy and distressed on the basis of illusion. The living entity is actually a spiritual soul who is part and parcel of God and has nothing to do with relationships in the world of duality. Therefore Nārada Muni advised Citraketu not to lament for his so-called dead son.

SB 6.16.1, Translation:

Śrī Śukadeva Gosvāmī said: My dear King Parīkṣit, by his mystic power the great sage Nārada brought the dead son into the vision of all the lamenting relatives and then spoke as follows.

SB 6.16.5, Purport:

It is our practical experience in this material world that the same person who is one's friend today becomes one's enemy tomorrow. Our relationships as friends or enemies, family men or outsiders, are actually the results of our different dealings. Citraketu Mahārāja was lamenting for his son, who was now dead, but he could have considered the situation otherwise. "This living entity," he could have thought, "was my enemy in my last life, and now, having appeared as my son, he is prematurely leaving just to give me pain and agony." Why should he not consider his dead son his former enemy and instead of lamenting be jubilant because of an enemy's death? As stated in Bhagavad-gītā (3.27), prakṛteḥ kriyamāṇāni guṇaiḥ karmāṇi sarvaśaḥ: factually everything is happening because of our association with the modes of material nature. Therefore one who is my friend today in association with the mode of goodness may be my enemy tomorrow in association with the modes of passion and ignorance. As the modes of material nature work, in illusion we accept others as friends, enemies, sons or fathers in terms of the reactions of different dealings under different conditions.

SB 6.16.6, Purport:

It has already been explained that Citraketu's son was his enemy in a past life and had now appeared as his son just to give him more severe pain. Indeed, the untimely death of the son caused severe lamentation for the father. One may put forward the argument, "If the King's son was his enemy, how could the King have so much affection for him?" In answer, the example is given that when someone's wealth falls into the hands of his enemy, the money becomes the enemy's friend. Then the enemy can use it for his own purposes. Indeed, he can even use it to harm its previous owner. Therefore the money belongs neither to the one party nor to the other. The money is always money, but in different situations it can be used as an enemy or a friend.

SB 6.16.7, Purport:

Aside from the fact that the soul transmigrates from one body to another, even in this life the relationships between living entities are impermanent, as exemplified in this verse. The son of Citraketu was named Harṣaśoka, or "jubilation and lamentation." The living entity is certainly eternal, but because he is covered by a temporary dress, the body, his eternity is not observed. Dehino 'smin yathā dehe kaumāraṁ yauvanaṁ jarā: (BG 2.13) "The embodied soul continually passes, in this body, from boyhood to youth to old age." Thus the bodily dress is impermanent. The living entity, however, is permanent. As an animal is transferred from one owner to another, the living entity who was the son of Citraketu lived as his son for some time, but as soon as he was transferred to another body, the affectionate relationship was broken. As stated in the example given in the previous verse, when one has a commodity in his hands he considers it his, but as soon as it is transferred it becomes someone else's commodity. Then one no longer has a relationship with it; he has no affection for it, nor does he lament for it.

SB 6.16.8, Translation:

Even though one living entity becomes connected with another because of a relationship based on bodies that are perishable, the living entity is eternal. Actually it is the body that is born or lost, not the living entity. One should not accept that the living entity takes birth or dies. The living being actually has no relationship with so-called fathers and mothers. As long as he appears as the son of a certain father and mother as a result of his past fruitive activities, he has a connection with the body given by that father and mother. Thus he falsely accepts himself as their son and acts affectionately. After he dies, however, the relationship is finished. Under these circumstances, one should not be falsely involved with jubilation and lamentation.

SB 6.16.11, Translation:

The Supreme Lord (ātmā), the creator of cause and effect, does not accept the happiness and distress that result from fruitive actions. He is completely independent of having to accept a material body, and because He has no material body, He is always neutral. The living entities, being part and parcel of the Lord, possess His qualities in a minute quantity. Therefore one should not be affected by lamentation.

SB 6.16.12, Translation:

Śrī Śukadeva Gosvāmī continued: When the conditioned soul (jīva) in the form of Mahārāja Citraketu's son had spoken in this way and then left, Citraketu and the other relatives of the dead son were all astonished. Thus they cut off the shackles of their affection, which was due to their relationship with him, and gave up their lamentation.

SB 6.16.13, Translation:

After the relatives had discharged their duties by performing the proper funeral ceremonies and burning the dead child's body, they gave up the affection that leads to illusion, lamentation, fear and pain. Such affection is undoubtedly difficult to give up, but they gave it up very easily.

SB 6.16.14, Translation:

Queen Kṛtyadyuti's co-wives, who had poisoned the child, were very much ashamed, and they lost all their bodily luster. While lamenting, O King, they remembered the instructions of Aṅgirā and gave up their ambition to bear children. Following the directions of the brāhmaṇas, they went to the bank of the Yamunā, where they bathed and atoned for their sinful activities.

SB 6.18.23, Translation:

Śrī Śukadeva Gosvāmī said: Just to help Indra, Lord Viṣṇu killed the two brothers Hiraṇyākṣa and Hiraṇyakaśipu. Because of their being killed, their mother, Diti, overwhelmed with lamentation and anger, contemplated as follows.

SB 6.18.38, Translation:

Upon hearing Diti's request, Kaśyapa Muni was very much aggrieved. "Alas," he lamented, "now I face the danger of the impious act of killing Indra."

SB 6.18.40, Purport:

The natural instinct of a woman is to enjoy the material world. She induces her husband to enjoy this world by satisfying his tongue, belly and genitals, which are called jihvā, udara and upastha. A woman is expert in cooking palatable dishes so that she can easily satisfy her husband in eating. When one eats nicely, his belly is satisfied, and as soon as the belly is satisfied the genitals become strong. Especially when a man is accustomed to eating meat and drinking wine and similar passionate things, he certainly becomes sexually inclined. It should be understood that sexual inclinations are meant not for spiritual progress but for gliding down to hell. Thus Kaśyapa Muni considered his situation and lamented. In other words, to be a householder is very risky unless one is trained and the wife is a follower of her husband.