॥ ॐ नमो भगवते वासुदेवाय ॥
O My Shakti, who are worshipable for the entire world and whose nature is to bestow good fortune upon all living entities, go to Vraja, where there live many cowherd men and their wives. In that very beautiful land, where many cows reside, Rohini, the wife of Vasudeva, is living at the home of King Nanda. Other wives of Vasudeva are also living there incognito because of fear of Kamsa. Please go there.Within the womb of Devaki is My partial plenary expansion known as Sankarshana or Adishesha. Without difficulty, transfer Him into the womb of Rohini.O all-auspicious Yoga Maya, I shall then appear with My full six opulences as the son of Devaki, and you will appear as the daughter of mother Yashoda, the queen of King Nanda.By sacrifices of animals, ordinary human beings will worship you gorgeously, with various paraphernalia, because you are supreme in fulfilling the material desires of everyone.
Bhagavan blessed Yoga Maya by saying:
In different places on the surface of the earth, people will give you different names, such as Durga, Bhadrakali, Vijaya, Vaiṣhṇavi, Kumuda, Chaṇḍika, Kṛiṣhṇa, Madhavi, Kanyaka, Maya, Narayani, Ishani, Sharada and Ambika.
(We see clearly that all the forms of Devi we worship as Lakshmi, Parvati and Saraswati are included in this list. All of them are manifestations of Yoga Maya of Bhagavan Maha Vishnu.)The son of Rohini will also be celebrated as Sankarshana because of being sent from the womb of Devaki to the womb of Rohini. He will be called Rama because of His ability to please all the inhabitants of Gokula, and He will be known as Balabhadra because of his extensive physical strength.
दधार सर्वात्मकमात्मभूतं काष्ठा यथाऽऽनन्दकरं मनस्तः ॥
The gods prayed: O Lord, You never deviate from Your vow, which is always perfect because whatever You decide is perfectly correct and cannot be stopped by anyone. Being present in the three phases of cosmic manifestation — creation, maintenance and annihilation — You are the Supreme Truth. Indeed, unless one is completely truthful, one cannot achieve Your favour, which therefore cannot be achieved by hypocrites.
You are the active principle, the real truth, in all the ingredients of creation, and therefore You are known as Antaryami, the inner force. You are equal to everyone, and Your instructions apply for everyone, for all time. You are the beginning of all truth. Therefore, offering our obeisances, we surrender unto You. Kindly give us protection.
The body [the total body and the individual body are of the same composition] may figuratively be called “the original tree.” From this tree, which fully depends on the ground of material nature, come two kinds of fruit — the enjoyment of happiness and the suffering of distress. The cause of the tree, forming its three roots, is association with the three modes of material nature — goodness, passion and ignorance. The fruits of bodily happiness have four tastes — adherence to duty, economic development, sense gratification and liberation — which are experienced through the five senses for acquiring knowledge in the midst of six circumstances: lamentation, illusion, old age, death, hunger and thirst.
The seven layers of bark covering the tree are skin, blood, muscle, fat, bone, marrow and semen, and the eight branches of the tree are the five gross and three subtle elements — earth, water, fire, air, ether, mind, intelligence and false ego. The tree of the body has nine hollows — the eyes, the ears, the nostrils, the mouth, the rectum and the genitals — and ten leaves, the ten airs passing through the body. In this tree of the body there are two birds: one is the individual soul, and the other is the Paramatma.
The efficient cause of this material world, manifested with its many varieties as the original tree, is You, O Lord. You are also the maintainer of this material world, and after annihilation You are the one in whom everything is conserved. Those who are covered by Your external energy cannot see You behind this manifestation, but theirs is not the vision of learned devotees.
O Lord, You are always in full knowledge, and to bring all good fortune to all living entities, You appear in different incarnations, all of them transcendental to the material creation. When You appear in these incarnations, You are pleasing to the pious and religious devotees, but for nondevotees You are the annihilator.
O lotus-eyed Lord, by concentrating one’s meditation on Your lotus feet, which are the reservoir of all existence, and by accepting those lotus feet as the boat by which to cross the ocean of consciousness, one follows in the footsteps of great saints, sages and devotees. By this simple process, one can cross the ocean of consciousness as easily as one steps over the hoofprint of a calf.
O Lord, who resemble the shining sun, You are always ready to fulfil the desire of Your devotee, and therefore You are known as the wish-fulfilling tree (Vancha Kalpataru). When acharyas completely take shelter under Your lotus feet in order to cross the fierce ocean of cconsciousness, they leave behind on earth the method by which they cross, and because You are very merciful to Your other devotees, You accept this method to help them.
O lotus-eyed Lord, although non-devotees who accept severe austerities and penances to achieve the highest position may think themselves liberated, their intelligence is impure. They fall down from their position of imagined superiority because they have no regard for Your lotus feet.
O Madhava, Supreme Personality of Godhead, Lord of the goddess of fortune, if devotees completely in love with You sometimes fall from the path of devotion, they do not fall like non-devotees, for You still protect them. Thus they fearlessly traverse the heads of their opponents and continue to progress in devotional service.
O Lord, during the time of maintenance You manifest several incarnations, all with transcendental bodies, beyond the material modes of nature. When You appear in this way, You bestow all good fortune upon the living entities by teaching them to perform Vedic activities such as ritualistic ceremonies, mystic yoga, austerities, penances, and ultimately samadhi, ecstatic absorption in thoughts of You. Thus You are worshipped by the Vedic principles.
O Lord, cause of all causes, if Your transcendental body were not beyond the modes of material nature, one could not understand the difference between matter and transcendence. Only by Your presence can one understand the transcendental nature of Your Lordship, who are the controller of material nature. Your transcendental nature is very difficult to understand unless one is influenced by the presence of Your transcendental form.
O Lord, Your transcendental name and form are not ascertained by those who merely speculate on the path of imagination. Your name, form and attributes can be ascertained only through devotional service. Even while engaged in various activities, devotees whose minds are completely absorbed at Your lotus feet, and who constantly hear, chant, contemplate and cause others to remember Your transcendental names and forms, are always on the transcendental platform, and thus they can understand Bhagavan.
O Lord, we are fortunate because the heavy burden of the demons upon this earth is immediately removed by Your appearance. Indeed, we are certainly fortunate, for we shall be able to see upon this earth and in the heavenly planets the marks of lotus, conchshell, club and disc that adorn Your lotus feet.
O Supreme Lord, You are not an ordinary living entity appearing in this material world as a result of fruitive activities. Therefore Your appearance or birth in this world has no other cause than Your pleasure potency. Similarly, the living entities, who are part of You, have no cause for miseries like birth, death and old age, except when these living entities are conducted by Your external energy.
O supreme controller, Your Lordship previously accepted incarnations as a fish, a horse, a tortoise, Narasimhadeva, a boar, a swan, Lord Ramacandra, Parashurama and, among the demigods, Vamanadeva, to protect the entire world by Your mercy. Now please protect us again by Your mercy by diminishing the disturbances in this world. O Kṛṣṇa, best of the Yadus, we respectfully offer our obeisances unto You.
O mother Devaki, by your good fortune and ours, Bhagavan Himself, with all His plenary portions, such as Baladeva, is now within your womb. Therefore you need not fear Kamsa, who has decided to be killed by the Lord. Your eternal son, Sri Krishna, will be the protector of the entire Yadu dynasty.
Sage Shuka concludes, after thus offering prayers to Bhagavan, Lord Vishnu, the Supreme Being, all the gods, with Lord Brahma and Lord Shiva before them, returned to their homes in the heavenly regions.
Note: Tomorrow is the story of Sri Krishna's birth, and it also happens to be...Sri Ramanavami!
