How can one who points to the wrongdoer get the same destination as the wrongdoer, as Bhagavatam 1.17.22 states?
Podcast:
Question: What does it mean when the Bhagavatam states in 1.17.22 that the one who points out the offender gets the same destination as the offender?
Answer:
To understand this, we need to consider the overall context of the Bhagavatam, which is always aiming to reveal deeper truths. On a straightforward logical level, it doesn’t make sense to take this statement literally. For instance, imagine someone has been robbed, and another person points out the robber to the police. Would both—the one who committed the robbery and the one who reported it—be sent to jail? Obviously not.
Even in Vedic times, such literal interpretation doesn’t hold. Take, for example, the case of Vishwamitra informing Lord Rama that demons were desecrating his sacrifices. Lord Rama didn’t punish Vishwamitra—He punished the demons. So, both logically and historically, a literal interpretation of the verse is not valid.
So, what is going on in this verse?
If we look at the context of the chapter, Maharaja Parikshit sees someone (Kali) attacking a cow and a bull. Yet, instead of immediately accusing the wrongdoer, he asks the bull, “What is the cause of your distress?” Now, one might think: “Isn’t it obvious? Didn’t Parikshit see the person attacking?” The bull could have said, “Can’t you see? That person is beating us!”
But instead, the bull replies wisely, saying that it is difficult to determine the exact cause of suffering. Maharaja Parikshit appreciates this response, saying “Bravo! Well done.”
Why? Because the entire mood of the Bhagavatam is not to get entangled in superficial or immediate causes, but to look deeper—to find underlying spiritual truths. This is exactly what Parikshit Maharaj himself does later in the Bhagavatam. When he is cursed to die in seven days, he doesn’t blame the sage’s son or complain about the harshness of the punishment. Instead, he sees it as Krishna’s arrangement to help him renounce the world and focus entirely on spiritual advancement.
In this way, the Bhagavatam teaches us to avoid reactive blame and instead seek deeper meaning behind life’s events.
So when the verse says that “the person who points out the offender attains the same destination as the offender,” it does not mean karmically both will go to hell. Rather, it means that if we only focus on external blame, we remain trapped in the same ignorance as the wrongdoer. We remain caught in the same cycle of material reactions.
This is not to say that external causes are always irrelevant—there may be times when we have to address them. But if we focus only on external causes and do not look deeper, we will remain bound in the darkness (tamas) of material existence.
So “same destination” in this verse refers not necessarily to the same karma or same hellish result, but to the same state of ignorance—remaining in the material realm, without understanding the deeper spiritual purpose behind events.
As the Upanishadic prayer says:
“Tamaso mā jyotir gamaya”—From darkness, lead me to light.
The Bhagavatam is guiding us away from the darkness of blame and reactivity, toward the light of understanding and transcendence.
Thank you.