Bhagavatam study 12 – 1.3.17-25 – The avataras deliver in diverse ways

We will continue the discussion of other avatars in our future talks, thank you.
Apayayat Suran, Anyan, Mohinya Mohayanstriya, this is 1.3.17 so Dhanvantara Dvadashamam, so Dhanvantari appeared as the 12th avatar, Dvadasham, Dvadashamam, and the 13th was Mohinya Mohayanstriya, was the Mohini avatar, what did she do, Mohinya, she came in the form of a deluding woman and with a charming beauty and Apayayat, Apayayat means, so to drink, she gave to drinking, Suran, Anyan, so she gave the nectar to the Devatas and for others she deluded them, Anyan is refers to the demons, she deluded them with her beauty, so the previous text, text 16, it is talked about Kamatarupena, so that was referring to the Kurma avatar, so in that same past time, the Lord manifested multiple times, some of the other times I mentioned over here, so the Lord appeared as Kurma initially, so that churning could happen, otherwise the mountain would have sunk, but when the churning went on and on and on and after various other, various things manifested till and the demigods and demons persevered till the final gift manifested and that was the nectar, so the Lord manifested in his form as Dhanvantari and Dhanvantari is considered to be the god of health, he is often seen as the presiding, as a primary worshipable deity for Ayurveda, he is the god of medicine, of course, ultimately, everybody s potency comes from Supreme, from Nama Krishna, mayayamavihitaanitaan, as Krishna says in the Bhagavad Gita in 7.22, but in this particular case, it is stated that Dhanvantari appeared, but it was not Dhanvantari, it was Krishna who manifested in the form of Dhanvantari, so thus it is with the Supreme Lord manifested and he offered the fruit of the yajna, that the fruit was nectar and by relishing that nectar, they became, the citizens became elevated, they moved onwards towards liberation and further, it is stated that the Trayodashamam, so the 13th avatar that appeared was Apayayat, it was Mohinimurti, now the original treaty between the devatas and the asuras was that the nectar which would come out, that would be taken equally between both of them, but what happened was that the devatas were weaker, the asuras were stronger and the asuras took all the nectar, so at that time, to delude them, Vishnu appeared in the form of Mohinimurti and the asuras were so captivated by her beauty that they immediately desired to to have her as their object for enjoyment and in order to make a positive impression on her, they started behaving in a very gentlemanly way and they said, oh we trust you, you distribute the nectar and what Mohinimurti did was, because they had already violated their word, they had used the cooperation of the devatas for churning but then they wanted to take the nectar for themselves, so deception was repaid by with deception, Shatho Shatyam, as it is said, so Mohinimurti appeared and he deluded the devatas and deluded the asuras and she told them that let us all of you sit in a row and I will serve the nectar to everyone, so she had all of them seated and they sat down and on one side, devatas sat and she started serving the devatas first and while she was serving the devatas, she was giving the nectar generously to the devatas and she was in between while serving the nectar to the devatas, she was also casting a glance towards the asuras and with that glance, she deluded them and with that glance, she actually captivated them so much that they just were satisfied with the glance and they did not ask for anything more and they just accepted what was being offered, it was just a deluding glance and by the time the nectar got over and the asuras were left with nothing, so in this way, Mohinya, so the lord appeared as Mohinimurti and he deceived the deceivers, so he tricked the tixters, so this is, the lord has appeared in many manifestations but this is the only time the lord appears in a female manifestation, of course, the lord always is there, in most of the incarnations is there with his consort, till now of course, the list of incarnations that I mentioned, the consort has not been highlighted but this is an incarnation in which the lord himself appears in a female form and in that sense, this is a special incarnation and after this, let us go to text 18th so the 14th in this particular list, it said to be Narasimhadeva and so he advented so Indra refers to the leader or the king, Daitendra refers to the king of the daityas, daityas are the sons of Diti and they are considered to be demoniac and Daitendra was Hiranyakashipu, Urjitam, this is Daitendra, Hiranyakashipu had a very powerful body, he ate his powerful body, the daar, Karjair, Uraav, the daar, he bifurcated it, ripped it apart, Karjair, Karjair is by his nails, Uraav, while placing him on his lap, Erakam Katakrudhyatha, Erakam, Erakam refers to if there is a cane and a carpenter wants to cut it apart, Katakrudhyatha refers to a carpenter, so you know carpenter is trained, it’s an interesting metaphor, the carpenter is trained and for a layperson to cut a cane might be a little difficult but when a carpenter is trained, the carpenter doesn’t have much difficulty in, in, in separating the, in cutting a cane, it’s very easy, effortlessly he does it, similarly although Narasimhadeva played with Hiranyakashipu for some time and it was the Bhagavatam describes, this past time is described in the seventh canto of Bhagavatam, Bhagavatam describes that this playing was just like a cat playing with a mouse before eventually devouring it and eventually Narasimhadeva, Narasimha, Nara and Simha, man and lion, so it is said about Narasimhadeva that he is half man, half lion and full god, he is god in his full majesty and quite often in the various incarnations, the, the demons are physically bigger than the devatas, they are, even than the lord also, the demons sometimes giant and the lord is small and yet the lord overpowers the demons but in this case, although Hiranyakashipu was formidable but Hiranyakashipu was no match to Narasimhadeva, Narasimhadeva was simply huge and in this way, Narasimhadeva overpowered the demon Hiranyakashipu and not only overpowered him, not only defeated him but his body which was so formidable that even Indra’s thunderbolt could not put a crack on it, could not put a scratch on it, that body was ripped apart by lord Narasimhadeva and in this way, it’s of course not mentioned here, the whole past time will come in detail in the seventh canto, in this way, he delivered Prahlad Maharaj and he delivered the whole universe, text 19, so Panchadasham, the 15th incarnation that is mentioned, Vamanakam, so Vamanakam means, Vaman refers to one who is short, who is dwarf like, so the lord appeared in this short manifestation as Vamanakam and Kutvagat, by assuming this form of a dwarf brahmana, Kutvagat, he went, adhvaram balehe adhvaram, for the sacrifice of Bali Maharaj, at that time, Bali was the king of the Asuras and padatrayam ya chamanaha, when he came as a brahmana over there, Bali Maharaj, as per the brahmanical culture, the etiquette, he honoured him and offered him charity and Vaman Dev said, just give me three steps in charity and what happened, Bali Maharaj agreed and when the three steps were given, Pratya Ditsus, Pratya Ditsus, he actually, he went there with the desire, with the intention to return, to gain the Tripishtapam, Tripishtapam is the three, the kingdom of the three planetary systems, so his intention in going there was to get the whole world, the whole universe in fact, which had been conquered by Vaman, by Bali Maharaj and he wanted to give it back to Indra, this particular manifestation of the lord is also known as Upendra, because he appeared from the same father as Indra, same parents as Indra, Aditi and Kasha and because Indra had already appeared, so he was like the younger brother of Indra and so Upendra he is called, so he wanted to benedict his brother by giving that kingdom back, the kingdom of, especially the heavenly planets and indeed the whole universe which Bali Maharaj had taken, he wanted to take it back from Bali Maharaj and he did that, but he asked initially for only three steps, so here we see that the Bhagavatam speaks, now at one level we may say isn’t it deceptive asking for three steps and taking and then taking everything by expanding one’s size, yes it may be deceptive, but we also need to understand that the lord is transcendental and whatever he does, he does not with any intention of deception, he does with the intention of redemption, of benediction, he wants us to bless and redeem everyone, so in fact by taking the kingdom from Bali Maharaj and giving it to Indra, he did not bless Indra alone, he blessed Bali Maharaj also, because Bali Maharaj in the process of surrendering to the supreme, got devotion to the supreme, he had some dormant devotion because of being a descendant of Prahlad, but that devotion had become covered over by demoniac association and by the infatuation with opulence that had come because of that demoniac association and when that opulence was taken away and when the lord himself appeared, Bali Maharaj should not resent or protest, but his devotion manifested and he surrendered and thus the lord gave Bali Maharaj supreme benediction of devotion, so actually whatever the lord does is supremely auspicious for everyone and in this case, he did not destroy the Dushkruti that is Bali Maharaj, Bali Maharaj also had a devotional connection and had a devotional inclination, so he destroyed whatever demoniac conditionings were obscuring the devotional inclination and thus he not only granted him devotion, but thereafter he also went and became an associate of Bali Maharaj in Sutala, where he chose Bali Maharaj as a doorkeeper, such mercy bestowed, so Bali Maharaj whatever he lost, he got far far greater things in return by the blessing of the supreme, text 20, so Shodasha, the 16th avatar is described as pashyan brahmadruho nrupan, pashyan on seeing nrupan, the kings to be brahmadruho, to be the enemies of the brahmanas, to be hostile and violent towards the brahmanas, trisapta means 3 into 7, 21 times, being furious with them, rid the world of the Kshatriyas, Kshatriyas under Karthivir Arjun had become so insolent that first they, their defiance of the brahmanas was seen in their forcibly seizing away the property of the, of the bhagupati, here it is referred to as, here the father of Parashuram, he, Jamadagni, he was, he stole, Karthivir Arjuna stole away his cow and when Parashuram punished him by cutting off the hands of Karthivir Arjuna and thereafter delivering him by beheading him, so his sons, they were furious and they wanted to take revenge, now Parashuram had fought valiantly and had in a fair combat over, overpowered Karthivir Arjuna and his sons had fled at that time, they had not been able to be of any assistance at that time, whatever reason, but instead of again coming for a fair fight, they, very in a cowardly way, they attacked the father of Parashuram, their mode was that you kill our father, we will kill your father, but they forgot that their father was a Kshatriya who had violated the proper course of conduct by trying to steal from a Brahmana, in contrast Jamadagni had done nothing wrong, he had just been a Brahmana practising Brahmanical principles and he was not even a warrior and so they, when they killed Jamadagni, Parashuram was furious and Parashuram, he, he saw this as a rot, sometimes some surgeons, when they see, some doctors, when they see one symptom of a pervasive rot in the body, at present only one finger may be rotten, but they may say the whole hand has to be chopped off, because already this much rot is visible, but beyond this visible rot, there is an invisible rot which is there and even if you cut off the visible rot, still the invisible rot will spread and the whole body will get diseased, so we have to cut not only where we see the visible rot, we also have to see, cut where there is an invisible rot, so Parashuram, he saw the brazen murderousness of the sons of Kartiveerarjuna as a visible rot and further he saw the overall Brahmadrupo, overall animosity, disrespect and violent disposition of the Kshatriyas towards the Brahmanas, which was not, which might not have been manifested at that time, that has an invisible rot and thus he removed not just the visible, but also the invisible rot and thus he delivered the earth from atrocious rulers, this is not just a blood vendetta, you killed my father, so I will, so you, I will destroy all of you, no, it was done actually for the welfare of citizens because if the kings are atrocious, then who will protect the citizens, so Parashuram, he took the responsibility of protecting the citizens and he ensured that by teaching such a lesson to the Kshatriyas, he ensured that they would at least for a substantial amount of time to come, they would not dare to become disrespectful of Brahmanical culture and they would not become indiscriminately violent in their dealings, they would not abuse their powers, which they had as Kshatriya rulers. Text 21, ततः सप्तदशे जातः सत्यवत्यां पराशरात् चक्रे वेद तरोः शाखा धृष्ट्वा पुम्सो अल्पमेध सहा ततः सप्तदशे जातः सप्तदशे is 17th जातः, appeared, was born, सत्यवत्यां पराशरात् so from Parashuram through Satyavati was born Vyasadeva, this is referring to चक्रे वेद तरोः शाखा चक्रे he prepared from the desire tree of the Vedas, वेद तरोः Vedas are also in Kalpataru, so here is the word तरोः is used for, the shorter word is used for poetic purposes, poetic grammar is शाखा so he prepared, put the Vedas in written form and he made their शाखाs, their divisions so धृष्ट्वा पुम्सो अल्पमेध सहा he saw that people were अल्पमेध सहा people did not have adequate intelligence Krishna uses the word अल्पमेध सहा to refer to the worshippers of the देवताs in 7.23 अन्तवक्तः पलंतेशाम् तन्भवत्य अल्पमेध साम् so Prabhupada translated मेध सहा as brain substance so अल्पमेध सहा means scant brain substance so less intelligence so the Vedas along with their Upanishads and everything the whole body of knowledge is quite extensive and it’s not so easy to understand so just as if we are given a huge watermelon to eat how will we eat it? it can’t even go in our mouth so what do we do is we cut it into small manageable pieces and then we can eat it so similarly here Vyasadev he divided the vast Vedic knowledge into branches so this division into branches has been talked about will be talked about once again in the next chapter before describing how Vyasadev despite doing this literary work remained dissatisfied but suffice it to say that this was a phenomenal literary achievement and he was what we could call a literary superstar and this Vyasadev is considered to be a literary incarnation of the Lord and he had descended for the purpose of making spiritual knowledge available for the masses and thus enabling them to be benefited by this knowledge so he made it available in written form and he made it available also through division into various sections in an accessible form because whereas in the past people had photographic memories by which they could hear and they would retain so they could remember huge quantities of information and knowledge and understanding but because they could not do that especially in Kalyuga so he benefited them by dividing the literature into shakhas so 1.322 So the Lord appeared in a human form while being he was actually divine while manifested in human form he manifested thus for for fulfilling the purpose of the devatas samudra nigraha dini samudra nigraha nigraha adini nigraha means to control so he controlled the ocean by getting a floating bridge built across it adini he did many wonderful things like that including of course delivering the world and especially the devatas of the scourge of the Rakshasa monarch Ravana in this way he performed superhuman activities thereafter so Lord Ram is among the most celebrated avatars of the Lord and his pastimes are described in the Ramayana by Valmiki Rishi and have been immortalised thereafter by many poets through their writings in many vernacular languages in all over the Indian subcontinent and even beyond so Lord Ram here is describing so it is described how one of the most amazing things that he did was to have a bridge built across the oceans he controlled the ocean we may say that was it he who controlled the ocean you know is it was that the monkeys built the bridge but actually before that he had sat in austerity to try to please the Samudra Dev and to ask him to separate to offer him away when Samudra Dev refused then Lord Ram he just took one arrow and even before he discharged the arrow he had invested such mystic power in the arrow that the whole ocean started getting heated up and heated up and at that time Samudra Dev was forced to come in come and offer obeisances and offer and pacify him and he said that I cannot give up my nature of being liquid but still if you construct a bridge I will support it from below and I will ensure that the stones don’t sink so this by thus so then yes the Mandaras built the bridge and they were able to build the bridge because they were able to because Lord Ram had controlled Nigraha he had controlled the Samudra Dev and he had thus got the Samudra to cooperate so this was a spectacular feat by which Lord Ram scaled the ocean and thus was able to perform further superhuman deeds such as overcoming all the demon hordes including that Emperor Ravana so Ekoneshwa and Vimshwa the 19th and 20th manifestations of the Lord were they appeared as the descendants of Rishni in the in the family of Rishni and who were they? they appeared in the earth as Ram and Krishna so Ram is a short way to refer to Balram over here so Balram and Krishna are mentioned here in 19th and 20th avatars Vishnu iti bho bhagwan aharadbharam they appeared as Bhagwan and they removed the burden of the earth Kunti Maharaj talks about this purpose of the Lord in dissenting that is to equate and liberate by removing the burden of the earth so it is that same purpose which we talked about later is mentioned briefly over here when the earth was being overrun by various demons Krishna and Balram appeared and freed the earth from the burden of the demons of course while Krishna and Balram Krishna is mentioned here as one among the list of incarnations his special position will be highlighted soon after a few verses and we’ll discuss that in due course when we come to it so here what is stated is that the Lord appeared so in Kalyuga sammohaya suradvisham those who are envious of the Suras for deluding them he appeared by the name of Buddha he appeared in the province of Kikata Gaya so now Buddha his godmother his mother was not Anjana but his godmother the nurse who took care of him and who was proved all practical purposes acted like his mother was Anjana and although he was not born in Gaya he attained enlightenment in Gaya but the Bhagavatam is talking about subtle truths over here so Buddha he attained buddhatva so the Bhagavatam is not talking just about his physical birth over here but he is attaining of enlightenment buddhatva that happened in Gaya there is a tree in Bodh Gaya where he got bodh he got enlightenment and interestingly his mission is said to be sammohaya suradvisham those who are enemies of the Deitas he deluded them how did he do that? those who had gone away from Vedic wisdom by by misinterpreting it as a licence for animal slaughter Buddha he told them to give it up at least to come to preliminary moral principles so they had become so they were when they asked what the Vedas say this he says how can you follow something which doesn’t which doesn’t gel with your conscience can’t you if you can’t give life what right do you have to kill take life so don’t follow the Vedas then what about God? don’t bother about God so Buddha for all practical purposes was agnostic and pragmatic he didn’t say there is no God all the subsequent Buddhist thinkers have often portrayed Buddhism as atheistic but primarily it is non-theistic and he said don’t bother about God don’t bother about scripture just live morally so those who so although he said that you reject God but he said don’t bother about God but he himself was God and when people followed him they were indirectly following the word of God so thus they were elevated so Surat Bisha means those who were against scripture those against God those who are against Vedic culture in general he deluded them for their own good by getting them to he didn’t let their defiance take on Rajasic or Tamasic forms but he allowed he brought it gradually towards Sattvic forms by enabling them by facilitating them to follow regularity principles of good conduct of positive thought positive words or positive actions by which they could stay progressive on the path of Dharma and then the last of this I talked about so so now the and now one Kanisha that is being talked about is the prediction here at the junction of the two ages by that time most of the kings will have become flag bearers so at that time will be born as the son of a brahmana named Vishnu the lord of universe Jagatpati he will be born as Kalki so this is a prophecy that is made that Kalki will come and deliver the universe towards the so towards the end of Satyuga Kalki will appear and he will free the universe of all the afflictions which are their characteristic of Kalyuga and he will inaugurate Satyuga thereof so the Bhagavatam is a book written in a historical context and we are just here we are having a prophecy being given the prophecies for Kalyuga will be talked about more in the 12th canto also and we’ll discuss them there so essentially the Bhagavatam gives Bhagavatam’s lists of avatars completes here with Kalki then some important summary statements and some significant inferences from this list will be given in future verses which we’ll discuss in our future classes thank you