An Incident From The Bhagavatam-Part II... Contd.

Sri Ramakrishna

oi-Staff

By Super

Thursday, April 19, 2012, 14:25

Narrative: As Yashoda was not aware of both these, she remained unsuccessful in binding Him this far. The Gopis were watching her. However much she tried, she could not tie Krishna. No rope of any length was sufficient. Every rope ran short by two inches! Watching her predicament, the gopis started laughing. Yashoda did not know what to do. Drained of all her strength, mental and physical, and unable to make any head and tail of what was happening, Yashoda, too, joined their laughter.

Comments: A mother"s deepest treasure lies in her pride of her child. She feels responsible for whatever happens to the child. It was this ego of Yashoda that the Lord was hitting at. When she started laughing, it meant she gave up her ego and accepted defeat. At that point, the Lord allowed her to tie Him up. Says Srimad Bhagavatam, 'Seeing His mother"s plight, Krishna finally allowed Himself to be tied up," (drishtvaa parishramam krishnah kripayaa aseet svabandhane). Similar is the case of spiritual aspirants who do spiritual practices thinking that they can attain to God through their ego-centered actions. But they realise, after much effort, that God cannot be controlled through their sadhanas. They, then, learn to surrender themselves to God. Then only God"s blessings come to them and they experience His eternal Presence.

Conclusion
Spiritual aspirants can learn one vital lesson from this incident. The reason why God is difficult to attain is that we cling to our ego. It is our ego that obstructs our spiritual experience. Only when our ego is annihilated, though hard spiritual practices, does the Lord appear. Do we not see how much of effort Yashoda put to tie him up? At last, only when she gave up saying, 'I cannot do anymore," that the Lord did graciously help her.

Suka, the narrator of Bhagavatam, after describing this incident, paused and closed his eyes in meditation for a while. After sometime, he reopened his eyes and addressing Parikshit, who was listening to him with full devotion, said,'The kind of grace that Yashoda got from Sri Krishna was not there for Brahma, or Shiva or even Lakshmi though she resides right on his chest." All the sages listening to this recital had their eyes filled with tears of joy.

Referring to this, Madhusudana Saraswati, the celebrated monk-scholar of seventeenth century, says in his Mandaakini Stotra, 'Out of hatred, Duryodhana tried to bind the Lord. In return, both he and his entire race were annihilated. Yashoda tried the same thing out of love. Not only did she succeed in binding Him, she is also extolled by all, including gods, for her devotion to Krishna. Let us worship the Lord Krishna who allowed Himself to be bound and let us also reverentially salute Yashoda for her devotion."