Srimad Bhagavatam Canto 10 Chapter 23 Verses 10-11

Canto 10: The Summum Bonum | Chapter 23: The Brāhmaṇas' Wives Blessed

Bhaktivedanta VedaBase: Śrīmad Bhāgavatam 10.23.10-11

deśaḥ kālaḥ pṛthag dravyaḿ

mantra-tantrartvijo 'gnayaḥ

devatā yajamānaś ca

kratur dharmaś ca yan-mayaḥ

taḿ brahma paramaḿ sākṣād

bhagavantam adhokṣajam

manuṣya-dṛṣṭyā duṣprajñā

martyātmāno na menire

SYNONYMS

deśaḥ — the place; kālaḥ — time; pṛthak dravyam — particular items of paraphernalia; mantra — Vedic hymns; tantra — prescribed rituals; ṛtvijaḥ — priests; agnayaḥ — sacrificial fires; devatāḥ — the presiding demigods; yajamānaḥ — the performer of the sacrifice; ca — and; kratuḥ — the offering; dharmaḥ — the invisible power of fruitive results; ca — and; yat — whom; mayaḥ — constituting; tam — Him; brahma paramam — the Supreme Absolute Truth; sākṣāt — directly manifest; bhagavantam — the Personality of Godhead; adhokṣajam — who is transcendental to material senses; manuṣya-dṛṣṭyā — seeing Him as an ordinary man; duṣprajñāḥ — perverted in their intelligence; martya-ātmānaḥ — falsely identifying themselves with the material body; na menire — they did not properly honor.

TRANSLATION

Although the ingredients of sacrificial performance — the place, time, particular paraphernalia, mantras, rituals, priests, fires, demigods, performer, offering and the as yet unseen beneficial results — are all simply aspects of His opulences, the brāhmaṇas saw Lord Kṛṣṇa as an ordinary human because of their perverted intelligence. They failed to recognize that He is the Supreme Absolute Truth, the directly manifest Personality of Godhead, whom the material senses cannot ordinarily perceive. Thus bewildered by their false identification with the mortal body, they did not show Him proper respect.

PURPORT

The ritualistic brāhmaṇas could not understand why the sacrificial food should be offered to Lord Kṛṣṇa, whom they considered an ordinary human being. Just as a person with rose-colored glasses sees the entire world as rose-colored, a conditioned soul with mundane vision sees even God Himself as mundane and thus loses the opportunity to go back home, back to Godhead.

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His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupāda, Founder Ācārya of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness
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