Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 10.11.6
Blended reading (Sanskrit + English inline)
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svam ātmajam
—
his own son
Ātmaja — 'born from oneself.' For Nanda, Kṛṣṇa is literally ātma-ja, his own child. The Gauḍīya rasa-theology insists this is not delusion (māyā-mātra) but a higher truth enabled by yoga-māyā: Kṛṣṇa accepts Nanda as His father in fact, not just in appearance.
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nandaḥ
—
Nanda Mahārāja
Nanda — from the root nand, 'to rejoice.' He is named for the joy he embodies and gives. In Gauḍīya lists of Vraja-vāsīs, Nanda is the foremost vātsalya-rasa-ālambana — the support of the entire rasa of parental love.
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prahasat - vadanaḥ
—
smiling-faced
Pra-has — to laugh forth. Nanda does not scold; he laughs. The Gauḍīya teaching: the response to Bhagavān's mischief is not correction but tasting. Nanda's smile is itself prema in expression.
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vimumoca ha
—
released Him
Vi-muc — the same root as mukti. Nanda 'liberates' the Lord of liberation. The pun is doctrinal: he who is the granter of mokṣa accepts mokṣa from His devotee's hand, dramatizing the principle that in bhakti the roles invert without the substances changing.
Nanda Mahārāja was surprised that Yaśodā, Kṛṣṇa’s mother, could have bound her beloved child in such a way. Kṛṣṇa was exchanging love with her. How then could she have been so cruel as to bind Him to the wooden mortar? Nanda Mahārāja understood this exchange of love, and therefore he smiled and released Kṛṣṇa. In other words, as Kṛṣṇa, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, binds a living entity in fruitive activities, He binds mother Yaśodā and Nanda Mahārāja in parental affection. This is His pastime.
Glancing constantly over all of Krsna’s limbs, Nanda smiled. "Your mother, whose lap you prefer to mine, has bound you up because of your small offense. So how can I release you?" Thinking in this way he was smiling. In the same way that you bind the jivas with maya, you bind your mother and father with prema.
This verse shows Nanda’s strong vātsalya. The description of Kṛṣṇa with the mortar is repeated in this verse to indicate that Nanda saw the sweetness of the pastime. It awaked his prema when he considered that his child was young but healthy, in spite of pulling the mortar. He examined his son in all his limbs (vilokya). He smiled in order to make the frightened, bound up child happy. He had a smile on his face, because internally he was angry at Yaśodā on seeing his son tied up and feared the fall of the two trees. Another version has prahasad- vadanam. He saw the smiling face of his son. Viṣṇu Purāṇa says navodgatālpa-dantāṁśu-sita-hāsaṁ ca balākam: he saw the child who smiled, showing his tiny, new, white teeth. Kṛṣṇa was afraid of his father, but on seeing Nanda smile, the child also smiled in order to have his father understand that he was not fearful and thus satisfy him. His father freed him from the rope tied to the mortar. He first of all untied the rope binding him to the mortar. The word ha expresses joy. Just as Yaśodā was able to tie up Kṛṣṇa, Nanda was able to untie him. Thus Nanda had similar prema. Nanda did not notice the huge quantity of rope used for tying Kṛṣṇa.
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- Notice today where Kṛṣṇa is quietly 'binding' you through duties and relationships, and accept those ropes as His arrangement rather than resisting them.
- Speak to Kṛṣṇa with the intimacy of a parent or family member at least once today — not as a distant Absolute but as the personal Lord who delights in being held close.
- Refuse the impersonalist drift the next time you reach for 'the universe' or 'the Self' — name Him as Kṛṣṇa and offer the moment to Him directly.
A king signs a treaty letting himself be 'governed' by his beloved queen in domestic matters — his sovereignty is undiminished, but love rewrites the chain of command. Nanda, smiling, unties Kṛṣṇa: the Lord who has bound the universe in karma agrees to be bound and unbound by a father's hand, because prema rearranges who holds the rope.
Just before this verse, Yaśodā had bound Kṛṣṇa to the mortar with a rope that — by His own arrangement — kept falling two fingers short until her exhaustion melted her into laughter and love. The Gauḍīya saints (especially Sanātana Gosvāmī's Bṛhad-bhāgavatāmṛta) read this as the central revelation: He cannot be bound by sacrifice, austerity, or knowledge, but He can be bound by prema.
Nanda's smile in this verse is the masculine echo of Yaśodā's binding: she binds in love; he unbinds in love. Together they show that Kṛṣṇa's freedom and Kṛṣṇa's bondage are both His response to bhakti.
My note
Source: vedabase.io