10.54 · The Marriage of Kṛṣṇa and Rukmiṇī

• su-saṁrabdhāḥ — greatly angered
  Compound of su (intense) + saṁrabdha (enraged). The kings' fury is the natural reaction of the materially-proud when Kṛṣṇa quietly removes what they think is theirs — a recurring Bhāgavatam shape (Kaṁsa, Jarāsandha, Śiśupāla).
• dhṛta — holding
  Past participle of √dhṛ. The kings 'hold' their bows; in the next chapters Kṛṣṇa 'holds' Rukmiṇī. The same root names the act of māyā holding souls and Kṛṣṇa being held by His devotees (dhṛta-pāṇiḥ at Yaśodā's churn).
• kārmukāḥ — bows
  Plural — the multiplicity of bows lifted against one Lord. Gauḍīyas read the scene as a foil: the world's many weapons against the one Govinda who needs no weapon to win His own.
• balaiḥ — with armies
  Plural instrumental of bala. The verse stacks military force on military force; the rasa of the chapter depends on this preposterous asymmetry between armed kings and the unarmed cowherd who carries the bride.
• anvīyuḥ — they followed
  Imperfect of anu-√i, 'to follow after'. The same verb-shape the Bhāgavatam uses for the gopīs following Kṛṣṇa into the rāsa — here it names the opposite movement: the envious pursuing what they hate, instead of the loving pursuing what they love.

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Like clouds boiling up around a mountain, the rival kings darken the sky with their armies — yet the mountain (Kṛṣṇa) holds the form of Rukmiṇī under His arm and does not flinch. The fury of the world is the backdrop against which Bhagavān's tenderness for His devotee is photographed.

• yādava-anīka — of the Yādava army
  Compound: yādava (descendants of Yadu) + anīka (army). The Yadus are the dynasty Kṛṣṇa graced by birth; in Gauḍīya understanding 'Yādava' designates not race but those whom Bhagavān has made His own household.
• yūtha-paḥ — the officers / herd-leaders
  Yūtha-pa literally means 'leader of a herd' — the same word used in Canto 8 for Gajendra's elephant lordship. Even military leadership, in the Bhāgavatam, is described in vraja-tinted pastoral vocabulary.
• sammukhāḥ — directly facing
  Sam (together, fully) + mukha (face). Facing the enemy is a soldier's dharma; turning the face toward Kṛṣṇa (kṛṣṇa-sammukhya) is the soul's. The Yādavas demonstrate both at once.
• visphūrjya — twanging
  Onomatopoeic root √sphūrj — the sound of bow-string drawn taut. Vyāsa is meticulous about the soundscape of līlā: the twang here is a sonic counter to the conches that will sound at the wedding.
• rājan — O King (Parīkṣit)
  Vocative. Śukadeva keeps calling Parīkṣit back into the frame — the dying king who has only seven days left needs the reassurance that Kṛṣṇa's people stand firm even against overwhelming odds.

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Like a sea-wall meeting the wave, the Yādava commanders turn and stand, the twang of their bows a single calm note over the kings' roar. To stand in defense of Kṛṣṇa's chosen is itself a kind of bhakti — sthitam.

• śara-varṣāṇi — rains of arrows
  Compound: śara (arrow) + varṣa (rain, downpour). Sanskrit poetics has a stock metaphor for battle-fury as monsoon; Vyāsa picks it up to set up the Govardhana echo — rain that cannot harm Kṛṣṇa's shelter.
• meghāḥ — clouds
  Megha is also a stock simile for Kṛṣṇa's dark complexion (megha-śyāma). The verse plays the irony: clouds (enemy kings) pour rain on a hill, while the true Megha (Kṛṣṇa) stands as the hill that takes the rain.
• adriṣu — upon mountains
  Locative plural of adri. Adri is one of the Bhāgavatam's favorite words for Govardhana (giri-rāja). The acoustic association is deliberate — the verse trains the ear to hear Vraja under Mathurā/Dvārakā events.
• astra-kovidāḥ — expert in the use of weapons
  Astra (missile) + kovida (skilled). Material expertise has limits; the next verses show that the most skilled weapon-handlers still cannot harm what Kṛṣṇa protects. Skill without Kṛṣṇa is a closed door.
• mumucuḥ — they released
  Perfect of √muc, 'to release, let go'. The same verb-root that names mukti (release from saṁsāra). Here the enemies 'release' arrows; only Kṛṣṇa can release the soul — Vyāsa lets the pun hang in the background.

Arrows fall on the Yadus like monsoon rain on mountain-flanks — but rain only washes a mountain clean; it cannot move it. The Yādavas under Kṛṣṇa's shelter receive the storm as the Govardhana hill received Indra's downpour: untouched.

• patyuḥ — of her Lord
  Genitive of pati. Already, before the wedding rites, Rukmiṇī addresses Kṛṣṇa with the bridal possessive — Gauḍīya commentators read this as proof that the relation is eternal, not constituted by the kanyādāna to come.
• su-madhyamā — slender-waisted
  Su (beautiful) + madhyama (middle). A standard epithet for Rukmiṇī; in Gauḍīya rasa-śāstra it names not waistline alone but the perfect proportion of a nāyikā — the body itself is a sign of fitness for mādhurya-rasa.
• sa-vrīḍam — shyly, with modesty
  Sa (with) + vrīḍā (bashfulness). Vrīḍā is one of the named sañcāri-bhāvas of mādhurya-rasa in Rūpa Gosvāmī's Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu — the shyness that intensifies, rather than diminishes, intimacy.
• bhaya-vihvala-locanā — whose eyes are disturbed by fear
  Compound: bhaya (fear) + vihvala (overwhelmed) + locanā (whose eyes). Fear before Kṛṣṇa is not contradiction of love; the gopīs feared Pūtanā, feared Aghāsura, feared Indra's rain — fear directed toward the Lord IS śaraṇa.
• vīkṣya — seeing
  Gerund of vi-√īkṣ. Rukmiṇī first sees the danger; the next gerund (aikṣat) is her looking at Kṛṣṇa's face. Gauḍīyas note the sequence — the devotee glimpses danger only to be turned more sharply toward the Lord's countenance.

Like a newly-married bride glancing at her husband during a thunderstorm — fear softened by sidelong trust — Rukmiṇī's frightened eyes already form the prototype for every devotee's plea: I am afraid; You see me; that is enough.

• prahasya — laughing
  Gerund of pra-√has. Kṛṣṇa's laughter inside battle is the same laughter at the rāsa, the same smile while lifting Govardhana — the unshakable mood of one who is the cause of all causes. The smile is the doctrine.
• bhagavān — the Supreme Lord
  From bhaga + vat — the possessor of all six opulences (wealth, fame, strength, beauty, knowledge, renunciation, per Viṣṇu Purāṇa 6.5.47). Vyāsa inserts 'bhagavān' just before the diminutive 'do not be afraid' — the same Person who runs the universe is comforting one frightened bride.
• vāma-locane — O beautiful-eyed one
  Compound: vāma (lovely) + locana (eye). Sweet-name address. Gauḍīya rasa-vocabulary makes the eye the chief organ of mādhurya — what passes between Kṛṣṇa and His beloveds is, first and irreducibly, dṛṣṭi-pāta, the fall of the glance.
• tāvakaiḥ — by your (army)
  Possessive 'belonging to you'. Prabhupāda's purport flags this word: Kṛṣṇa transfers the entire Yādava military to Rukmiṇī's account. The Gauḍīya principle — what is Kṛṣṇa's becomes the devotee's the moment she takes refuge — is encoded in one possessive suffix.
• mā sma bhaiḥ — do not be afraid
  Aorist prohibitive of √bhī with mā sma. The same sentence the four-armed Lord speaks at the moment of liberation in Vaikuṇṭha; the words that calm the gopīs in the rāsa night. Wherever Bhagavān is, abhaya is His native climate.

Like a husband who laughingly hands his wife the keys to the treasury — 'these are your soldiers, not mine' — Kṛṣṇa absorbs Rukmiṇī into His own dynasty before a single arrow is loosed. Marriage is, for Bhagavān, simply the public form of an already-eternal belonging.

• saṅkarṣaṇa — Lord Balarāma
  From sam + √kṛṣ, 'one who draws together' — He who drew the foetus from Devakī's womb to Rohiṇī. Gauḍīyas worship Saṅkarṣaṇa as Kṛṣṇa's mūla prakāśa, the first manifestation of Bhagavān's own self for service — hence His role here as Kṛṣṇa's elder protector.
• gada — Gada, Kṛṣṇa's younger brother
  Son of Vasudeva by Sunāmā. The Bhāgavatam consistently honors the lesser-known Yadu heroes alongside Balarāma — bhakti-history is not a one-Person show; the entire family of the Lord shares in His protection of the devotee.
• vīrāḥ — the heroes
  Plural of vīra. Vīra-rasa in Gauḍīya śāstra is one of the sapta-gauṇa-rasas — secondary to mādhurya but real. Kṛṣṇa's pastimes need warriors as much as cowherds; both serve the same Person.
• amṛṣyamāṇāḥ — not tolerating
  Present participle middle of √mṛṣ. The Yādava heroes refuse to tolerate insult to Kṛṣṇa — this 'kṛṣṇa-aparādha-asahanam' is, for Gauḍīyas, the third of the six signs of śaraṇāgati (Hari-bhakti-vilāsa).
• nārācaiḥ — with iron arrows
  Nārāca — fully-iron shafts, the heaviest grade. The metallurgy detail is not ornament; the Bhāgavatam wants the reader to feel the weight of what the Yadus bring to defend Kṛṣṇa's choice.

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Like a father's elder brother stepping in when a younger relative is insulted, Saṅkarṣaṇa and Gada strike down the offending mounts — their fury is not their own, it is the household's protective instinct around Kṛṣṇa and His bride.

• śirāṁsi — the heads
  Plural of śiras. The head is the seat of vanity in Sanskrit poetics; when it falls 'by the millions,' the verse is staging the fate of ahaṅkāra apart from Kṛṣṇa-conscious surrender.
• kuṇḍala — earrings
  Ornaments that mark royal status. Their detachment from royal heads on the battlefield mirrors the spiritual point Balarāma will make later (vv. 41–43): identification with bodily decoration is the deepest illusion.
• kirīṭāni — helmets
  Also 'crowns'. The same word that the Bhāgavatam uses for the kirīṭa of Viṣṇu in Vaikuṇṭha; here, fallen. Royal kirīṭas without surrender to the original kirīṭi (Bhagavān) end in mud.
• bhuvi — to the ground
  Locative of bhū. The whole verse is a vertical fall — from elephant-back, horse-back, chariot-seat, down to bhū. The motion of pride is always downward; only bhakti goes up.
• koṭiśaḥ — by the millions
  From koṭi (ten million) + the distributive suffix. The hyperbole isn't bloodlust; it is Vyāsa's way of insisting that the scale of opposition only sharpens the scale of Kṛṣṇa's protection.

Helmets and earrings rolling on the field — Vyāsa's camera pans low to where pride lives: in heads decorated for war. When kings forget that their crowns belong to the Lord, the crowns return to dust without their consent.

• karabhāḥ — fingerless hands (or elephant's trunks)
  Prabhupāda's purport (citing the dictionary) flags the double meaning — wrist-to-knuckle of a human, and the trunk of an elephant. Vyāsa's simile collapses the distinction: the limb of a man and the limb of a beast lie equally on the field.
• ūravaḥ — thighs
  From uru. The thigh is, in the Vedic Puruṣa-sūkta, the seat of the kṣatriya. The thighs of warriors lying severed are an emblem of kṣatriya-dharma destroyed when it is divorced from the Person who is the original Puruṣa.
• aśva-aśvatara-nāga-uṣṭra-khara-martya — horses, donkeys, elephants, camels, wild asses, humans
  Six species piled into one compound. Vyāsa flattens the hierarchy: kṣatriya and ass receive the same death in the absence of Kṛṣṇa-consciousness. Saṁsāra is the great leveller; only bhakti differentiates.
• iṣu-āsāḥ — bows
  Iṣu (arrow) + āsa (resting place, container) — the bow as that-which-holds-arrows. Even the names of weapons in Sanskrit carry the architecture of attachment; nothing in this scene is ornamental.
• asi — swords
  Asi is also the second person singular of √as ('you are') — and the Upaniṣadic mahā-vākya 'tat tvam asi' famously turns on it. Here the swords lie in the dirt: the Vedic 'thou art' goes nowhere when the 'thou' has not surrendered to the 'That' who is Kṛṣṇa.

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The battlefield becomes an anatomy lesson — hands, thighs, donkey heads, elephant trunks lying together. The verse is not gore for its own sake; it is the Bhāgavatam's blunt statement that the body, severed from its purpose in Kṛṣṇa's service, is no more than its parts.

• vṛṣṇibhiḥ — by the Vṛṣṇis
  The Vṛṣṇi clan — the branch of Yadus from which Vasudeva and Kṛṣṇa take birth. To be on the Vṛṣṇi side is, in Bhāgavata reckoning, to be on Kṛṣṇa's side; the genealogy is a vehicle for prema.
• jaya-kāṅkṣibhiḥ — who were eager for victory
  Jaya (victory) + kāṅkṣin (longing). The same word-pair appears in the Bhagavad-gītā's first verses; here, however, the longing for victory is yoked to Kṛṣṇa's cause, not against it (cf. BG 1.32 where Arjuna says he does NOT want victory).
• vimukhāḥ — discouraged / face-turned-away
  Vi (away) + mukha (face). The exact opposite of sammukha (last verse). Gauḍīyas treat vimukhatā toward Kṛṣṇa as the constituting condition of māyā; here it is dramatized — the demons literally turn their faces from Him.
• rājānaḥ — the kings
  Plural of rājan. Throughout Canto 10 the rājan-class is portrayed as opposing or worshipping Kṛṣṇa — there is no neutral king. Even Parīkṣit, the rājan to whom Śuka speaks, must choose.

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Like jackals who circled a kill but slink away when the lion turns, Jarāsandha and his rank withdraw — not because their numbers shrank but because the protection of Kṛṣṇa cannot be out-counted. Vimukha — face turned away — is exactly the opposite of sammukhya, the devotee's posture.

• śiśupālam — Śiśupāla
  King of Cedi, Kṛṣṇa's cousin (son of Kṛṣṇa's father's sister Śrutaśravā). Destined to be liberated by Kṛṣṇa's discus at the Rājasūya (SB 10.74). Gauḍīyas read his envy as covert connection — sustained meditation on Kṛṣṇa, even as enemy, ripens into mukti.
• hṛta-dāram — whose wife was stolen
  Hṛta (taken) + dāra (wife). Prabhupāda's purport flags the over-claim — Śiśupāla had not married Rukmiṇī; the grief is over a projection. Gauḍīyas use this as a parable for material possessiveness in general.
• naṣṭa-tviṣam — whose color was lost
  Naṣṭa (lost) + tviṣ (radiance). The body's complexion fades when the mind has fixed itself on what was never given. Loss of bhakti makes a similar shadow — the soul drains of its constitutional brilliance.
• śuṣyat-vadanam — whose face was dried up
  Present participle of √śuṣ + vadana (face). The Bhāgavatam's medical observation: grief desiccates the body. Bhakti, by contrast, makes the body sa-rasa, full of juice (cf. SB 11.14.23).
• āturam — perturbed
  From ā-√tṝ. Used in Āyurveda for 'patient' — one who is afflicted. Śiśupāla is presented in clinical language; his envy is diagnosed, not narrated.

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Like a man who has discovered that a treasure he never opened was already empty — Śiśupāla mourns Rukmiṇī as a 'lost wife,' though she had never been his. The verse exposes how the mind manufactures grief over what it never possessed and never could.

• śārdūla — tiger (vocative)
  Tiger-of-men: stock epic flattery between defeated demons. The Bhāgavatam reproduces such epithets faithfully to show how the asurika mind props up its dignity with titles even in its lowest moment.
• daurmana-syam — depressed state of mind
  From durmanas (bad-minded, depressed). Note how Jarāsandha names depression but offers no actual remedy — only the māyāvāda-style consolation that 'nothing is permanent.' Gauḍīyas distinguish this dry detachment from prema's true equanimity.
• priya-apriyayoḥ — of the desirable and undesirable
  Dual genitive: priya (dear) + apriya (un-dear). The Gītā's same pair (BG 2.57) — but in the Gītā it is overcome by surrender to the Lord; in Jarāsandha's mouth it dwindles to fatalism.
• niṣṭhā — permanence
  From ni-√sthā, 'to stand firm'. The same word that in Gītā 3.3 and 18.50 names the firmness of devotional or jñāna-niṣṭhā. Jarāsandha can name the absence of niṣṭhā in the world; he cannot name the niṣṭhā in bhakti that is the answer.
• dehiṣu — among embodied beings
  Locative plural of dehin. Bodies are unstable; the dehin (the embodied self) is eternal — exactly what Balarāma will spell out at v. 45ff. Jarāsandha touches the truth but doesn't enter it.

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Like a doctor whose own house is on fire prescribing calm to others, Jarāsandha lectures Śiśupāla on impermanence — the same Jarāsandha who, in eighteen battles, refused to learn the very lesson he teaches. Impersonal philosophy, divorced from surrender, becomes a polished mask for unhealed envy.

• dāru-mayī — made of wood
  Dāru (wood) + mayī (composed of). A wooden marionette. The Bhāgavatam will reuse the dāru-mayī yoṣit image at SB 5.6.7 and elsewhere — a stock simile for the illusory body.
• kuhaka — of the showman / magician
  Kuhaka is a stage-trickster, a sleight-of-hand artist. The world Jarāsandha sees has only the magician and the puppet; bhakti adds a third term — the personal devotee who steps off the stage.
• īśvara-tantraḥ — under the control of the Supreme Lord
  Īśvara (controller) + tantra (system, controlling apparatus). The Gauḍīya reading: the world IS īśvara-tantra, but Bhagavān runs the system through prema, not mere causality. Jarāsandha sees only the apparatus.
• īhate — endeavors / struggles
  Present middle of √īh. Material effort always carries the flavor of struggle (īhā); bhakti-yoga alone is anāyāsa, effortless in its essence (cf. BG 9.2).
• sukha-duḥkhayoḥ — in joy and misery
  Dual locative. The Gītā's standard binary. Material life is, by definition, the field of this dvandva; transcendence is named as 'beyond joy and sorrow' (sukha-duḥkhe same kṛtvā, BG 2.38), which only Kṛṣṇa-consciousness reaches.

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A wooden puppet dances because a hand pulls strings she cannot see — Jarāsandha grants the Lord as īśvara of the puppet-show, but mistakes Him for a remote, impersonal manipulator. Gauḍīyas read the same image differently: Bhagavān is not the hidden stage-hand but the lover who wishes to dance with the puppet once she becomes a person.

• śaureḥ — with Kṛṣṇa (lit. of the descendant of Śūra)
  Genitive of Śauri — Kṛṣṇa as Vasudeva's son, Vasudeva being Śūrasena's son. Patronymics in the Bhāgavatam quietly insist on the personal lineage of God: Bhagavān has parents, an ancestry, a household.
• sapta-daśa — seventeen
  The famous number of Jarāsandha's defeats. Vyāsa preserves the count because the absurd ratio (17:1) is itself the doctrinal point — the demon can win once when the Lord chooses to lose.
• saṁyugāni — battles
  Sam (together) + yuga (joining). A 'meeting' or 'joining-with' — Sanskrit's idiom for battle is meeting, an unintended echo of bhakti, which is also a sam-yoga but in love, not arms.
• parājitaḥ — defeated
  Para (other, opposite) + ajita (un-conquered). 'Conquered by the other.' The same word, in another mood, is what every devotee should be: para-ajita, conquered by the Other who is Kṛṣṇa.
• ekam — one (only)
  Numerical: one. The arithmetic is the rasa — one victory swallowed by seventeen defeats. The verse uses bookkeeping to mock the asurika project of competing with Kṛṣṇa.

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Like a gambler boasting that he once won a hand to console himself for seventeen losses, Jarāsandha cites his single victory over Kṛṣṇa as if it proved anything. The Lord allows such victories — they are part of His līlā, never of His limits.

• kālena — by time
  Instrumental of kāla. In Gauḍīya theology, kāla is Kṛṣṇa's energy (cf. BG 11.32 'kālo 'smi'); naming time without naming the Person who IS time is to glance at the shadow and miss the body.
• daiva — fate / providence
  From deva. Originally 'that which pertains to the gods.' The Bhāgavatam uses daiva as the residual karmic momentum that the Lord administers — not blind, but personal. Jarāsandha takes it as blind.
• vidrāvitam — driven
  Past participle of vi-√dru, 'driven, made to run.' The world is driven; the devotee, by contrast, walks with the Lord (cf. Prahlāda 7.5.32, 'where the unsought guidance of Bhagavān becomes one's path').
• na śocāmi — I do not lament
  BG 2.11 begins with the same prohibition: 'aśocyān anvaśocas tvam' — 'you grieve for those not to be grieved for.' Kṛṣṇa offers the cure (surrender); Jarāsandha offers only the discipline of refusal.
• jagat — the world
  From √gam — 'that which goes / is in motion.' The world is constitutively motion, never rest. The only rest is in the unmoving Mover, Kṛṣṇa — a doctrine Jarāsandha is one step short of seeing.

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A man can name the words 'time' and 'fate' without ever surrendering to the Person behind them — like a sailor who maps the wind but refuses to set a sail. Jarāsandha's calm is the cousin of true equanimity, but it cannot reach śaraṇa.

• phalgu-tantraiḥ — with a meager entourage
  Phalgu (insignificant, faint) + tantra (apparatus, entourage). The same root phalgu is the name of the dry river at Gayā — externally small, internally sacred. The Yadus look phalgu, but house the Lord.
• kṛṣṇa-pālitaiḥ — protected by Kṛṣṇa
  Kṛṣṇa + pālita (protected). The exact phrase that defines a devotee: not by self-strength but by Kṛṣṇa's pālana. Cf. BG 9.22, 'yoga-kṣemaṁ vahāmy aham.' This is the verse's secret theology, hidden in an enemy's lament.
• vīra-yūtha-pa-yūtha-pāḥ — leaders of leaders of heroes
  Triple compound: vīra (hero) + yūthapa (leader) + yūthapa (leader again). Kings of kings of warriors. The grammatical pile-up of titles only sharpens the irony — all these stacked dignities defeated by Kṛṣṇa's 'few.'
• parājitāḥ — defeated
  Same word as v. 13 — but now in the plural, owned by all the kings. The repetition is Vyāsa underscoring: this is not Jarāsandha's quirk; it is the universal asurika condition.
• yadubhiḥ — by the Yadus
  Instrumental plural. Even when Kṛṣṇa Himself fights, the credit is given to His devotees. That is Bhagavān's signature courtesy — the Lord makes His servants the apparent agents.

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Like a great lake covered by morning mist — the kings cannot see that the 'meager entourage' of Yadus is Kṛṣṇa-pālita, sheltered by the Lord, and therefore unconquerable. Numbers count nothing where Bhagavān stands as canopy.

• kāle — in time
  Locative of kāla. Jarāsandha keeps invoking time. The Bhāgavatam will reveal at SB 11.7.48 that 'I, time' is one of Kṛṣṇa's own self-descriptions — the demons unwittingly name their conqueror.
• ātma-anusārīṇi — favoring them (lit. following the self)
  Ātma (self) + anusārin (following). Demons construe time as serving their self-interest in cycles; Vaiṣṇavas know time follows Kṛṣṇa, not the asura's plans.
• pradakṣiṇaḥ — turned toward us (lit. moving to the right / auspicious)
  Pra (forward) + dakṣiṇa (right, south, auspicious). The word that names temple-circumambulation. Jarāsandha hopes time will 'circumambulate' him as if HE were the deity — a precise inversion of bhakti.
• vijeṣyāmaḥ — we shall conquer
  Future of vi-√ji. The same verb that produces 'jaya.' The demons project conquest into the future because the present has refused them. Gauḍīyas note: bhakti never postpones — 'yatra yatra mano dehī tatra tatra samāhitam' (BG 6.26).
• ripavaḥ — enemies
  Plural of ripu. Naming Kṛṣṇa as 'enemy' is the demon's freedom; the devotee names Him 'mine.' Same Lord, different relation; entirely different fate.

• Padaseva Pr SB 10-54-16 Oriya
  His Grace Padaseva Prabhu· Oriya

Like a man who has lost at chess hoping the board will tilt back his way, Jarāsandha sees time as a wheel that simply revolves through good and bad sides. The Gauḍīya answer: the wheel is real, but it has a hub — Kṛṣṇa — and stepping onto the hub ends the spin.

• prabodhitaḥ — persuaded / awakened
  Past participle of pra-√budh. The verb of 'awakening,' but used here for political consolation. Vyāsa is wry: real prabodha is the awakening of the soul to Kṛṣṇa, which Jarāsandha cannot give Śiśupāla because he himself does not have it.
• caidyaḥ — Śiśupāla (descendant of Cedi)
  Patronymic referring to the Cedi line. The Bhāgavatam will spend SB 10.74 on his liberation by Kṛṣṇa's cakra — a famous moment of dveṣa-bhakti culminating in mukti.
• mitraiḥ — by his friends
  Plural instrumental of mitra. The asurika 'friend' (Jarāsandha) keeps Śiśupāla in saṁsāra; the Vaiṣṇava 'friend' (Uddhava, Akrūra, Nārada) draws his hearer to Kṛṣṇa. Both are called mitra; only one is suhṛt.
• hata-śeṣāḥ — those who remained from the killed
  Hata (killed) + śeṣa (remainder). The remainder — the not-yet-killed — is everyone alive. The Bhāgavatam constantly reminds us we are all hata-śeṣas of Time, and the only question is whether the remaining time is offered to Kṛṣṇa.
• puram — to his city
  Each man retreats to his own pura, his own walled identity. The opposite movement, which the next chapters will show, is to leave one's pura and enter Kṛṣṇa's pura, Dvārakā — exchange of cities is exchange of selves.

• Padaseva Pr SB 10-54-17 Oriya
  His Grace Padaseva Prabhu· Oriya

Like cattle wandering home after a storm has scattered them — each returning to its own pen, none any wiser — Śiśupāla and the kings retreat to their cities. They have been 'consoled' by philosophy without surrender; nothing in them has changed.

• rākṣasa-udvāham — marriage in the style of demons (i.e., by abduction)
  Rākṣasa (one of eight forms of vivāha listed in Manu-smṛti 3.21–34) + udvāha (marriage). For kṣatriyas, rākṣasa-vivāha — winning the bride by force from rival suitors — is dharmically legitimate; Gauḍīyas note that Kṛṣṇa's 'abduction' is the bride's own prior plan via Brāhmaṇa-message (SB 10.52).
• kṛṣṇa-dviṭ — hater of Kṛṣṇa
  Kṛṣṇa + dviṣ (one who hates). The technical name of a category of being. Rūpa Gosvāmī classifies kṛṣṇa-dveṣa as a kind of negative connection (vipralambha by hostility); even hatred, sustained, ripens. But far better is service.
• asahan — unable to bear
  Present participle a- + √sah. The asurika temperament. To-be-able-to-bear (sahiṣṇu) is a sign of the brāhmaṇa-Vaiṣṇava (cf. CC Madhya 19.149); Rukmī is the photographic negative of that virtue.
• svasuḥ — of his sister
  Genitive of svasṛ. Family possessiveness, when uninformed by knowledge of Kṛṣṇa as the original father/brother/owner, becomes a prison. Rukmī treats Rukmiṇī as property; she has already become Kṛṣṇa's.
• akṣauhiṇyā — by an akṣauhiṇī military division
  An akṣauhiṇī (21,870 chariots, 21,870 elephants, 65,610 cavalry, 109,350 infantry per Mahābhārata) — one of Kurukṣetra's standard counting units. Vyāsa lists the size to make Rukmī's solitary final charge (v. 23) the more pathetic.

• Padaseva Pr SB 10-54-18 Oriya
  His Grace Padaseva Prabhu· Oriya

Like a thorn furious that a gardener uprooted it from the rose-bush, Rukmī cannot bear that his sister has been claimed by the One she always belonged to. Envy of Kṛṣṇa is, in Gauḍīya reading, the most exquisite form of self-harm.

• amarṣī — intolerant
  From a- + √mṛṣ. The same family as 'amarṣa' (sañcāri-bhāva of impatience). In bhakti-rasa, intolerance can be holy (kṛṣṇa-aparādha-asahanam, v. 6 above); in asurika hands, it is poison.
• pratijajñe — he swore
  Perfect of prati-√jñā. A pratijñā binds even the gods; here Rukmī binds himself uselessly, since he cannot fulfill the impossible promise of killing the Unkillable.
• mahā-bāhuḥ — mighty-armed
  Mahā (great) + bāhu (arm). A standard epithet for warriors — but the Bhāgavatam reserves its strongest use for Kṛṣṇa Himself (cf. v. 33 below where Rukmiṇī addresses Him so). The repetition strips the title from Rukmī and re-grants it to the Lord.
• kuṇḍinam — the city of Kuṇḍina
  Capital of Vidarbha — Rukmiṇī and Rukmī's birthplace (cf. SB 10.52). Vyāsa names it deliberately; the vow about Kuṇḍina becomes the geography of Rukmī's defeat: he will build a new city (Bhojakaṭa, v. 51) to keep the letter of the vow while violating its spirit.
• satyam — in truth
  From √as ('to be'). The most loaded word in the Sanskrit lexicon. Rukmī swears 'in truth' to do what is metaphysically impossible — to fight the Person who IS satya. The Bhāgavatam's irony is theological, not just dramatic.

• 05 - RGS SB 10-54-19-42 - Rukmini Mangalam-05 - New Jersey
  His Holiness Radha Govinda Swami· English
• RRDD SB 10-54-20-21 - Glories of Garuda - 2025-01-17
  Her Grace Ratna Radhika Mataji· 2025-01-17· English

Like a man who has bolted the door of his own house with a vow he cannot retract, Rukmī swears in front of the kings — and his oath becomes the cage that builds Bhojakaṭa. Pratijñā made in anger, not in dharma, is a self-imposed exile.

• sārathim — to his driver
  Sa (with) + ratha (chariot). The same word for the role Kṛṣṇa Himself fills for Arjuna at Kurukṣetra. The contrast is exact: Rukmī commands a sārathi; Arjuna receives one who is the Lord. The choice of sārathi defines the rasa.
• codaya — drive
  Imperative of √cud, 'to impel.' The same root in 'pra-codayāt' of the Gāyatrī (Bṛhad-āraṇyaka Up. 5.14.1). Rukmī uses the verb of divine impulsion to demand purely material speed — a small theft of vocabulary.
• saṁyugam — battle / meeting
  Same root as v. 13's saṁyugāni — 'meeting.' Rukmī asks for a meeting with Kṛṣṇa; he will get one, but not the one he expects. Every meeting with Bhagavān, even hostile, leaves the asura altered.
• satvaraḥ — quickly
  Sat (with) + tvara (haste). The grammatical irony — 'with hurry' the very prefix sat-, also names truth. He moves with hurry, but no truth.
• yataḥ — to where
  Relative adverb. Wherever Kṛṣṇa is — that becomes the destination. Even the demon's grammar bends in this direction. Gauḍīya commentators love such accidents.

Like a moth flying into the lamp while shouting threats at the flame, Rukmī commands the charioteer to drive him faster toward Kṛṣṇa. The Lord obliges every approach — even one in fury.

• gopālasya — of the cowherd (or: of the protector of the Vedas)
  Go (cow / Veda / earth) + pāla (protector). The triple meaning is built into the word. Rukmī intends 'mere cowherd'; Śrīdhara Svāmī (in the purport) reads 'protector of the Vedas / of the earth.' Sanskrit refuses to demean Kṛṣṇa even when its speaker wants to.
• su-durmateḥ — whose mentality is most wicked (or: whose mind is most beautifully compassionate)
  Su (intensely or beautifully) + durmati (bad-minded; or — read as 'durga-mati' — possessing a difficult-to-understand mind). Rukmī insults; the language praises. Gauḍīya commentary feasts on such inversions.
• vīrya-madam — intoxicated pride of prowess
  Vīrya (potency) + mada (intoxication). Rukmī accuses Kṛṣṇa of the very thing Rukmī is doing. Projection is the asura's epistemology — he sees his own madness everywhere except in himself.
• prasabham — violently / by force
  Pra (forth) + sabham (an assembly). Sanskrit's idiom for 'in the open, before the gathered.' Rukmī treats public claim as theft. Yet Kṛṣṇa's 'abduction' was conducted in the open, with the bride's prior written consent — Vyāsa records the slander to make the contrast sharper.
• niśitaiḥ — sharp
  From ni-√śā, 'to sharpen.' Rukmī's arrows are sharp; the answer the Lord gives him (six arrows, v. 26) is sharper. Bhagavān's response is always commensurate, never excessive, never deficient.

Like a thief calling the rightful owner a robber, Rukmī labels Kṛṣṇa 'wicked cowherd.' Vyāsa preserves Śrīdhara Svāmī's reading: gopāla also means 'protector of the Vedas,' and durmati can be inverted to 'whose beautiful mind extends mercy even to the wicked' — the slander becomes praise the moment a Vaiṣṇava reads it.

• ku-matiḥ — foolish (lit. of bad mind)
  Ku (bad) + mati (intellect). The exact opposite of su-mati. In Gauḍīya prayer-language, kṛṣṇa-bhakta-mati is the highest mati; ku-mati is its absence. Rukmī shows what mati becomes when it refuses Kṛṣṇa.
• apramāṇa-vit — not knowing the dimensions
  A- (not) + pramāṇa (measure, proof) + vid (knower). One who does not know the standard of measure. The Lord is the original pramāṇa (cf. BG 7.7, 'matataḥ parataraṁ nānyat kiñcid asti'). To not know His pramāṇa is to live, like Rukmī, without an instrument that could ever read Him.
• govindam — to Lord Kṛṣṇa (lit. one who gives pleasure to the cows / senses / earth)
  Go (cows / senses / earth) + vinda (giver of pleasure). The name Brahmā gives Kṛṣṇa at the end of His abhiṣeka in SB 10.27. Vyāsa uses the most affectionate of Kṛṣṇa's names in the moment of Rukmī's challenge — softening the air around what is about to happen.
• tiṣṭha-tiṣṭha — stand and fight (lit. 'stand, stand')
  Doubled imperative of √sthā. The doubling is the demon's bravado. The Bhāgavatam echoes the same doubling in praise-contexts (jaya jaya); here it is challenge.
• vikatthamānaḥ — boasting
  Present participle of vi-√kath, 'to boast.' The Bhāgavatam catalogues this as one of the eight āsuri-sampat traits at SB 11.5.8. Boasting is rakṣas in seed; bhakti's antithesis is dīna-bhāva, the mood of being-poor before the Lord.

Like a child trying to scoop the sea into a cup, Rukmī attempts to measure the Immeasurable with one chariot. The verse turns on apramāṇa-vit — 'not knowing the dimensions' — the precise theological diagnosis of every quarrel humans pick with the Lord.

• vikṛṣya — drawing (the bow)
  Gerund of vi-√kṛṣ. Beautiful pun: the same root that gives Kṛṣṇa His name (one explanation: 'kṛṣ' = 'to attract'). Rukmī 'kṛṣ'-es his bow toward Kṛṣṇa; the One whose business is attraction permits the gesture.
• tribhiḥ — with three
  Three arrows. Note the count throughout this fight — three here, six in v. 26, eight + two + three in v. 27. Vyāsa records the arithmetic to underline Kṛṣṇa's exactitude: each shot answered with precise measure, never with rage.
• kula-pāṁsana — O corrupter of the dynasty (or: O master and slayer-of-enemies of the Yadu dynasty)
  Kula (family) + pāṁsana (one who reduces to dust). Śrīdhara Svāmī (per Prabhupāda's purport) re-parses as kula-pa + aṁsana — 'master of the Yadu dynasty, expert killer of enemies.' Same insult, opposite meaning. Sanskrit again refuses to truly insult the Lord.
• yadūnām — of the Yadus
  Genitive plural. Rukmī tries to drive a wedge between Kṛṣṇa and 'His' dynasty. The Bhāgavatam's response is the whole rest of Canto 10 — the Yadus are not only Kṛṣṇa's family but a manifestation of His own internal energy.
• jaghne — he struck
  Perfect of √han. The verb for killing — used here for striking that cannot kill. Kṛṣṇa's body is acyuta; the verb's force runs into a wall. Vyāsa uses violent vocabulary to display violence's emptiness against Bhagavān.

• Janananda Sw SB 10-54-24 - 2007-05-23 ISKCON Melbourne
  His Holiness Janananda Goswami· 2007-05-23· English

Three arrows pierce the Body that is the support of all bodies — and Kṛṣṇa lets them. Like a father absorbing a child's slap and waiting for the tantrum to spend itself, the Lord receives Rukmī's first volley as part of the līlā He has staged.

• dhvāṅkṣa-vat — like a crow
  Dhvāṅkṣa (crow) + vat (like). The crow in Vedic culture is the canonical thief of offerings — anyajña-bhakṣaka. Rukmī's metaphor convicts him: it is HE who is stealing what was offered to Bhagavān. Vyāsa lets the slip stand.
• haviḥ — the sacrificial butter / oblation
  From √hu. The substance offered into the yajña-fire. The Bhāgavatam's quiet doctrine: every devotee is a havis offered into the fire of bhakti — and the Lord is the offering, the fire, and the receiver simultaneously (cf. BG 4.24).
• māyinaḥ — of the deceiver / of one with mystic power
  From māyā. Rukmī calls Kṛṣṇa a 'māyin' — a deceiver. The word's other meaning is 'possessor of māyā,' which IS Bhagavān. The slander is true; only its valence is wrong.
• kūṭa-yodhinaḥ — of the cheating fighter
  Kūṭa (cheating, illusion) + yodhin (warrior). Kūṭa is also the term for a Vedānta-paradox or hidden meaning — Kṛṣṇa's 'cheating' is the līlā-strategy by which He attracts His own. Rukmī condemns; the devotee adores.
• manda — fool
  Manda — slow, dull. The same word the Bhāgavatam will use at SB 1.1.10 to describe the age we live in ('mandāḥ sumanda-matayaḥ'). Rukmī unwittingly identifies himself in the curse — manda is what Kali-yuga is, and Rukmī's posture is a foretaste.

A crow attempts to steal the puroḍāśa offered to Indra in a yajña — the bird snatches what was meant for a god and is shrieked away by all the priests. Rukmī, calling Kṛṣṇa a crow stealing havis, has the metaphor exactly backwards: Rukmiṇī is herself the offering, and Kṛṣṇa is the Indra-of-all-yajñas to whom she is owed.

• smayan — smiling
  Present participle of √smi. The smile is Kṛṣṇa's most consistent expression in combat. Gauḍīya iconography never depicts Him grim in battle; even at Kurukṣetra He is described as smiling (prahasann iva, BG 2.10). Battle is part of His sport.
• chittvā — breaking
  Gerund of √chid. Kṛṣṇa breaks the bow, not the bearer. The verse-grammar embeds the mercy: He cuts what attacks, not who attacks. Compassion is built into the syntax.
• ṣaḍbhiḥ — with six (arrows)
  Six — the number of Bhagavān's opulences. Even the count of Kṛṣṇa's arrows witnesses to the bhāgavata-doctrine. Mathematical signs of grace.
• śayīthaḥ — (you may) lie down
  Aorist optative of √śī. Rukmī's threat — 'lie down dead.' Viśvanātha re-reads it as Kṛṣṇa's destiny — to lie down with Rukmiṇī on the wedding-bed. The same verb, two ends of the līlā.
• dārīkām — the girl
  Diminutive of dārā (wife). 'Little girl' — Rukmī's belittling of his own sister. Vyāsa preserves the word to register Rukmī's possessiveness mixed with contempt; Bhagavān will treat Rukmiṇī, by contrast, as the Goddess Ramā Herself (v. 60).

• Janananda Sw SB 10-54-26 - Improve your Chanting and Sadhana - 2007-05-24 ISKCON Melbourne
  His Holiness Janananda Goswami· 2007-05-24· English
• SBKS SB 10-54-26 - 2024-03-27 ISKCON Vrindavan
  His Holiness Svayam Bhagavan Keshava Swami· 2024-03-27· English

Six arrows, one smile — Kṛṣṇa breaks the bow without breaking the man. Śrī Viśvanātha Cakravartī's gloss flips Rukmī's threat: it was Kṛṣṇa who was meant to lie down — on a flower-bed, with Rukmiṇī. Even the demon's curse is, when read by a Vaiṣṇava, accidentally a description of the līlā that follows.

• vāhān — horses
  From √vah, 'to carry.' What carries us through battle (and saṁsāra) is itself fragile; the Lord can disable our mounts to make us walk back to Him.
• sūtam — the chariot driver
  Sūta — the charioteer-caste. Rukmī's sūta loses his driver-status the instant Kṛṣṇa's arrows strike. By contrast, Arjuna's Sūta IS the Supreme Lord — the very being whose station is high.
• dhvajam — the flagpole
  Dhvaja — a king's banner, his proclaimed identity. Kṛṣṇa breaking the dhvaja is symbolic: the public sign of Rukmī's authority is severed. Outer authority falls; only Kṛṣṇa's authority stays.
• aṣṭabhiḥ — with eight (arrows)
  Eight — number of Bhagavān's primary aṣṭa-sakhīs (in mādhurya-rasa). Vyāsa's arithmetic keeps tapping the reader on the shoulder: even in war, the numbers belong to līlā.
• pañcabhiḥ — with five (arrows)
  Five — number of the senses, the prāṇas, the elements. Rukmī's response is to strike with five — to fight Kṛṣṇa with the five senses. The Bhāgavatam-vyākhyā tradition reads such numerical patterns as catechetical asides.

• Prabha Vishnu Pr SB 10-54-27-34 - 2024-03-28 ISKCON Vrindavan
  His Grace Pariksit Prabhu· 2024-03-28· English
• Tamohara Pr SB 10-54-27-35 - 2014-11-18 ISKCON Alachua
  His Grace Tamohara Prabhu· 2014-11-18· English
• BKG SB 10-54-27 - Reputation of a Pure Devotee - 2024-09-10 New Goloka
  His Holiness Bir Krishna Goswami· 2024-09-10· English

Like a teacher disarming a hot-headed student weapon by weapon — patiently, until nothing is left in the hand — Kṛṣṇa methodically dismantles Rukmī's chariot, horses, driver, flag. The Lord conducts even battle as instruction.

• acyutaḥ — the infallible Lord (lit. one who never falls / never lapses)
  A- (not) + cyuta (fallen). One of Kṛṣṇa's most beloved names, used hundreds of times in the Gītā and Bhāgavatam. Cf. BG 1.21 where Arjuna first addresses Him so. The name itself is a refutation of Rukmī's project.
• avyayaḥ — the inexhaustible
  A- (not) + vyaya (decay, expense). One who does not diminish. The Bhāgavatam's name for the Lord that emphasizes ontological permanence — Rukmī's bows, by contrast, are paradigmatically vyaya.
• ciccheda — He broke
  Perfect of √chid. The same verb as v. 26's chittvā. The repetition is itself the doctrine: Kṛṣṇa's act of disarming is not a one-time spasm but a continuous mode of being for the Lord — He keeps cutting what attacks His own.
• punaḥ — again
  Adverb. Rukmī's 'again' is futile; Kṛṣṇa's 'again' is patient. Same word, opposite moods. The Bhāgavatam's poetic delight is in such acoustic chiaroscuro.
• acchinat — He broke (the second bow)
  Imperfect of √chid. Variation from ciccheda. Vyāsa varies the verb-form so the prose does not lull — bhakti-narrative resists boredom.

Like a metronome resetting after every misbeat, Kṛṣṇa snaps each new bow Rukmī picks up. The Lord is not in a hurry, not annoyed, not threatened — only continuous. This is what acyuta means: that which does not waver.

• hariḥ — Lord Kṛṣṇa (lit. the Remover)
  From √hṛ, 'to take away.' Hari is the Lord because He takes away — sins, attachments, and now Rukmī's weapons. Gauḍīyas read every act of Kṛṣṇa's 'taking' as preparation for giving Himself in return.
• parigham — iron bludgeon
  A heavy club studded with iron. Stock weapon of the heaviest infantry. Even the densest material is fragile against the Lord's lightness.
• śūlam — lance / trident
  Same word as Śiva's trident. Vyāsa's understated joke: Rukmī wields a śūla, but he is no Śiva, and the One in front of him is the Master of even Śiva.
• tat-sarvam — all of them
  Tat (that) + sarva (all). The completeness is the point — not 'most of them,' not 'eventually,' but ALL of them. Bhagavān's protection has no leakage.
• yat-yat — whatever
  Doubled relative — 'whichever and whichever.' The Bhāgavatam's grammar of exhaustiveness. Cf. BG 10.41's 'yad yad vibhūtimat sattvam' — wherever there is glory, there I am. Same doubling, opposite direction: here, wherever there is weapon, there I break.

Whatever Rukmī picks up — club, spear, sword, shield, pike, javelin — Kṛṣṇa shatters. The verse becomes a catalog of useless arms. So too the soul: whatever it picks up against the Lord (intelligence, opulence, family, scholarship) breaks in His hand. Disarmament is the precondition of bhakti.

• avaplutya — leaping down
  Ava (down) + √plu, 'to jump.' The same root as 'plava' (boat). Rukmī jumps down to swim a sea he cannot cross — toward the One who is Himself the bridge.
• jighāṁsayā — with the desire to kill
  Desiderative of √han + instrumental. 'With kill-want.' One of the seven kinds of attachment-to-Kṛṣṇa in bhakti-rasa-śāstra is dveṣa — hostility. Rukmī manifests it pure. Even this connects him to the Lord (cf. Śiśupāla's mokṣa).
• pataṅgaḥ — a bird (or: a moth)
  Pataṅga — literally 'flying thing.' The same word for moth in the famous 'pataṅgo yathā' image (Kaṭha Up.). Rukmī flying at Kṛṣṇa is the moth-image: cannot stop, must burn.
• pāvakam — the wind (or, by another reading, the fire)
  Pāvaka literally 'the purifier' — usually Agni. Most commentators here render 'wind,' but the resonance with fire (the moth's destination) is unmissable. Either way, Rukmī is rushing into what consumes.
• kruddhaḥ — furious
  From √krudh. Krodha is one of the six enemies of the self (kāma, krodha, lobha, moha, mada, mātsarya). Rukmī arrives at Kṛṣṇa armored in all six — yet even so, will not be killed, because Kṛṣṇa is also the merciful one.

Like a moth not turning back even as its wings are singed, Rukmī leaps from his chariot sword-in-hand and runs at Kṛṣṇa as a bird flies into wind. There is something almost devotional in his refusal to stop — but without surrender, the same intensity that could be prema becomes only momentum toward annihilation.

• tilaśaḥ — into small pieces (lit. like sesame seeds)
  From tila (sesame) + the distributive śaḥ. Sanskrit's idiom for 'pulverized.' Vyāsa's smallness of image (sesame seeds) emphasizes the surgical, almost playful precision of the Lord's arrows.
• iṣubhiḥ — with His arrows
  Plural instrumental of iṣu. The Bhāgavatam never numbers Kṛṣṇa's own arrows in this exchange — the count is always for Rukmī. Kṛṣṇa's response is unmeasured because His resources are infinite.
• tigmam — sharp
  An older word for sharp than niśita. Vyāsa uses the rarer term to lift the moment — this is not a chase any longer, this is the verge of execution.
• asim — His sword
  Same noun as v. 8's 'asi' (the swords on the battlefield). There, swords lie in the dirt; here, the Lord's own sword rises. Gauḍīya commentators love such echoes.
• udyataḥ — prepared / lifted up
  Past participle of ud-√yam, 'to raise.' The Lord's hand is raised, paused. The whole next verse hangs on this paused hand. Bhakti's interruption is about to happen.

Sword and shield turned to confetti — and Kṛṣṇa lifts His own sword to end the matter. The Lord is willing to kill, but waits for the right voice to ask Him not to. Bhakti often functions just so: not as the prevention of consequence but as its intercessor.

• satī — saintly (lady)
  From √as — 'the one who truly is.' Satī names not chastity narrowly but ontological truth-of-being. Rukmiṇī is satī because she is Lakṣmī-svarūpā; her plea has metaphysical weight.
• karuṇam — pathetically / with pathos
  From karuṇā. Karuṇa-rasa is one of the eight primary rasas of Bharata's Nāṭya-śāstra. Vyāsa labels Rukmiṇī's speech with the rasa-name — alerting the reader that what follows is to be received as drama-quality emotion.
• bhrātṛ-vadha — the killing of her brother
  Bhrātṛ (brother) + vadha (slaying). A specific category of sin in the dharma-śāstras (bhrātṛ-hatyā). Rukmiṇī is asking Kṛṣṇa not to incur even the appearance of this. Kṛṣṇa's mercy here is also His protection of Rukmī from a more famous death.
• patitvā — falling
  Gerund of √pat. The classic śaraṇa-gesture — falling at the feet. Cf. BG 18.66 (sarva-dharmān parityajya) where the surrenderer falls; cf. CC Ādi 17 where Caitanya falls at Advaita's feet. The body's geometry is the prayer.
• vihvalā — agitated / overcome
  Vi (intensely) + hvala (shaking). Same word as v. 4 ('bhaya-vihvala-locanā'). The frame is closing: Rukmiṇī begins the chapter vihvalā for the army; she ends vihvalā for her brother. The same trembling, deepened.

Like a wife falling between her husband and her brother in the moment the sword is raised — Rukmiṇī becomes the literal mediatrix. The same posture the gopīs will take throughout Canto 10 when they ask Kṛṣṇa for some softening: bent body, choking throat, hands at His feet.

• yoga-īśvara — controller of all mystic power
  Yoga (linking, mystic power) + īśvara (controller). Title used at BG 11.4, 18.75 etc. Rukmiṇī invokes the cosmic Kṛṣṇa just when she needs the intimate Kṛṣṇa — the larger title makes the smaller request more credible.
• aprameya-ātman — O immeasurable one
  A- (not) + prameya (measurable) + ātman (self). Echoes v. 23's apramāṇa-vit. Rukmī did not know the measure; Rukmiṇī affirms there IS no measure. The contrast is the chapter's spine.
• deva-deva — O Lord of lords
  Same epithet used by Arjuna at BG 10.15. Rukmiṇī, in distress, reaches for the canonical Vaiṣṇava vocative. The Bhāgavatam shows: bhakti has its own grammar of address that surfaces under pressure.
• jagat-pate — O master of the universe
  Jagat (world) + pati (master). The same compound that defines the Lord's role in the BG (jagat-prabhuḥ, 10.15). Rukmiṇī widens her addressee to the cosmos and then asks for one life — a stunning rhetorical move.
• mahā-bhuja — O mighty-armed one
  Mahā (great) + bhuja (arm). The same epithet she just feared the use of (the sword in His hand). She invokes His arms TO restrain His arms. Devotional rhetoric at its most exact.

• BKG SB 10-54-33 - Approaching the Lord - 2024-09-12 New Goloka
  His Holiness Bir Krishna Goswami· 2024-09-12· English

Like a devotee who, in the very moment of crisis, addresses the Lord by His most exalted names — Yogeśvara, Devadeva, Jagatpati — Rukmiṇī softens her petition by reminding the Lord of His own scale. To plead with Bhagavān is to first acknowledge that He is too large to be petty.

• paritrāsa-vikampita-aṅgayā — whose limbs are trembling with total fear
  Triple compound: paritrāsa (utter terror) + vikampita (trembling) + aṅga (limbs). Rūpa Gosvāmī catalogues 'vepathu' (trembling) as one of the eight sāttvika-bhāvas — bodily symptoms of intense rasa. Rukmiṇī's body is in a sāttvika state, even in karuṇa.
• ruddha-kaṇṭhayā — whose throat is choked
  Ruddha (blocked) + kaṇṭha (throat). Another sāttvika-bhāva — svara-bheda, voice-broken. The body cannot get the words out; the Lord reads the body instead of the words.
• visraṁsita-hema-mālayā — whose golden necklace is scattered
  Visraṁsita (loosened) + hema (gold) + mālā (garland). The decorative ornament comes undone in the moment of true emotion — Gauḍīya rasa-śāstra reads such 'disorder' as the highest order. Cf. mother Yaśodā's mālatī flowers (SB 10.9.3).
• karuṇaḥ — compassionate
  From karuṇā. The Bhāgavatam applies karuṇa twice in this chapter — once to Kṛṣṇa (here) and once to Balarāma (v. 36). Both desist from killing Rukmī. Karuṇā is the family-trait of the Lord and His brother.
• nyavartata — He desisted
  Imperfect of ni-√vṛt, 'to turn back.' Bhakti's most precious result: the Lord turns His hand back. The same root as 'nivṛtti-dharma' — turning back from the world. Here the Lord turns His own action back toward mercy.

Limbs trembling, mouth dry, throat choking, gold necklace scattered — and Kṛṣṇa stops. Like a husband who has been waiting for one signal from his wife to set down the weapon, the Lord watches for the body of His devotee to ask. Bhagavān is karuṇa not in the abstract but in response to a specific posture from a specific bhakta.

• cailena — with a strip of cloth
  Cela — a cloth, a strip. Domestic material, not a warrior's rope. Vyāsa specifies the texture to underline the comedy: this is now a household scene, not a battlefield.
• sa-śmaśru-keśam — leaving some of his mustache and hair
  Sa (with) + śmaśru (mustache) + keśa (hair). The 'partial shave' — Indian custom of half-shaving (ardha-cumbana) as social mark of public disgrace. Kṛṣṇa's punishment is exquisitely chosen: dishonor calibrated to Rukmī's vanity, not to his life.
• vyarūpayat — made him disfigured
  Causative of vi-√rūp, 'to deform.' From rūpa (form). Bhagavān is the Form of forms; He alone has the right to grant or take form. Rukmī's vanity was attached to his rūpa, so the Lord touches exactly that.
• yadu-pravīrāḥ — the foremost heroes of the Yadu dynasty
  Yadu + pravīra (foremost hero). Vyāsa names the army with affection — these are not mere soldiers but the Lord's relatives. Familial categories of bhakti animate even military verses.
• nalinīm — a lotus flower
  Nalinī — lotus. The army crushed 'like a lotus by elephants.' The image is delicate: even destruction is rendered in vraja-vegetal vocabulary. The Bhāgavatam never lets its similes wander from its lotus-feet.

Tied with cloth, half-shaved, ridiculous — Rukmī receives the punishment of a wedding-prankster, not of a mortal enemy. Kṛṣṇa converts a duel into a comic shave. The elephants of the Yadus crush the army like a lotus, while their Lord, with the same hand that could have killed, gives a peculiar haircut.