Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 10.56.22
Blended reading (Sanskrit + English inline)
-
puruṣam prākṛtam
—
a mundane person
Compound idea: puruṣa (person) + prākṛtam (made of prakṛti, mundane). The exact category-error the Gītā warns against (BG 9.11). Mistaking Bhagavān for prākṛta puruṣa is the root mūrkhatā of every age.
-
svāmīnā
—
with (his) master
Instrumental. The narrator's correction inside the verse itself — Jāmbavān fights, but the Bhāgavata reminds us he fights his own svāmī. The grammar holds the truth even when the character cannot.
-
anubhāva-vit
—
aware of His position
Compound: anubhāva (glory, position) + vit (knower) — negated by 'na'. Anubhāva is the technical term for the manifest signs of Bhagavān's identity. Jāmbavān is, for the moment, anubhāva-blind. The fight is the means of restoration.
The words puruṣaṁ prākṛtaṁ matvā, “thinking Him a mundane person,” are very significant. So-called Vedic scholars, including most Western ones, enjoy translating the word puruṣam as “man” even when the word refers to Lord Kṛṣṇa, and thus their unauthorized translations of Vedic literature are tainted by their materialistic conceptions of the Godhead. However, here it is clearly stated that it was because Jāmbavān misunderstood the Lord’s position that he considered Him prākṛta-puruṣa, “a mundane person.” In other words, the Lord is actually puruṣottama, “the ultimate transcendental person.”
In fighting with the weak demons like Canura, Kamsa, and Jarasandha, Krsna did not get much satisfaction. In order to get full satisfaction in fighting, the lord therefore desired to fight with his own servant who had similar strength, his devotee Jambavan. As well, since his devotee Jambavan had not been fully satisfied in vira rasa by fighting with the troops of Ravana, Krsna wanted to satisfy him now. In order to fulfill both his and Jambavan's desires, he thus covered his sweet aspect from Jambavan by his lila sakti, through the power of his yoga maya. Thus Jambavan though of him as an ordinary human.
He fought with the Lord, whose aṁśa was Rāma. Jāmbavān considered Brahman in human form (puruṣam) to be an ordinary material person (prākrṭam) since he did not bother to consider his powers (na anubhava-vit). He became angry because of loss of discriminating powers.
He fought with Kṛṣṇa, endowed with all powers (bhagavatā), and his own master. During Rāma’s Appearance, he served Rāma because he was by nature a devotee. He took him as an ordinary human because he was angry, because he did not know Kṛṣṇa’s power (na anubhāva-vit). Or fought because he lost his intelligence because of anger.
A servant of Rāma, not knowing this is the same Rāma, raises arms against Him. Jāmbavān has been waiting for his Lord for an age — and almost misses Him because the form is different. The Bhāgavatam's quiet teaching: the form may change, but the offer of conflict is always misrecognition.
In the Mahābhārata, when Arjuna realises Kṛṣṇa is leaving the world, he weeps that he had not recognized his sārathi as Bhagavān every moment — the casualness of their friendship suddenly looks like blindness.
Jāmbavān here is in the same blindness, but with fists raised. The Bhāgavatam will let him finish the fight before letting him weep.
My note
Source: vedabase.io