10.85 · Lord Kṛṣṇa Instructs Vasudeva and Retrieves Devakī's Sons

• ātmajau — his two sons
  Dual: 'two born from the self'. Vasudeva still speaks of Them as ātma-jau even as he is about to discover that They are themselves the ātmā of all. The verse's whole movement is the slow loosening of this single word.
• kṛta-pāda-abhivandanau — having bowed at his feet
  Compound: kṛta (done) + pāda (feet) + abhivandanau (honoring). Bhagavān physically touches Vasudeva's feet — the Supreme submitting to vātsalya-rasa. Gauḍīyas read this as the very form of Kṛṣṇa's mādhurya: aiśvarya is voluntarily eclipsed by relationship.
• saṅkarṣaṇa-acyutau — to Balarāma and Kṛṣṇa
  Dual compound naming both brothers. Saṅkarṣaṇa = 'the one who draws together' (the first catur-vyūha expansion); Acyuta = 'the one who never falls'. The pair names both viṣṇu-tattva (Balarāma) and svayam-bhagavān (Kṛṣṇa).
• prītyā — affectionately
  Instrumental of prīti — the natural form of love a father feels toward his sons. Even at the threshold of recognizing Their divinity, Vasudeva's first response is vātsalya, not awe. Gauḍīyas insist this is correct: relationship precedes theology.

• SKP SB 10-85-01 - 2025-09-21 ISKCON Vrindavan
  His Grace Srutakirti Prabhu· 2025-09-21· English

When Vasudeva sees Kṛṣṇa and Balarāma bowing at his feet, the situation is upside-down — the One who upholds the worlds touches the feet of the one whom He chose as His father. Like a king who, having entered a play, kneels to the actor cast as his elder, the Lord honors the role He Himself has assigned.

• munīnām — of the sages
  Genitive plural. The sages — Nārada and others — had told Vasudeva that his sons were the Supreme Lord. Vasudeva's recognition is not unmediated; it comes through the paramparā channel of muni-vacana, the Gauḍīya standard.
• dhāma-sūcakam — indicating Their transcendental position
  Compound: dhāma (abode, splendor, status) + sūcakam (indicating). The sages' words pointed not at power but at dhāma — Kṛṣṇa's own identity-region. Gauḍīyas use dhāma precisely for Vṛndāvana and Goloka.
• vīryaiḥ — by Their valorous deeds
  Instrumental plural of vīrya. The killing of Pūtanā, Aghāsura, Keśin, and finally Kaṁsa — these vīryas form the second witness, paired with muni-vacana, that produces Vasudeva's faith.
• jāta-visrambhaḥ — having developed firm conviction
  Compound: jāta (born, arisen) + visrambhaḥ (faith, trust). Visrambha is the very name Rūpa Gosvāmī uses for intimate confidence in rasa-śāstra. Vasudeva's faith is not awestruck distance but intimate trust.

A father who has watched his son lift a mountain finally sees not the boy he raised but the One the sages described. Like a man holding a lamp who suddenly notices it is the sun, Vasudeva's vision shifts without his son moving an inch.

• kṛṣṇa kṛṣṇa — O Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa
  Repetition is the form of love. Gauḍīyas hear in this doubled address the very pattern that Mahāprabhu would later weep upon — the name uttered twice because once is not enough to hold the heart.
• mahā-yogin — O greatest of yogīs
  Vocative. Not 'yogī' in the contemplative sense — yoga here means the mystic power by which the Lord conjoins material nature with His own play. He is mahā-yogin because Yoga-māyā is His potency.
• saṅkarṣaṇa — O Saṅkarṣaṇa
  Vocative addressing Balarāma. The name carries the doctrine: Saṅkarṣaṇa is the first emanation in the catur-vyūha, the ground of jīva-tattva and the foundation of Mahā-Viṣṇu's later activity.
• pradhāna — the ingredients (material nature)
  Pradhāna = unmanifest material nature, the totality of guṇas before differentiation. Sāṅkhya-technical term. Vasudeva is using śāstric vocabulary precisely — his confession is no sentimental outburst but a tattva-statement.
• puruṣau — two enjoyers / two Persons
  Dual of puruṣa. Pradhāna and puruṣa are the two principles of sāṅkhya; Vasudeva collapses both into his two sons. They are simultaneously the field and the knower of the field — śruti's deepest paradox spoken to one's own children.

A father who has raised the universal Cause in his own house now addresses Him by name and asks Him to teach. Like a gardener discovering the seed he planted is the tree under which all worlds rest, Vasudeva speaks pradhāna-puruṣau — 'You two are the very ingredients and the very enjoyer.'

• yatra-yena-yataḥ-yasya-yasmai — where, by whom, from whom, of whom, for whom
  A fivefold relative pronoun cascade — locative, instrumental, ablative, genitive, dative. The Sanskrit grammar itself enacts the doctrine: every case-relation a thing can have, it has only with respect to Bhagavān.
• bhagavān — the Personality of Godhead
  Six-opulence Lord. Gauḍīyas insist the word bhagavān is not a generic divine title — it names personal, relational completeness, and Kṛṣṇa is svayam bhagavān (SB 1.3.28), the very source of the term.
• pradhāna-puruṣa — of nature and its lord
  Compound: pradhāna (material nature) + puruṣa (the cosmic Lord, Mahā-Viṣṇu). Vasudeva names the dual aspect: Kṛṣṇa is both the substrate of creation and the One who lies upon the causal ocean and impregnates it.
• īśvaraḥ — the supreme controller
  From √īś, 'to rule'. Of the many possible 'controllers' in Vedic literature, the Bhāgavatam uses īśvara with precision: there is no second īśvara in the absolute sense — īśvaraḥ paramaḥ kṛṣṇaḥ (Brahma-saṁhitā 5.1).

• Akuti Mataji SB 10-85-04 - 2016-02-10 ISKCON Alachua
  Her Grace Akuti Mataji· 2016-02-10· English
• RCP SB 10-85-04 Telugu - 2014-06-26 ISKCON Tirupati
  His Grace Rupeshwar Caitanya Prabhu· 2014-06-26· Telugu

Picture the screen on which a film plays: every scene appears within it, by its light, from its surface, and resolves back into it. Vasudeva says Bhagavān is the where, the how, the from-which, the for-whom — five prepositions all collapsed into one Person.

• adhokṣaja — transcendental Lord (one beyond sensory reach)
  Compound: adhaḥ (below) + akṣaja (sense-born knowledge). Bhagavān is beyond what the senses can grasp — yet Vasudeva is addressing Him by name as his son. The paradox is the heart of vātsalya-rasa.
• anupraviśya — having entered within
  Gerund of anu + pra + √viś. The technical word of the Upaniṣadic 'tat sṛṣṭvā tad evānuprāviśat' (Taittirīya 2.6) — the Lord's entrance into His own creation as the Supersoul. Vasudeva is quoting śruti to Kṛṣṇa Himself.
• prāṇaḥ — the life force
  Not breath in the medical sense but the cosmic life-principle. Bhagavān is the prāṇa of prāṇa — the consciousness behind the energy that animates each living being.
• jīvaḥ — the conscious living entity
  From √jīv. Here it names the Lord's role as the Supersoul who underlies and accompanies every jīva. Gauḍīyas read this in acintya-bhedābheda mode: Paramātmā and jīvātmā are simultaneously one and different.
• aja — O unborn one
  Vocative. The single word that resolves the chapter's central tension: how is the One who is aja taking birth in Vasudeva's house? Only by His own yoga-māyā — He is born without ceasing to be unborn.

• BPSPSw SB 10-85-05 - 2025-09-24 ISKCON Vrindavan
  His Holiness Bhakti Padma Saurabh Pracharak Swami· 2025-09-24· English
• Bhanu Sw SB 10-85-05 - Krsna is the Soul of Jiva and Prakruti at the same time aloof from it - ISKCON Chennai
  His Holiness Bhanu Swami· English

A spider extrudes its web from itself, enters into it as it walks across it, and withdraws it back. Vasudeva uses the antaryāmī teaching directly to Kṛṣṇa's face: 'You make this world from Yourself, then enter it as the very prāṇa of every body.'

• śaktayaḥ — potencies
  Nominative plural of śakti. The Gauḍīya word: parāsya śaktir vividhaiva śrūyate (Śvetāśvatara 6.8). Bhagavān's energies are not separate from Him in the Māyāvāda sense; they are His own, distinguishable yet inseparable.
• parasya — of the Supreme
  Genitive of para. The śaktis belong to a specific Person — para puruṣa. Gauḍīyas refuse the impersonalist move that detaches śakti from the śaktimān; here Vasudeva attaches them firmly back.
• pāratantryāt — because of dependence
  Ablative abstract noun: pāratantrya = 'the state of being under another'. The whole cosmos is structurally para-tantra — dependent on Bhagavān. Self-existence belongs only to Him.
• vaisādṛśyāt — because of mutual difference
  Ablative of vaisādṛśya = 'dissimilarity'. Paired with pāratantrya: matter and life depend on Him AND differ from one another. This is the bheda-side of acintya-bhedābheda spoken in Sāṅkhya vocabulary.

• Bhanu Sw SB 10-85-06 Shaktis of Lord are different from Lord dependent on Lord and operates by the Lord - ISKCON Chennai
  His Holiness Bhanu Swami· English

A puppet show: every gesture of every puppet is the puppeteer's gesture, but the strings are real and the puppets are real too. Bhagavān is acintya-bhedābheda — the energies move because He moves, distinct from Him as the puppet is from the hand, non-distinct from Him as the gesture is from the will.

• kāntiḥ — the soft glow (of the moon)
  From √kānt, 'to shine softly'. The Bhāgavatam's cosmology assigns each elemental quality to Bhagavān's direct presence — the same move BG 7.8 makes (raso 'ham apsu).
• tejaḥ — the brilliance (of fire)
  Tejas is one of the five mahā-bhūtas in its quality-aspect. Vasudeva's litany follows the elemental order — fire's tejas, sun's prabhā — naming Bhagavān as the actual presence behind each.
• sthairyam — permanence, stability
  From sthira (firm). The earth-bearing mountains hold their place by participating in Bhagavān's own sthairya. Even apparent inertia is divine activity.
• gandhaḥ — fragrance
  Earth's distinguishing tanmātra. BG 7.9 echoes: puṇyo gandhaḥ pṛthivyāṁ ca — 'I am the pure fragrance of the earth.' The two verses cross-light each other.

• Bhanu Sw SB 10-85-07-10 - Realizing opulence of Lord is necessary but eclipsed when his sweetness is realized - ISKCON Chennai
  His Holiness Bhanu Swami· English

When you taste fragrance in earth, see brilliance in fire, watch the moon's cool light — you are tasting an attribute that has no source outside Bhagavān. Like a single perfume that travels through many flowers, the qualities of the elements are Kṛṣṇa Himself appearing under different names.

• rasaḥ — taste
  BG 7.8: raso 'ham apsu kaunteya. Rasa is also the Gauḍīya word for the sweetness of relationship with Kṛṣṇa — Vasudeva names a cosmic principle, but the word secretly opens onto rasa-śāstra.
• ojaḥ — vitality
  The subtle life-essence in the body, distinct from gross strength. Āyurveda treats ojas as the final refined product of all dhātus; Vasudeva traces it to its true source — Bhagavān.
• balam — strength
  Physical power. BG 7.11: balaṁ balavatāṁ cāham. The strength by which any being acts is on loan from Bhagavān; no creature lifts a finger by independent force.
• īśvara — O controller
  Vocative. Vasudeva is not philosophizing in the abstract; every doctrinal statement is addressed directly to his Son. The Bhāgavatam's deepest tattva is always spoken to a Person.

• Vaisesika Pr SB 10-85-08-09 - 2025-09-27 ISKCON Vrindavan
  His Grace Vaisesika Prabhu· 2025-09-27· English

Each sip of cold water on a hot day delivers four gifts at once — taste, refreshment, life, strength — and all four are one Person under four names. Bhagavān is the rasa in the water and the breath in the breath.

• sphoṭaḥ — the unmanifest sound-principle
  Technical term from Sanskrit grammarians (Bhartṛhari, Pāṇinian school): the indivisible meaning-bearing unit that 'bursts' into manifest phonemes. Vasudeva identifies Bhagavān with this most subtle linguistic reality.
• oṁkāraḥ — the syllable oṁ
  Praṇava. BG 8.13 calls oṁ the one-syllable Brahman. Gauḍīyas read oṁ as containing Kṛṣṇa's name in seed — A-U-M corresponding to the Lord, His energy, and the jīva.
• varṇaḥ — the phoneme, the audible sound-unit
  From √vṛ, 'to cover, to color'. Each distinct sound is a 'coloring' of the underlying sphoṭa. Bhagavān is both the colorless ground and the colored manifestations.
• kham — the ether, space
  The subtlest of the five elements; the substrate that holds sound. Vasudeva moves through the elemental hierarchy from gross to subtle, naming each layer as Bhagavān.

• RCP SB 10-85-09 Telugu - 2014-07-06 ISKCON Tirupati
  His Grace Rupeshwar Caitanya Prabhu· 2014-07-06· Telugu

Before sound has shape there is the silent presence of space ready to receive it; before the syllable there is oṁ; before any word there is the One whose breath the word is. Vasudeva traces speech back upstream until he arrives at Kṛṣṇa.

• indriyāṇām — of the senses
  Genitive plural. Each indriya has a presiding devatā (sun for eye, directions for ear, etc.) — Vedic psychology. Bhagavān is identified as the One behind the whole network.
• anugrahaḥ — the sanction (given by the demigods)
  From anu + √grah, 'to take after, to favor'. The same word the Bhāgavatam uses for the Lord's mercy. Even the sense-functioning of the worldliest person rests on a hidden anugraha.
• avabodhaḥ — the discriminating awakening (of intelligence)
  From ava + √budh, 'to awaken to, to recognize'. Bhagavān is the very capacity by which buddhi distinguishes one thing from another — without Him, even doubt could not arise.
• anusmṛtiḥ — the faculty of accurate memory
  From anu + √smṛ. The smṛti by which the jīva retains identity across time. Gauḍīyas read smaraṇa as a limb of bhakti; the same faculty turned toward Kṛṣṇa becomes sādhana.

• Dina Bandhu Pr SB 10-85-10 - 2025-09-28 ISKCON Vrindavan
  His Grace Dina Bandhu Prabhu· 2025-09-28· English
• Revati Raman Pr SB 10-85-10 Telugu Translation - 2014-07-07 ISKCON Tirupati
  His Grace Revati Raman Prabhu· 2014-07-07· Telugu

An eye sees only because three things meet: the eye itself, the deity who presides over sight (the sun), and the sanction by which the deity lights the object. Bhagavān is all three at once — the instrument, the presider, and the consent that fuses them.

• bhūta-ādiḥ — the source of the physical elements (tāmasa-ahaṅkāra)
  Compound: bhūta (element) + ādi (origin). False ego in the mode of ignorance, the seedbed of the five gross elements. Sāṅkhya-precise terminology.
• taijasaḥ — the source of the senses (rājasa-ahaṅkāra)
  From tejas. False ego in the mode of passion, which evolves into the eleven senses. Each mode of ahaṅkāra spawns its own register of phenomena.
• vaikārikaḥ — the source of the demigods (sāttvika-ahaṅkāra)
  From vikāra (transformation). False ego in the mode of goodness, producing the presiding deities. Together these three exhaust the ahaṅkāra-tattva.
• pradhānam — the unmanifest material energy
  The unmanifest totality from which the three ahaṅkāras arise. Sāṅkhya's deepest material category. Vasudeva is reciting cosmology to his Son and tracing it home to its actual cause.

From one root of false-self three branches grow — one bearing elements, one bearing senses, one bearing devas — and underneath them all lies the unbroken trunk of pradhāna. Vasudeva names every layer of cosmic psychology as Bhagavān's own.

• naśvareṣu — among destructible things
  Locative plural of naśvara, 'perishable'. Everything in the field of vyavahāra is destructible — except the Person who underlies them. The verse echoes BG 2.16's sad-asat distinction.
• anaśvaram — the indestructible
  Negation of naśvara: 'non-perishable'. Gauḍīyas: Bhagavān's body, name, abode, and associates are all anaśvara — sac-cid-ānanda — even when they appear within the perishable realm.
• dravya-vikāreṣu — in the transformations of a substance
  Compound: dravya (substance) + vikāra (modification). The classical Vedānta example: clay/pot, gold/ornament. The substance persists; the form transforms. Bhagavān is the dravya of every dravya.
• nirūpitam — is determined, ascertained
  Past participle of nir + √rūp, 'to define, fix the form of'. A philosophical technical term. Vasudeva's statement is not poetic; it is śāstra-vat — defining-grade language.

Gold remains gold whether it is bracelet, ring, or coin — the ornaments change names, the substance does not. Bhagavān is the unchanging substance through every transformation; whatever appears and vanishes does so on His permanence.

• sattvam rajaḥ tamaḥ iti — thus: goodness, passion, ignorance
  The three guṇas of prakṛti, named in canonical order with the iti-marker that closes a list. Gauḍīyas note that prema is nirguṇa — beyond all three — and only by Bhagavān's mercy can a jīva exit this trinity.
• brahmaṇi pare — in the Supreme Absolute
  Locative phrase. Para-brahman, the highest absolute, is here identified with Vasudeva's own son. Gauḍīya theology: para-brahman is not the impersonal Brahman but Kṛṣṇa Himself (BG 14.27).
• yoga-māyayā — by Yoga-māyā
  Instrumental. Yoga-māyā is Bhagavān's internal arranging potency — distinct from mahā-māyā that bewilders the conditioned. Yoga-māyā stages the līlās; she is the choreographer of Vraja itself.
• kalpitāḥ — are arranged, devised
  Past participle of √kḷp. Not 'fabricated' in the illusory sense but 'arranged' — the guṇas have real function within Bhagavān; they are not unreal, only secondary.

Sunlight passing through a stained-glass window is one but appears blue, red, green according to the glass it touches. The guṇas are the colored panels through which Yoga-māyā lets the world appear within Bhagavān — He remains one light.

• vikalpitāḥ — manifested as differentiated forms
  Past participle of vi + √kḷp. Creation is vi-kalpita — 'differently arranged' — within Bhagavān. The bhāva-s of the world are real-as-arranged, not real-as-independent.
• avyāvahārikaḥ — beyond all empirical dealings
  Compound negation: a- + vyāvahārika ('pertaining to ordinary dealings'). Bhagavān stands outside the entire transactional realm — yet enters it freely as the son of Vasudeva. This is acintya.
• vikāreṣu — in the transformations
  Locative plural of vikāra. The transformations of prakṛti are the products of guṇa-interaction. Bhagavān is present in them and yet not exhausted by them.
• anyadā — at other times (i.e. during pralaya)
  Adverb: 'at another time'. The cosmological hint: between cycles of manifestation, only Bhagavān is. The world's apparent solidity is interruptible; His being is not.

Waves do not exist apart from the ocean, and the ocean's depth is unchanged whether waves rise or fall. When creation rests, only Bhagavān stands — and even when creation rises, Bhagavān is what stands inside it.

• guṇa-pravāhe — in the flow of the modes
  Compound: guṇa (mode) + pravāha (current, stream). The world is not static — it is a moving current of guṇas. The jīva is being carried; only Bhagavān is the bank.
• akhila-ātmanaḥ — of the Soul of all
  Compound: akhila (entire) + ātman (Self). Bhagavān is the Self of every self — a strong Paramātmā claim. The abudhā miss this not because it is hidden but because they refuse the relationship it implies.
• gatim sūkṣmām — the subtle goal
  Gati = destination; sūkṣmā = subtle, fine. Bhagavān is the actual telos of every jīva's journey, but the goal is sūkṣma — invisible to gross perception, requiring devotional vision.
• abudhāḥ — the ignorant
  From a- + budh (to know). Not lacking information but lacking the bodha that recognizes the Person. Gauḍīyas: real knowledge is bhagavat-tattva-vijñāna, and its absence is the only relevant ignorance.
• saṁsaranti — they wander in the cycle of birth and death
  From sam + √sṛ. Saṁsāra-cycling is the natural consequence of abodha — not a punishment, but a structural outcome of failing to recognize the destination.

• Vraja Bihari Pr SB 10-85-15 - Krishna Is Everywhere - 2016-08-28 ISKCON Chowpatty
  His Grace Vraja Bihari Prabhu· 2016-08-28· English
• IDS SB 10-85-15 - 2025-10-02 ISKCON Vrindavan
  His Holiness Indradyumna Swami· 2025-10-02· English

A fish swept along the current of a river that has no banks visible — that is the soul who fails to recognize Bhagavān as the destination. Without the lighthouse of His Person, the guṇa-flow simply pushes the jīva from one birth to the next.

• nṛtām — human form
  Accusative abstract: 'human-ness'. Among the 8.4 million species, the human form alone has the structural capacity for jñāna, vairāgya, and bhakti. To waste it is the single greatest tragedy in Bhāgavata cosmology.
• durlabhām — rarely obtained
  Compound of dur (difficult) + labh (to obtain). The Bhāgavatam returns to this word again and again. Caitanya tradition: nṛ-deha + sad-guru + Kṛṣṇa-bhakti is the triple durlabha-prāpti.
• pramattasya — of one who is mad with intoxication
  Genitive present participle from pra + √mad. Pramāda means crazed inattention. The technical name for the disease the human birth was meant to cure — and which the human, drunk on his own birth, becomes.
• māyayā — by Your illusory potency
  Instrumental of māyā. Vasudeva is careful: even the deluded use of human life happens by Bhagavān's own māyā — not outside His sovereignty. This is the doctrinal foundation of śaraṇāgati.

Imagine being handed a winning lottery ticket and using it to wrap fish. Human birth is exactly such a ticket — durlabha, rare — and Bhagavān's māyā ensures that without His mercy, the holder spends the asset on sense-gratification and dies still holding the unused paper.

• asau aham mama — I, mine
  The three pronouns of false self: asau (this one), aham (I), mama (mine). The Bhāgavatam diagnoses these as the actual chains. Liberation is the unbinding of exactly these three words.
• sneha-pāśaiḥ — by the ropes of affection
  Compound: sneha (affection) + pāśa (rope, noose). Sneha is normally a positive vātsalya-word; here it is the binding agent. Gauḍīyas distinguish material sneha (toward body and progeny) from rasa-sneha (toward Kṛṣṇa and His devotees).
• nibadhnāti — binds
  Causative present of ni + √bandh. Bhagavān binds — He is the binder; He is also the unbinder. The same Person who tied Vasudeva to family-life is now offering, as Vasudeva's son, to release him.
• anvaya-ādiṣu — in offspring and so on
  Compound: anvaya (lineage, descendants) + ādi (etc.). The 'mama' moves outward through children, spouse, wealth, nation. Each circle is a tighter loop of the same rope.

A puppeteer holds two ropes — 'this is me' and 'this is mine' — and every person dances when these are pulled. Bhagavān Himself is the rope-holder. Vasudeva is confessing on behalf of the whole world: the bondage is real, but its origin is not in us.

• sutau — sons
  The very word Vasudeva is now retracting. The whole speech turns on this single noun: he uses it only to disown it — 'You are not our sutau but the pradhāna-puruṣa-īśvarau.'
• pradhāna-puruṣa-īśvarau — the Lords of nature and its director (Mahā-Viṣṇu)
  Triple compound, dual ending. Three sāṅkhya-vedānta technical terms compressed into one word: They control pradhāna (matter), puruṣa (Mahā-Viṣṇu), and are īśvara of both. Vasudeva is naming the highest theological altitude in a single breath.
• bhū-bhāra-kṣatra-kṣapaṇe — for diminishing the burden of warrior-rulers upon the earth
  Long compound: bhū (earth) + bhāra (burden) + kṣatra (warrior caste) + kṣapaṇa (eliminating). The avatāra's purpose. Gauḍīyas emphasize that this is the secondary mission; the primary is Vraja-līlā for the devotees.
• avatīrṇau — descended
  Dual past participle of ava + √tṝ, 'to cross down'. Avatāra-vocabulary in its purest form. Vasudeva uses the very word the śāstras reserve for the Lord's descent.

A parent who has just realized the child in his arms is the king of the kingdom does not stop being a parent — but a second knowledge layers itself over the first. Vasudeva: 'You are not our sons.' He says it while still calling Them by name.

• araṇam — shelter, refuge
  From √ṛ. Śaraṇa-vocabulary. Vasudeva is performing śaraṇāgati to his own son — the highest dharma compressed into a single sentence. BG 18.66 echoes.
• pāda-aravindam — the lotus feet
  Compound: pāda (foot) + aravinda (lotus). The Gauḍīya touchstone. Caitanya tradition: kṛṣṇa-pāda-padma is the only fixed point in the storm of saṁsāra.
• ārta-bandho — O friend of the distressed
  Vocative compound: ārta (distressed) + bandhu (friend). Kṛṣṇa's name as the One who relates personally to the suffering. He is not a remote deliverer but a friend who comes close.
• alam alam — enough, enough
  Doubled adverb: 'enough!' The very phrase of someone setting down a weight. Vasudeva is laying down decades of fatherhood-as-identity and asking to be only a śaraṇāgata.
• apatya-buddhiḥ — the conception that You are my child
  Compound: apatya (offspring) + buddhi (conception, intelligence). Vasudeva names the specific obstacle: his own vātsalya-buddhi. He doesn't reject vātsalya itself — he asks not to mistake the rasa for the metaphysical fact.

• UM SB 10-85-19 - Satisfied in Love - 2025-04-15 Bhakti Center - New
  Her Grace Urmila Mataji· 2025-04-15· English

A man who has been holding a torch by the burning end discovers there is a handle, and lets the fire end fall. Vasudeva's old grip on 'this is my son' burned him; now he reaches for the lotus feet — etāvatā alam, 'enough already.'

• sūtī-gṛhe — in the maternity room
  Compound: sūti (childbirth) + gṛha (room). The reference is to SB 10.3 — the Mathurā prison, where the newborn Kṛṣṇa revealed His four-armed Viṣṇu-form to Vasudeva and Devakī. Vasudeva is now placing today's recognition inside that older event.
• anu-yugam — age after age
  Adverbial compound: anu (following) + yuga (age). The doctrine of recurrent avatāra. BG 4.7–8: yadā yadā hi dharmasya — same teaching now told by the father to the Son who said it first.
• nija-dharma-guptyai — for the protection of His own principles of religion
  Compound: nija (one's own) + dharma + gupti (protection). The Lord descends to protect dharma — but Gauḍīyas underline 'nija': not abstract dharma, but His own (bhāgavata-dharma, the path of bhakti).
• gagana-vat — like the sky
  Compound: gagana (sky) + -vat (like). The classical Vedānta image for the changeless substrate from which cloud-forms emerge and into which they dissolve. The avatāra-bodies are real but sky-like in their freedom from material constraint.
• uru-gāya — O widely-glorified one
  Vocative compound: uru (wide, extensive) + gāya (sung-of). A Vedic epithet of Viṣṇu. The Bhāgavatam's preferred mode: address Bhagavān by names that name His glorification, not just His being.

• Bhanu Sw SB 10-85-20-23 - Krsna used philosophy of oneness to protect Vatsalya Rasa of Vasudeva - ISKCON Chennai
  His Holiness Bhanu Swami· English

A cloud forms in clear sky, releases its rain, dissolves back into the same sky. Bhagavān's appearances and disappearances are gagana-vat — sky-like, leaving no trace where they came from or where they went. The cloud is real; the sky is what the cloud is.

• sātvata-ṛṣabhaḥ — the chief of the Sātvata-Yādavas
  Compound: sātvata (the Sātvata dynasty, devotees of Viṣṇu) + ṛṣabha (the best, the bull-among). Kṛṣṇa as the foremost of His own dynasty. The Sātvatas are the original bhāgavatas; their Lord is named accordingly.
• praśraya-ānamraḥ — humbly bowed in deference
  Compound: praśraya (humility, respect) + ānamra (bent down). Bhagavān bowing His own head before Vasudeva. Gauḍīyas hold this moment up as the visible form of dāsya inside vātsalya: the Lord enacts the humility a son owes a father.
• prahasan — smiling
  Present participle of pra + √has. Kṛṣṇa's smile — the same smile of the flute-player. It is not mockery; it is the mādhurya that accompanies all His teachings, even when the topic is metaphysical.
• ślakṣṇayā girā — with gentle words
  Instrumental: ślakṣṇa (smooth, soft) + gir (speech). The tone of the teaching. The Gauḍīya pattern: even the highest tattva is given softly, never with the harshness of impersonalist disputation.

A teacher who has been the listener now becomes the speaker. Kṛṣṇa lowers His head before His father even as He prepares to instruct him — bowed in praśraya, smiling in mādhurya. The teaching that follows is given from beneath, never from above.

• samaveta-artham — with a fitting meaning
  Compound: samaveta (fitting, joined) + artha (meaning, purpose). Kṛṣṇa is acknowledging that Vasudeva's words are not merely affectionate — they are sam-aveta, technically correct.
• tāta — dear Father
  Vocative of tāta. The standard affectionate address from a son to a father. Even while teaching the highest tattva, Kṛṣṇa preserves the rasa-relationship by using this single word.
• putrān samuddiśya — with reference to your sons
  Accusative + gerund. Vasudeva used his sons as the demonstrandum of cosmic categories. Kṛṣṇa observes: you have done illustrative tattva-vyākhyā — taught categories by pointing at persons.
• tattva-grāmaḥ — the assemblage of categories
  Compound: tattva (essential principle) + grāma (collection, village). The whole inventory of sāṅkhya-vedānta tattvas. Kṛṣṇa is saying: you have, in your father's address, recited the entire tattva-grāma.

A doctor calls his medical kit 'his children' and means it tenderly — but a colleague who hears him says, 'You speak truer than you know; the kit is also the discipline of medicine.' Kṛṣṇa receives Vasudeva's tattva-statement and ratifies it: 'Yes — you have explained the categories correctly using Us as the example.'

• āryaḥ — respected elder brother
  Nominative of ārya. Refers to Balarāma as Kṛṣṇa's revered elder. Even in His own teaching to His father, Kṛṣṇa preserves the etiquette of family-rasa: Balarāma is 'ārya'.
• dvārakā-okasaḥ — the residents of Dvārakā
  Compound: dvārakā + okas (dweller). The Dvārakā-vāsīs share the same metaphysical status — all are non-different from Bhagavān in their essential nature, while different in role. Gauḍīya acintya-bhedābheda in a single phrase.
• yadu-śreṣṭha — O best of the Yadus
  Vocative compound. Vasudeva is here addressed not as 'father' but as the chief of the Yadu-vaṁśa. Kṛṣṇa lifts him out of the merely personal rasa for one moment of tattva-instruction.
• cara-acaram — moving and nonmoving
  Compound: cara (moving) + acara (unmoving). The exhaustive division of creation. BG 9.10 uses the same pair: prakṛti produces sa-carācaram. Nothing is excluded from the metaphysical claim.

• Revati Raman Pr SB 10-85-23 Telugu Translation - 2014-07-17 ISKCON Tirupati
  His Grace Revati Raman Prabhu· 2014-07-17· Telugu

When a king tells you that he is the kingdom, the next sentence is hard: 'so are you, and so is everyone in this room.' Kṛṣṇa does not let Vasudeva keep the realization private. The whole of Dvārakā belongs to the same metaphysics — moving and unmoving.

• ātmā — the Self (Paramātmā)
  Here specifically Paramātmā — the Supreme Soul, not the jīva-ātmā. Gauḍīyas read the verse in the bhāgavata frame: Paramātmā is Kṛṣṇa's Mahā-Viṣṇu/Garbhodakaśāyī expansion.
• svayam-jyotiḥ — self-luminous
  Compound: svayam (by Himself) + jyotis (light). Bhagavān shines by His own light; He needs no second source. Upaniṣadic vocabulary (Bṛhad-āraṇyaka 4.3.9), now spoken by Kṛṣṇa about Himself.
• nirguṇaḥ — free from material qualities
  Compound negation: nir + guṇa. Bhagavān is nirguṇa in the sense that the material guṇas do not touch Him; He is not nirguṇa in the sense of being attribute-less. Gauḍīyas: His sac-cid-ānanda qualities are aprākṛta, transcendental.
• ātma-sṛṣṭaiḥ — created by Himself
  Compound: ātma (self) + sṛṣṭa (created). The guṇas are not external to Him; He emanates them. The multiplicity He appears in is generated by His own creative act.
• bahudhā īyate — appears as many
  Adverb + verb: bahu-dhā (in many ways) + √i (to go, to seem). Echoes Kaṭha 2.1.10: nehā nānāsti kiñcana. The 'manyness' is appearance; the One is the reality — but neither side is unreal.

• Bhanu Sw SB 10-85-24-26 - Bhagavatam is like Krsna which manifests differently for different types of people - ISKCON Chennai
  His Holiness Bhanu Swami· English

One lamp behind colored glass casts blue, red, green light across the wall. The lamp is one; the colors are many. Paramātmā is one self-luminous Person; the modes are the glass; the apparent multiplicity is what the wall sees.

• yathā-āśayam — according to the receptacle
  Compound: yathā (as) + āśaya (vessel, container). The elements appear differently according to the container they fill. The doctrinal heart of the verse: the variation is in the vessel, not in what fills it.
• alpa-bhūri — small and large
  Dvandva compound: alpa (small) + bhūri (much). The element-quantity ranges from a drop to an ocean; the substance is the same. Vasudeva must extrapolate from elements to Paramātmā.
• āviḥ tiraḥ — manifest and unmanifest
  Pair: āvis (visible) + tiras (hidden). The same element flickers between visible and invisible without changing its essence. Kṛṣṇa's līlās do the same — visible in Vraja, hidden in Goloka.
• nānātvam yāti — comes to have multiplicity
  Noun + verb: nānātva (manyness) + √yā (to go). The One 'goes into' manyness — the verb of apparent (not real) multiplication. The Sanskrit grammar preserves the ontological subtlety the verse depends on.

The same air fills a flute, a conch, a balloon, and the lungs of a singer — appearing as music here, as a shout there, as a stretched skin elsewhere, yet remaining one. Paramātmā is air-like in this: one substance, infinite appearances, shaped by what receives Him.

• vinaṣṭa-nānā-dhīḥ — with all sense of duality destroyed
  Compound: vinaṣṭa (destroyed) + nānā (manyness) + dhī (intelligence). The dualistic frame has collapsed — not into Māyāvāda merging, but into recognition that the multiplicity is held within the Person.
• tūṣṇīm — silently
  Adverb: 'silently'. The proper response to receiving the highest truth from Bhagavān is silence, not commentary. Gauḍīyas: when prema rises, words recede — Caitanya Himself often answered the highest questions only by tears.
• prīta-manāḥ — with a satisfied mind
  Compound: prīta (pleased) + manas (mind). The result of receiving Kṛṣṇa's teaching from Kṛṣṇa is not first jñāna but prīti — the same word that runs through all the rasa-treatises.
• udāhṛtaḥ — having been addressed
  Past participle of ud + ā + √hṛ, 'to bring forth, declare to'. Vasudeva is the recipient of declared teaching — the verb specifies that this was not casual conversation but formal upadeśa.

• Prabha Vishnu Pr SB 10-85-26 - 2008-05-14 - ISKCON Melbourne
  His Grace Pariksit Prabhu· 2008-05-14· English
• Revati Raman Pr SB 10-85-26-28 Telugu Translation - 2014-07-19 ISKCON Tirupati
  His Grace Revati Raman Prabhu· 2014-07-19· Telugu

A man who has been arguing two sides of a question in his head suddenly hears the master's word and the argument stops — not because it is won, but because the questioner has been answered. Vasudeva falls silent: prīta-manāḥ, satisfied at heart.

• devakī — Devakī (Kṛṣṇa's mother)
  The seventh consort of Vasudeva in this birth, but cosmologically named in SB 10.3 as Aditi reborn. Devakī's vātsalya is the rasa-counterpart of Yaśodā's — the mādhurya of one who could not raise her son, but who is the mother He honors.
• kṛṣṇa-rāmau — Kṛṣṇa and Balarāma
  Dual compound. Devakī addresses both — but it is Kṛṣṇa who will answer. The two brothers are the constant pair of Kaṁsa-līlā and the rescue-līlās that follow.
• kaṁsa-vihiṁsitān — killed by Kaṁsa
  Compound: kaṁsa + vihiṁsita (slain, dashed). The reference is to SB 10.1 — the six prior sons Kaṁsa killed on the prison-floor before Kṛṣṇa's birth. Decades have passed; the wound is still fresh.
• vaiklavyāt — out of agitation, distress
  Ablative abstract: vaiklavya = 'state of being shaken'. Devakī's calm is broken by the memory. Gauḍīyas note that vātsalya is so deep that it can be re-opened decades later by a single triggering event.
• aśru-locanā — with tear-filled eyes
  Compound: aśru (tear) + locanā (eyed-one, feminine). The verse closes with the visible sign of mother's love. Devakī's tears do work in the world — they bring Kṛṣṇa to Sutala.

• BRasamritaSw SB 10-85-27-28 - 2015-07-03 ISKCON Melbourne
  His Holiness Bhakti Rasamrita Swami· 2015-07-03· English
• Bhanu Sw SB 10-85-27-39 - Krsna%27s mystical power to please his devotees and the influence of yogamaya potency - ISKCON Chennai
  His Holiness Bhanu Swami· English

Hearing of one son brought back from death awakens in Devakī the memory of six sons she never finished mourning. Like a sealed well disturbed by a single stone, her old grief rises — and she places the lifted stone in the very hands that could lift it.

• rāma rāma — O Rāma, Rāma
  Doubled vocative — Devakī addresses Balarāma first, as the elder. The doubled address is itself a rasa-marker: love repeats names.
• aprameya-ātman — O immeasurable Self
  Compound: a- + prameya (measurable) + ātman. Bhagavān is beyond measurement by any pramāṇa. Devakī uses the most absolute term — and then asks her absolute Lord to do the most domestic favor.
• yoga-īśvara īśvara — Lord of all yoga-masters
  Compound: yoga-īśvara (master of yoga) + īśvara (Lord). The same paired vocative as BG 11.4. Kṛṣṇa is not merely a yogi among yogis; He is the Lord of all who command yoga-śakti.
• ādi-pūruṣau — the original Persons
  Compound: ādi (original) + pūruṣa (Person, dual). The plural is significant: Devakī recognizes both Kṛṣṇa and Balarāma as ādi-puruṣa-tattva. Gauḍīyas read this as confirmation of Balarāma's status as Kṛṣṇa's first plenary expansion.

• Prabha Vishnu Pr SB 10-85-29 - 2008-05-15 - ISKCON Melbourne
  His Grace Pariksit Prabhu· 2008-05-15· English

A mother who has been told her sons are gods now speaks to Them as gods — but the sentence she will arrive at is still 'please bring me my babies.' Aprameya-ātman is the address; the request is vātsalya. Both registers are true; both are spoken in one breath.

• kāla-vidhvasta-sattvānām — of those whose goodness has been destroyed by time
  Compound: kāla (time) + vidhvasta (destroyed) + sattva (goodness). A precise diagnosis: time is the agent of sattva-erosion. The avatāra responds not to the start of evil but to the wearing-down of good.
• ut-śāstra-vartinām — of those who act against scripture
  Compound: ud (against) + śāstra + vartin (acting). The Bhāgavata standard for adharma: not raw cruelty but anti-śāstric behavior. The rulers who violate śāstra become the burden Bhagavān removes.
• bhārāyamāṇānām — of those who are a burden
  Present participle of denominative bhārāyamāṇa, 'becoming a burden'. Earth herself groans (SB 10.1) — the avatāra is her relief.
• avatīrṇau — have descended
  Dual past participle of ava + √tṝ. Same word Vasudeva used in verse 18. Now Devakī picks it up — both parents speak in avatāra-vocabulary about their own children.

When the soil grows so heavy with thorny weed that no crop can rise, the gardener Himself takes a body and walks the field. Kāla-vidhvasta-sattva names the moment: the rulers' goodness has been worn down by time, and the burden has finally summoned the Lord.

• aṁśa aṁśa aṁśa — an expansion of an expansion of an expansion
  Three iterations of aṁśa ('part, expansion'). The Bhāgavatam's precise hierarchy of avatāra: Kṛṣṇa → Saṅkarṣaṇa → Mahā-Viṣṇu → Garbhodakaśāyī → Kṣīrodakaśāyī. The world arises from one of the furthest expansions.
• viśva-ātman — O Soul of the universe
  Compound vocative: viśva (universe) + ātman. Devakī addresses her son with the same epithet the Upaniṣads reserve for the cosmic Self. The vātsalya-rasa and the antaryāmī-doctrine coexist in one address.
• gatim gatā — have approached as my goal
  Noun + past participle: gati (destination) + gatā (gone-to). The verb of śaraṇāgati. Devakī, like Vasudeva, formally takes refuge.
• utpatti-laya-udayāḥ — creation, dissolution and maintenance
  Compound: utpatti (origination) + laya (dissolution) + udaya (rising / maintenance). The three Bhāgavata functions — sṛṣṭi, sthiti, pralaya — performed by a sliver of Bhagavān's expansion. The scale of the request that follows is measured against this scale of the asked.

A river flows from a Himalayan source; that source is a glacier melting under sun; the sun receives its light from a deeper origin still. Devakī traces the world's making three levels upstream — aṁśa of aṁśa of aṁśa — and finds her sons.

• guru-dakṣiṇām — the teacher's payment
  Compound: guru (teacher) + dakṣiṇā (offering, payment). The traditional gift to one's preceptor at the end of study. Kṛṣṇa offered the most expensive dakṣiṇā recorded — a son retrieved from death.
• yoga-īśvara īśvarau — O supreme masters of all yoga masters
  Dual vocative compound. Devakī uses the technical address for the resurrection-act she is about to request. Bringing the dead back is a yoga-śakti act; only the īśvarau of yoga-īśvaras can do it.
• bhoja-rāja-hatān — killed by the king of Bhoja (Kaṁsa)
  Compound: bhoja (the Bhoja clan) + rāja (king) + hata (slain). Kaṁsa is named by dynastic title — Devakī's wound is so old it has become a historical category. Bhoja-rāja-hatān is the heading under which her six children file.
• draṣṭum — to see
  Infinitive of √dṛś. The whole request collapses to this verb. Devakī does not ask for justice or even for the children to live — only that she see them once. The infinite simplicity of mātṛ-vātsalya.

• Prabha Vishnu Pr SB 10-85-32-33 - Surrender everything to the Lord like Bali Maharaj - ISKCON Melbourne
  His Grace Pariksit Prabhu· English
• Haladhar Sw SB 10-85-32-37 - 2025-10-16 ISKCON Vrindavan
  His Holiness Haladhar Swami· 2025-10-16· English
• Haladhar Sw SB 10-85-32-37 Hindi - 2025-10-16 ISKCON Vrindavan
  His Holiness Haladhar Swami· 2025-10-16· Hindi

A mother offers a precedent to her own son: 'You once brought back your teacher's lost child as guru-dakṣiṇā. Do for the mother what You did for the guru.' The teacher's payment becomes the mother's claim. Bhagavān honors both.

• sutalam — Sutala (a region of the lower planetary system)
  One of the seven sub-terrestrial regions. Bali Mahārāja was given sovereignty of Sutala by Vāmana-deva after surrendering everything (SB 8.22). It is the abode of a great devotee, not a hellish region.
• yoga-māyāyam upāśritau — taking shelter of Yoga-māyā
  Compound + participle: yoga-māyā + upa + ā + √śri (to take shelter of). The Lord moves between regions not by physical travel but by His own internal potency. Yoga-māyā is His private vehicle.
• saṁviviśatuḥ — the two of Them entered
  Dual aorist of sam + vi + √viś, 'to enter together'. Both brothers enter as one act. Gauḍīyas: where Balarāma goes, Kṛṣṇa goes; their movements are coordinated tattva.
• sañcoditau — thus urged
  Dual past participle of sam + √cud, 'to be urged'. Kṛṣṇa moves only when prompted by His devotee's prayer. Devakī's vaiklavya is the actual cause of the Sutala-journey.

Two brothers step into a hidden chamber the way you might step into a memory — the door is yoga-māyā, the chamber is sutala, and what waits inside is a king who has been ready for this visit for ages. Their movement is not travel; it is the rearrangement of where they are.