Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 11.10.20
కోఽన్వర్థ: సుఖయత్యేనం కామో వా మృత్యురన్తికే ।
ఆఘాతం నీయమానస్య వధ్యస్యేవ న తుష్టిద: ॥ ౨౦ ॥
ko ’nv arthaḥ sukhayaty enaṁ
[ko ’nv arthah sukhayaty enam]
kāmo vā mṛtyur antike
[kaamo vaa mrityur antike]
āghātaṁ nīyamānasya
[aaghaatam neeyamaanasya]
vadhyasyeva na tuṣṭi-daḥ
[vadhyasyeva na tushti-dah]
Word-for-word
kaḥ
—
what
nu
—
certainly
arthaḥ
—
material object
sukhayati
—
gives happiness
enam
—
to a person
kāmaḥ
—
sense gratification derived from material things
vā
—
or
mṛtyuḥ
—
death
antike
—
standing nearby
āghātam
—
to the place of execution
nīyamānasya
—
of one who is being led
vadhyasya
—
of one who is to be killed
iva
—
like
na
—
not at all
tuṣṭi-daḥ
—
gives satisfaction.
Blended reading (Sanskrit + English inline)
ko ’nv arthaḥ sukhayaty enaṁ
kāmo vā mṛtyur antike
kaḥ
what
nu
certainly
arthaḥ
material object
sukhayati
gives happiness
enam
to a person
kāmaḥ
sense gratification derived from material things
vā
or
mṛtyuḥ
death
antike
standing nearby
āghātaṁ nīyamānasya
āghātam
to the place of execution
nīyamānasya
of one who is being led
vadhyasyeva na tuṣṭi-daḥ
vadhyasya
of one who is to be killed
iva
like
na
not at all
tuṣṭi-daḥ
gives satisfaction.
Death is not at all pleasing, and since everyone is exactly like a condemned man being led to the place of execution, what possible happiness can people derive from material objects or the gratification they provide?
Purport
It is customary throughout the world that a condemned man is offered a sumptuous last meal. For the condemned man, however, such a feast is a chilling reminder of his imminent death, and therefore he cannot enjoy it. Similarly, no sane human being can be satisfied in material life, because death is standing near and may strike at any moment. If one is sitting in one’s living room with a deadly snake at one’s side, knowing that at any moment the poisonous fangs might pierce the flesh, how can one sit peacefully and watch television or read a book? Similarly, unless one is more or less crazy, one cannot be enthusiastic or even peaceful in material life. Knowledge of the inevitability of death should encourage one to become determined in spiritual life.
— A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupāda
Gauḍīya Ācāryas
Viśvanātha Cakravartī Ṭhākura
Gauḍīya
Translation
What object or desire can bring a person happiness? Death standing next to you does not bring satisfaction. Similarly the person being led to the place of execution cannot be satisfied by an offering of sweets.
“Well, at least before death one can have happiness.” That is not so. Objects or the desire arising from them cannot make one happy because death being present nearby does not give happiness. When the criminal to be executed is brought to the execution place and is offered as much sweet rice as he can eat, that offering will not bring happiness. Thus material objects and desires for them are not the goal of life.
Related lectures
Personal Guidance
Like a condemned prisoner offered a last meal, no embodied soul can truly relish material pleasures while death stands waiting at the door.
Practical Applications
- Before reaching for the next pleasure today, pause and ask aloud, "Would I enjoy this if I knew death was at my shoulder?"
- Set aside ten minutes this evening to read Prabhupāda's purport on this verse and let the executioner-image strike you, not soothe you.
- Convert the urgency of mṛtyu into determined sādhana: chant your rounds first thing tomorrow, before any viṣaya consumption.
Reflection Questions
- Which specific kāma am I still pretending will satisfy me, even though I intellectually accept that death is antike?
- Where in my daily life am I behaving like a condemned man enjoying his last meal — and what would sane behavior look like instead?
For Each Age Group
youth
- When friends pressure you toward a pleasure that feels hollow even before you taste it, name that hollowness instead of overriding it.
- Before your next scroll session or party, ask yourself what the condemned-man test would say about how you are spending these hours.
- Pick one daily sādhana — japa, reading, or a temple visit each week — and protect it as the one thing death cannot interrupt mid-bite.
householder
- When making the next big family purchase, sit with the question of whether you are buying happiness or simply furnishing the cell.
- Use the weight of mortgage and career not as an excuse to forget death but as the very fuel for offering each action to Kṛṣṇa.
- Speak with your spouse this week about how the family's routines would change if you both took mṛtyur antike seriously — and change one thing.
senior
- Stop pretending the body's signals are inconveniences; let each one return you to the verse and to chanting Kṛṣṇa's names.
- Begin loosening grip on one possession or position this month, giving it away or handing it on, as a rehearsal for the final letting-go.
- Mentor a younger devotee by speaking plainly about what the last-meal image now means to you — your honesty will instruct them more than theory.
Common Pitfalls
- Turning the verse into morbid depression rather than letting it sharpen determination for bhakti.
- Using "death is near" as cynical detachment to neglect duties, when Krishna asks for renounced action, not inaction.
- Intellectually agreeing that material objects cannot satisfy while continuing to arrange life as though they will.
Discussion Prompts
- Share one material pleasure you still actively chase. Does remembrance of death diminish it, or does it leave you cold? Be honest with each other.
- Prabhupāda compares us to a condemned man at his last meal. Does this image feel exaggerated to you, or accurate? Where do you push back?
- If knowledge of inevitable death is meant to fuel spiritual determination, why does it so often produce only anxiety or denial in us instead?
Role Play
One student plays a friend who has just received a serious medical diagnosis and is frantically planning a bucket-list trip to "finally enjoy life." The other plays a Gauḍīya practitioner who must respond without being preachy or cold — actually engaging the friend's fear while pointing toward the verse's deeper logic that death cannot be outrun by intensifying viṣaya.
Objections & Responses
- This is just a fear-based scare tactic. Healthy people enjoy life without obsessing over death, and they are happier for it.
The verse does not prescribe obsession but sobriety. The condemned-man image is not meant to terrorize but to expose a delusion we already live inside. Forgetting death does not abolish it; it only ensures we meet it unprepared. Prabhupāda's point is that knowledge of mṛtyu should encourage determined spiritual life, not paralyze ordinary life. - Modern people live longer and more comfortably than ever. The condemned-prisoner image feels medieval and overblown for our reality.
Longevity statistics do not change the verse's claim: every embodied being, ancient or modern, is being led to the same āghāta. A longer wait in the cell does not make the sentence less real. The comfort of modern life is precisely the sumptuous last meal Prabhupāda describes — it distracts, but it does not save.
My note
Source: vedabase.io