Wordings
Mukunda, murdhna, pranipatya, yache, Bhabantam, ekantam, iyantam, artham, abismriti, taba, charanaravinde, bhabe, bhave, may, asta, tabe, prasadat.
Synonyms
Mukunda—oh my Lord Mukunda,; Abismriti—Without being forgetful,; Murdhna—my head; Taba—your Lordship's; Pranipatya—Bowing down.; Charanaravinde—upon the Lotus feet.; Yache—Respectfully beg.; Bhave bhave—In every repeatation of birth.; Bhabantam—From you,; May—Mine,; Ekantam—Ultimately,; Astu—Let it be so; yeantam—So far and not more; Taba—your; Artham—Fulfilment of desire.; Prasadat—By mercy.
Translation
Oh my Lord Mukunda! I do bow down my head unto the Lotus feet of your Lordship and respectfully ask from you the fulfilment of my only desire so far that in every repeatation of my birth let it be so by your Lordship's mercy that without being forgetful I may always remember you.
Purport
A pure devotee has nothing to ask from the Lord inspite of all difficulties. The world in which we live is a miserable place. It is so to say is a prison house for the ever joyful spiritsoul and as a prisoner cannot move or enjoy life fully—so also the living entities who have been conditioned by the laws of material nature are doomed. They cannot have any freedom at least from the four principle miseries namely birth, death, oldage and diseases. These miseries are imposed upon the living entities by the laws of external nature called Maya just for giving punishment to the forgetful living beings who are busy in making plans for lasting happiness in the desert of distress. The pure devotee knows this very well by the mercy of the Lord. The whole philosophy of life is to understand this truth. Advancement of knowledge means to understand the naked truth of this world
and not to be deluded by the so called temporary beauty of this got up show. The material nature is not at all beauty ful but it is an imitation peacock. The real peacock is a different thing and one must have a sense to understand this. The class of men who are mad after enjoying or capturing the imitation peacock as well as the class of man who has only a pesimistic view only of the imitation peacock without any positive information of the real peacok, both are illusioned by the modes of material nature. Those who are after the immitation peacock are called generally the fruitive worker. And those, who simply condemn the imitation peacock without any definite information of the real peacock are called the empiric philosophers seeking to merge into voidness out of an disgust of following a mirage.
But a pure devotee is not classified in either of the above two bewildered classes. He seeks the real peacock and does not aspire after enjoying the imitation peacock nor does he condemn it in disgust like the baffled empiricist. He is above all these servants of material nature because he has preferred to serve the Lord the master of nature. He seeks the substance and does not wish to give it up. The lotus feet of Mukunda is the substance and King Kulasekhara as the most intelligent devotee prays to gain the substance and not the shadow. A devotee of Narayana is not at all affraid of any circumstances that may befal upon him. He is not at all afraid if by chance he has to visit the kingdom of Pluto neither he is anxious to enter into the Kingdom of heaven. For him both these Kingdoms are
of equal value and compared with castle in the air. He does not aspire for either of them nor does he condemn them. What he desires ultimately is very nicely expressed in the words of King Kulasekhara.
A pure devotee of the Lord like the King Kulasekhara does not pray to God for material wealth, followers, beautiful wife or any such immitation peacock because he knows the real value of such got up shows. And if by circumstantially placed in such situation, he does not try to get out of it artificially or by condemnation.
Raghunath Das Goswami a great associate of Lord Chaitanya was a very rich mans' son equipped with beautiful wife and all other necessary parapharnalia. When he first met the Lord Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu at Panihati a village about forty miles off from Calcutta,—Sri Raghunath Das asked permission of the Lord for accompanying Him and thus leave his material connection. The Lord refused to accept this proposal and instructed Srila Raghunath Das that it is useless to leave worldly connection by sentiment or by artificial rennunciation. One should have the real thing at heart i.e. one must have a complete knowledge of the physical world and behave outwardly as a worldly man but inwardly must be faithful for spiritual realisation. That will help the progressive march of life. No body can cross over the big ocean by a sudden jump over by an imitation attempt. What was possible for Hanuman by the Grace of Rama is not possible by every one. So for going across the ocean one has to wait & see and by such means only one can gradually
reach the other side. A pure devotee although does not bother himself what is going to happen next yet with constant alertness, he does not forget his ultimate aim. King Kulasekhara therefore prays for this that he may not forget the lotus feet of the Lord. Forgetfulness of the relation of the Lord and thus to remain in the overflow of material hankerings is the most condemned mode of life. This is exactly the nature of animal life. In the lower animal life the living entity is completely forgetful of his relation with the Lord and therefore he is constantly busy in the matter of eating, sleeping, fearing and sense-gratification. A life of forgetfulness like this with an improved economic condition for eating etc. is the mode of modern civilization. There is a regular & definite propaganda by different agents of the external energy to root out the very seed of Divine Consciousness. This is an impossible fact. Because the Divine Consciousness of a living being may be chocked up for the time being by circumstances but it cannot be killed. The living entity in his original identity is non-destructible and so also are his original spiritual qualities, one can neither kill the spirit soul nor its spiritual qualities. To remember the Lord or a desire to serve Him are the spiritual qualities of the spirit soul. You can snub down the spiritual qualities by artificial ways but such qualities will reflect in a perverted way on the mirror of material existence. The spiritual quality of serving the Lord out of transcendental affinity is reflected in a perverted way in the form of love for wine women wealth in different forms. The so called love of material things, even that of one's country, community, religion, family, etc. which are accepted as superior qualifications of human kind, are all perverted reflection of love of Godhead which is dormant in every soul. The position of King Kulasekhara is the position of a liberated soul because he does not want to pollute his genuine love of God into love of so called material things.
The word bhave bhave is very significant here. It means
repeatation of birth. A pure devotee is never afraid of such repeatation of births as it is done by the Jnanins who aspire after merging in the Absolute and thereby stop the process of repeatition of births. In the Bhagwat Geeta it is said that the birth and deeds of the Personality of Godhead is 'Divyam' or transcendental. In the same Bhagwat Geeta it is also said that the Lord and Arjuna had many many other births before the present one. The Lord remembered all such births and deeds that took place previously but Arjuna did not remember them. For the Lord there is no history of past, present & future but for the living being there is history on account of his being forgetful of the past. Therefore a living entity who is a constant companion of the Lord is also transcendentally situated. His birth and death are the one and the same thing because such occurances are ephemeral flashes only without any effect on the spiritual existence of a devotee.
A crude example maybe set in herewith like the cats' paw. The cat captures in her mouth both her offspring as well as her prey the rat. Both such capturing processes appear to be the same action in the eyes of a lay man but in fact there is a vast difference in both the processes. While carried by the mouth of the cat, sense perception of the rat and that of the cats' offspring are different by poles asunder. For the rat the capture is death strike while for the offspring it is a pleasure giving touch sensation only. Therefore passing away of a devotee from the active scene of material existence appearing as death and that of an ordinary man are difference of quality. The death of an ordinary being has back ground of his past good and evil deeds and as such the next birth is focussed according to the reaction of such past deeds. But for a devotee the case is different. Even to the failure no 1 devotee is guarateed to have his birth in the good family of a learned man and devotee Brahmin or in the family of
a rich merchancile Vaishya. Such persons have a better chance to improve his spiritual conditions and devotional services in such well to do family. But in this ironage the members of such well to do family mistakes his prosperous condition in a different way and instead of improving his spiritual advancement, he is mislead by faulty association and falls victim of material sensuality. In order to be saved from this faulty association the King prays fervently to the Lord that he may not forget His Lotus feet even if there is repeatition birth. A devotee who has attained perfect success in the order of devotional services, does certainly go back to Godhead without any doubt and there is no question of repeatition of birth or death. But even there is not complete perfection a devotee is guaranteed to have his birth in the learned and well to do families. Even if he is not given the chance of good parentage, the benediction of remembering the Lotus feet of the Lord is more than any number of material assets. Constant rememberance of the Lord's Name, Fame, (?—) etc. automatically counter acts the reactions of all vices and extends the blessings of goodness. This constant rememberance of the Lotus feet of the Lord means an active service of the Lord.
A pure devotee therefore does not ask from the Lord any material wealth, man-power followers or even beautiful wife but he simply prays for unalloyed faith in the Lord's service. That should be the motto of life of all prospective students in the devotional service.