During this auspicious Kartika month, delve into Lord Krishna’s heartwarming lilas as Damodara and discover the deep lessons they offer.
Deepavali is well known as the festival of lights. Another significant festival of lights is the Kartika Deepotsava, celebrated in the Gaudiya Vaishnava tradition during Kartika masa (Oct-Nov) to commemorate Lord Krishna’s lilas as Damodara. In Sanskrit, dama means rope, and udara means belly. Damodara refers to Krishna bound with a rope by His mother Yashoda.
One may wonder why these pastimes are relevant even in today’s scientific and ambitious world.
We all want a developed nation and world. People are investing time, effort, and resources in education, healthcare, industry, and facilities for sports, music, and recreation like never before, yet we see corruption and dissatisfaction rising. Why is this so?
Table of Contents
We Want the Kingdom of God Without God
Although we have made great efforts materially, we need to catch up spiritually. All the great scriptures and saints say that the purpose of human life is to know and love God. But in today’s world, God is forgotten too often and easily in our pursuit of power and pleasure. Hence, humans have invented unnecessary and dangerous things like slaughterhouses, places of intoxication, prostitution, and gambling.
Indulging in such papa-karmas (sinful activities) is like putting one’s hand into the fire but expecting not to get burnt. It doesn’t work. Our wise ancestors knew this and were careful not to indulge in nor encourage sinful activities. The Srimad Bhagavatam, the ripened fruit of all Vedic wisdom, describes the reigns of great kings like Parikshit, Yudhisthira, Prithu and so on.
As depicted in the image, King Parikshit stands as a protector of dharma against the forces of Kali, the current age of quarrel and hypocrisy.
They led exemplary lives and inspired the world’s citizens to accept the principles of religion, namely austerity, cleanliness, mercy, and truthfulness, by chanting the Lord’s holy names and strictly enforcing the Lord’s laws.
One question that can come to mind is, “This is all very nice to hear, but what do we do in this modern age when sinful activities are rampant?”
Practical Solutions for Today’s World
King Parikshit, while questioning and hearing from his spiritual master, Srila Sukadeva Gosvami, got the answer to this question for us around 5000 years ago. Discussing topics related to Krishna is the remedy for this quarrelsome age of Kali (Srimad Bhagavatam 10.1.14). King Parikshit also glorified the power of chanting about Krishna’s magnanimous childhood pastimes to vanquish the contaminations of the material world (Srimad Bhagavatam 10.8.47).
The Reservoir of All Pleasure
Although the Lord incarnates to protect the pious and annihilate the miscreants, He also appears to please His pure devotees. We all look for pleasure in this world. But we find it temporary and illusory (Bhagavad-gita 8.15). The scriptures explain that Krishna or God is the source of all pleasure.
raso vai saḥ, rasaṁ hy evāyaṁ labdhvānandī bhavati, eṣa hy evānandayāti
When one understands the Personality of Godhead, the reservoir of pleasure, Krishna, he actually becomes transcendentally blissful.
(Taittiriya Upanishad 2.7.1)
Mother Yashoda, the Epitome of Motherly Love for God
After the lila of showing the Universal Form to Mother Yashoda, she was once busy churning butter as her maidservant was busy with other chores. While she churned, she sang songs poetically composed by herself on Krishna’s childhood lilas, blissfully immersed in the thoughts of her dear child. This is called vatsalya-bhakti (love of God as a parent).
God or Krishna can be loved in a variety of relationships:
- In passive appreciation of His greatness (Shanta)
- As a servant (Dasya)
- As a friend (Sakhya)
- As a parent (Vatsalya)
- As a lover (Madhurya)
Krishna was sleeping while Mother Yashoda churned butter. When He woke up, He desired to drink her milk and appeared before her. He tried to obstruct her churning to let her know His desire. Mother Yashoda understood and happily obliged. As she lovingly fed Krishna, a milk vessel on the stove began to overflow. Mother Yashoda put Krishna aside and went to stop the milk from spilling.
Krishna became very angry at this. He broke the butter pot and, crying falsely, began to eat the butter. One may think that Yashoda should have pleased Krishna first. For pure devotees, the Lord instructs directly, either personally or as the Paramatma from within the heart, on what to do and what not to do.
The Only Way to Know God
Mother Yashoda soon returned and realised Krishna’s mischief. She smiled and thought Krishna had cleverly eaten the butter and hidden Himself, afraid of punishment. After searching for a while, she found Krishna sitting on a wooden grinding mortar, taking butter from a pot hanging from the ceiling and sharing it with monkeys. He was also looking to see if someone had seen Him.
When Mother Yashoda silently approached Krishna from behind, Krishna spotted her and began to run away. She chased after Him through all corners of the house. It’s remarkable that the Supreme Lord, Whom even wise sages and gods find difficult to capture, ran in playful fear out of love for His devoted mother. This lila demonstrates that Krishna can be known only by devotional service (Bhagavad-gita 18.55).
The Bonds of Pure Devotion
Although tired, Mother Yashoda somehow managed to catch Krishna, Who was now on the brink of tears. Yashoda felt protective of Krishna and decided to tie Him with a rope to the grinding mortar to teach Him a lesson.
But when she tried to do so, she found the rope short by two inches. She tried again with more coils of rope, but the result was the same: short by two inches. She tried again and again until she used all the ropes in the house, but the rope was always short by two inches.
Though tired, Mother Yashoda smiled and wondered how this was happening. Seeing her sweating hard to tie Him, Krishna compassionately agreed to be bound. The Lord is always the Lord. He is beyond material time and space, without beginning or end, transcending all relativity and perception by material senses. So, He cannot be bound by anyone. Yet, He agrees to be bound when satisfied by the pure devotional service of His unalloyed devotees. We can also begin devotional service by using the tongue to chant the Hare Krishna mantra and taste Krishna prasadam.
Join us in following the footsteps of Krishna’s devotees by participating in the Kartika Deepotsava festival, and be blessed.
To know more about the celebrations, visit:
To watch the Damodara lila, visit:
