Daily Class

The attendants who came with Satī were meant to protect her from calamities, but since they were unable to protect their master’s wife, they decided to die for her, and before dying they wanted to kill Dakṣa. It is the duty of attendants to give protection to their master, and in case of failure it is their duty to die.

A person who is born in a brāhmaṇa family but has no brahminical qualifications is called a brahma-bandhu. Brāhmaṇas are generally very softhearted and forbearing because they have the power to control the senses and the mind. Dakṣa, however, was not forbearing. For the simple reason that his son-in-law, Lord Śiva, did not stand up to show him the formality of respect, he became so angry and hardhearted that he tolerated even the death of his dearest daughter.

It was the duty of Dakṣa to look after the maintenance and comforts of all living entities because he was situated as Prajāpati, the governor of all living entities. Therefore how is it that he neglected his own daughter, who was the most exalted and chaste woman, a great soul, and who therefore deserved the most respectful treatment from her father?

Session 1 on the theme of how small conflicts become big; how small slides lead to big catastrophe and how we can avoid or minimize them.

One should be extremely careful about associating with persons who are not respectful to the higher authorities. It is therefore instructed in the Vedic literature that one should always be free from the association of atheists and nondevotees and should try to associate with devotees, for by the association of a devotee one can be elevated to the platform of self-realization. This injunction is stressed in many places in Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam; if one wants to be liberated from the clutches of material existence, then one has to associate with great souls, and if one wants to continue one’s material existential life, then one may associate with persons who are materialistic.

Any spiritual process keeps the body fit without separate endeavor, but if one takes it that the ultimate aim of yoga is to maintain the body, then he is mistaken. The real perfection of yoga is elevation of the soul to a higher position or the liberation of the soul from material entanglement.

Dakṣa was the embodiment of envy, for he unnecessarily blasphemed a great personality, Lord Śiva. Simply upon hearing the word dākṣāyaṇī, she felt afflicted because of reference to the context because her body was the symbol of all the offensiveness with which Dakṣa was endowed.

Lord Śiva is the greatest of all devotees of Lord Viṣṇu. It is stated, vaiṣṇavānāṁ yathā śambhuḥ. Śambhu, Lord Śiva, is the greatest of all devotees of Lord Viṣṇu. In the previous verses, Satī has described that Lord Śiva is always in a transcendental position because he is situated in pure vasudeva. Vasudeva is that state from which Kṛṣṇa, Vāsudeva, is born, so Lord Śiva is the greatest devotee of Lord Kṛṣṇa, and Satī’s behavior is exemplary because no one should tolerate blasphemy against Lord Viṣṇu or His devotee.

Satī’s father was under the impression that he was exalted in both prestige and opulence and that he had offered his daughter to a person who was not only poor but devoid of all culture. Her father might have been thinking that although she was a chaste woman, greatly adherent to her husband, her husband was in a deplorable condition. To counteract such thoughts, Satī said that the opulence possessed by her husband could not be understood by materialistic persons like Dakṣa and his followers, who were flatterers and were engaged in fruitive activities.

The Vedic activities are so designed that the conditioned soul who has come to enjoy the material world may do so under direction so that at the end he becomes detached from such material enjoyment and is eligible to enter into the transcendental position.