Srimadbhagavatam - King Parikshit meets Kali

[elmec]

Hari Om
Om Namo Bhagavate Vasudevaaya


King Parikshit was in the habit of travelling all over his kingdom to
find out how his subjects were keeping. He would often find people still
eulogizing Yudhishtira’s reign and find people quite happy with his
ruling. On one such trip he comes across a man who was tormenting a bull
and a cow. The bull was standing on only one leg and its other three
legs were cut off. The cow was also shedding tears. The King is very
much hurt at the sight of these poor animals and feels bad that even as
Lord Krishna had just then left the earth to his abode vaikuntah , such
a plight should befall the bull and the cow so soon. King realises that
the bull is the Dharma devata whose four feet were austerity, purity,
charity and truthfulness and at the end of each yuga it was losing one
foot of his and now he was barely able to stand upon its one leg which
was truthfulness and even that the Kali purusha was  about to cut that
off. The cow was the mother earth who was shedding tears unable to
withstand the weight of the paapa karmaas that people were indulging in.
King parikshit consoles both of them promising that he would restore the
bull all its feet and that he would reduce the burden of the cow by
punishing the evil.
The king is terribly angered at the treatment meted out to the bull and
the cow and he takes out his sword to kill the man immediately. The man
falls at his feet and begs excuse. King withdraws his sword as it is his
dharma not to kill one who takes refuge in him. King questions his
whereabouts and he answers that he is Kali purusha  who has descended on
earth soon after Lord’s return to his abode. King orders him to leave
his country and get out. But Kali reminds him that the whole of earth
belongs to King parikshit and that kali purusha should be offered some
place to live in in his vast country. King bids him to live in four
places where vices flourished – gambling, drinking, prostitution and
violence on animals. Kali purusha says that though he is a treasure
house of all vices, he still had one very good quality – the quality of
bestowing moksha to people without even performing severe austerities
that they had to do in the other three yugaas. People in this yuga could
easily attain moksha by just chanting the name of the Lord. Pleased by
this quality of Kali, King Parikshit allows him to occupy one
respectable place - that of the Gold.

Here we may wonder how Kali can live in Gold when Lord Krishna has
declared in the Bhagavat Geeta that He is the Gold among all the metals
– dhaatUnAm kAnchanamasmi . Well, people while wearing gold should wear
it as a benediction received by the Lord. But those who wear Gold
without such humble thought would be inviting Kali to come and reside in
them !

King Parikshit is cursed – next episode.

Hari Om
Om Namo Bhagavate Vaasudevaaya

Regards,
Latha Vidyaranya

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: </archives/advaita-l/attachments/20000927/071c4144/attachment.html>