Everyone, in any condition of life, should be interested in hearing about Krishna and His activities because He is the Supreme Absolute Truth, the Personality of Godhead. He is all-pervading; He is living within everyone's heart, and He is living as His universal form. And yet, as described in the Bhagavad-gita, He appears as He is in the human society just to invite everyone to His transcendental abode, back to home, back to Godhead.

The Transcendental Pastimes of Lord Krishna

Getting to know Krishna

Krishna-katha means narrations about Krishna. There are two Krishna-kathas: narrations spoken by Krishna and narrations spoken about Krishna. Bhagavad-gita is the narration or the philosophy or the science of God, spoken by Krishna Himself. Srimad-Bhagavatam is the narration about the activities and transcendental pastimes of Krishna. Both are Krishna-katha. It is the order of Lord Chaitanya that Krishna-katha should be spread all over the world, because if the conditioned souls, suffering under the pangs of material existence, take to Krishna-katha, then their path of liberation will be open and clear. The purpose of presenting this book is primarily to induce people to understand Krishna or Krishna-katha, because thereby they can become freed from material bondage.

This Krishna-katha will also be very much appealing to the most materialistic persons because Krishna's pastimes with the gopis (cowherd girls) are exactly like the loving affairs between young girls and boys within this material world. Actually, the sex feeling found in human society is not unnatural, because this same sex feeling is there in the original Personality of Godhead. The pleasure potency is called Srimati Radharani. The attraction of loving affairs on the basis of sex feeling is the original feature of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, and we, the conditioned souls, being part and parcel of the Supreme, have such feelings also, but they are experienced within a perverted, minute condition. Therefore, when those who are after sex life in this material world hear about Krishna's pastimes with the gopis, they will relish transcendental pleasure, although it appears to be materialistic. The advantage will be that they will gradually be elevated to the spiritual platform. In the Bhagavatam it is stated that if one hears the pastimes of Lord Krishna with the gopis from authorities with submission, then he will be promoted to the platform of transcendental loving service to the Lord, and the material disease of lust within his heart will be completely vanquished. In other words, it will counteract the material sex life.

Krishna will be appealing to the liberated souls and to persons who are trying to be liberated, as well as to the gross, conditioned materialist. According to the statement of Maharaja Parikñit, who heard about Krishna from Shukadeva Gosvami, Krishna-katha is equally applicable to every human being, in whatever condition of life he is in. Everyone will appreciate it to the highest magnitude. But Maharaja Parikshit also warned that persons who are simply engaged in killing animals and in killing themselves may not be very much attracted to Krishna-katha. In other words, ordinary persons who are following the regulative moral principles of scriptures, no matter in what condition they are found, will certainly be attracted, but not persons who are killing themselves. The exact word used in the Srimad-Bhagavatam is pashughna, which means killing animals or killing oneself. Persons who are not self-realized and who are not interested in spiritual realization are killing themselves; they are committing suicide. Because this human form of life is especially meant for self-realization, by neglecting this important part of his activities, one simply wastes his time like the animals. So he is pashughna. The other meaning of the word refers to those who are actually killing animals. This means persons who are animal eaters (even dog eaters), and they are all engaged in killing animals in so many ways, such as hunting, opening slaughterhouses, etc. Such persons cannot be interested in Krishna-katha.

King Parikshit was especially interested in hearing Krishna-katha because he knew that his forefathers and particularly his grandfather, Arjuna, were victorious in the great battle of Kurukshetra only because of Krishna. We may also take this material world as a battlefield of Kurukshetra. Everyone is struggling hard for existence in this battlefield, and at every step there is danger. According to Maharaja Parikshit, the battlefield of Kurukshetra was just like a vast ocean full of dangerous animals. His grandfather Arjuna had to fight with such great heroes as Bhishma, Drona, Karna, and many others who were not ordinary fighters. Such warriors have been compared to the timingila fish in the ocean. The timingila fish can very easily swallow up big whales. The great fighters on the battlefield of Kurukshetra could swallow many, many Arjunas very easily, but simply due to Krishna's mercy, Arjuna was able to kill all of them. Just as one can cross with no exertion over the little pit of water contained in the hoofprint of a calf, so Arjuna, by the grace of Krishna, was able to very easily jump over the ocean of the battle of Kurukshetra.

Maharaja Parikshit very much appreciated Krishna's activities for many other reasons. Not only was his grandfather saved by Krishna, but he himself also was saved by Krishna. At the end of the battle of Kurukshetra, all the members of the Kuru dynasty, both the sons and grandsons on the side of Dhritarashtra, as well as those on the side of the Pandavas, died in the fighting. Except the five Pandava brothers, everyone died on the battlefield of Kurukshetra. Maharaja Parikshit was at that time within the womb of his mother. His father, Abhimanyu, the son of Arjuna, also died on the battlefield of Kurukshetra, and so Maharaja Parikshit was a posthumous child. When he was in the womb of his mother, a brahmastra weapon was released by Ashvatthama to kill the child. When Parikshit Maharaja's mother, Uttara, approached Krishna, Krishna, seeing the danger of abortion, entered her womb as the Supersoul and saved Maharaja Parikshit. Maharaja Parikshit's other name is Vishnurata because he was saved by Lord Vishnu Himself while still within the womb.

Thus everyone, in any condition of life, should be interested in hearing about Krishna and His activities because He is the Supreme Absolute Truth, the Personality of Godhead. He is all-pervading; He is living within everyone's heart, and He is living as His universal form. And yet, as described in the Bhagavad-gita, He appears as He is in the human society just to invite everyone to His transcendental abode, back to home, back to Godhead. Everyone should be interested in knowing about Krishna, and this book is presented with this purpose: that people may know about Krishna and be perfectly benefited in this human form of life.