Srimad Bhagavatam – day 644
The picnic lunch
Srihari Narayana
“The boys offered to their friends a taste of the food they had brought from their homes. While laughing and making others laugh, they joyfully had their lunch together with Srikrishna”.
When eating, the mind should always be joyful and pleasant. Eating when irritable is incorrect. Arguing with others and criticizing others are forbidden while eating. In quite a few homes, the mother finds it a perfect opportunity to scold the child at the time he is eating. Along with serving food she reprimands her child. In anger, the child leaves the dining table and goes away hungry. Is it correct? There are some who sit for food and then midway they realize that drinking water is unavailable. They then scream for water.
Serious topics should not be encouraged while eating, else food will not get assimilated properly. Light, casual topics should be taken up during meal time. Then the lunch becomes even more enjoyable. In fact, the person consumes a morsel or two more when food is accompanied by laughter and jokes. Through this incident of having a picnic lunch, Krishna is teaching us the procedure to adopt during meals. He is also teaching us that we should always sit and eat food. Standing and eating is unhealthy. Food should not be had in solitude, but should be had along with other members of the family or with friends. A calm, joyous environment should prevail when eating.
Bhojana kale Govinda smarana- during lunch, one should think of the Lord. We should have our food while singing, laughing and talking joyfully. With this, tremendous amount of oxygen will be inhaled which will be the nectar that nourishes the body.
“Krishna sat with his flute tucked in-between the two pieces of cloth knotted around his waist on His right. On his left, he kept His baton and bugle”.
Every cowherd boy had his own bugle. To Krishna the bugle was an instrument to signal other boys. The baton in His hand symbolizes that He drives away our spiritual ignorance (ajnana). Do not presume He held a baton for his own security. Saints hold danda (holy staff) in their hands. Instead of trying to figure out the hidden significance in holding the staff, ignorant people wrongly presume that saints hold the staff for their security. They presume it is to protect themselves from dogs or other animals that could chase them.
In a way people’s interpretation can be termed correct. In order to prevent the mind of the disciples or devotees from running hither and tither i.e. in order to control the animal tendencies that arise in their devotees, saints hold a staff in their hands. This staff they hold is the dharma danda. They are furthering dharma (righteous conduct) in the world. They are leading others on the path of dharma. They have sacrificed their body as well as their personal dharma and have offered everything to the Supreme Lord. Everything that they have is contained within the staff they hold. It as if they are symbolically declaring- ‘there is nothing within our bodies. Our body, our mind everything is within this staff’. What I have explained thus far is only a tiny fraction of the actual significance of that staff held by saints. For a sanyasi, the staff is the most crucial.
The saffron clothes worn by saints indicates their quality of tyaga (sacrificial nature). Merely through their costume, saints make known their ideals.
“Krishna was holding a flute, a baton and a bugle. In His hand, He held a curd-rice ball and in-between his fingers He retained pickle pieces”.
If this image of His is painted, it will be adorable. In between His fingers were pickle pieces. In the centre of His palm was a ball of curd-rice. Let us assume that He had lime-pickle in his hands.
“He was seated in the centre of a large circular group”.
This wonderful description of the Lord is being given by Maharishi Śuka to Emperor Parikshit.
“Seated amidst them all, Krishna was joking with all his friends, even as He was eating. He was laughing while making them laugh”.
Aha! Just imagine the scene. Previously we had spoken about Krishna who held butter in His hands. Now we are visualizing the picnic lunch He had by the river bank.
“When the Supreme Lord, who accepts only the sacred offerings in the Yagna rituals, was seated amidst small cowherd boys and was eating food along with them, from heaven, the Devatas stared at him in awe with widened eyes”.
Here was the Supreme Lord Srihari who is addressed as Paramatma. He is the Lord who eats the offerings made in the supremely sacred Yagna rituals. Seated here on Earth, He was happily eating food along with small boys. What is this human form of His? What is this joyful mingling with all cowherd boys? What can be said of the games He played with them? Aha! How fortunate were these boys! The Devatas who were watching all His childhood pastimes were astounded.
“The young cowherd boys, who normally tended to calves, now began to eat their food with their minds focussed entirely upon Krishna”.
Narayana Krishna