796
Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam
[Canto 1, Ch. 15]
TEXT 20
सोऽहं नृपेन्द्र रहितः पुरुषोत्तमेन 
  सल्या प्रियेण सुहृदा हृदयेन शून्यः । 
  अच्चन्युरुक्रमपरिग्रहमङ्ग रक्षन् 
  गोपैरसद्भिरबलेव विनिर्जितोऽस्मि ॥२०॥
so 'ham nṛpendra rahitaḥ puruṣottamena 
  sakhyā priyeṇa suhṛdā hṛdayena śūnyaḥ 
  adhvany urukrama-parigraham aṅga rakṣan 
  gopair asadbhir abaleva vinirjito 'smi
saḥ—that; aham—myself; nṛpendra—O Emperor; rahitaḥ—bereft of; puruṣottamena—by the Supreme Lord; sakhyā—by my friend; priyeṇa—by my dearmost; suhṛdā—by the well-wisher; hṛdayena—by the heart and soul; śūnyaḥ—vacant; adhvani—recently; urukrama-parigraham—the wives of the all-powerful; aṅga—bodies; rakṣan—while protecting; gopaiḥ—by the cowherds; asadbhiḥ—by the infidels; abalā iva—like a weak woman; vinirjitaḥ asmi—I have been defeated.
TRANSLATION
O Emperor, now I am separated from my friend and dearmost well-wisher, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, and therefore my heart appears to be void of everything. In His absence I have been defeated by a number of infidel cowherdmen while I was guarding the bodies of all the wives of Kṛṣṇa.
PURPORT
The important point in this verse is how it was possible that Arjuna could be defeated by a gang of ignoble cowherdmen and how such mundane cowherdmen could touch the bodies of the wives of Lord Kṛṣṇa who were under the protection of Arjuna. Śrīla Viśvanātha Cakravartī Thākur has justified the contradiction by research in the  Viṣṇu Purāṇa  and  Brahma Purāṇa . In these  Purāṇas  it is said that once the fair denizens of heaven pleased Aṣṭāvakra Muni by their service and were blessed by the Muni to have the Supreme Lord as their husband. Aṣṭāvakra Muni was curved in eight joints of his body, and thus he used to move in a peculiarly