The Stealing of the Boys and Calves by Brahma 91

Balarama inquired from Krsna about the actual situation. He said, “My
dear Krsna, in the beginning I thought that all these cows, calves and
cowherd boys were either great sages and saintly persons or demigods, but
at the present it appears that they are actually Your expansions. They are
all You; You Yourself are playing as the calves and cows and boys. What is
the mystery of this situation? Where have those other calves and cows and
boys gone? And why are You expanding Yourself as the cows, calves, and
boys? Will You kindly tell Me what is the cause?” At the request of
Balarama, Krsna briefly explained the whole situation: how the calves and
boys were stolen by Brahma and how He was concealing the incident by
expanding Himself so people would not know that the original cows,
calves, and boys were missing.

While Krsna and Balarama were talking, Brahma returned after a mo-
ment’s interval (according to the duration of his life). We have information
of Lord Brahma’s duration of life from the Bhagavad-gita: 1,000 times the
duration of the four ages, or 4,300,000 x 1,000, comprise Brahma’s
twelve hours. Similarly, one moment of Brahma is equal to one year of
our solar calculation. After one moment of Brahma’s calculation, Brahma
came back to see the fun caused by his stealing the boys and calves. But
he was also afraid that he was playing with fire. Krsna was his master, and
he had played mischief for fun by taking away His calves and boys. He was
really anxious, so he did not stay away very long; he came back after a
moment (of his calculation). He saw that all the boys, calves and cows
were playing with Krsna in the same way as when he had come upon
them, although he was confident that he had taken them and made them
lie down asleep under the spell of his mystic power. Brahma began to
think, “All the boys, calves and cows were taken away by me, and I know
they are still sleeping. How is it that a similar batch of cows, boys and
calves are playing with Krsna? Is it that they are not influenced by my
mystic power? Have they been playing continually for one year with
Krsna?” Brahma tried to understand who they were and how they were
uninfluenced by his mystic power, but he could not ascertain it. In other
words, he himself came under the spell of his own mystic power. The
influence of his mystic power appeared like snow in darkness or the glow
worm in daytime. During the night’s darkness, the glow worm can show
some glittering power, and the snow piled up on the top of a hill or on the
ground can shine during the daytime. But at night the snow has no silver
glitter; nor does the glow worm have any illuminating power during the
daytime. Similarly, when the small mystic power exhibited by Brahma
was before the mystic power of Krsna, it was just like snow or the glow
