162 Krsna, the Supreme Personality of Godhead

“My dear wives of the brahmanas,”’ Krsna said. “You can now return to
your homes. Engage yourselves in sacrificial activities and be engaged in
the service of your husbands and household affairs so that your husbands
will be pleased with you, and the sacrifice which they have begun will be
properly executed. After all, your husbands are householders, and without
your help how can they execute their prescribed duties?”

The wives of the brahmanas replied, “Dear Lord, this sort of instruction
does not befit You. Your eternal promise is that You will always protect
Your devotees, and now You must fulfill this promise. Anyone who comes
and surrenders unto You never goes back to the conditioned life of
material existence. We expect that You will now fulfill Your promise. We
have surrendered unto Your lotus feet, which are covered by the tulasi
leaves, so we have no more desire to return to the company of our so-called
relatives, friends, and society and give up the shelter of Your lotus feet.
And what shall we do, returning home? Our husbands, brothers, fathers,
sons, mothers and our friends do not expect to see us because we have
already left them all. Therefore we have no shelter to return to. Please,
therefore, do not ask us to return home, but arrange for our stay under
Your lotus feet so that we can eternally live under Your protection.”

The Supreme Personality of Godhead replied, ““My dear wives, rest
assured that your husbands will not neglect you on your return, nor will
your brothers, sons, or fathers refuse to accept you. Because you are My
pure devotees, not only your relatives but also people in general, as well as
the demigods, will be satisfied with you.” Krsna is situated as the Super-
soul in everyone’s heart. So if someone becomes a pure devotee of Lord
Krsna, he immediately becomes pleasing to everyone. The pure devotee of
Lord Krsna is never inimical to anyone. A sane person cannot be an enemy
of a pure devotee. “Transcendental love for Me does not depend upon
bodily connection,” Krsna said further, “but anyone whose mind is always
absorbed in Me will surely, very soon, come to Me for My eternal associa-
tion.”

After being instructed by the Supreme Personality of Godhead, all the
wives again returned home to their respective husbands. Pleased to see
their wives back home, the brahmanas executed the performances of
sacrifices by sitting together, as it is enjoined in the sastras. According to
Vedic principle, religious rituals must be executed by the husband and
wife together. When the brahmanas’ wives returned, the sacrifice was duly
and nicely executed. One of the brahmanas’ wives, however, who was
forcibly checked from going to see Krsna, began to remember Him as she
heard of His bodily features. Being completely absorbed in His thought,
