Prabhupada knew that the Oriental people were very fond of
hearing descriptions of nature and that the time of the au-
tumn season is particularly auspicious to them. Presenting
spiritual philosophy by examples from nature would be best
for their understanding. For each seasonal phenomenon, a
parallel teaching could be given. For example, the dark
cloudy evening of the rainy autumn season when no stars
are visible is compared to the present materialistic, godless
civilization when the bright stars of the Bhagawata’s wisdom
(the devotees and scriptures) are temporarily obscured.
Altogether Srila Prabhupada composed 48 commentaries to
go along with the verses of the chapter.

Srila Prabhupada’s plan was that the organizers of the
conference should find a qualified Oriental artist to illustrate
each verse, and he also wrote directions from which the
artist could design each painting. He hoped that the paint-
ings and their accompanying explanations would make an
impressive display for visitors to the conference. If possible
he wished that a book might also be published containing
the illustrations and the texts.

Due to unfortunate circumstances, Srila Prabhupada was
unable to attend the conference and the whole project of
“Light of the Bhagawata”’ was postponed. In fact, at the time
of Srila Prabhupada’s disappearance the ‘‘Light of the Bhag-
awata’”’ still remained unpublished, and the illustrations not
yet painted. Only recently has “‘Light of the Bhagawata”’
been published in English and Chinese.

The color illustrations were done by the renowned artist
Madame Yun-sheng Li, whose mature creative talent and
sensitive brushwork alone could properly complement

viii
