Text 5] Appearance of Sukadeva Gosvami 991
atho—thus; vihaya— giving up; imam — this; amum—and the next; ca—also;
lokam—planets; vimarsitau—all of them being judged; heyataya—because
of inferiority; purastat—hereinbefore; krsna-anghri—lotus feet of the Lord,
Sri Kysna; sevam—transcendental loving service; adhimanyamanah—one
who thinks of the greatest of all achievements; upavisat—sat down firmly;
prayam—for fasting; amartya-nadyam—on the bank of the transcendental
river (the Ganges or the Yamuna).
TRANSLATION
Maharaja Pariksit sat down firmly on the banks of the Ganges to con-
centrate his mind in Krsna consciousness, rejecting all other practices of
self-realization, because transcendental loving service of Krsna is the
greatest achievement, superseding all other methods.
PURPORT
For a devotee like Maharaja Pariksit, none of the material planets, even
the topmost Brahmaloka, is as desirable as Goloka Vrndavana, the abode
of Lord Sri Krsna, the primeval Lord and Original Personality of Godhead.
This earth is one of the innumerable material planets within the universe,
and there are innumerable universes also within the compass of the mahat-
tattva. The devotees are told by the Lord and His representatives, the
spiritual masters or acaryas, that not one of the planets within all the
innumerable universes is suitable for the residential purposes of a devotee.
The devotee always desires to go back home, back to Godhead, just to
become one of the associates of the Lord in the capacity of servitor,
friend, parent or conjugal lover of the Lord, either in one of the innumer-
able Vaikuntha planets or in the Goloka Vrndavana, the planet of Lord Sri
Krsna. All these planets are eternally situated in the spiritual sky, the
Paravyoma, which is on the other side of the Causal Ocean within the
mahat-tattva. Maharaja Pariksit was already aware of all this information
due to his accumulated piety and birth in a high family of devotees, the
Vaisnavas, and thus he was not at all interested in the material planets.
Modern scientists are very eager to reach the moon by material arrange-
ments, but they cannot conceive of the highest planet of this universe.
But a devotee like Maharaja Pariksit does not care a fig for the moon or,
for that matter, any of the material planets. So when he was assured of his
death on a fixed date, he became more determined in the transcendental
loving service of the Lord Krsna by complete fasting on the bank of
