992 Stimad-Bhagavatam [Canto 3, Ch. 24
ending all reactions to fruitive activities. Thus she also will be freed from
all material fear.

PURPORT

Kardama Muni was anxious about his good wife, Devahiti, while leaving
home, and so the worthy son promised that not only would Kardama
Muni be freed from the material entanglement, but Devahiti would also be
freed by receiving instruction from her son. A very good example is set
here: the husband goes away, taking the sannyasa order for self-realization,
but his representative, the son, who is equally educated, remains at home
to deliver the mother. A sannyasi is not supposed to take his wife with him.
At the vdnaprastha stage of retired life, or the stage midway between
householder life and renounced life, one may keep his wife as an assistant
without sex relations, but in the sannydsa order of life one cannot keep
his wife with him. Otherwise, a person like Kardama Muni could have kept
his wife with him, and there would have been no hindrance to his prose-
cution of self-realization.

Kardama Muni followed the Vedic injunction that no one in sannydsa
life can have any kind of relationship with women. But what is the position
of a woman who is left by her husband? She is entrusted to the son, and
the son promises that he will deliver his mother from entanglement. A
woman is not supposed to take sannyasa. So-called spiritual societies con-
cocted in modern times give sannydsa even to women, although there is no
sanction in the Vedic literature for a woman’s accepting sannyasa.
Otherwise, if it were sanctioned, Kardama Muni could have taken his wife
and given her sannydsa. The woman must remain at home. She has only
three stages of life: dependency on the father in childhood, dependency on
the husband in youth, and, in old age, dependency on the grown-up son,
such as Kapila. In old age the progress of women depends on the grown-up
son. The ideal son, Kapila Muni, is assuring His father of the deliverance of
His mother so that His father may go peacefully without anxiety for his
good wife.

TEXT 41
457 Taq
ad agra after sarefi: |
afaviteca f fiat sata aaa z e211
maitreya uvdca
evam samuditas tena
kapilena prajapatih
