Text 22] Maharaja Prthu’s Going Back Home 1003

“As the embodied soul continually passes, in this body, from boyhood to
youth to old age, the soul similarly passes into another body at death. The
self-realized soul is not bewildered by such a change.” (Bg. 2.13)

When a living entity transfers from one body to another, a process
generally known as death, a sane man does not lament, for he knows that
the living entity is not dead but is simply transferred from one body to
another. The Queen should have been afraid of being alone in the forest
with the body of her husband, but since she was a great wife of a great
personality, she lamented for a while but immediately understood that she
had many duties to perform. Thus instead of wasting her time in lamenta-
tion, she immediately prepared a fiery pyre’on top of a hill and then placed
the body of her husband on it to be burned.

Maharaja Prthu is described here as dayita, for he was not only the king
of the earth, but he treated the earth as his protected child. Similarly, he
protected his wife also. It was the duty of the king to give protection to
everyone, especially to the earth or land which he ruled, as well as the
citizens and his family members. Since Prthu Maharaja was a perfect king,
he gave protection to everyone, and therefore he is described here as dayita.

TEXT 22
fra get atetreran
THE | ARERR: |
van fefretfecaife: qetea
fata afe caret aa URI

vidhaya krtyam hradini-jalapluta
dattvodakam bhartur udara-karmanah

natva divi-sthams tri-dasams trih paritya
vivesa vahnim dhyayati bhartr-padau

vidhdya—executing; krtyam—the regulative function; hradini—in the
water of the river; jala-dpluta—taking bath completely; dattvd udakam—
offering oblations of water; bhartuh—of her husband; uddra-karmanah—
who was so liberal; natud—offering obeisances; divi-sthan—situated in the
sky; tri-dasdn—the thirty million demigods; trih—three times; paritya—
circumambulating; vivesa—entered; vahnim—the fire; dhydyati—while think-
ing of; bhartr—of her husband; padau—the two lotus feet.
