88 Srimad-Bhagavatam [Canto 7, Ch. 2
others to be outsiders. Because of this misconception, he suffers.
Indeed, the accumulation of such concocted material ideas is the
cause of suffering and so-called happiness in the material world.
The conditioned soul thus situated must take birth in different
species and work in various types of consciousness, thus creating
new bodies. This continued material life is called sarnsdra. Birth,
death, lamentation, foolishness and anxiety are due to such ma-
terial considerations. Thus we sometimes come to a proper under-
standing and sometimes fall again to a wrong conception of life.
TEXT 27
SACI CG
4 e. e eo
ame sateqat dae a fratag 12
atrapy udéharantimam
itihdsam purdtanam
yamasya preta-bandhinam
samvadam tam nibodhata

atra—in this connection; api—indeed; udaharanti—they cite;
imam—this; itihdsam—history; purdtanam—very old; yamasya—of
Yamaraja, the superintendent of death, who gives judgment after death;
preta-bandhiinam—of the friends of a dead man; saravaddam—discus-
sion; tam—that; nibodhata—try to understand.

TRANSLATION

In this regard, an example is given from an old history. This in-
volves a discourse between Yamaraja and the friends of a dead
person. Please hear it attentively.

PURPORT

The words itihdsarh purdtanam mean “an old history.” The Purdnas
are not chronologically recorded, but the incidents mentioned in the
Puranas are actual histories of bygone ages. Srimad-Bhagavatam is the
Mahaé-purana, the essence of all the Purdnas. The Mayavadi scholars do
