Bhaktivedanta VedaBase: Sri Brahma-samhita 5.44

srishti-sthiti-pralaya-sadhana-saktir eka

chayeva yasya bhuvanani bibharti durga

icchanurupam api yasya ca ceshtate sa

govindam adi-purusham tam aham bhajami

SYNONYMS

srishti -- creation; sthiti -- preservation; pralaya -- and destruction; sadhana -- the agency; saktih -- potency; eka -- one; chaya -- the shadow; iva -- like; yasya -- of whom; bhuvanani -- the mundane world; bibharti -- maintains; durga -- Durga; iccha -- the will; anurupam -- in accordance with; api -- certainly; yasya -- of whom; ca -- and; ceshtate -- conducts herself; sa -- she; govindam -- Govinda; adi-purusham -- the original person; tam -- Him; aham -- I; bhajami -- worship.

TRANSLATION

The external potency Maya who is of the nature of the shadow of the cit potency, is worshiped by all people as Durga, the creating, preserving and destroying agency of this mundane world. I adore the primeval Lord Govinda in accordance with whose will Durga conducts herself.

PURPORT

(The aforesaid presiding deity of Devi-dhama is being described.) The world, in which Brahma takes his stand and hymns the Lord of Goloka, is Devi-dhama consisting of the fourteen worlds and Durga is its presiding deity. She is ten-armed, representing the tenfold fruitive activities. She rides on the lion, representing her heroic prowess. She tramples down Mahishasura, representing the subduer of vices. She is the mother of two sons, Karttikeya and Ganesa, representing beauty and success. She is placed between Lakshmi and Sarasvati, representing mundane opulence and mundane knowledge. She is armed with the twenty weapons, representing the various pious activities enjoined by the Vedas for suppression of vices. She holds the snake, representing the beauty of destructive time. Such is Durga possessing all these manifold forms. Durga is possessed of durga, which means a prison house. When jivas begotten of the marginal potency (tatastha sakti) forget the service of Krishna they are confined in the mundane prison house, the citadel of Durga. The wheel of karma is the instrument of punishment at this place. The work of purifying these penalized jivas is the duty devolved upon Durga. She is incessantly engaged in discharging the same by the will of Govinda. When, luckily. the forgetfulness of Govinda on the part of imprisoned jivas is remarked by them by coming in contact with self-realized souls and their natural aptitude for the loving service of Krishna is aroused, Durga herself then becomes the agency of their deliverance by the will of Govinda. So it behooves everybody to obtain the guileless grace of Durga, the mistress of this prison house, by propitiating her with the selfless service of Krishna. The boons received from Durga in the shape of wealth, property, recovery from illness, of wife and sons, should be realized as the deluding kindness of Durga. The mundane psychical jubilations of dasa-maha-vidya, the ten goddesses or forms of Durga, are elaborated for the delusion of the fettered souls of this world. Jiva is a spiritual atomic part of Krishna. When he forgets his service of Krishna he is at once deflected by the attracting power of Maya in this world, who throws him into the whirlpool of mundane fruitive activity (karma) by confining him in a gross body constituted by the five material elements, their five attributes and eleven senses, resembling the garb of a prisoner. In this whirlpool jiva has experience of happiness and miseries, heaven and hell. Besides this, there is a subtle body. consisting of the mind, intelligence and ego, inside the gross body. By means of the subtle body. the jiva forsakes one gross body and takes recourse to another. The jiva cannot get rid of the subtle body. full of nescience and evil desires, unless and until he is liberated. On getting rid of the subtle body he bathes in the Viraja and goes up to Hari-dhama. Such are the duties performed by Durga in accordance with the will of Govinda. In the Bhagavata sloka, vilajyamanaya... durdhiyah -- the relationship between Durga and the conditioned souls has been described.

Durga, worshiped by the people of this mundane world, is the Durga described above. But the spiritual Durga, mentioned in the mantra which is the outer covering of the spiritual realm of the Supreme Lord, is the eternal maidservant of Krishna and is, therefore, the transcendental reality whose shadow, the Durga of this world, functions in this mundane world as her maidservant. (Vide the purport of sloka 3.)

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His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, Founder Acarya of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness