Bhaktivedanta VedaBase: Śrīmad Bhāgavatam 9.15.24

tasmai sa naradevāya

munir arhaṇam āharat

sasainyāmātya-vāhāya

haviṣmatyā tapo-dhanaḥ

SYNONYMS

tasmai — unto him; saḥ — he (Jamadagni); naradevāya — unto King Kārtavīryārjuna; muniḥ — the great sage; arhaṇam — paraphernalia for worship; āharat — offered; sa-sainya — with his soldiers; amātya — his ministers; vāhāya — and the chariots, the elephants, the horses or the men who carried the palanquins; haviṣmatyā — because of possessing a kāmadhenu, a cow that could supply everything; tapaḥ-dhanaḥ — the great sage, whose only power was his austerity, or who was engaged in austerity.

TRANSLATION

The sage Jamadagni, who was engaged in great austerities in the forest, received the King very well, along with the King's soldiers, ministers and carriers. He supplied all the necessities to worship these guests, for he possessed a kāmadhenu cow that was able to supply everything.

PURPORT

The Brahma-saḿhitā informs us that the spiritual world, and especially the planet Goloka Vṛndāvana, where Kṛṣṇa lives, is full of surabhi cows (surabhīr abhipālayantam [Bs. 5.29]). The surabhi cow is also called kāmadhenu. Although Jamadagni possessed only one kāmadhenu, he was able to get from it everything desirable. Thus he was able to receive the King, along with the King's great number of followers, ministers, soldiers, animals and palanquin carriers. When we speak of a king, we understand that he is accompanied by many followers. Jamadagni was able to receive all the King's followers properly and feed them sumptuously with food prepared in ghee. The King was astonished at how opulent Jamadagni was because of possessing only one cow, and therefore he became envious of the great sage. This was the beginning of his offense. Paraśurāma, the incarnation of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, killed Kārtavīryārjuna because Kārtavīryārjuna was too proud. One may possess unusual opulence in this material world, but if one becomes puffed up and acts whimsically he will be punished by the Supreme Personality of Godhead. This is the lesson to learn from this history, in which Paraśurāma became angry at Kārtavīryārjuna and killed him and rid the entire world of kṣatriyas twenty-one times.

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