asuras | The Hare Krishna Movement

Bhagavad-gītā Lecture

I have always liked this story of the dis-robing of Draupadi, and how she was saved by Krsna supplying endless heaps of sari. The following lecture by Srila Prabhupada is a very nice description of the contest between good and evil, or pious or impious activities.

Prabhupāda: So pāpam eva. Pāpam means sinful activities, and puṇyam is pious. So people should consider in every activity, whether it is pāpam or puṇyam, whether it is virtuous or sinful activities. But the asuras, they do not know. Pravṛttiṁ ca nivṛttiṁ ca na vidur asurā janāḥ [Bg. 16.7]. Those who are asuras, they do not care what is sinful or what is right. “I like it; I must do it.” This is asura. There is no reference to the authorities, whether the action which I am going to do, whether it is pious or impious…

…”Now she is our property. We can do whatever we like with. Arjuna has lost his wife.” So he advised that “Make her naked in this assembly.” To become naked in the, so many people, that is a great insult for woman. So actually, they tried to insult. Not tried, it was fact. But Kṛṣṇa saved. You know, Draupadi’s vastra-haraṇa. She was tried to become naked, but these people could not make her naked. The sārī was supplied by Kṛṣṇa, one after another, one after another, heaps of sārī. Then they become fed up, gave up that business, that “She cannot be made naked.” (from Bhagavad-gita 1.36 Lecture)

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Beyond the Senses

…Krishna is accepted as the Supreme Personality of Godhead by such authoritative personalities as Vyāsa, Devala, Asita, Nārada, Madhva, Śaṅkara, Rāmānuja, Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu, Jīva Gosvāmī, Viśvanātha Cakravartī, Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī, and all other authorities of the line. He Himself has declared as much in many places of the authentic literatures. And yet there is a class of men with demoniac mentality who are always reluctant to accept the Lord as the Supreme Absolute Truth. This is partially due to their poor fund of knowledge and partially due to their stubborn obstinacy, which results from various misdeeds in the past and present. Such persons could not recognize Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa even when He was present before them.

Teachings of Queen Kunti
By His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada
Chapter 2, Beyond the Senses

māyā-javanikācchannam
ajñādhokṣajam avyayam
na lakṣyase mūḍha-dṛśā
nato nāṭya-dharo yathā

Being beyond the range of limited sense perception, You are the eternally irreproachable factor covered by the curtain of deluding energy. You are invisible to the foolish observer, exactly as an actor dressed as a player is not recognized. —Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 1.8.19

In the Bhagavad-gītā Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa affirms that less intelligent persons mistake Him to be an ordinary man like us, and thus they deride Him. The same is confirmed herein by Queen Kuntī.

The less intelligent persons are those who rebel against the authority of the Lord. Such persons are known as asuras. The asuras cannot recognize the Lord’s authority. When the Lord Himself appears among us, as Rāma, Nṛsiṁha, Varāha, or in His original form as Kṛṣṇa, He performs many wonderful acts which are humanly impossible. As we shall find in the Tenth Canto of this great literature, Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa exhibited His humanly impossible activities even from the days of His lying on the lap of His mother. He killed the Pūtanā witch, although she smeared her breast with poison just to kill the Lord. The Lord sucked her breast like a natural baby, and He sucked out her very life also. Similarly, He lifted the Govardhana Hill, just as a boy picks up a frog’s umbrella, and stood several days continuously just to give protection to the residents of Vṛndāvana.