Canto 8: Withdrawal of the Cosmic CreationsChapter 21: Bali Mahārāja Arrested by the Lord

Bhaktivedanta VedaBase: Śrīmad Bhāgavatam 8.21.5

brahmādayo loka-nāthāḥ

sva-nāthāya samādṛtāḥ

sānugā balim ājahruḥ

sańkṣiptātma-vibhūtaye

SYNONYMS

brahma-ādayaḥ — great personalities, headed by Lord Brahmā; loka-nāthāḥ — the predominating deities of various planets; sva-nāthāya — unto their supreme master; samādṛtāḥ — with great respect; sa-anugāḥ — with their respective followers; balim — different paraphernalia of worship; ājahruḥ — collected; sańkṣipta-ātma-vibhūtaye — unto the Lord, who had expanded His personal opulence but had now reduced His size to the Vāmana form.

TRANSLATION

Lord Brahmā and all the predominating deities of the various planetary systems began to worship Lord Vāmanadeva, their supreme master, who had reduced Himself from His all-pervading form to His original form. They collected all the ingredients and paraphernalia for this worship.

PURPORT

Vāmanadeva first expanded Himself to the universal form and then reduced Himself to the original Vāmana-rūpa. Thus He acted exactly like Lord Kṛṣṇa, who, at the request of Arjuna, first showed His universal form and later resumed His original form as Kṛṣṇa. The Lord can assume any form He likes, but His original form is that of Kṛṣṇa (kṛṣṇas tu bhagavān svayam). According to the capacity of the devotee, the Lord assumes various forms so that the devotee can handle Him. This is His causeless mercy. When Lord Vāmanadeva resumed His original form, Lord Brahmā and his associates collected various paraphernalia for worship with which to please Him.

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