Bhakta-vatsala Hari

[Guest guest]

"When Krsna was on the lap of His mother, the demon Putana

appeared before His mother and prayed to nurture the child in her lap.

Mother Yasoda agreed, and the child was transferred onto the lap of

Putana, who was in the garb of a respectable lady. Putana wanted to kill

the child by smearing poison on the nipple of her breast. But when

everything was complete, the Lord sucked her breast along with her very

air of life, and the demon's gigantic body, said to be as long as six

miles, fell down. But Lord Krsna did not need to expand Himself to the

length of the she-demon Putana, although He was quite competent to extend

Himself more than six miles long. In His Vamana incarnation He posed

Himself as a dwarf brahmana, but when He took possession of His land,

promised by Bali Maharaja, He expanded His footstep to the top of the

universe, extending over thousands and millions of miles. So it was not very

difficult for Krsna to perform a miracle by extending His bodily feature,

but He had no desire to do it because of His deep filial love for His mother,

Yasoda. If Yasoda had seen Krsna in her lap extending six miles to cope with

the she-demon Putana, then the natural filial love of Yasoda would have

been hurt because in that way Yasoda would have come to know that her

so-called son, Krsna, was God Himself. And with the knowledge of the

Godhood of Krsna, Yasodamayi would have lost the temper of her love for

Krsna as a natural mother."

 

--from purport to Srimad-Bhagavatam, 2.7.27