Story of Ajamila - Part 1

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From Srimad-Bhagavatam, translation by His Divine Grace A. C.

Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada

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SB

6.1.21: In the city known as Kanyakubja there was a brahmana

named Ajamila who married a prostitute maidservant and lost all his

brahminical qualities because of the association of that low-class

woman.

SB

6.1.22: This fallen brahmana, Ajamila, gave trouble to others

by arresting them, by cheating them in gambling or by directly

plundering them. This was the way he earned his livelihood and

maintained his wife and children.

SB

6.1.23: While he thus spent his time in abominable, sinful

activities to maintain his family of many sons, eighty-eight years of

his life passed by.

SB

6.1.24: That old man Ajamila had ten sons, of whom the youngest

was a baby named Narayana. Since Narayana was the youngest of all the

sons, he was naturally very dear to both his father and his mother.

SB

6.1.25: Because of the child's broken language and awkward

movements, old Ajamila was very much attached to him. He always took

care of the child and enjoyed the child's activities.

SB

6.1.26: When Ajamila chewed food and ate it, he called the

child to chew and eat, and when he drank he called the child to drink

also. Always engaged in taking care of the child and calling his name,

Narayana, Ajamila could not understand that his own time was now

exhausted and that death was upon him.

SB

6.1.27: When the time of death arrived for the foolish Ajamila,

he began thinking exclusively of his son Narayana.

SB 6.1.28-29: Ajamila

then saw three awkward persons with deformed bodily features, fierce,

twisted faces, and hair standing erect on their bodies. With ropes in

their hands, they had come to take him away to the abode of Yamarāja.

When he saw them he was extremely bewildered, and because of attachment

to his child, who was playing a short distance away, Ajamila began to

call him loudly by his name. Thus with tears in his eyes he somehow or

other chanted the holy name of Narayana.

SB

6.1.30: The order carriers of Vishnu, the Vishnudutas,

immediately arrived when they heard the holy name of their master from

the mouth of the dying Ajamila, who had certainly chanted without

offense because he had chanted in complete anxiety.

SB

6.1.31: The order carriers of Yamaraja were snatching the soul

from the core of the heart of Ajamila, the husband of the prostitute,

but with resounding voices the messengers of Lord Vishnu,

the Vishnudutas,, forbade them to do so.

SB

6.1.32: When the order carriers of Yamaraja, the son of the

sun-god, were thus forbidden, they replied: Who are you, sirs, that have

the audacity to challenge the jurisdiction of Yamaraja?

 

SB

6.1.33: Dear sirs, whose servants are you, where have you come

from, and why are you forbidding us to touch the body of Ajamila? Are

you demigods from the heavenly planets, are you sub-demigods, or are you

the best of devotees?

SB 6.1.34-36:

The order carriers of Yamaraja said: Your eyes are just like the petals

of lotus flowers. Dressed in yellow silken garments, decorated with

garlands of lotuses, and wearing very attractive helmets on your heads

and earrings on your ears, you all appear fresh and youthful. Your four

long arms are decorated with bows and quivers of arrows and with swords,

clubs, conchshells, discs and lotus flowers. Your effulgence has

dissipated the darkness of this place with extraordinary illumination.

Now, sirs, why are you obstructing us?

SB

6.1.37: Being thus addressed by the messengers of Yamaraja, the

servants of Vasudeva smiled and spoke the following words in voices as

deep as the sound of rumbling clouds.

SB

6.1.38: The blessed messengers of Lord Vishnu, the Vishnudutas,

said: If you are actually servants of Yamaraja, you must explain to us

the meaning of religious principles and the symptoms of irreligion.

SB

6.1.39: What is the process of punishing others? Who are the

actual candidates for punishment? Are all karmis engaged in fruitive

activities punishable, or only some of them?