Yajñapatnī Uddhāra

The Yajñapatnī Uddhāra is the deliverance of the wives of the brāhmaṇas who were performing the Bṛhaspati-sava yajña. It is told in the 23rd chapter of the 10th Skandha of the Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa.

Kṛshṇa and Balarāma were out herding cattle with the gopa-boys, and the boys were hungry. Kṛshṇa sent them to ask for food from brāhmaṇas who were performing a yajña nearby. The brāhmaṇas were proud of their ritual rank and learning. They refused to give food to cowherd boys, even when Kṛshṇa’s name was spoken. Their wives overcame every obstacle and brought four kinds of food to Kṛshṇa. He welcomed them and sent them home. When the wives told their husbands what had happened, the brāhmaṇas were full of regret and mourned their own blindness.

The request to the brāhmaṇas

Kṛshṇa and Balarāma were herding cattle near Vṛndāvana when the gopa-boys felt hungry. Out of his own compassion, and as a teaching, Kṛshṇa sent the boys to a group of brāhmaṇas who were performing the Bṛhaspati-sava, a long Vedic yajña, in a clearing nearby. He said: “Tell them that Kṛshṇa and Balarāma have sent you, that we are hungry, and ask them to give whatever food they can spare.”

The boys went and asked just as they were told. The brāhmaṇas did not even look up from their ritual work. They were deep in the steps of their yajña, which they believed needed their full and undivided attention. They gave no answer. Even when the boys said Kṛshṇa’s name again, the brāhmaṇas did not respond. The boys came back empty-handed.

The wives bring food

The wives of the brāhmaṇas had heard the words “Kṛshṇa sent us.” To them the name of Kṛshṇa was not a ritual form. It was what they loved and longed for most deeply. They at once filled vessels with the four kinds of anna (food):

• anna: cooked rice and side dishes
• pānīya: drinks
• khādya: solid foods
• lehya: foods to be licked or tasted

They put on their best ornaments, because they knew they were going to see Bhagavān Kṛshṇa, and set out for the place where Kṛshṇa and Balarāma were.

Their husbands called after them and tried to stop them. They said the wives had sacred duties to perform, that it was not proper for women to go out unescorted, and that they must not leave the yajña in the middle of the rite. The women did not stop.

The meeting with Kṛshṇa

The women reached the place where Kṛshṇa and Balarāma sat among the gopas. They saw Kṛshṇa just as they had always imagined and hoped. He was dark and beautiful, wore yellow garments and a peacock feather, and was surrounded by the gopa-boys who loved him. Their hearts were filled with a joy that overwhelmed every other feeling.

Kṛshṇa welcomed them warmly and accepted their food with deep gratitude. He spoke to them with great appreciation for their devotion. Then he said: “Go back to your husbands now. The yajña they are performing is still going on and must be completed. Your place in it is important. Do not stay away. Your love and devotion have reached me completely. There is nothing lacking in your bhakti (devotion). Go back now.”

Some of the women were sad at parting from Bhagavān Kṛshṇa and did not want to leave. Kṛshṇa comforted them. A woman who has truly seen Bhagavān Kṛshṇa in her mind is never really parted from him. The body goes back to its place, but the mind and the heart, where Bhagavān Kṛshṇa lives, stay with him.

They went home. One of them could not come at all, because her husband had locked her in the house. She meditated on Kṛshṇa from inside the locked room with total, one-pointed devotion. The Bhāgavata says that through this deep meditation alone she gained moksha (liberation). She left her body there in the room and merged into the Supreme.

The brāhmaṇas’ regret

The wives returned and told their husbands what they had seen. The brāhmaṇas were struck with deep regret. They thought over what they had done. Bhagavān Kṛshṇa himself had sent his people to ask for food and had given his own name, and they had not even raised their eyes from their ritual. What was the use of all their Vedic learning and long rites if these had not opened their hearts to know Bhagavān Kṛshṇa standing right in front of them?

The Bhāgavata records their lament: “We have studied all the Vedas, performed all the yajñas and mastered all the Vedāṅgas. Yet our hearts were so closed by pride in our ritual rank that we could not know him. Our wives have no Vedic training, yet they knew him at once because their hearts were open in love. Who is truly learned? Who is truly wise?”

They decided to go to Kṛshṇa themselves. But by the time they could leave the yajña, Kṛshṇa had moved on. The chapter ends with their regret unresolved. The Bhāgavata uses this to show that bhakti does not depend on ritual qualification but on the turning of the heart.

Sources

• Bhāgavata Mahā Purāṇa, 10th Skandha, Chapter 23