Whenever dharma declines, O Bharata, and adharma ascends, then do I bring myself forth. 7 To protect the righteous, to destroy the wicked, and to establish dharma anew, I am born age after age. 8 Word-by-word breakdown. Whenever, indeed, the decline of dharma comes to be, O Bharata, and the rise of adharma, then I bring myself forth. 7. To protect the virtuous, and to destroy the evildoers, and for the establishment of dharma, I am born in age after age. 8. Grammatical analysis. O Bharata! Whenever the decline (loss) of dharma (that dharma marked by the four orders of life, ordained by the Vedas) and the simultaneous rise (emergence) of adharma come to pass, then I bring myself forth (I manifest through form as if created by maya). 7. For the protection (preservation) of the righteous (those established in the Vedic path, devoted to their own dharma), for the destruction (slaying) of the evildoers (those opposed to the Vedic way, fallen from their dharma), and for the establishment (the setting forth of deeds ordained by the Vedas) of dharma, in every age (in every epoch) do I come forth (I am born by my own will). 8. Difficult words. Whenever = time and again; Decline = hateful, murky degradation. I bring myself forth = I manifest myself; my eternally perfected form I make appear as if created through maya. To protect = to safeguard from all calamitous circumstances. And = both. The evildoers = the wicked, those of sinful conduct. I come forth = I become manifest, I am born. Alternative rendering. O offspring of the Bharata line! When the decline of dharma and the rise of adharma occur, then do I bring you forth. 7. For the protection of those devoted to dharma, for the destruction of those fallen from dharma, and for the establishment of dharma, I take birth age after age. 8. Commentary. O Arjuna, offspring of the Bharata line! Whenever in the world the degradation of dharma and the simultaneous emergence of adharma appear, then do I take embodiment and manifest myself. 7. To protect those devoted to dharma, to uproot those heretics fallen from dharma, and to establish the dharma ordained by the Vedas, do I manifest myself in every age. 8. Translation. O Bharata—O Arjuna—whenever and wherever dharma becomes sullied and adharma gains strength, then do I manifest myself anew. To safeguard the virtuous, to annihilate the wicked, and to restore and re-establish dharma (in forms suited to the times), I am born age upon age. I myself, in the form of the avatars, have through the visionary sages—those seers blessed with divine knowledge—established dharma timely and suited to each age. Yet by the law of time, human devotion to that dharma grows slack; into it creep all manner of corruptions, and it becomes fouled by vice. Simultaneously, fragmented and divisive doctrines multiply. Among this sullied dharma, the wicked flourish and the righteous are oppressed. By degrees the situation becomes so tangled and degraded that mortals, however strenuously they labor, cannot reform it themselves. Then, to remove that corrupted, disfigured dharma and set in its place a living, timely dharma; to vanquish and destroy the wicked; to keep the righteous safe—I must come again, clothed in human form, taking on the role of teacher. And I come when the moment demands it, when many tasks accumulated await me—tasks that none but I can fulfill: the curses and boons with which I have bound myself, or bound myself to fulfill. For instance: to liberate Ahalya; to fulfill the heart's desire of the seers of the forest Dandaka in the Treta age (by the boon they received in Krishna's birth, to worship me in secret as a gopī); to restore Jay and Vijay; to liberate Ravana and Shishupal; to grant Anga a boon (so that in the Dwapara age, born as a hunter, he might lean upon me to avenge his father's death)—such tasks could never be accomplished by any hand but mine.
# On the Divine Descent
I myself must come to perform these tasks. When a devotee of the Lord becomes an oppressor, and no one else—whether through divine blessing or the fruits of karma from a previous birth—is capable of slaying him, then I myself must come to destroy him. I do not sit in my own place and turn his mind around, nor do I kill him through the mere exercise of my will. I do nothing so strange as that.
The Lord and the sages impelled by the Lord come also to establish ideals (3/24-25). What people learn from witnessing one person’s truth and righteous conduct cannot be taught by a thousand sermons. Age after age—not merely age after age, but again and again whenever necessity demands—the Lord manifests himself. When required, he descends more than once within a single age.
The word ‘deliverance’—its meaning is not merely ‘rescue.’ It contains several interconnected meanings: protecting the virtuous from the touch or influence of demonic forces; granting them deliverance from rebirth by making the Lord’s birth and deeds directly accessible to them; freeing them from the anguish and torment that overtake the virtuous when they long for the Lord’s presence.
‘Destruction’—its true meaning is to annihilate demonic tendencies. There is no need to understand that the Avatar comes to slay sinners by laying hands upon them. Chaitanya or Buddha did not kill anyone by taking them by the hand. Why fire a cannon to swat a mosquito? When the Avatar arrives, a flood of merit flows forth; the sinful self within humanity drowns and perishes in it (and the destruction of evil deeds—*vinashaya cha dushkritam*). The filthy, festering river of sin that once flowed is no longer—the virtuous are freed from its murk and find ‘deliverance’ from the touch of sin; they are rescued from the death-laden ocean of this world (I shall rescue them from the ocean of samsara, death-bound—*tesham aham samuddharta mrityu-samsara sagarat*, 12/7). When the Avatar comes, the earth is flooded by a tide of spiritual truth.
What is dharma? The yogis say: within our hearts, according to the mind’s disposition, there arise the ages of truth, treta, dvapara, and kali; what happens in the vast cosmos happens also in the small cosmos—the soul itself. If a person wishes to be led from the kali age toward the dharma of the mental satya age, so must his practice be oriented. When the mind becomes distraught and tormented by inner turbulence, and no means of deliverance appears, then surrender to the Lord becomes the only way—if one surrenders with sincerity, the Lord himself descends into the seeker’s heart. If he is called upon sincerely, by the Lord’s boundless grace the seeker gradually becomes free from mental distress (for the deliverance of the virtuous—*paritranaya sadhhunam*) and the obstacles to union with the Lord’s feet are slowly removed (and the destruction of evil deeds—*vinashaya cha dushkritam*). God has given humanity a measure of autonomy, a measure of freedom; if through misuse of these people attempt to obstruct the smooth working of the world’s wheel, then God must come to his aid—not through miracles, but in human form, as a teacher, as a ruler, standing beside him to set things right. This is the law of the Eternal; he himself has ordained it.
# কর্ম, স্বাধীনতা এবং ঈশ্বরের হস্তক্ষেপ
“যে যথা মাং প্রপদ্যন্তে, তাংস্তথৈব ভজামাহম্।”
The question arises: why does God not turn the minds of evildoers away from sin? The answer is that He deliberately refrains from doing so—He does not interfere with their freedom. That freedom, corrupted though it may be, is born of the fruits of actions accumulated across countless lifetimes. God never violates the law of karma. He is not merely Truth; He is *ritam-satyam*—the Divine that upholds both cosmic order and ultimate reality. When falsehood and corruption spread through religion itself, God must descend in human form to cleanse that stain. Yet He does not miraculously sweep away the wicked. There is another reason for this restraint, it seems: He desires that humanity exercise *purushakar*—their own will and effort—rather than depend on the divine. He wishes that people themselves reform their society. Only when human effort, despite its sincerest exertion, remains barren; only when, exhausted and despairing, they surrender wholly to Him—only then does He act through human means to fulfill their prayers. Nor does He always grant aid even then. Perhaps, due to sins of past lives or other causes, those who suffer find no relief at that moment. The intermingling of human effort, the fruit of actions, and divine grace—no one can say how their combined result manifests across different times, places, and circumstances. It lies beyond the reach of human reason to grasp such mysteries.
As the river that once flowed with life becomes lifeless when weeds and rot continually decay within its body, its water turning putrid—so too it is with religion. When a few wicked men begin acts of sin, others observe their apparent happiness and think: these men prosper, no harm befalls them, why should we not live as they do? When this takes root widely, when the teachings of various sages and their practices grow confused, when religion loses its pristine form and becomes distorted, we say that falsehood has entered religion and unrighteousness gains dominion. When this corruption becomes severe, when the righteous of that age, despite their sincere efforts, can accomplish nothing, when they are persecuted and slain by the wicked—then does a great soul appear.
Whether one calls him God or not matters little, yet his coming is like God’s coming, for he who arrives is filled with God’s power. God manifests Himself through humanity; man becomes God’s image. When God’s power incarnates in one—that one is an Avatar. It matters not if we do not call him God; what matters is recognizing that God has responded through him—and I trust none will object to this understanding.
He whose very touch, whose very glance awakens knowledge in people and destroys ignorance (*vinashaya cha dushkritam*); through whom the scriptures shine with new light (*dharma samsthapanartha*); through whose grace the virtuous can cross the insurmountable illusion—”*mayametam taranti te*”—transcend this difficult Maya and attain *jivanmukti*, liberation in this very life; he who saves beings in this manner, and before whom even the wisest ascetics, finding their ideal exemplified, become free from desire, fear, and anger, achieving a higher state—what name but Avatar of God can be given to such a one?
From the *Kathamrita* of Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, we gain this understanding: when great logs of timber—sal, teak, and such—come floating down the river, many people climb upon them and cross over safely. Similarly, when Avatars come, hundreds find refuge in them and are saved. The perfected soul, through arduous effort and struggle, can barely manage to save himself alone.
# The Two-Fold Meaning of These Verses
These two verses hold yet another dimension of meaning. Within our minds dwell both the noble and the base instincts. The base declares: pleasure alone is the highest human good, and ceaselessly strives to convince the noble of this truth. It displays countless temptations to seduce the noble into submission, then assails it with manifold torments. When this persecution intensifies to its uttermost extreme, and even then the noble does not break, God seems to manifest within it, endowing it with infinite strength. The base is vanquished; the noble is rescued from ruin. In the philosophy of action, this is a singular truth: what is duty shall not be abandoned even under relentless persecution. When one remains steadfast in duty, God becomes one’s ally.
The merciless persecution of the righteous by the wicked has been the way of the world since time immemorial. It attended the rise of Christianity; it attended the rise of Protestantism; it manifested in the brutal flogging of Haridas to take his very life; it appeared in the slaughter of the Sikh Gurus. Yet the righteous do not break under such persecution; they do not heed the call to surrender their lives.
Should the question arise concerning the antiquity of karma-yoga and its noble purpose, that answer has already been given. Should it be asked what relation God’s coming bears to karma-yoga—if one were ignorant of these two verses and the related verses that follow, what harm would come of it?—the answer has been provided above, and briefly stated, it is this: that karma-yoga possesses this great principle—whatever truth one holds to be true must be clung to—and one must gird oneself with the faith that God shall establish it. In what form and when He shall establish it is difficult to say. And regarding His coming—when and how He comes is also not to be determined; yet this much is certain: He does come—either by sending a representative, which is His coming, or when necessity demands, He Himself comes—and He does not come leaping from heaven, but emerges from within humanity itself, in human form. And He comes to teach—that within the infinity of action lies hidden the infinity of peace—to teach this and to demonstrate how one must act, with mental equipoise and steadfastness, without resorting to the renunciation of action, through karma-yoga, without doubt, without harboring enmity, how one must dedicate oneself to the pursuit of one’s own dharma, however arduous it may be (4:41). Had not God and His representatives come to impart these teachings, then the wheel of the world could not have continued to turn through the calamities and afflictions of countless ages; it would have ground to a halt long ago!
These two verses are in no way irrelevant to karma-yoga; the principles they expound are ones we must understand with particular care to grasp karma-yoga itself. This very understanding is jnana-yoga, the yoga of knowledge.
These verses are magnificent in their poetic form and glory; they infuse courage into the hearts of those who despair. They are cited repeatedly and often.
Sri Krishna has many avatars—twenty-two are described in the Srimad Bhagavata; ten of these are celebrated in the Prayer of the Ten Avatars (Fish, Tortoise, Boar, Man-Lion, Dwarf, Parasurama, Rama, Balarama, Buddha, and Kalki). Because Sri Krishna Himself is held to be the Supreme Lord, the source, the fullness itself, His name does not appear among the avatars. The avatars are generally classified into six categories—the avatars of the purusha, the avatars of the gunas, the avatars of divine play, the avatars of the age of Manu, the avatars of the ages, and the avatars of the descent of divine power.
In these two verses, Lord Sri Krishna speaks:
When the characteristics of varna and ashrama—the means by which beings advance and attain supreme welfare, the dharma that accomplishes this—whenever this dharma is imperiled, at such times I fashion Myself through maya into visible form. To protect the righteous established in the path of truth, for reasons such as these, in every age do I manifest Myself.
# On Divine Incarnation and Dharma
There is no fixed time for my appearance. Whenever the dharma ordained by the Vedas, the order of the four castes, the four stages of life, and the well-constituted human society suffer ruin, and such calamities come to pass—at such moments I reshape myself through my own will and resolve, as I have done before. The pious Vaishnavas of righteous character, marked by the signs I have described, who cannot grasp my name, my deeds, and my true nature through heart and word, and who therefore find no joy in life, for whom each moment of separation seems like a thousand ages, whose bodies grow weak in the anguish of longing, who feel the very breath leaving them—to them I grant a vision of my own form and play, and through conversation ease their pain of separation. Age after age, I manifest myself as god and man to establish the Vedic dharma that is my worship.
Do not think me cruel because I suppress the wicked. As I have said—just as a mother’s discipline in raising her child speaks not of her heartlessness but of her love, even so the Lord who governs virtue and vice is without cruelty.
That which is ordained by the Vedas, that which is the means of the welfare and ultimate good of all beings, characterized by injunction and prohibition (rules of engagement and rules of restraint), marked by the knowledge of these—dharma consists in the performance of prescribed deeds and the renunciation of forbidden ones—and that which is expressed through the duties of the four castes and the conduct proper to each stage of life: this is dharma.
Do you not need a savior, one who will rescue you from drowning amid a thousand temptations?
The birth of Krishna is nothing but the awakening of knowledge in the human soul. Janmashtami is the celebration of the birth of that love and self-surrender which destroys ignorance and selfishness. This Supreme Brahman in the form of knowledge has neither birth nor death—only an awakening, and this awakens only when a human being passes through intense spiritual and divine crisis.
Incarnation means arrival—from heaven to earth—crossing that boundary which divides heaven from earth. Truth shall ultimately prevail. Those who transform the world, though they dwell among the ordinary, are themselves extraordinary beings; they play the role of the incarnate. They inaugurate a new world, a new dharma; they redirect the flow of our minds. This glory of the incarnate surpasses all else and reaches into that secret chamber of the human soul where human liberation dwells.
The word “dharma” means not merely the ritualistic works prescribed by the Vedas for the next world, but dharma encompasses also the duties of the four castes, justice, ethics, and such matters. What the Lord does and why He does it—the soul bound by maya cannot easily comprehend this. The destruction of the wicked is for their own welfare.
The Lord says: through me the wicked are destroyed and thus attain me. This destruction is not my cruelty. Regarding creation, some say the world is the Lord’s glory; some say it is His very nature; some say it is not-illusion-form; some say it springs from the will of the Lord of true resolve; some say it arises from desire; some say for enjoyment’s sake… some say for play’s sake… some say the world is like the son of a barren woman.
Whenever the natural dharma of beings is violated and the unnatural appears, the Lord Himself sets in motion the workings of nature. Dharma means: the natural equilibrium of things.
To save the saints—this means: to deliver them from the acute suffering of separation from me. When good people struggle in the ocean of sin, they feel the void of my absence, and perceiving this I descend to earth in human form and manifest myself. (It is difficult to teach humanity unless I come in human guise.)
# Religion
Religion is that which no one but God can establish in the hearts of men. It is for the establishment of religion that the Divine descends into the world in avataric form. Sometimes God takes on a body, sometimes He manifests as knowledge within the living heart, sometimes He dwells in the intellect of a liberated soul—always He descends for the welfare of creation. (How else would mankind reach Him if He did not come down? A man established in the seventh plane of wisdom cannot concern himself with the affairs of the world; out of compassion for all beings, God descends to the fifth plane. When people have lost reverence for truth, when they engage in consuming the forbidden, when chastity abandons womankind, when such transgressions abound—then know that religion has fallen into decline. The world trembles; war, famine, and plague ravage the four quarters. The wheel of dharma is shaken violently, and from this upheaval arise various powerful souls; sometimes God Himself descends to the world. To turn the mind that wanders outward toward the inward, He appears as the Divine Guru.)
Truth, the age of gold, and so forth arise from the individual’s disposition of mind. The four pillars of religion are: in the age of truth, austerity, purity, compassion, and truthfulness. Yet austerity has been consumed by pride, purity by intense worldly attachment, and compassion by intoxication—these three pillars have vanished. Still, whoever has preserved these four principles remains established in the age of truth, even though born in this dark age. Religion means the instrument of holding—that by which these virtues are sustained. When one wholly fulfills one’s own dharma, one dwells mentally in the age of truth. The perfect clarity of body, life-force, mind, and intellect—this is the age of truth; in each successive age, one pillar of this clarity is lost. In the dark age, the being’s primary attachment clings to the body. When, through the cultivation of the life-force, one ceases to trust in bodily dharma (selfishness and sensual gratification), then comes the age of duality; when through life-force practice the vital energy becomes steady and the senses grow pure, turning God-ward, then comes the age of giving; when the mind’s restlessness is entirely removed, the intellect becomes steady and focused, still and God-absorbed, and supreme knowledge arises, then comes the age of truth. The origin and unfoldment of these ages occur entirely within the mind. Even dwelling in the dark age, a person can taste the peace of the age of truth.
In the dark age, one sees the effort to labor outwardly alone; in the age of duality, the mind turns inward and strives for concentration; in the age of giving, through the steadiness of the life-force, infinite patience arises in the mind and the intellect becomes pure. In the age of truth, the intellect grows exceedingly pure and enters into Brahman. The more body-identification and ego increase in the dark age, the further the being drifts from God. This wandering of the human soul through various ages depends upon mankind’s spiritual power. Therefore, to rescue humanity from spiritual and inner crisis, the Divine Avatar comes to earth.
Seekers encounter manifold trials. Then they must take refuge in God, and He shows mercy. In surrender, the word is given: “I bestow upon them the intellect born of pure knowledge, through which they return to Me”—this is the salvation of seekers.
What God does is this: the destruction of wrongdoers who bear the nature of demons and titans. But is He then cruel? No—this destruction is preservative; without it, nothing could exist in the world. Glory, splendor, speech, memory, intelligence, steadiness, forgiveness—these seven divine mothers all vanish when the demoniac nature increases.
Dharma upholds the world. God is the centre and source of dharma. From the centre, power streams forth to the circumference; from the circumference, it returns to the centre. Thus involution and evolution—contraction and expansion—are the laws of dharma’s wheel; this is ascent and descent, creation and dissolution. When the living being misuses its freedom, it suffers; God does not intervene to prevent this, for thereby the being accumulates knowledge. When dharma’s measure is disturbed by inequity, God must manifest to restore it to its natural state. Through the body, mind, and vital force of man, the work of establishing dharma continues. In the dual-petalled or command chakra, the soul’s radiance is most abundant. The mind’s true abode is that same dual-petalled lotus. But when the mind descends with the five elements, it forgets all save body and the objects of sense, and is lost in the currents of countless vital breaths. When consciousness, self-luminous and knowing, flashes forth, the self is forgotten; when there is vibration in consciousness, the state of the objective arises, and the vital force begins to pulsate.
As this vital force pulsates, it manifests as fifty-one winds—currents of life-energy—flowing through countless nadis, and turns outward, agitating the sense-powers to seize their objects. When the mind departs from the dual-petalled lotus, there arises the sense of individual embodiment—the root of all sin. The effort to hold the mind in its own place is dharma’s establishment. The mind must be brought back to the command chakra; then it will be fixed in dharma. When the quality of passion is quieted, the gates of yoga—union with Brahman—open (6:27). Through repeated pranayama with the mind, withdrawal, concentration, meditation—all states can be attained. Then, in the explanation of “age after age,” the restlessness of the vital force is breathing itself; it flows sometimes through the left nostril in the ida nadi, sometimes through the right in the pingala; the flowing of breath through ida and pingala is what is called the world; this is the quality of passion and darkness, the root of all sinful desire. Yet God says He descends age after age to destroy sin. Age, that is, the dual or paired state. When breath goes from ida to pingala once, it returns through the sushumna—this union with sushumna is what age means; in this junction-moment God manifests; yogis extend this moment of union through their practice. Wherever the being can reach Him, there He descends. In the heart-centre He dwells eternally in His own glory. Should the mind enter there even once by some means, its self-forgetfulness will surely be shattered. Such is the miraculous birth and action of God.
A brief summary of the first verse. Thou art the supreme being, dense with existence, consciousness, and bliss; yet why must thou act as though embodied, and in what seasons must thou manifest?—thinking that Arjuna might ask such questions, this verse descends. When the revolution of Vedic dharma and duty appears in the world, when men become bereft of right conduct marked by the discrimination of what leads to the highest good and what binds, when people, forsaking the practices prescribed by caste and stage of life, turn toward the crooked path, and when through neglect and improper nurture dharma becomes thin and pallid, while on the other hand anti-Vedic and diverse false practices grow strong, when men become servants of unrighteousness that brings manifold suffering and misery, and when unrighteousness itself swells its infamous and ugly form and lifts its head in pride—then, O Arjuna! Through the power of my illusion, I create myself anew and manifest as an avatar. Thou art descended from the Bharata line, or thou art bhā—one possessed of knowledge; therefore, it is not proper for thee to withdraw without purpose. Rather, thou must engage in battle to protect dharma and in the effort to vanquish unrighteousness. Thou art my friend; whatsoever is my cherished resolve, that too must be thy support. (God’s descent has no fixed time; when circumstances call for it, He creates Himself anew through His own will in the manner described above.) 7.
# Brief Significance of the Second Verse
Is it then that the decline of dharma and the rise of adharma please you so much that you manifest yourself only at such times? In that case, your avatar must be considered the cause of endless calamity. To refute this baseless fear—that is precisely the purpose made clear in explaining the Lord’s descent.
When society is afflicted by such devastation as the decay of dharma, those devoted to Vedic ordinance and righteous conduct—pious saints and sages—often face decline and ruin. To protect such persons wholly from this dire catastrophe is one purpose of my descent. Just as in times of dharmic decline those who follow paths contrary to the Vedas, who engage in irreligious deeds and remain steeped in sin, grow fat and multiplied in their wickedness, so too is the destruction of the wicked another purpose of my avatar. And through the suppression of the wicked, the protection of the righteous, and the establishment of Vedic dharma—through these means, the proper restoration of dharma itself is yet another purpose of my descent. It is with the intention of fulfilling all these purposes that I manifest myself in due time, by the means aforementioned.
When the vile Hiranyakashyap filled the earth almost to overflowing with sin through his tyranny, the Lord Sri Hari assumed the form of Narasimha to slay that demon fiend and protect Prahlad, the foremost devotee and jewel of the righteous. When the ten-headed Ravana, intoxicated with pride and power, continuously oppressed the three worlds through sinful acts, the wanderer of Goloka, Sri Hari, took on the form of Sri Rama to annihilate that demon lord with all his kin and to preserve Vibhishana, the crown jewel of the righteous. When the villainous Kamsa, the wicked-minded Jarasandha, the base-hearted Shishupal and others of their kind afflicted the righteous so severely that they were brought to utter despair, and when the weight of sin made the earth like hell itself, then that Lord of Vaikuntha, Narayana, took the form of Sri Krishna and accepted human birth in this world to ensure the protection of Vasudeva, Devaki, Rukmini, the warrior kings, and other saints.
In this way, in infinite forms and for infinite purposes, that infinite Person has spread his divine play through endless time, appearing as gods and men in the world, fulfilling and blessing the devotees with his vision. Those whose very flesh trembles in love at the mere mention of that eternal Being, and from whose eyes flow streams of tears of devotion as they sing his praises—if that Lord, the giver of all blessings sought by devotees, does not protect such supreme devotees in times of dharmic upheaval, then who shall?
The phrase “age after age” in the verse does not mean that only a single avatar appears in each age. The Lord’s descents are infinite, and whenever need arises more than once in an age, that ocean of grace, friend of the afflicted, that Hari, manifests himself repeatedly.
Again and again that supreme Lord descends and destroys the wicked, yet no blame of cruelty can ever be laid upon him for this. A tender-hearted mother and father sometimes caress their child and lift him into their lap for his welfare, and sometimes inflict strict discipline or punishment for his benefit. Such treatment by parents reveals no want of affection or cruelty toward the child. Precisely so, in all the deeds of that all-governing Supreme Lord there is no possibility of either merit or fault. (8)
Now let us discuss the nature of avatar. Ava + tar + ghan = avatar. The root *tar* with the prefix *ava* means “descent” or “coming down.” The word “avatar” itself means “descent.” So when we speak of the Lord’s avatar, the natural question arises: if descent or coming down is what the word avatar means, what then is the Lord’s avatar? From where does he come down? To answer this question properly, I cite certain passages from the original text and commentary of the *Laghu Bhagavatamrta*:
# On the Avatars of Lord Krishna
Lord Sri Krishna, who dwells transcendent in those celestial abodes beyond the phenomenal world, descends in three forms: His complete form, His form of identity with Himself, and His form through divine infusion. Yet when the occasion arises—when devotees suffer and cry out for deliverance, when the Vedic dharma requires protection, when demons must be vanquished—then does He descend from those transcendent realms into this visible world of phenomena. Such a descent is called His “avatar”—His assumption of a particular form in this realm. The avatars of the Lord are innumerable, each distinct and marked with unique characteristics. (See the *Laghu Bhagavata Amrita* and the twentieth chapter of the *Madhya Lila* in the *Sri Chaitanya Charitamrita*.)
Lord Hari takes birth in various forms at various times for the accomplishment of various purposes. Those forms, embraced by Narayana, are known by the name of avatar. The avatars are countless, and their works are infinite. In some avatars, the Lord exists in His complete form; in others, only a portion of His power is manifest; and in still others, only His infusion is reflected. Regarding the avatars of the Lord, the scriptures offer many different accounts. Generally, His ten avatars are described everywhere. Yet the *Srimad Bhagavata* and the *Sri Chaitanya Charitamrita* mention many avatars. Let us see what is said in the third chapter of the first canto of the *Srimad Bhagavata* concerning the avatars:
That Lord (the cosmic person), in the beginning, descended as Brahma and, in order to create Sanatkumara and others of the four virgin youths, engaged in the difficult practice of lifelong celibacy with an undivided mind. [Avatar 1: Brahma]
O Yajnesh, in order to create all these beings and to rescue the earth submerged in the nethermost depths, He took on the form of a boar for the second time. [Avatar 2: Varaha]
In the third manifestation, becoming a sage, He created the rishis and spoke forth the Vaishnava scriptures, declaring that those teachings which lead to the fruit of action performed without desire yield the pure fruit of liberation. [Avatar 3: Narada]
In the fourth avatar, desiring to create a consort who embodied half of dharma itself, He assumed the dual form of Nara and Narayana and engaged in intense austerities with a tranquil mind. [Avatar 4: Ardhanarishvara] (Understand this dual form of Nara-Narayana as the form in which the feminine aspect is Nara and the masculine aspect is Narayana—a perfect androgynous pair.)
The great soul known as ‘Kapila’ is His fifth avatar. That master of perfections—the supreme among all yogis possessed of the eight supernatural powers such as anima—Kapila himself first imparts to the sage Asuri the science of Sankhya, which destroys the illusion of the false self and determines the nature of all fundamental realities. [Avatar 5: Kapila] (The eight perfections beginning with anima are: anima, garima, laghima, mahima, prapti, prakamya, isitva, and vasitva.)
In the sixth avatar, without any sense of selfish attachment—without thinking “I desire a son; I wish to beget one like myself”—but moved by pure compassion alone, the Lord accepted the role of son to Atri. That Datthatreya, the supreme Lord, then imparted to the sage Alarka the science of logic and debate, the foundation of all philosophy. [Avatar 6: Datthatreya] (He is called Dattatreya because he was given as a son to Datta—he who has given.)
Next, in the seventh avatar, born as Yajna to the sage Ruchi from the womb of the goddess Akuti, that Lord of Sacrifice, along with His divine companions such as Yama, protected the Svayambhuva Manvantara. [Avatar 7: Yajna]
In the eighth avatar, born to the god Nabi from the womb of the goddess Meru, the divine Rishabha—He whose strides measure all worlds—revealed to mankind the righteous path that is honored in all the four stages of life and then withdrew into divine play. [Avatar 8: Rishabha]
In the ninth avatar, at the prayers of the sages, the Lord took on the form of King Prithu and drew forth from this earth, bountiful with all treasures and giving milk like a divine cow, all manner of excellent things. O Brahmins, it was for this reason that He was especially honored among the people. [Avatar 9: King Prithu]
In the tenth avatar, the Lord assumed the form of a fish. When the deluge came during the Chakshusa Manvantara and the oceans overflowed all the earth, that fish-form Lord rescued Manu Vaivasvata by guiding him to the one vessel that remained afloat upon the waters. [Avatar 10: Matsya]
In the eleventh avatar, when the gods and demons together churned the ocean, using Mount Mandara as their churning rod, the omnipotent Lord, in the form of a tortoise, supported that great mountain upon His own back. [Avatar 11: Kurma]
In the twelfth incarnation, he took the form of Dhanvantari and brought the nectar; in the thirteenth, assuming the female form of Mohini, he bewildered the demons while granting the elixir to the gods. [Dhanvantari and Mohini avatars—12 and 13]
In the fourteenth incarnation, taking the form of Narasimha, he seized the mighty and formidable lord of demons, Hiranyakashyap, upon his thigh and tore him asunder with the same ease that a worker of mats—who prepares reed-mats and such wares—might rend the erka grass, that peculiar stringless reed from which such mats are fashioned. [Narasimha avatar—14]
In the fifteenth incarnation, he assumed the dwarf form and went to the sacrifice of King Bali. There he asked merely three paces of land, yet through his stride he desired to encompass all the heavens. [Vamana avatar—15]
In the sixteenth incarnation, seeing the kings in rebellion against the Brahmins, he grew wrathful and rendered the earth bereft of Kshatriyas twenty-one times over. [Parashurama avatar—16]
Then in the seventeenth incarnation, he was born of Parashara into the womb of Satyavati, he who, observing humanity’s feeble intellect, divided the great tree of the Vedas into its branches. [Vyasa avatar—17]
Thereafter, desiring to accomplish the work of the gods, he attained godhood in human form—as Rama—who performed deeds of mighty prowess, including the binding of the sea. [Rama avatar—18]
In the nineteenth and twentieth incarnations, two gods—Rama and Krishna—were born into the Vrishni line and bore away the burden of the earth. [Balarama and Krishna—19 and 20]
Then, when the Kali age shall have firmly taken hold, he shall be born as Buddha, the son of Anjana, in the Keekat region—that is, in Gaya—to bewilder those creatures who are hostile to the divine. [Buddha avatar—21]
Thereafter, this very Lord of the world, when the twilight of that age arrives—when nearly all kings have become robbers—shall be born as Kalki, begotten by Vishnu Yasha. [Kalki avatar—22] (The Puranas declare that Kalki shall be born in the village of Shambhala, in a Brahmin family, his mother and father named Sumati and Vishnu Yasha.)