At this time, Prajvara set fire to Puranjana’s city, to please his younger brother. (At the time of death, the temperature is raised to 107 degrees Fahrenheit.) When King Puranjana saw how all of his family members, servants, and citizens were being consumed in the conflagration, he became very morose. The city’s police superintendent, the serpent, (the subtle body and life-air) also became very aggrieved to see how his residence had been set ablaze, and due to the severe heat he wanted to leave the city, just as a snake living within the cavity of a tree hopes to escape when there is a forest fire. However, when the serpent attempted to leave the city, he was checked by the enemy, and so he began to cry out loudly in anguish. (At the time of death, the gates of the body become choked up and so one cannot clearly express his difficulties to others.)
King Puranjana was overly attached to his family, due to having the false conception of “I” and “mine”, so that at the time of separation, he became very sorry. In great anxiety he thought, “My poor wife is encumbered by so many children. After I leave this body, who will take care of her, and how will she maintain her dependents?”
Puranjana began thinking of his past dealings with his wife- how she would never eat nor bathe until he had done so, how much attached she had been to him, and how she used to pout when he would sometimes chastise her. He thought of how she used to give him good advice, and how she became very aggrieved when he was away from home. As part and parcel of Lord Krishna, Puranjana should have been thinking of Him. Instead, he was absorbed in thinking of a woman, and then, as he lamented over the fate of his wife and children, Yavana-raja came there to arrest him.
As the Yavanas were binding Puranjana like an animal, to take him away to the place of judgement, his followers became very aggrieved, and in that state, they were also forced to accompany their master. (When the Yamadutas take away a living entity, the life-air, senses, desires, and the reactions to his past activities all follow him.)
As soon as the king and his subjects were out of the city, it immediately became dismantled and smashed to dust. And yet, even as he was being dragged away by the Yavana king, due to ignorance, Puranjana could not remember his friend and well-wisher, the Supreme Soul. Taking advantage of the cruel Puranjana’s helpless condition, all of the animals that he had killed in sacrifice came and pierced him with their horns, and thus it felt to him as if he were being hacked to pieces with axes.
This is a section of the book “A Sidelong Glance”.
To buy the complete book, click here
Leave a Reply