Amused, light

कीचड़ में दो बालकTwo boys in the mud

In Gokula, Rāma and Keśava, Balarāma and Kṛṣṇa, were crawling on their hands and knees. They dragged their little feet through the mud of the cow-pens, loved the jingle of their own anklets, followed any stranger who passed, then took fright and scrambled back to their mothers. Their mothers picked them up, mud and all, as if the mud were sandal paste. When they could walk, they caught the calves by the tail and were dragged round the yard, and the women left their housework to watch and laughed. 10.8.21 to 24

उलाहनेThe complaints

The gopīs came to Yaśodā in a crowd, where she could hear them, and made their complaints. 10.8.28 to 29

वत्सान्मुञ्चन्क्वचिदसमये क्रोशसञ्जातहासः स्तेयं स्वाद्वत्त्यथ दधिपयः कल्पितैः स्तेययोगैः।
मर्कान्भोक्ष्यन्विभजति स चेन्नात्ति भाण्डं भिन्नत्ति द्रव्यालाभे सगृहकुपितो यात्युपक्रोश्य तोकान्॥Bhāgavata 10.8.29

He lets the calves loose before milking time, and when we shout, he laughs. He steals our curd and milk, by tricks he has worked out, and eats the sweet things he has stolen. He shares it out to the monkeys, and if a monkey will not eat, he breaks the pot. If there is nothing to steal, he is angry with the whole house, and makes the babies cry, and goes. If the pot hangs too high, he piles up stools and the mortar. He makes holes in the hanging pots. In a dark storeroom the jewels on his own body give him light. 10.8.29 to 30

And after all that, they said, there he sits, looking as good as gold. And as they told it, the women kept glancing at his lovely frightened face; and Yaśodā laughed, and could not bring herself to scold him. 10.8.31

मिट्टीThe mud

One day, while they were playing, the boys, Balarāma among them, ran to his mother: Kṛṣṇa has eaten mud! Yaśodā took him by the hand. She was afraid for him, and her eyes showed it. Why did you eat mud in secret, you naughty boy? Your friends all say so, and so does your elder brother. 10.8.32 to 34

नाहं भक्षितवानम्ब सर्वे मिथ्याभिशंसिनः।
यदि सत्यगिरस्तर्हि समक्षं पश्य मे मुखम्॥Bhāgavata 10.8.35

I didn't eat it, Mother. They are all lying about me. If they are telling the truth, look in my mouth yourself. Then open it, she said. And Hari, the Lord whose power nothing can stop, a little boy playing at being a little boy, opened his mouth. 10.8.35 to 36

उसके मुँह मेंIn his mouth

सा तत्र ददृशे विश्वं जगत्स्थास्नु च खं दिशः।
साद्रिद्वीपाब्धिभूगोलं सवाय्वग्नीन्दुतारकम्॥Bhāgavata 10.8.37

There she saw the whole universe: all that moves and all that stands, the sky and the directions, the round earth with its mountains, islands and oceans, the wind and fire, the moon and the stars, the senses and the mind, time and the nature of things. And in it she saw Vraja, and herself. She was afraid. Is this a dream, she asked, or the Lord's illusion, or has my own mind gone wrong? And she bowed to That which no thought can reach. 10.8.37 to 42

Then the Lord spread over her His own māyā, the one made of a mother's love. At once she forgot what she had seen. She took her son on her lap, and her heart was full of love for him, as before. 10.8.43 to 44

उसकी हँसीHis laughter

Most of what a Jyotirgana has heard for years is scolding. From the house, from the village, from the clinic, from himself. He has forgotten that he is allowed to laugh, or he laughs and feels he has no right to.

In this story the Lord of all the worlds is a boy who steals butter, lies to his mother with a straight face and gets caught. The Bhāgavata tells it with a smile, and the women who complain are laughing while they complain. And Yaśodā, who had every reason to scold, laughed instead, and could not. The laughter was not his excuse. It was how she saw him.

And when she looked into the mouth of the boy who had eaten dirt, the whole universe was in it. That is where this lamp's road goes: from a laugh to wonder, and from wonder back into love. He is allowed to laugh, at the world and at himself. A God who plays in the mud is not far from the man who has been in it.

The story: the Bhāgavata Purāṇa, 10.8.21 to 45, read in Sanskrit in the GRETIL e-text (Ulrich Stiehl); the verse numbers are that text's. The telling in English is ours, and so is what it means for him.