Text 11
sa vismayotphulla-vilocano hariṁ
sutaṁ vilokyānakadundubhis tadā
kṛṣṇāvatārotsava-sambhramo ’spṛśan
mudā dvijebhyo ’yutam āpluto gavām
saḥ — he (Vasudeva, also known as Ānakadundubhi); vismaya-utphulla-vilocanaḥ — his eyes being struck with wonder at the beautiful appearance of the Supreme Personality of Godhead; harim — Lord Hari, the Supreme Personality of Godhead; sutam — as his son; vilokya — observing; ānakadundubhiḥ — Vasudeva; tadā — at that time; kṛṣṇa-avatāra-utsava — for a festival to be observed because of Kṛṣṇa’s appearance; sambhramaḥ — wishing to welcome the Lord with great respect; aspṛśat — took advantage by distributing; mudā — with great jubilation; dvijebhyaḥ — to the brāhmaṇas; ayutam — ten thousand; āplutaḥ — overwhelmed, surcharged; gavām — cows.
When Vasudeva saw his extraordinary son, his eyes were struck with wonder. In transcendental jubilation, he mentally collected ten thousand cows and distributed them among the brāhmaṇas as a transcendental festival.
Śrīla Viśvanātha Cakravartī Ṭhākura has analyzed the wonder of Vasudeva upon seeing his extraordinary child. Vasudeva was shivering with wonder to see a newborn child decorated so nicely with valuable garments and gems. He could immediately understand that the Supreme Personality of Godhead had appeared, not as an ordinary child but in His original, fully decorated, four-handed form. The first wonder was that the Lord was not afraid to appear within the prison house of Kaṁsa, where Vasudeva and Devakī were interned. Second, although the Lord, the Supreme Transcendence, is all-pervading, He had appeared from the womb of Devakī. The third point of wonder, therefore, was that a child could take birth from the womb so nicely decorated. Fourth, the Supreme Personality of Godhead was Vasudeva’s worshipable Deity yet had taken birth as his son. For all these reasons, Vasudeva was transcendentally jubilant, and he wanted to perform a festival, as kṣatriyas do to celebrate the birth of a child, but because of his imprisonment he was unable to do it externally, and therefore he performed the festival within his mind. This was just as good. If one cannot externally serve the Supreme Personality of Godhead, one can serve the Lord within one’s mind, since the activities of the mind are as good as those of the other senses. This is called the nondual or absolute situation (advaya jñāna). People generally perform ritualistic ceremonies for the birth of a child. Why then should Vasudeva not have performed such a ceremony when the Supreme Lord appeared as his son?