by Satsvarūpa dāsa Adhikārī (ISKCON Boston)

The followers of Krsna consciousness are aware that at present the universe and the earth are in the Age of Kali. Vedic culture calculates the long duration of time between the creation and annihilation of the cosmos according to repeated cycles of the following four seasons: Satya-yuga, Treta-yuga, Dvapara-yuga and Kali-yuga. Of the four, the last, the Kali-yuga, is noted for being the fallen age, the age of hypocrisy and quarrel. Aside from the evidence of Vedic literature, one can observe the fallen condition of the present civilization in everyday common affairs. In Kali-yuga the basic principles of religion are abandoned by a majority of the people, the government is ruled by the lowest class of men, and society lives on the basis of animal life for the goal of sense gratification. Huge quarrels are predicated on various minor pretexts. Kali-yuga lasts for 432,000 years and is supposed to get increasingly worse, until finally men will be eating their own sons and finding sport in hunting down the devotees of God. Let us therefore examine the history of the influx of Kali-yuga 5,000 years ago and try to understand how its degrading influence can be checked.

This information regarding Kali-yuga is recorded in the Srimad-Bhagavatam, the transcendental literature which depicts the pastimes performed by the Personality of Godhead Sri Krsna when He appeared on the earth. Srimad-Bhagavatam relates that Krsna appeared on this earth for a period of 125 years during the end of the Dvapara-yuga, and when He disappeared from the earth the Age of Kali entered. The personification of Kali, the agent for all irreligion and vice, was kept in check, however, even after the disappearance of Krsna, due to the presence of a very strong and pious ruler of the earth, Maharaja Pariksit. His life is described as being wonderful in its birth, wonderful in its duration, and wonderful in its completion. We may at this time examine the life of Maharaja Pariksit as the background to understand the strength of Krsna consciousness even in the midst of Kali-yuga.

Maharaja Pariksit's strength was due to his being completely surrendered to the word of Krsna. And as we shall see, Krsna was pleased to work His will through this surrendered soul. Maharaja Pariksit was the posthumous child of Abhimanyu, who was the son of Arjuna, the famous hero of the Battle of Kuruksetra. While he was still in the womb, Maharaja Pariksit was struck by a nuclear weapon detonated by an enemy of his family, and yet due to the mercy of the Personality of Godhead, Sri Krsna, who entered the womb of his mother, Uttara, and protected him, Pariksit was not burned. When he grew up and began to rule the kingdom, he was always conscientiously surrendered unto the Personality of Godhead and was never afraid nor overwhelmed, even up to his death.