It is a Vedic custom that the junior members of the family should offer respects to the elderly persons every morning. The children or the disciples especially should offer their respects to the parents or the spiritual master in the morning. In pursuance of this Vedic principle, Lord Krsna and Balarama used to offer Their obeisances to Their father, Vasudeva, along with his wives. One day, after having returned from the sacrificial performances at Kuruksetra, when Lord Krsna and Balarama went to offer Their respects to Vasudeva, Vasudeva took the opportunity of appreciating the exalted position of his two sons. Vasudeva had the opportunity to understand the position of Krsna and Balarama from the great sages who had assembled in the arena of the sacrifice. He not only heard from the sages, but on many occasions he actually experienced that Krsna and Balarama were not ordinary human beings, but were very extraordinary. Thus he believed the words of the sages that his sons Krsna and Balarama were the Supreme Personality of Godhead.

With firm faith in his sons, he addressed them thus: "My dear Krsna, You are the sac-cid-ananda-vigraha Supreme Personality of Godhead, and my dear Balarama, You are Sankarsana, the master of all mystic powers. I have now understood that You are eternal. Both of You are transcendental to this material manifestation and to its cause, the Supreme Person Maha-Visnu. You are the original controller of all. You are the rest of this cosmic manifestation. You are its creator, and You are also its creative ingredients. You are the master of this cosmic manifestation, and actually this manifestation is created for Your pastimes only.

"The different material phases from the beginning to the end of the cosmos manifest under different time formulas are also Yourself, because You are both the cause and effect of this manifestation. The two features of this material world, the predominator and the predominated, are also You, and You are the supreme transcendental controller who stands above them. Therefore, You are beyond the perception of our senses. You are the supreme soul, unborn and unchanging. You are not affected by the six kinds of transformations which occur in the material body. The wonderful varieties of this material world are also created by You, and You have entered as the Supersoul into each living entity and even into the atom. You are the maintainer of everything.

"The vital force which is acting as the life principle in everything and the creative force derived from it are not acting independently, but are dependent upon You, the Supreme Person behind these forces. Without Your will, they cannot work. Material energy has no cognizance. It cannot act independently without being agitated by You. Because the material nature is dependent upon You, the living entities can only attempt to act. But without Your sanction and will they cannot perform anything or achieve the result they desire.

"The original energy is only an emanation from You. My dear Lord, the shining of the moon, the heat of the fire, the rays of the sun, the glittering of the stars, and the electric lightning which is manifested as very powerful, as well as the gravity of the mountains, the energy of the earth and the quality of its flavor--all are different manifestations of You. The pure taste of water and the vital force which maintains all life are also features of Your Lordship. The water and its taste are also Yourself.

"My dear Lord, although the forces of the senses, the mental power of thinking, willing and feeling, and the strength, movement and growth of the body appear to be performed by different movements of the airs within the body, they are all ultimately manifestations of Your energy. The vast expanse of outer space rests in Yourself. The vibration of the sky, its thunder, the supreme sound omkara and the arrangement of different words to distinguish one thing from the other are symbolic representations of Yourself. Everything is Yourself. The senses, the controllers of the senses, the demigods, and the acquisition of knowledge which is the purpose of the senses, as well as the subject matter of knowledge--all are Yourself. The resolution of intelligence and the sharp memory of the living entity are also Yourself. You are the egotistic principle in ignorance which is the cause of this material world, the egotistic principle of passion which is the cause of the senses, and the egotistic principle of goodness which is the origin of the different controlling deities of this material world. The illusory energy, or maya, which is the cause of the conditioned soul's perpetual transmigration from one form to another, is Yourself.

"My dear Supreme Personality of Godhead, You are the original cause of all causes, exactly as the earth is the original cause of different kinds of trees, plants and similar varieties of manifestation. As the earth is represented in everything, so You are present throughout this material manifestation as Supersoul. You are the supreme cause of all causes, the eternal principle. Everything is, in fact, a manifestation of Your one energy. The three qualities of material nature--sattva, rajas and tamas--and the result of their interaction, are linked up with You by Your agency of yogamaya. They are supposed to be independent, but actually the total material energy is resting upon You, the Supersoul. Since You are the supreme cause of everything, the interactions of material manifestation--birth, existence, growth, transformation, deterioration and annihilation--are all absent in Yourself. Your supreme energy, yogamaya, is acting in variegated manifestations, but because yogamaya is Your energy, You are therefore present in everything."

In the Bhagavad-gita, this fact is very nicely explained in the Ninth Chapter, wherein the Lord says, "In My impersonal form I am spread all over the material energy; everything is resting in Me, but I am not there." This very statement is also given by Vasudeva. To say He is not present everywhere means that He is aloof from everything, although His energy is acting everywhere. This can be understood by a crude example: In a big establishment, the energy, or the organization of the supreme boss, is working in every nook and corner of the business, but that does not mean that the original proprietor is present there, although in every department and every atmosphere the presence of the proprietor is felt by the worker. The physical presence of the proprietor in every department is formality only. Actually his energy is working everywhere. Similarly, the omnipresence of the Supreme Personality of Godhead is felt in the action of His energies. Therefore the philosophy of inconceivable simultaneous oneness with and difference from the Supreme Lord is confirmed everywhere. The Lord is one, but His energies are diverse.

Vasudeva said, "This material world is like a great flowing river, and its waves are the three material modes of nature--goodness, passion and ignorance. This material body, as well as the senses, the faculties of thinking, feeling and willing and the stages of distress, happiness, attachment and lust--are all are different products of these three qualities of nature. The foolish person who cannot realize Your transcendental identity above all this material reaction continues to remain in the entanglement of fruitive activity and is subjected to the continuous process of birth and death without a chance of being freed."

This is also confirmed in a different way by the Lord in the Fourth Chapter of Bhagavad-gita. There it is said that anyone who knows the appearance and activities of the Supreme Lord Krsna becomes freed from the clutches of material nature and goes back home, back to Godhead. Therefore Krsna's transcendental name, form, activities and qualities are not products of this material nature.

"My dear Lord," Vasudeva continued, "despite all these defects of the conditioned soul, if someone somehow or other comes in contact with devotional service, he achieves this civilized human form of body with developed consciousness and thereby becomes capable of executing further progress in devotional service. And yet, illusioned by the external energy, people generally do not utilize this advantage of the human form of life. Thus they miss the chance of eternal freedom and unnecessarily spoil the progress they have made after thousands of births.

"In the bodily concept of life, one is attached to the offspring of the body, due to false egotism, and everyone in conditioned life is entrapped by false relationships and false affection. The whole world is moving under this false impression of material bondage. I know that neither of You are my sons; You are the original chief and progenitor, the Personalities of Godhead, known as Pradhana and Purusa. But You have appeared on the surface of this globe in order to minimize the burden of the world by killing the ksatriya kings who are unnecessarily increasing their military strength. You have already informed me about this in the past. My dear Lord, You are the shelter of the surrendered soul, the supreme well-wisher of the meek and humble. I am therefore taking shelter of Your lotus feet, which alone can give one liberation from the entanglement of material existence.

"For a long time I have simply considered this body to be myself, and although You are the Supreme Personality of Godhead, I considered You to be my son. My dear Lord, at the very moment when You first appeared in Kamsa's prison house, I was informed that You were the Supreme Personality of Godhead and that You had descended for the protection of the principles of religion as well as the destruction of the unfaithful. Although unborn, You descend in every millennium to execute Your mission. My dear Lord, as in the sky there are many forms appearing and disappearing, so You also appear and disappear in many eternal forms. Who, therefore, can understand Your pastimes or the mystery of Your appearance and disappearance? Our only business should be to glorify Your supreme greatness."

When Vasudeva was addressing his divine sons in that way, Lord Krsna and Balarama were smiling. Because They are very affectionate to Their devotees, They accepted all the appreciation of Vasudeva with a kindly smiling attitude. Krsna then began to confirm all Vasudeva's statements as follows: "My dear father, whatever you may say, We are, after all, your sons. What you have said about Us is certainly a highly philosophical understanding of spiritual knowledge. I accept it in total without exception."

Vasudeva was in the complete perfection of life in considering Lord Krsna and Balarama to be his sons, but because the sages assembled in the place of pilgrimage at Kuruksetra had spoken about the Lord as the supreme cause of everything, Vasudeva simply repeated it out of his love for Krsna and Balarama. Lord Krsna did not wish to detract from His relationship with Vasudeva as father and son; therefore in the very beginning of His reply He accepted the fact that He is the eternal son of Vasudeva and that Vasudeva is the eternal father of Krsna. After this, Lord Krsna informed His father of the spiritual identity of all living entities. He continued, "My dear father, everyone, including Myself and My brother Balarama, as well as all the inhabitants of the city of Dvaraka and the whole cosmic manifestation, is exactly as you have already explained, but all of us are also qualitatively one."

Lord Krsna intended for Vasudeva to see everything in the vision of a mahabhagavata, a first-class devotee. A first-class devotee sees that all living entities are part and parcel of the Supreme Lord and that the Supreme Lord is situated in everyone's heart. In fact, every living entity has spiritual identity, but in contact with material existence he becomes influenced by the material modes of nature. He becomes covered by the concept of bodily life, forgetting that his spirit soul is of the same quality as the Supreme Personality of Godhead. One mistakenly considers one individual to be different from another simply because of their material bodily coverings. Because of differences between bodies, the spirit soul appears before us differently.

Lord Krsna then gave a nice example in terms of the five material elements. The total material elements, namely, the sky, the air, the fire, the water and the earth, are present in everything in the material world, whether in an earthen pot or in a mountain or in the trees or in an earring. These five elements are present in everything, in different proportions and quantities. A mountain is a gigantic form of the combination of these five elements, and a small earthen pot is of the same elements, but in a smaller quantity. Therefore all material items, although in different shapes or different quantities, are of the same ingredients. Similarly, the living entities--beginning from Lord Krsna and including the Visnu-tattva and millions of Visnu forms, and then the living entities in different forms, beginning from Lord Brahma down to the small ant--are all of the same quality in spirit. Some are great in quantity, and some are small, but qualitatively they are of the same nature. It is therefore confirmed in the Upanisads that Krsna, or the Supreme Lord, is the chief among all living entities, and He maintains them and supplies them with all necessities of life. Anyone who knows this philosophy is in perfect knowledge. The Vedic version tat tvam asi, "Thou art the same," does not mean that everyone is God, but everyone is qualitatively of the same nature as that of God.

After hearing Krsna speak the entire philosophy of spiritual life in an abbreviated summation, Vasudeva was exceedingly pleased with his son. Being thus elated, he could not speak, but remained silent. In the meantime, Devaki, the mother of Lord Krsna, sat by the side of her husband. Previously she had heard that both Krsna and Balarama were so kind upon Their teacher that They had brought back the teacher's dead sons from the clutches of the superintendent of death, Yamaraja. Since she had heard this incident, she had been also thinking of her own sons who were killed by Kamsa, and while remembering them she became overwhelmed with grief.

In compassion for her dead sons, Devaki began to appeal to Lord Krsna and Balarama thus: "My dear Balarama, Your very name suggests that You give all pleasure and all strength to everyone. Your unlimited potency is beyond the reach of our minds and words, and my dear Krsna, You are the master of all mystic yogis. I also know that You are the master of the Prajapatis like Brahma and his assistants, and You are the original Personality of Godhead, Narayana. I also know for certain that You have descended to annihilate all kinds of miscreants who have been misled in the course of time. They have lost control of their minds and senses, fallen from the quality of goodness, and have deliberately neglected the direction of the revealed scriptures by living a life of extravagancy and impudency. You have descended on the earth to minimize the burden of the world by killing such miscreant rulers. My dear Krsna, I know that Maha-Visnu, who is lying in the causal ocean of the cosmic manifestation and who is the source of this whole creation, is simply an expansion of Your plenary portion. Creation, maintenance and annihilation of this cosmic manifestation are being effected only by Your plenary portion. I am, therefore, taking shelter of You without any reservation. I have heard that when You wanted to reward Your teacher, Sandipani Muni, and he asked You to bring back his dead son, You and Balarama immediately brought him from the custody of Yamaraja, although he had been dead for a very long time. By this act I understand You to be the supreme master of all mystic yogis. I am, therefore, asking You to fulfill my desire in the same way. In other words, I am asking You to bring back all my sons who were killed by Kamsa; upon Your bringing them back, my heart will be content, and it will be a great pleasure for me just to see them once."

After hearing Their mother speak in this way, Lord Balarama and Krsna immediately called for the assistance of yogamaya and started for the lower planetary system known as Sutala. Formerly, in His incarnation of Vamana, the Supreme Personality of Godhead was satisfied by the King of the demons, Bali Maharaja, who donated to Him everything he had. Bali Maharaja was then given the whole of Sutala for his residence and kingdom. Now when this great devotee, Bali Maharaja, saw that Lord Balarama and Krsna had come to his planet, he immediately merged in an ocean of happiness. As soon as he saw Lord Krsna and Balarama in his presence, he and all his family members stood up from their seats and bowed down at the lotus feet of the Lord. Bali Maharaja offered Lord Krsna and Balarama the best seat he had in his possession, and when both Lords were seated comfortably, he began to wash Their lotus feet. He then sprinkled the water on his head and on the heads of his family members. The water used to wash the lotus feet of Krsna and Balarama can purify even the greatest demigods, such as Lord Brahma.

After this, Bali Maharaja brought valuable garments, ornaments, sandalwood pulp, betel nuts, lamps and various nectarean foodstuffs, and along with his family members he worshiped the Lord according to the regulative principles and offered his riches and body unto the lotus feet of the Lord. King Bali was feeling such transcendental pleasure that he repeatedly grabbed the lotus feet of the Lord and kept them on his chest; and sometimes he put them on the top of his head, and in this way he was feeling transcendental bliss. Tears of love and affection began to flow down from his eyes, and all his hairs stood on end. He began to offer prayers to the Lords in a voice which choked up intermittently.

"My Lord Balarama, You are the original Anantadeva. You are so great that Anantadeva Sesa and other transcendental forms have originally emanated from You and Lord Krsna. You are the original Personality of Godhead, and your eternal form is all-blissful and full of complete knowledge. You are the creator of the whole world. You are the original initiator and propounder of the systems of jnana-yoga and bhakti-yoga. You are the Supreme Brahman, the original Personality of Godhead. I therefore with all respect offer my obeisances unto both of You. My dear Lords, it is very difficult for the living entities to get to see You, yet when You are merciful upon Your devotees it becomes easy for them to see you. As such, only out of Your causeless mercy have You agreed to come here and be visible to us, who are generally influenced by the qualities of ignorance and passion.

"My dear Lord, we belong to the daitya or demon category. The demons or demonic persons--the Gandharvas, the Siddhas, the Vidyadharas, the Caranas, the Yaksas, the Raksasas, the Pisacas, the ghosts and the hobgoblins--are incapable, by nature, of worshiping You or becoming Your devotees. Instead of becoming Your devotees, they simply become impediments on the path of devotion. But, opposed to them, You are the Supreme Personality of Godhead, representing all the Vedas and situated in the mode of uncontaminated goodness. Your position is always transcendental. For this reason, some of us, although born of the modes of passion and ignorance, have taken shelter of Your lotus feet and become devotees. Some of us are actually pure devotees, and some of us have taken shelter of Your lotus feet, desiring to gain something from devotion.

"By Your causeless mercy only we demons in direct contact with Your personality. This contact is not possible even for the great demigods. No one knows how You act through Your yogamaya potency. Even demigods cannot calculate the expanse of the activities of Your internal potency, so how is it possible for us to know it? I therefore place my humble prayers before You: please be kind to me, who am fully surrendered unto You, and favor me with Your causeless mercy so that I may simply remember Your lotus feet birth after birth. My only ambition is that I may live alone just like the paramahamsas who, traveling alone here and there in great peace of mind, depend simply upon Your lotus feet. I also desire that if I have to associate with anyone, they may be only Your pure devotees and no one else, because Your pure devotees are always well-wishers of all living entities.

"My dear Lord, You are the supreme master and director of the whole world. Please, therefore, engage me in Your service and let me thus become freed from all material contaminations. You can purify me in that way because if someone engages himself in the loving service of Your Lordship, he immediately becomes free from all kinds of regulative principles enjoined in the Vedas."

The word paramahamsa mentioned here means the supreme swan. It is said that the swan can draw milk out from a reservoir of water; it can take only the milk portion and reject the watery portion. Similarly, a person who can draw out the spiritual portion from this material world and who can live alone, depending only on the Supreme Spirit, not on the material world, is called paramahamsa. When one achieves the paramahamsa platform, he is no longer under the regulative principles of the Vedic injunctions. A paramahamsa accepts only the association of pure devotees and rejects others who are too much materially addicted. In other words, those who are materially addicted cannot understand the value of the paramahamsa, but those who are fortunately advanced in spiritual sense take shelter of the paramahamsa and thus successfully complete the mission of human life.

After Lord Krsna heard the prayers of Bali Maharaja, He spoke as follows: "My dear King of the demons, in the millennium of the Svayambhuva Manu, the Prajapati known as Marici begot six sons, all demigods, in the womb of his wife, Urna. Once upon a time, Lord Brahma became captivated by the beauty of his daughter and was following her, impelled by sex desire. At that time, these six demigods looked at the action of Lord Brahma with abhorrence. This criticism of Brahma's action by the demigods constituted a great offense on their part, and for this reason they were condemned to take birth as the sons of the demon Hiranyakasipu. These sons of Hiranyakasipu were thereafter put in the womb of mother Devaki, and as soon as they took their birth, Kamsa killed them one after another. My dear King of the demons, mother Devaki is very anxious to see these six dead sons again, and she is very much aggrieved on account of their early death at the hand of Kamsa. I know that all of them are living with you. I have decided to take them with Me in order to pacify My mother Devaki. After seeing My mother, all these six conditioned souls will be liberated, and thus in great pleasure they will be transferred to their original planet. The names of these six conditioned souls are as follows: Smara, Udgitha, Parisvanga, Patanga, Ksudrabhrt and Ghrni. They will be again reinstated in their former position as demigods."

After thus informing the King of the demons, Krsna stopped speaking, and Bali Maharaja understood the Lord's purpose. He worshiped Him sufficiently, and thereafter Lord Krsna and Lord Balarama took away the six conditioned souls and returned to the city of Dvaraka, where He presented them as little babies before His mother, Devaki. Mother Devaki became overwhelmed with joy and was so ecstatic in motherly feeling that immediately milk began to flow from her breasts, and she fed the babies with great satisfaction. She began to take them on her lap again and again, smelling their heads and thinking, "He has gotten my lost children back!" For the time being she became overpowered by the energy of Visnu, and in great motherly affection she began to enjoy the company of her lost children.

The milk from the breasts of Devaki was transcendental nectar because the same milk had been sucked by Lord Krsna. As such, the babies who sucked the breasts of Devakiji, which had touched the body of Lord Krsna, immediately became self-realized persons. The babies therefore began to offer their obeisances unto Lord Krsna, Balarama, their father Vasudeva, and mother Devaki. After this, they were immediately transferred to their respective heavenly planets.

After they departed, Devaki became stunned with wonder that her dead children had come back and had again been transferred to their respective planets. She could adjust the events only by thinking of Lord Krsna's pastimes, in which, because Lord Krsna's potencies are all inconceivable, anything wonderful can be performed. Without accepting the inconceivable, unlimited potencies of the Lord, one cannot understand that Lord Krsna is the Supreme Soul. By His unlimited potencies, He performs unlimited pastimes also, and no one can describe them in full nor can anyone know them all. Suta Gosvami, speaking Srimad-Bhagavatam before the sages of Naimisaranya, headed by Saunaka Rsi, gave his verdict in this connection as follows.

"Great sages, please understand that the transcendental pastimes of Lord Krsna are all eternal. They are not ordinary narrations of historical incidences. Such narrations are identical with the Supreme Personality of Godhead Himself. Anyone, therefore, who hears such narrations of the Lord's pastimes becomes immediately freed from the contamination of material existence. And those who are pure devotees enjoy these narrations as nectar entering into their ears." Such narrations were described by Sukadeva Gosvami, the exalted son of Vyasadeva, and anyone who hears them, as well as anyone who describes them for the hearing of others, becomes Krsna conscious. And it is only the Krsna conscious persons who become eligible for going back home, back to Godhead.

Thus ends the Bhaktivedanta purport of the Second Volume, Thirtieth Chapter, of Krsna, "Spiritual Instruction for Vasudeva and Return of the Six Dead Sons of Devaki by Lord Krsna."