In this verse, the three colors mentionedsukla, rakta and krsnaare not to be understood literally, in terms of what we experience with our senses, but rather as representatives of sattva-guna, rajo-guna and tamo-guna. After all, sometimes we see that a duck is white, although it is in tamo-guna, the mode of ignorance. Illustrating the logic called bakandha-nyaya, the duck is such a fool that it runs after the testicles of a bull, thinking them to be a hanging fish that can be taken when it drops. Thus the duck is always in darkness. Vyasadeva, however, the compiler of the Vedic literature, is blackish, but this does not mean that he is in tamo-guna; rather, he is in the highest position of sattva-guna, beyond the material modes of nature. Sometimes these colors (sukla-raktas tatha pitah) are used to designate the brahmanas, ksatriyas, vaisyas and sudras. Lord Ksirodakasayi Visnu is celebrated as possessing a blackish color, Lord Siva is whitish, and Lord Brahma is reddish, but according to Srila Sanatana Gosvami in the Vaisnava-tosani-tika, this exhibition of colors is not what is referred to here.

The real understanding of sukla, rakta and krsna is as follows. The Lord is always transcendental, but for the sake of creation He assumes the color rakta as Lord Brahma. Again, sometimes the Lord becomes angry. As He says in Bhagavad-gita (16.19):