Verse 1.17.42

Bengali text, Devanagari and Unicode transliteration of verse 1.17.42:

চরণ-প্রভাব শুনি’ বিপ্র-গণ মুখে আবিষ্ট হৈলা প্রভু প্রেমানন্দ-সুখে ॥ ৪২ ॥

चरण-प्रभाव शुनि’ विप्र-गण मुखे आविष्ट हैला प्रभु प्रेमानन्द-सुखे ॥ ४२ ॥

caraṇa-prabhāva śuni’ vipra-gaṇa mukhe āviṣṭa hailā prabhu premānanda-sukhe || 42 ||

carana-prabhava suni’ vipra-gana mukhe avista haila prabhu premananda-sukhe (42)

English translation:

(42) Hearing the glories of the Lord’s lotus feet from the brāhmaṇas, the Lord became absorbed in ecstatic love.

Commentary: Gauḍīya-bhāṣya by Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura:

The phrase caraṇa-prabhāva is explained as follows: Imagining the Supreme Lord to be formless, the impersonalists cannot understand the wonders of the Lord’s eternal form, which attracts even self-satisfied souls. The impersonalists’ process of consideration arises from material conceptions. After subduing the impersonal philosophy, the lotus feet of the Lord were installed on the head of Gayāsura at Gayā; these lotus feet of the Lord are the source of all spiritual pastimes. The voidism of the Buddhists and the impersonalism of the pañcopāsakas are buried under these lotus feet of Gadādhara. Since the pañcopāsakas ultimately become impersonalists, they are simply Buddhists in disguise. The conceptions of the fruitive workers who are opposed to Vedic injunctions are under the shelter of ignorance; the conceptions of the Buddhists are opposed to the Vedas and deny spiritual existence; and the conceptions of the impersonalists, though not directly Buddhist, superficially follow the Vedas, deny material existence, and are a covered form of Buddhism.

Since the covered Buddhist impersonalists and their followers, the pañcopāsakas, consider the eternal form and eternal lotus feet of Gadādhara as material, perceivable by their senses, and products of material nature, they are eternally bereft of the good fortune of seeing them. The devotees who accept the eternally variegated pastimes of the Lord never give respect to the philosophy of covered Buddhism that superficially follows the Vedas. The lotus feet of the Lord attract Śiva,

Brahmā, Śukadeva, and many other self-satisfied souls; they are the eternal Absolute Truth, or sac-cid-ānanda-vigraha. Therefore the impersonalists’ conception of pañcopāsana, which is meant for cheating people, is nothing but a means for cheating innocent foolish people.

Therefore the most intelligent devotees never accept impersonalism, the covered form of Buddhism.