When Shree Krishna descended in this brahmand (universe) to establish a Divine space in the celestial dimension in order to govern and manage the affairs of this planetary system, He came in the form of Vishnu. And His abode is called Kshirsagar (the Ocean of Milk). There on Kshirsagar, He reclines on Sheshnag (the Divine cosmic serpent that has a thousand heads). So He was reclining on Sheshnag in the Ocean of Milk, and as He was reclining, a lotus flower sprang from His nabhi (navel). A beautiful Divine lotus flower opened, and out of that lotus came Brahma.
Now Brahma looked around. Up he saw space. Down he saw the Ocean of Milk. And he didn’t know,
“Who am I? Where did I come from? I know I’m supposed to do srishti (creation). I’m supposed to complete the creation of this planetary system, but I don’t know how. What am I supposed to do?”
So he said, “Okay, I came out of this lotus flower, and the stem of the lotus goes down into this Ocean of Milk. Let me try to see if I can find the origin of it.”
So he swam down, and he kept going and going and going and going. This is Brahma we’re talking about. Who is more intelligent and powerful than Brahma? And yet, with all of his effort, he couldn’t find the source of where he came from. He couldn’t reach the source. He came back up to the surface and said,
“What am I going to do? I can’t tell where I came from, or who I am, or what I’m supposed to do!”
So he prayed.
यस्यैक-निश्र्वसित-कालम् अथ अवलम्ब्य जीवन्ति लोम-बिलजा जगद्-अण्ड-नाथाः ।
विष्णुः महान् स इह यस्य कला-विशेषो गोविन्दम् आदि-पुरुषं तम् अहम् भजामि ॥ ४८ ॥Yasyaika-niśhvasita-kālam athavalambya jīvanti loma-vilajā jagad-aṇḍa-nāthāḥ.
Viṣhṇur mahān sa iha yasya kalā-viśheṣho govindam ādi-puruṣhaṁ tam ahaṁ bhajāmi.
It’s a very long prayer called the Brahma Samhita. It’s one of our scriptures. He’s praying to Shree Krishna in all of these beautiful shlokas (Sanskrit verses), saying,
“O Govind!, O Supreme God! O origin of all the forms of God, please help me! I need to know. Where did I come from? Who am I, and what am I supposed to do?”
So Shree Krishna graced him.
With Shree Krishna’s grace, Brahma was able to understand the knowledge of the Vedas (the Divine eternal scriptures), and with that knowledge he understood who he was, what he had to do, and how he could complete the creation process.
He says to Narad Ji:
नाहं न यूयं यदृताङ्गतिं विदुर्न वामदेवः किमुतापरे सुराः ।
तन्माययाऽह्यस्त्विदमात्मसमं विचक्षते ॥Nāhaṁ na yūyaṁ yad ṛitāṅ-gatiṁ vidur na Vāmadevaḥ kim utāpare surāḥ.
Tan-māyayā hyastvidam ātma-samaṁ vichakṣhate.- Shrimad Bhagavatam 2.5.19
“Hey Narad, I cannot know Shree Krishna. You cannot know Shree Krishna. Shiva cannot know Shree Krishna. We can all exercise our intellect and try to see how far we can get in trying to know Him, but really we’re just showing our own self-effort. None of us can actually know who He is through our own power of intellect.”
And they have Divine power of intellect. What to say of us, who have a material mind?
