O embodiment of all auspiciousness for the people of Vraja, your very presence dispels every sorrow and brings blessings to all. Yet, for those whose hearts ache with longing for you, even the slightest withdrawal of your presence serves as the only remedy for the suffering of separation among your beloved devotees. O beloved, we gently rest your beautiful lotus feet upon our breasts, even though we fear their hardness. Is this why you wander the forest paths? Do your tender feet not suffer from the sharp stones you tread upon? Our minds, sustained only by your existence, never stray from you. Thus concludes the thirty-first chapter, known as “The Song of the Gopīs,” in the first half of the Tenth Book of the Śrīmad Bhāgavatam, the great Purāṇa, revered among the scriptures of the supreme renunciates. When the time of departure came, the wives of Rāma embraced his body and entered the fire. Likewise, the wives of Vasudeva and the daughters-in-law of Hari, including those of Pradyumna, followed this path. The wives of Kṛṣṇa, led by Rukmiṇī, too, entered the fire, their spirits united with him. Arjuna, overwhelmed by the pain of separation from his dearest friend Kṛṣṇa, sought solace by singing songs and reciting wise teachings about him. He then performed the proper funeral rites for his relatives whose lineage had been lost, arranging the ceremonies in due order for those who had fallen. Soon after, the ocean swallowed the city of Dvārakā, abandoned by Hari, in a single moment, O King, sparing only the Lord’s splendid abode. There, Lord Madhusūdana remains eternally present, bringing auspiciousness and dispelling all evil for those who remember him. Dhanañjaya, taking with him the women, children, and elders who survived, brought them to Indraprastha and installed Vajra as king. When Arjuna’s grandfathers learned of the death of their friends, O King, they made you the bearer of the family line, and all departed on the great journey. Whoever, with faith, recounts the deeds and divine birth of Viṣṇu, Lord of the gods, becomes freed from all sins. By hearing and reciting the enchanting descents, heroic exploits, and childhood pastimes of Hari—whether here or elsewhere—a person attains supreme devotion, walking the path of the highest renunciates. Yet, a person driven by the body, pride, growing anger, and desire, quarrels with others who are similarly driven, bringing ruin upon himself. Within the body made of the five elements, the ignorant soul clings again and again to false notions of “I” and “mine,” and from this delusion arises a faulty intellect. If once more a living being follows the path of the unrighteous, seeking only to satisfy the belly and genitals, he falls again into darkness as before. Truth, purity, compassion, silence, intelligence, fortune, modesty, fame, forgiveness, tranquility, self-control, and prosperity—all these virtues diminish when one associates with those who lack them. Therefore, one should not associate with the restless, the foolish, the broken in spirit, or the unsaintly, nor with the pitiable or with women who are like playthings. Delusion and bondage do not arise so much from associating with others as from associating with women—and even more from associating with those attached to women. Even the lord of creatures, upon seeing his own daughter who had taken the form of a roe deer, was overcome by her beauty and, ashamed, pursued her in the form of a stag. Among all beings created and created again, who except the sage Nārāyaṇa—whose mind is never disturbed—can resist a woman like me, fashioned by illusion? Behold the power of my illusion, embodied as woman, which conquers even the victorious of all directions—she subdues those who have walked the earth merely by the arching of her brows. Therefore, one who aspires to the highest stage of yoga should never associate with women; those who have realized the true self through service to me declare that such association is the gateway to hell. The illusion, in the form of woman, created by the gods, approaches slowly; one should recognize her as death for the self, like a well covered with grass. Deluded, a man thinks of her as his wife, though she is my illusion, appearing as a cow; by associating with women, he enters womanhood and becomes bound to wealth, children, and home. He should understand her—who is the embodiment of husband, child, and home—as death itself, sent by fate, just as the song of a hunter spells death for the deer. With a body endowed with life, a man wanders from world to world, continually performing actions and experiencing their results without end. The living being’s body, made of elements, senses, and mind, follows him; its dissolution is his death, and its manifestation is his birth. When the means of perceiving an object and the capacity to perceive it are lost, that is called dissolution; the sense of “I” arises with the perception of objects, and that is called birth. Just as, when the eye or its parts lose the ability to see, the seer’s capacity to perceive ceases—so too, when both are unfit, vision ends. Therefore, one should not be afraid, nor feel pity or confusion. Knowing the journey of the soul, the wise, free from attachment, should live in this world accordingly. With intellect endowed with true vision, joined with yoga and detachment, one should live in this world, fashioned by illusion, unconcerned with the body. Śuka continued: Thus, the gopīs, singing and lamenting in many ways, wept loudly, O King, longing to see Kṛṣṇa. Then, Hari himself appeared among them, his lotus face smiling, dressed in yellow garments, adorned with a garland—he who bewilders even the god of love. At the sight of their beloved’s return, the gopīs’ eyes blossomed with joy; they all rose at once, as if life itself had returned to their bodies. One joyfully took Hari’s lotus hand in her joined palms; another placed his sandalwood-scented arm upon her shoulder. Another, slender and graceful, took the betel leaf he had chewed in her cupped hands; one, burning with longing, pressed his lotus foot between her breasts. One gopī, her brow knit in agitation, overwhelmed by the tumult of love, seemed to strike him with her sidelong glances, her teeth clenched beneath her lips. Another, with unblinking eyes, gazed upon his lotus-like face, and though she drank in its beauty, she was never satisfied, just as the wise are never satiated by his feet. Another closed her eyes, drawing him into her heart through the gateway of her gaze, embracing him with her goosebump-covered limbs and losing herself in the bliss of a yogi. All of them, delighted by the sight of Keśava, experienced the supreme festival of joy, and, as people do upon attaining wisdom, abandoned the pain of separation.