SB 1.16.21
A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada
TEXT 21
- arakṣyamāṇāḥ striya urvi bālān
- śocasy atho puruṣādair ivārtān
- vācaṁ devīṁ brahma-kule kukarmaṇy
- abrahmaṇye rāja-kule kulāgryān
SYNONYMS
arakṣyamāṇāḥ — unprotected; striyaḥ — women; urvi — on the earth; bālān — children; śocasi — you are feeling compassion; atho — as such; puruṣa-ādaiḥ — by cannibals (Rākṣasas); iva — like that; ārtān — those who are unhappy; vācam — vocabulary; devīm — the goddess; brahma-kule — in the family of the brāhmaṇa; kukarmaṇi — acts against the principles of religion; abrahmaṇye — persons against the brahminical culture; rāja-kule — in the administrative family; kula-agryān — most of all the families (the brāhmaṇas).
TRANSLATION
Are you feeling compunction for the unhappy women and children who are left forlorn by unscrupulous persons? Or are you unhappy because the goddess of learning is being handled by brāhmaṇas addicted to acts against the principles of religion? Or are you sorry to see that the brāhmaṇas have taken shelter of administrative families that do not respect brahminical culture?
PURPORT
In the age of Kali, the women and the children, along with brāhmaṇas and cows, will be grossly neglected and left unprotected. In this age illicit connection with women will render many women and children uncared for. Circumstantially, the women will try to become independent of the protection of men, and marriage will be performed as a matter of formal agreement between man and woman. In most cases, the children will not be taken care of properly. The brāhmaṇas are traditionally intelligent men, and thus they will be able to pick up modern education to the topmost rank, but as far as moral and religious principles are concerned, they shall be the most fallen. Education and bad character go ill together, but such things will run parallel. The administrative heads as a class will condemn the tenets of Vedic wisdom and will prefer to conduct a so-called secular state, and the so-called educated brāhmaṇas will be purchased by such unscrupulous administrators. Even a philosopher and writer of many books on religious principles may also accept an exalted post in a government which denies all the moral codes of the śāstras. The brāhmaṇas are specifically restricted from accepting such service. But in this age they will not only accept service, but they will do so even if it is of the meanest quality. These are some of the symptoms of the Kali age which are harmful to the general welfare of human society.