Shloka 4
Brahmā’s Prayers to Lord Kṛṣṇa (Brahmā-stuti) and the Restoration of Vraja’s Lunch Pastime
श्रेय:सृतिं भक्तिमुदस्य ते विभो क्लिश्यन्ति ये केवलबोधलब्धये । तेषामसौ क्लेशल एव शिष्यते नान्यद् यथा स्थूलतुषावघातिनाम् ॥ ४ ॥
śreyaḥ-sṛtiṁ bhaktim udasya te vibho kliśyanti ye kevala-bodha-labdhaye teṣām asau kleśala eva śiṣyate nānyad yathā sthūla-tuṣāvaghātinām
O mighty Lord, devotion (bhakti) to You is the highest path to true good. Those who abandon it and struggle only for intellectual knowledge gain nothing but distress—like one who beats an empty husk and never obtains the grain.
Loving service to the Supreme Person is the natural and eternal function of every living entity. If a person renounces his own constitutional function and instead laboriously seeks so-called enlightenment through impersonal, speculative knowledge, his result is simply the trouble and bother that come from following an artificial process. A fool may beat an empty husk, not knowing that the grain has already been removed. Similarly foolish is the person who throws his mind again and again into the pursuit of knowledge without surrendering to the Supreme Personality of Godhead, for it is the Supreme Personality of Godhead who is the very substance and goal of knowledge, just as grain is the substance and goal of the entire agricultural effort. Vedic knowledge or, indeed, material science without the Personality of Godhead is exactly like an empty and useless husk of wheat.
FAQs
This verse says that abandoning devotion to Kṛṣṇa and striving only for impersonal knowledge yields merely fatigue and suffering—no real spiritual gain—like beating husks without getting grain.
After being humbled by Kṛṣṇa’s divine power in the Vraja līlā, Brahmā offers prayers acknowledging that true welfare comes from bhakti to Kṛṣṇa, not from pride in independent knowledge.
Prioritize devotion and humble practice—hearing, chanting, and serving—rather than relying only on intellectual spirituality; let knowledge support bhakti instead of replacing it.