Dearest Śrīla Prabhupāda, Friend of the Poor in Spirit,

I offer myself at your feet, which are compared to luminous lotus flowers, bestowing the light of knowledge that brings sight to blinded eyes.

Years ago I was surprised to hear you speaking of the French medieval saint Joan of Arc, at the end of a lecture you gave in the “City of Angels”, Los Angeles. When a woman asked you whether there was anyone similar to Joan of Arc in the Bhāgavatam, you first affirmed that you were “familiar” with her, and then you replied in a general and inclusive way: “Any activities of devotees, that is Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam.” You then explained the literal meaning of the word bhāgavata as “pertaining to” Bhagavān. “So Bhāgavata can be expanded to any unlimited. So anything in relationship with God, that is Bhāgavatam. So if Joan of Arc, she was in relationship with God, she is also Bhāgavatam. You should expand Bhāgavatam in that way. Yes.”

Revisiting these words of yours these several years later in printed form, I am no less surprised as when I first heard them. Yet my surprise turns to wonder as I consider your advice at the end of your reply to the unnamed woman, “You should expand Bhāgavatam in this way. Yes.”

The first wonder is that you suggest that the Bhāgavatam might be “expanded.” To me, it points to the commentarial tradition, which you so expertly and richly extended with your Bhaktivedanta purports. Such expansion is inclusive: you include the insights of previous ācāryas, you include your own insights, and you invite readers to draw on their own life experiences as ways to affirm the truths expressed in the Bhāgavatam. You also encourage and expect devotees to expand the Bhāgavatam by following your example of reading and then expounding on it in morning classes, discussing its meaning “from all angles of vision.”

Your suggestion of how to expand the Bhāgavatam is also a wonder: “So if Joan of Arc, she was in relationship with God, she is also Bhāgavatam.” Here you suggest that reading the Bhāgavatam is a dynamic process, in which it is possible and indeed necessary to find and appreciate how persons not explicitly included in the ancient text of Śrīla Vyāsadeva can be seen as participating in what you once called “the beautiful story of the Supreme Personality of Godhead.” Thus, for you, the Bhāgavatam is not limited to descriptions of the Lord’s devotees in ancient India, as it is not a geographically or ethnically circumscribed work. Rather, the Bhāgavatam, as you hint in this discussion, challenges us to think broadly, to see it as a dynamic, living text that is to be inhabited as we read and realize its transformative import.

I am reminded of Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu’s joyful exclamation, upon hearing King Pratāparudra recite a verse from the Tenth Canto’s “Gopī Gītā”: bhūridā, bhūridā! “You are the most magnanimous!” (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 10.31.9; CC Madhya 14.14). Mahāprabhu saw the king—despite his apparent disqualification due to being engaged in worldly duties—as one to be acknowledged and even celebrated as a participant in the spirit of the Bhāgavatam, a spirit epitomized by the gopīs in their pure love for Kṛṣṇa.

I pray for your blessings, that I may imbibe some portion of this, your magnanimous vision of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam’s inclusiveness, to be your instrument in helping others to appreciate and enter deeply into this glorious literary work of Vyāsa’s genius, which you so lovingly translated and elaborated to benefit and bless us all.

Serving your lotus feet,

Kṛṣṇa Kṣetra Swami