Srimad Bhagavatam - The search for Adi Badri. - Part 1

I think it was the Ganesh Chaturthi of 2008 when the understanding of spiritual vibrations began to come together slowly, and yet, in a flood. I had thought of reading, or beginning to read the first volume of Srimad Bhagavatam, written by Srila Prabhupada. I had wanted to give it a try, and I am glad that I was humble, because I am never able to read without going beyond the first 2-3 pages of the Preface.

The moment I pick up the book, there are very gentle sensations within me. I am sure there will be many who will be amused by what I write, and similarly there will be those who will heckle me for an unscientific temperament. I am aware of only one aspect, a very primary aspect of science, and that is, to repeat a phenomenon again and again and again and again. I have done so, and I am not able to read beyond 2-3 pages without getting gentle sensations within me.

I cannot focus, and I cannot read properly. Mind you, I am not a biblio-phobic. On the contrary. I am totally, mindlessly, hopelessly addicted to books and reading. There is nothing that I would love to do more.

Anyways, on the day of Ganesh Chaturthi of 2008, after not being able to read the preface of the first volume of the Srimad Bhagavatam, I sat at my computer, and began to type the manuscript of "Srimad Bhagavatam - an attempt to understand". The words came by themselves. I typed the document in a non-stop mode. All alone. No. Certainly, not alone. Those who will understand, will know, and will certainly know who sat beside me, with the faint twirl of the peacock feather touching me, and who stood beside him, with the faint click of his prayer beads.

I will go into the details of the manuscript sometime later. I want to focus on one simple point for the purpose of beginning to try to understand what we can never begin to understand. There was one mention, that the great Maharishi Veda Vyasa, the author of the Srimad Bhagavatam, had written the several volumes at one location, at one non-stop attempt, at Adi Badri.

This mention got me very interested. At least, here was one actual fact. A location that could be verified in current times. Could such a place exist? A location that would need to be totally unlike the cave at Mana, north of Badrinath in Uttarakhand, where Maharishi Veda Vyasa took the help of Vigneshwara to write the Mahabharata.

The Srimad Bhagavatam is totally unlike that of the Mahabharata. The greatest message ever given within humanity, the Bhagavad Gita, is just one happening on one day of the great Kurukshetra war, and yet, the Mahabharata has a spread of more than ten generations. The Srimad Bhagavatam was at least twenty times larger than the Mahabharata and was written after the Mahabharata. It was written on palm leaves, at a remote location, in stanzas that were poetic in variety, and was entirely in ancient Sanskrit.

There was no internet, stenographers, libraries, maps, CDs /DVDs /pen-drives or whatever. Nobody to guide him and nobody to edit the stanzas. How did he do it? How did he remember? How did he not forget and how did he not repeat himself? How was it stored? How did he refer to his text, if he wanted? He would have almost worked solely in the daylight hours only. How did he stay disciplined, determined and focussed on his work?

Where was this place, Adi Badri, that would have allowed the greatest writer of all that is known and all that is not known in humanity, the great Maharishi Veda Vyasa to write and complete the Srimad Bhagavatam?

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