The growing of pearls leela

From Mukta Carita – The pearl story

This was written by Sri Raghunatha dasa Gosvami around 1550. This story took place in Vrindavan and is the pastime with Radha, Krishna and their friend’s gopis and cowherd boys.  Raghunatha dasa wrote 3 books – stavvali, sri dana carita and mukta carita.

The pastime starts at Malyahari kunda which is a small kund where the goips after picking flowers would come to make them into garlands. The story was told by Krsna to his wife Satyabhama at Dvarika.

During the month of kartik, on the occasion of Diwali, the gopis were making pearl necklaces to decorate themselves. When Krsna heard about this from the mouth of parrot vicaksana, Krsna went to Malyahari kunda and saw the gopis stringing pearl necklaces. He asked Radharani and the other gopis to give him some to decorate his cows. The gopis told Krsna proudly that these pearls are very expensive and not suitable for cows. He then begged them to spare at least a few pearls for his favorite cows Harini and Hasini. But then Lalita devi (gopi) told him that they don’t have even one pearl suitable for decorating his cows as they were all very precious.

Disappointed, Krsna went home and asked Mother Yasoda for some pearls to plant in a garden. She laughed and told him that everyone knows pearls come from oysters. But eventually she gave him some pearls and he planted them in the field. He then went to the gopis for some milk but the gopis laughed at this request to water his pearl garden with milk. After a few days, small shoots started to grow. When Krsna told the gopis they laughed and said they are thorn bushes.  But just after a few more days, they produced beautiful pearls, more beautiful that what the gopis had.

Seeing this, the gopis thought that now Krishna’s cows will look more enchanting and beautiful with his pearls than them. So they wanted to some of his pearls. But Krsna didn’t give them any.  So the gopis then though that if Krsna can grow pearls, we can grow them too and as our pearls are already beautiful, we can grow even more beautiful ones.  They collected all their pearls and also got more from their parents and elders telling them all that they will get more pearls in return and then planted them on their field. They watered the pearl garden three times a day with milk and ghee. Krsna then went with his cowherd friends and laughed at the gopis. To tease them, he decorated the cows, monkeys, buffaloes and sheep with pearls but didn’t give them any.

Fearing that their elders would punish them the gopis came to Krishna and asked Him for some of His pearls. Krishna told them that they would all have to come see Him individually. At first the gopis could not reach an agreement with Krishna to give them some pearls. But later when they all surrendered that he was their only hope, Krishna agreed.

Krishna then strung all the pearls into beautiful necklaces and put them in golden boxes. He gave the first box to Radharani and then sent a box with a pearl necklace to each of the gopis. In return, Radharani sent Krishna some scented garlands, betel nut, and some delicious food that she personally cooked.