Devanagari
ब्रह्म च ब्राह्मणांश्चैव यद्यूयं परिनिन्दथ ।
सेतुं विधारणं पुंसामत: पाषण्डमाश्रिता: ॥ ३० ॥
Verse text
brahma ca brāhmaṇāṁś caiva
yad yūyaṁ parinindatha
setuṁ vidhāraṇaṁ puṁsām
ataḥ pāṣaṇḍam āśritāḥ
Synonyms
brahma
—
the Vedas
;
ca
—
and
;
brāhmaṇān
—
the brāhmaṇas
;
ca
—
and
;
eva
—
certainly
;
yat
—
because
;
yūyam
—
you
;
parinindatha
—
blaspheme
;
setum
—
Vedic principles
;
vidhāraṇam
—
holding
;
puṁsām
—
of mankind
;
ataḥ
—
therefore
;
pāṣaṇḍam
—
atheism
;
āśritāḥ
—
have taken shelter .
Translation
Bhṛgu Muni continued: Since you blaspheme the Vedas and the brāhmaṇas, who are followers of the Vedic principles, it is understood that you have already taken shelter of the doctrine of atheism.
Translation (Visvanatha Cakravarti Thakura)
Because you criticize the Vedas and the brāhmaṇas, which act as the institution to support mankind, you will take shelter of heretical views
Brahma means Vedas. The brāhmaṇas are the teachers of the Vedas. They are the institution which supports men who are following the correct path.
Purport
Bhṛgu Muni, in cursing Nandīśvara, said that not only would they be degraded as atheists because of this curse, but they had already fallen to the standard of atheism because they had blasphemed the
Vedas,
which are the source of human civilization. Human civilization is based on the qualitative divisions of social order, namely the intelligent class, the martial class, the productive class and the laborer class. The
Vedas
provide the right direction for advancing in spiritual cultivation and economic development and regulating the principle of sense gratification, so that ultimately one may be liberated from material contamination to his real state of spiritual identification (
ahaṁ brahmāsmi
). As long as one is in the contamination of material existence, one changes bodies from the aquatics up to the position of Brahmā, but the human form of life is the highest perfectional life in the material world. The
Vedas
give directions by which to elevate oneself in the next life. The
Vedas
are the mother for such instructions, and the
brāhmaṇas,
or persons who are in knowledge of the
Vedas,
are the father. Thus if one blasphemes the
Vedas
and
brāhmaṇas,
naturally one goes down to the status of atheism. The exact word used in Sanskrit is
nāstika,
which refers to one who does not believe in the
Vedas
but manufactures some concocted system of religion. Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu has said that the followers of the Buddhist system of religion are
nāstikas.
In order to establish his doctrine of nonviolence, Lord Buddha flatly refused to believe in the
Vedas,
and thus, later on, Śaṅkarācārya stopped this system of religion in India and forced it to go outside India. Here it is stated,
brahma ca brāhmaṇān.
Brahma
means the
Vedas.
Ahaṁ brahmāsmi
means “I am in full knowledge.” The Vedic assertion is that one should think that he is Brahman, for actually he is Brahman. If
brahma,
or the Vedic spiritual science, is condemned, and the masters of the spiritual science, the
brāhmaṇas,
are condemned, then where does human civilization stand? Bhṛgu Muni said, “It is not due to my cursing that you shall become atheists; you are already situated in the principle of atheism. Therefore you are condemned.”