परिग्रहो हि दु:खाय यद्यत्प्रियतमं नृणाम् ।
अनन्तं सुखमाप्नोति तद्विद्वान्यस्त्वकिञ्चन: ॥
सामिषं कुररं जघ्नुर्बलिनोऽन्ये निरामिषा: ।
तदामिषं परित्यज्य स सुखं समविन्दत ॥
parigraho hi duḥkhāya yad yat priyatamaṁ nṛṇām |
anantaṁ sukham āpnoti tad vidvān yas tv akiñcanaḥ ||
sāmiṣaṁ kuraraṁ jaghnur balino’nye nirāmiṣāḥ |
tadāmiṣaṁ parityajya sa sukhaṁ samavindata ||
(Śrīmad Bhāgavatam: 11.9.1–2)
“Acceptance (parigraha) of whatever is most dear to human beings leads to suffering. One who understands this and is without anything (akiñcana) [i.e., possessionless], however, attains boundless peace. [When] An osprey with a piece of meat was attacked by other powerful ones without meat, then he gave up the meat and attained peace in full.”
Commentary
Neither Śrī Śrīdhara Svāmīpāda, nor Śrī Jīva Gosvāmīpāda, nor Śrī Viśvanātha Cakravartīpāda offers a gloss of the word parigraha in this verse. Numerous twentieth century translators have interpreted parigraha to mean āsakti, i.e., attachment. No well known Sanskrit dictionary (kośa), however, directly supports this reading, and earlier commentators such as Śrī Rādhā Ramaṇa Dāsa Gosvāmī (the author of the Dīpanī) and Śrī Śukadeva Ācārya (the author of the Siddhānta-pradīpa-ṭīkā) have interpreted parigraha to mean saṅgraha, i.e., acceptance or accumulation. For example,
priyatamaṁ dhana-vastrādikaṁ tasya saṅgraho duḥkhāya bhavati | tad āha saṅgraha-tat-tyāgayoḥ duḥkha-sukha-hetutvam … |
(Bhāvārtha-dīpikā of Śrī Rādhā Ramaṇa Dāsa Gosvāmī)
“Accumulation (saṅgraha) of that which is most desired, such as wealth, cloth, and so on, leads to suffering. Thus, he describes accumulation and abandonment thereof as being causes [respectively] of suffering and peace.”
This interpretation seems quite sound given the illustration that is presented in the following verse: the osprey is not simply troubled because of attachment to the meat in his possession; he is troubled simply because the meat in his possession and becomes peaceful when he removes it from his possession. Thus, the teaching of the avadhūta being presented in this verse by Bhagavān Śrī Kṛṣṇa to Uddhava Mahāśaya is not simply that desirable objects within saṁsāra are causes of suffering if one is attached to them and thus they are not causes of suffering if one retains possession of them without attachment. Rather, possession of desirable objects itself is a cause of suffering regardless of whether one is attached to them or not. Admittedly, possessing them without attachment may reduce the degree of suffering to some extent, but the teaching being given here by the avadhūta is that peace is attained not only by giving up attachment to one’s possessions but rather by giving up the possessions themselves as far as possible. Elsewhere in Śrīmad Bhāgavatam (3.28.4), Śrī Kapailadeva teaches the related principle of yāvad-artha-parigrahaḥ, acceptance only as far as required. Śrī Rūpa Gosvāmīpāda also speaks of this principle as a limb of bhakti in his Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu (1.2.76) and cites a verse from Nāradīya Purāṇa to illustrate it.