तं जिघांसुमभिप्रेत्य विहाय नृपलाञ्छनम् ।
तत्पादमूलं शिरसा समगाद्भयविह्वलः ॥२९॥

taá¹ jighÄá¹sum abhipretya
vihÄya ná¹›pa-lÄñchanam
tat-pÄda-mÅ«laá¹ Å›irasÄ
samagÄd bhaya-vihvalaḥ

 tam - him; jighÄá¹sum - willing to kill; abhipretya - knowing it well; vihÄya - leaving aside; ná¹›pa-lÄñchanam - the dress of a king; tat-pÄda-mÅ«lam - at his feet; Å›irasÄ - by the head; samagÄt - fully surrendered; bhaya-vihvalaḥ - under pressure of fearfulness.


Text

When the personality of Kali understood that the King was willing to kill him, he at once abandoned the dress of a king and, under pressure of fear, completely surrendered to him, bowing his head.

Purport

The royal dress of the personality of Kali is artificial. The royal dress is suitable for a king or ká¹£atriya, but when a lower-class man artificially dresses himself as a king, his real identity is disclosed by the challenge of a bona fide ká¹£atriya like MahÄrÄja ParÄ«ká¹£it. A real ká¹£atriya never surrenders. He accepts the challenge of his rival ká¹£atriya, and he fights either to die or to win. Surrender is unknown to a real ká¹£atriya. In the Age of Kali there are so many pretenders dressed and posed like administrators or executive heads, but their real identity is disclosed when they are challenged by a real ká¹£atriya. Therefore when the artificially dressed personality of Kali saw that to fight MahÄrÄja ParÄ«ká¹£it was beyond his ability, he bowed down his head like a subordinate and gave up his royal dress.