bahÅ«ni santi nÄmÄni
rÅ«pÄṇi ca sutasya te
guṇa-karmÄnurÅ«pÄṇi
tÄny ahaá¹ veda no janÄḥ

 bahÅ«ni - various; santi - there are; nÄmÄni - names; rÅ«pÄṇi - forms; ca - also; sutasya - of the son; te - your; guṇa-karma-anu-rÅ«pÄṇi - according to His attributes and activities; tÄni - them; aham - I; veda - know; no janÄḥ - not ordinary persons.


Text

For this son of yours there are many forms and names according to His transcendental qualities and activities. These are known to me, but people in general do not understand them.

Purport

BahÅ«ni: the Lord has many names. Advaitam acyutam anÄdim ananta-rÅ«pam Ädyaá¹ purÄṇa-puruá¹£aá¹ nava-yauvanaá¹ ca. As stated in the Brahma-saá¹hitÄ (5.33), the Lord is one, but He has many forms and many names. It was not that because Garga Muni gave the child the name Kṛṣṇa, that was His only name. He has other names, such as Bhaktavatsala, GiridhÄrÄ«, Govinda and GopÄla. If we analyze the nirukti, or semantic derivation, of the word “Kṛṣṇa,†we find that na signifies that He stops the repetition of birth and death, and kṛṣ means sattÄrtha, or “existence.†(Kṛṣṇa is the whole of existence.) Also, kṛṣ means “attraction,†and na means Änanda, or “bliss.†Kṛṣṇa is known as Mukunda because He wants to give everyone spiritual, eternal, blissful life. Unfortunately, because of the living entity’s little independence, the living entity wants to “deprogram†the program of Kṛṣṇa. This is the material disease. Nonetheless, because Kṛṣṇa wants to give transcendental bliss to the living entities, He appears in various forms. Therefore He is called Kṛṣṇa. Because Garga Muni was an astrologer, he knew what others did not know. Yet Kṛṣṇa has so many names that even Garga Muni did not know them all. It is to be concluded that Kṛṣṇa, according to His transcendental activities, has many names and many forms.