tasmān na santy amī bhāvā
yarhi tvayi vikalpitāḥ
tvaḿ cāmīṣu vikāreṣu
hy anyadāvyāvahārikaḥ
tasmat -- therefore; na -- not; santi -- exist; ami -- these; bhavah -- entities; yarhi -- when; tvayi -- within You; vikalpitah -- arranged; tvam -- You; ca -- also; amishu -- within these; vikareshu -- products of creation; hi -- indeed; anyada -- at any other time; avyavaharikah -- nonmaterial.
Thus these created entities, transformations of material nature, do not exist except when material nature manifests them within You, at which time You also manifest within them. But aside from such periods of creation, You stand alone as the transcendental reality.
When the universe is wound up at the time of its periodic annihilation, all the inert objects and bodies of living beings that hitherto were manifested by the Lord's Maya become disconnected from His sight. Then, since He maintains no association with them during the period of universal dissolution, they in fact no longer exist. In other words, material manifestations have real, functioning existence only when the Lord turns His attention to the creation and maintenance of the material cosmos. The Lord is never "within" these objects in any material sense, but He does mercifully pervade them all as the impersonal Brahman, and as the Paramatma He enters within every atom and also accompanies the jiva souls in their individual embodiments. As the Lord describes in His own words in the verses of Bhagavad-gita (9.4-5):
maya tatam idam sarvam
jagad avyakta-murtina
mat-sthani sarva-bhutani
na caham teshv avasthitah
na ca mat-sthani bhutani
pasya me yogam aisvaram
bhuta-bhrin na ca bhuta-stho
mamatma bhuta-bhavanah
"By Me, in My unmanifest form, this entire universe is pervaded. All beings are in Me, but I am not in them. And yet everything that is created does not rest in Me. Behold My mystic opulence! Although I am the maintainer of all living entities and although I am everywhere, I am not part of this cosmic manifestation, for My Self is the very source of creation."
