View source for Krsna pleaded that the best should be offered to the King. But Satrajit, being a worshiper of the demigods, had become too materialistic, instead of accepting Krsna's request, thought it wiser to worship the jewel to get the 170 pounds of gold every day

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{{terms|"Kṛṣṇa pleaded that the best should be offered to the King. But Satrājit, being a worshiper of the demigods, had become too materialistic and, instead of accepting the request of Kṛṣṇa, thought it wiser to worship the jewel to get the 170 pounds of gold every day"}}
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[[Category:Krsna]]
[[Category:Plea]]
[[Category:Best]]
[[Category:Should Be]]
[[Category:Offer]]
[[Category:King]]
[[Category:But]]
[[Category:Satrajit]]
[[Category:Being]]
[[Category:Demigod Worship]]
[[Category:Become]]
[[Category:Materialistic]]
[[Category:Instead Of]]
[[Category:Accept]]
[[Category:Krsna's Request]]
[[Category:Thought (as in to think)]]
[[Category:Wise]]
[[Category:Worship]]
[[Category:Jewels]]
[[Category:Get]]
[[Category:One Hundred and Seventy]]
[[Category:Pounds (weight)]]
[[Category:Gold]]
[[Category:Every Day]]
[[Category:Krsna Book Chapter 56 - The Story of the Syamantaka Jewel]]
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<h2>Other Books by Srila Prabhupada</h2>
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<h3>Krsna, The Supreme Personality of Godhead</h3>
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Kṛṣṇa pleaded that the best should be offered to the King. But Satrājit, being a worshiper of the demigods, had become too materialistic and, instead of accepting the request of Kṛṣṇa, thought it wiser to worship the jewel to get the 170 pounds of gold every day. Materialistic persons who can achieve such huge quantities of gold are not interested in Kṛṣṇa consciousness.
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[[Vanisource:KB 56|Krsna Book, 56]]
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Satrājit, however, did not come to see Kṛṣṇa; he was instead overwhelmed by the Syamantaka jewel. He installed the jewel in a temple to be worshiped by brāhmaṇas he engaged for this purpose. This is an example of a less intelligent person worshiping a material thing. In the Bhagavad-gītā it is stated that less intelligent persons, in order to get immediate results from their fruitive activities, worship the demigods created within this universe. The word “materialist” means one concerned with gratification of the senses within this material world. Although Kṛṣṇa later asked for this Syamantaka jewel, King Satrājit did not deliver it; on the contrary, he installed the jewel for his own purposes of worship. And who would not worship that jewel? The Syamantaka jewel was so powerful that daily it produced a large quantity of gold. A quantity of gold is counted by a measurement called a bhāra. According to Vedic formulas, one bhāra is equal to about twenty-one pounds, and one mound equals about eighty-two pounds. The jewel was producing about 170 pounds of gold every day. Besides that, it is learned from Vedic literature that in whatever part of the world this jewel was worshiped there was no possibility of famine, and wherever the jewel was present, there was no possibility of anything inauspicious, such as pestilence.

Lord Kṛṣṇa wanted to teach the world that the best of everything should be offered to the ruling chief of the country. King Ugrasena was the overlord of many dynasties and happened to be the grandfather of Kṛṣṇa, so Kṛṣṇa asked Satrājit to present the Syamantaka jewel to King Ugrasena. Kṛṣṇa pleaded that the best should be offered to the King. But Satrājit, being a worshiper of the demigods, had become too materialistic and, instead of accepting the request of Kṛṣṇa, thought it wiser to worship the jewel to get the 170 pounds of gold every day. Materialistic persons who can achieve such huge quantities of gold are not interested in Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Sometimes, therefore, to show special favor, Kṛṣṇa takes away one’s great accumulations of materialistic wealth and thus makes one a great devotee. But Satrājit refused to abide by the order of Kṛṣṇa and did not deliver the jewel.

After this incident, Satrājit’s younger brother, in order to display the opulence of the family, took the jewel, put it on his neck and rode on horseback into the forest, making a show of his material opulence. While Satrājit’s brother, who was known as Prasena, was moving here and there in the forest, a big lion attacked him, killed both him and the horse on which he was riding, and took away the jewel to his cave. News of this was received by the gorilla king, Jāmbavān, who then killed that lion in the cave and took away the jewel. Jāmbavān had been a great devotee of the Lord since the time of Lord Rāmacandra, so he did not take the valuable jewel as something he very much needed. He gave it to his young son to play with as a toy.

In the city, when Satrājit’s younger brother Prasena did not return from the forest with the jewel, Satrājit became very upset. He did not know that his brother had been killed by a lion and that the lion had been killed by Jāmbavān. He thought instead that because Kṛṣṇa wanted that jewel, which had not been delivered to Him, Kṛṣṇa might have therefore taken the jewel from Prasena by force and killed him. This idea grew into a rumor, which Satrājit spread in every part of Dvārakā.
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