10.77
bhagavati devananda vakresvara-krpate
bhagavatera bhakti-artha paila prabhu haite
SYNONYMS
bhagavati devananda—Devananda, who used to recite Srimad-Bhagavatam; vakresvara-krpate—by the mercy of Vakresvara; bhagavatera—of Srimad-Bhagavatam; bhakti-artha—the bhakti interpretation; paila—got; prabhu haite—from the Lord.
Devananda Pandita was a professional reciter of Srimad-Bhagavatam, but by the mercy of Vakresvara Pandita and the grace of the Lord he understood the devotional interpretation of the Bhagavatam.
PURPORT
In the Caitanya-bhagavata, Madhya-lila, Chapter Twenty-one, it is stated that Devananda Pandita and Sarvabhauma Bhattacarya’s father, Visarada, lived in the same village.
Devananda Pandita was a professional reciter of Srimad-Bhagavatam, but Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu did not like his interpretation of it.
In the present town of Navadvipa, which was formerly known as Kuliya, Lord Caitanya showed such mercy to him that he gave up the Mayavadi interpretation of Srimad-Bhagavatam and learned how to explain Srimad-Bhagavatam in terms of bhakti.
Formerly, when Devananda was expounding the Mayavadi interpretation, Srivasa Thakura was once present in his meeting, and when he began to cry, Devananda’s students drove him away.
Some days later, Caitanya Mahaprabhu passed that way, and when He met Devananda He chastised him severely because of his Mayavada interpretation of Srimad-Bhagavatam.
At that time Devananda had little faith in Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu as an incarnation of Lord Krsna, but one night some time later Vakresvara Pandita was a guest in his house, and when he explained the science of Krsna, Devananda was convinced about the identity of Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu.
Thus he was induced to explain Srimad-Bhagavatam according to the Vaisnava understanding In the Gaura-ganoddesa-dipika, verse 106, it is described that he was formerly Bhaguri Muni, who was the sabha-pandita who recited Vedic literature in the house of Nanda Maharaja.