SB 1.11.3
tam upasrutya ninadam
jagad-bhaya-bhayavaham
pratyudyayuh prajah sarva
bhartr-darsana-lalasah
Translation by His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Srila Prabhupada:
The citizens of Dvaraka, having heard that sound which threatens fear personified in the material world, began to run towards Him fast, just to have a long desired audience with the Lord, who is the protector of all devotees.
Purport by His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Srila Prabhupada:
As already explained, the citizens of Dvaraka who lived at the time of Lord Krsna’s presence there were all liberated souls who descended there along with the Lord as entourage. All were very anxious to have an audience with the Lord, although because of spiritual contact they were never separated from the Lord. Just as the gopis at Vrndavana used to think of Krsna while He was away from the village for cowherding engagements, the citizens of Dvaraka were all immersed in thought of the Lord while He was away from Dvaraka to attend the Battle of Kuruksetra. Some distinguished fiction writer in Bengal concluded that the Krsna of Vrndavana, that of Mathura and that of Dvaraka were different personalities. Historically there is no truth in this conclusion. The Krsna of Kuruksetra and the Krsna of Dvaraka are one and the same personality.
The citizens of Dvaraka were thus in a state of melancholy due to the Lord’s absence from the transcendental city, as much as we are put in a state of melancholy at night because of the absence of the sun. The sound heralded by Lord Krsna was something like the heralding of the sunrise in the morning. So all the citizens of Dvaraka awoke from a state of slumber because of the sunrise of Krsna, and they all hastened towards Him just to have an audience. The devotees of the Lord know no one else as protector.
This sound of the Lord is identical with the Lord, as we have tried to explain by the nondual position of the Lord. The material existence of our present status is full of fear. Out of the four problems of material existence, namely the food problem, the shelter problem, the fear problem and the mating problem, the fear problem gives us more trouble than the others. We are always fearful due to our ignorance of the next problem. The whole material existence is full of problems, and thus the fear problem is always prominent. This is due to our association with the illusory energy of the Lord, known as maya or external energy, yet all fear is vanished as soon as there is the sound of the Lord, represented by His holy name, as it was sounded by Lord Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu in the following sixteen words:
Hare Krsna, Hare Krsna, Krsna Krsna, Hare Hare/
Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare
We can take advantage of these sounds and be free from all threatening problems of material existence.