SB 11.12.13
mat-kama ramanam jaram
asvarupa-vido ’balah
brahma mam paramam prapuh
sangac chata-sahasrasah
Translation:
All those hundreds of thousands of gopis, understanding Me to be their most charming lover and ardently desiring Me in that way, were unaware of My actual position. Yet by intimately associating with Me, the gopis attained Me, the Supreme Absolute Truth.
Purport:
The words asvarupa-vidah (“not understanding My actual position or form”) indicate that the lovely gopis were so completely absorbed in conjugal love for Lord Krsna that they were not aware of the Lord’s unlimited potencies as the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Srila Visvanatha Cakravarti Thakura explains this and other meanings of the word asvarupa-vidah. In Sanskrit the word vid also means “to acquire.” Thus, asvarupa-vidah indicates that the gopis, like other pure devotees of the Lord, were not interested in achieving sarupya-mukti, the liberation of acquiring a bodily form similar to the Lord’s. Were the gopis to obtain a bodily form like the Lord’s, how could the Lord execute His conjugal pastimes of dancing with the gopis and embracing them? Since the gopis had realized their eternal spiritual forms as servitors of the Lord, the word svarupa also may indicate their own spiritual bodies, and thus asvarupa-vidah means that the gopis never thought, as materialists do, of their own bodily beauty. Although the gopis are the most beautiful girls in the Lord’s creation, they never thought of their own bodies but rather were always meditating on the transcendental body of Lord Krsna. Although we cannot imitate the gopi’s exalted conjugal feelings, we can follow their superb example of practical Krsna consciousness. They naturally took shelter of Lord Krsna and achieved the highest perfection of life.