Srila Prabhupada mentioned that everything is inside his books. These are not just empty words, but the truth.
After compiling the four Vedas, Vyasadeva compiled the 108 Upanisads, making the spiritual knowledge contained in the Vedas more evident, culminating in the Vedanta Sutra, which brings forth the conclusions of the Upanisads. In the process, he also compiled the 18 Puranas, the Mahabharata, and other books.
Because the real meaning of the Vedanta Sutra is so difficult to understand, Srila Vyasadeva was instructed by his guru, Narada Muni to compile another book that would directly speak about the glories of devotional service and the pastimes of Krsna, making the real meaning of the Vedanta Sutra easily available.
By the time He received this instruction, Vyasadeva had already compiled the original Bhagavata Purana, as part of the 18 original Puranas, but having received this instruction he had the inspiration to rewrite the book as the Srimad Bhagavatam we have access to today. In this process, he received the help of two other great sages: His son, Sukadeva Goswami, and the son of Romaharshana, Suta Goswami, who added their realizations to the book, making it even sweeter than originally. The Srimad Bhagavatam was originally taught by Srila Vyasadeva to Sukadeva Goswami, who added His own realization while describing it to Maharaja Pariksit. This narration was later expanded by Srila Suta Goswami, resulting in the final text. This, in turn, was commented on by different Vaishnava acaryas, culminating with Srila Prabhupada, who compiled all this knowledge accumulated over thousands of years in his purports, adding his own realization in the process. This Srimad Bhagavatam we have access to is thus the fruit of the combined effort of all these powerful personalities.
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