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Gunagrahi das Goswami Health Update - Official.
Written by Mahahari das and Gandharvika devi dasi
Dear Devotees, family and well wishers,
Please accept our obeisances. All glories to Srila Prabhupada and His Holiness Gunagrahi das Goswami.
My Husband and I both spoke to His Holiness Gunagrahi Maharaja today.
After undergoing his second MRI (Magnetic resonance imaging) it was discovered that the cancer has gotten worse. It has not spread to new areas of the body, but has gained strength in existing areas. He is also experiencing increased pain throughout the body, especially in the areas of the tumor near the spine. He is in good spirits and plans to continue the treatments for now. He will be in contact with the doctors, medical professionals and senior devotees as to what he plans to do next. We ask that the devotees please pray for his well being and that he may suffer the least pain possible.
Due to the intense situation, he will be minimizing even more his email, and we request that devotees only write him positive communication if necessary.
As requested in a previous update, he welcomes 30 second video greetings. Please send those to: gandarvika@yahoo.com
Your servants,
Mahahari das and Gandharvika devi dasi

Speaker: HG Jananivasa dasa
Venue: Mayapur Chandrodaya Mandir
Date: 28 Feb 2016

So today is the appearance day of Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura Prabhupada and the disappearance day of Purusottama Krishna and also the disappearance day of Srila Gaur Govinda Maharaja.

So we were asked to speak on Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura. So maybe we can chant these pranams first after Srila Prabhupada’s.

nama om vishnu-padaya krishna-preshthaya bhu-tale
srimate bhaktivedanta-svamin iti namine
namas te sarasvate deve gaura-vani-pracarine
nirvisesha-sunyavadi-pascatya-desa-tarine

nama om vishnu-padaya krishna-preshthaya bhu-tale
srimate bhaktisiddhanta-sarasvat iti namine
sri-varshabhanavi-devi-dayitaya kripabdhaye
krishna-sambandha-vijnana-dayine prabhave namah
madhuryojjvala-premadhya-sri-rupanuga-bhaktida
sri-gaura-karuna-sakti-vigrahaya namo ’stu te
namas te gaura-vani-sri-murtaye dina-tarine
rupanuga-viruddhapasiddhanta-dhvanta-harine

Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura avirbhava mahotsava tithi ki jaya!

Hare Krishna!

So Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati our parama guru or the guru of His Divine Grace Abhay Caranaravinda Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada. He was born in Jagannath Puri, in the dhama, to respond to the prayers of Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura who was praying for a ‘ray of Visnu’ to come and save the conditioned souls of this age. So Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura was the answer to that prayer and he became a very very powerful, empowered preacher of Gaura bhakti. The prayer apasiddhanta-dhvanta-harine, that he didn’t tolerate anything against proper siddhanta. So that time when he was in Puri, there was one Radha Ramana Carana dasa Babaji who formed some bogus mantra,

Nitai Gaura Radhe Shyama
japa Hare Krishna Hare Rama

Unbona fide mantra but he was very very popular. The tune was very good also, nice, sweet tune. But anyway, it was very popular at that time. And Bhaktivinoda Thakura and Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati also confronted him about using this improper mantra which had different faults in it. But when they met him and preached to him, he said, ‘What can I do? Now they are already chanting! What can I do?’ So he was so forceful in his preaching that the whole of Puri was like on fire with his preaching because this Radha Ramana Carana was very very popular. But Bhaktisiddhanta was so strict and strong in his preaching that he was disturbing the whole of Puri dhama, so his father Bhaktivinoda Thakura said, ‘You better leave! (laughs) You better leave! Go and stay in Mayapur and develop Mayapur!’

So then he came here and he started to develop Mayapur. He was living at the Sri Caitanya Math, just past the Yogapitha, the birth place of Caitanya Mahaprabhu, then past that Srivasa angam, then the next temple that is Caitanya Math. And he took a very severe vow to chant 1 billion names, I think. It means like you chant 3 lakhs of rounds everyday for nine years. He had to complete that vow and he did! And he was living like an avadhuta here. He would perform the Caturmasya ceremony very strictly – put some khichari on the ground and he would go down one time, put your hands behind your back and lick! lick! lick! and when you come up you don’t come down again, thats it for the day! He had grown long hair, kind of like an avadhuta. We see him very strict in his photographs like this but at that time he was like an avadhuta.

And so he stayed there developing. The first disciple he made, he was a son of a lawyer or something like that. Anyway he came to Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura here and he was very much impressed with his preaching. But he said to Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura that actually I have got a guru, a guru father and a guru mother. But they were Bauls, another apasampradaya. So anyway he went back to his village where they were staying and at night he had this dream, this young man had a dream and he saw his guru and his wife’s guru and the guru became a lion and she became a tiger. (laughs) And they were approaching their disciple to eat him. So he woke up suddenly, what an astonishing dream! Immediately the next day he went to Mayapur, he begged, ‘You please give me initiation! Please save me from the jaws of the tigers and the lions!’

So Srila Prabhupada said that he was there one time, you know the house of Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati is there. Just before the samadhi is the house, like that, Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura’s house. And there is a little verandah there and Prabhupada said he used to see his Guru Maharaja walking up and down, chanting on the verandah there. And one day the disciple said, ‘Guru Maharaja! Guru Maharaja! A very poisonous snake, big snake here, poison! What shall we do?’ And Bhaktisiddhanta was on the verandah. He said, ‘Kill it!’ And Prabhupada said, ‘I was thinking such a saint, I thought saintly persons they would not harm even an ant, any creature! Why is he ordering to kill!’ Prabhupada said, ‘I was thinking like that, at that time!’ So that snake was killed. Later on when Prabhupada was translating the, anyway in the Ninth Canto Prahlada Maharaja, I think its a prayer of Prahlada Maharaja, in the Seventh Canto, he said, the verse says, ‘Even a saintly person is pleased when the snake or a scorpion is killed!’ Because they are envious, they bite for no reason at all.’ So Prabhupada said, ‘I was very happy when I read that. It was confirmed. I was always thinking why he said that.’

When Srila Bhaktisiddhanta was living with Bhaktivinoda Thakura Svananda-sukhada-kunja across in Godruma dvipa and then Gaura Kisora dasa Babaji Maharaja came to Mayapur. He spent about 35 years in Vrindavana. He was very famous as a true renounced person and when he heard that the birthplace of Caitanya Mahaprabhu has been revealed again by the mercy of Jagannath dasa Babaji and Bhaktivinoda Thakura and Mayapur you know as the prophecy’s are, its expanding like a lotus flower. The other dhamas in Kaliyuga they close because of the sinful age but Navadvipa has advented especially for Kaliyuga, so its opening, its flourishing, specially from the time of Bhaktivinoda Thakura, it started to revive again. So Gaura Kisora dasa Babaji Maharaja came to stay in Navadvipa and he spent the rest of his life here practically. He would go here and there sometimes. Mostly he would stay here.

So Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura, he would go and see Bhaktivinoda Thakura. Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura, he pointed out my Guru, Bhaktisiddhanta said. He said he is your guru, Gaura Kisora, he said. Take initiation from him. You don’t come home until you’ve got initiation. You don’t come back till you get initiation from him. So he said, I was studying this person who had a little loin cloth, little babaji cloth, tiger skin cap, that was it. He had a few stamps, tilaka stamps, the holy name stamp. That was his possessions, some japa mala, some bit of cloth with knots in it, he used as japa mala. And he gave these possessions, that was his possessions, tiger skin hat, he gave to Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura. I think in their first meeting.

Anyway Bhaktivinoda Thakura, he is your guru. Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura said, ‘I was trying to understand him. But I couldn’t.’ He told me, ‘you give up your learning’ because he was a maha pandita. Nobody could defeat Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati at that time. People would flee if he came for a debate, which he liked to do. He said, ‘ When I was young I loveed to debate and defeat others.’ Gaura Kisora says, ‘Give up your learning and give up your attachment to morality.’ He was a naistika brahmacari also from birth. He maintained celibacy whole life. He said these are the two things, these are my identity, Bhaktisiddhanta was saying. I was such a strict moralist and also with my learning and everything I could defeat everyone. This was me, my identity. And Gaura Kisora said, ‘You should give up these qualities.’

So he said, ‘Either this person, he is genuinely renounced. Otherwise he has a huge huge false ego, that I cannot comprehend.’ And after some time he understood, no he is actually a genuine person. ‘I dont know any other person who is more renounced, I dont know of ever there will be one, than Gaura Kisora dasa Maharaja, from the time of Raghunatha dasa.’ I think he mentioned.
So anyway he approached Gaura Kisora dasa Babaji Maharaja, ‘You please give me initiation.’ And Gaura Kisora dasa Babaji Maharaja said, ‘I am illiterate.’ Practically he was illiterate. ‘And you are great pandita, you are a great scholar. It won’t be a good match!’ So anyway he approached him some time. And Gaura Kisora dasa Babaji Maharaja said, ‘Ok, I will ask my Prabhu!’ means Mahaprabhu. ‘I will ask my Prabhu! If He gives the order then I can give you the initiation.’ Bhaktisiddhanta very happy. The next day very enthusiastically he went to see, ‘What did He say? What did He say?’ ‘Oh! I forgot to ask Him!’ (laughs) ‘I’ll ask next time!’ So Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura said, ‘Just as Madhvacarya’, (Madhvacarya I believe or Ramanuja, Madhvacarya, anyway one of those,) he said, ‘he approached his guru about 18 or 19 times. So you are not going to deceive me. I am going to get initiation from you.’

So again he went to see him, he said, ‘Did you ask Mahaprabhu?’ He said, ‘Yes.’ ‘What did He say?’ ‘He said, He didn’t give me the order!’ Therefore I cannot initiate you.’ And Bhaktisiddhanta feeling very emotional, he stood up and said, ‘karuna na hoile, kandiya kandiya, prana na rakhibo ara’ (Saranagati) – if you are not merciful to me, I cannot maintain my life. And he fell down weeping at the lotus feet of his guru. Gaura Kisora was very moved. ‘Take your bath in the Jalangi. Come back and I’ll initiate you right now!’ So he was initiated into the name of Sri Varshabhanavi-devi-dayita dasa, one of the names of Srimati Radharani, servant of Srimati Radharani. Gaura Kisora sometimes he would see Bhaktisiddhanta approaching – Oh! Here comes a Manjari! That means Radharani must be around somewhere! Where is She? (laughs)

When he got news of disappearance of Srila Gaura Kisora dasa Babaji who was living in Navadvipa at that time. So Bhaktisiddhanta immediately went to the, he was in Mayapur side, so he immediately crossed the Ganga to Gaura Kisora dasa Babaji Maharaja’s bhajan kutir. And he said he wore green chadar. According to the alankrta sastra, or the sastra that deals with decoration and clothing, green invokes a mood of separation. So he put a green chadar on and quickly went to Navadvipa. When he got there there was some kind of a argument going on, who would give the Gaur Kisora dasa Babaji Maharaja samadhi rites. Who would do that, who can claim that! And different babaji’s were saying, I’ll do it, we’ll do it, we’ll do it, everyone was trying to claim. Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati was saying it would be quite a lucrative business if they establish his, some were thinking like that, people would come and give money at the samadhi if I maintain. So Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura said, ‘No’ll I’ll take the body! I’ll put the body in samadhi!’ They said, ‘But you are not a renunciant!’ This was before he took sannyasa. They said, ‘You are not a sannyasi! You are not a babaji!’ And Gaur Kisora dasa was a babaji. So therefore only a person in the renounced order of life can touch the body and make the samadhi. Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura with a voice like thunder, he said, ‘I may not be a sannyasi or a babaji but I can say that I’ve never done none of this monkey business. So I am telling you that if anybody here has no relationship with a woman in the last six months you can come and take the body and do the samadhi rites. Three months. The last one month. Last week.’ All the babaji’s turning their backs. And the chief of police was there also because there was lot of disturbance. And he asked Bhaktisiddhanta, ‘How will you know:’ He said, ‘If they come and claim I will give. But I am saying with all my power, if you are truly renounced, take the body. Otherwise there will be dire consequence.’

So then he said to his disciples, ‘Take the body!’ So they took the body and samadhi. Now there were others there who said, ‘Babaji Maharaja when he was here he was saying that when I die you drag my body through the streets, cover it with the dust of the dhama, then throw it to the dhama dogs.’ So they said, that was his order, one of his last orders, so we should execute the order of Gaura Kisora. Bhaktisiddhanta said, ‘No they could never understand his humility. This is his humility he is saying that. We will carry, just like Caitanya Mahaprabhu He carried Haridasa on His shoulders, we will carry our spiritual master on our shoulders.’ So they carried him away, made a samadhi for him.

We had one, two men who were friends and they helped us to get this land. When we first came here we got 9 bhigas of land, like from the Lotus building down to the main road. That was our ISKCON land and that was helped to get that by two muslim farmers who owned the land, Caku Sheikh and (?) Fakir. Anyway they sold the land to Prabhupada so we could start our project here. But they were telling us because they are from Mayapur village, they said when we were young, we remember Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura. When we were little kids because they were in the village. And they said you know we were kids, we were down playing as kids do rolling in the dirt and you know the ladies are down there washing their clothes in the water hole, the kids are looking after goats and things like that. And we were kind of happily playing and then we noticed that all the elderly people they kind of stopped, all activities stopped. The whole village comes kind of still and the kids realised something has happened and they look and they see in Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati’s house, he comes in the doorway, just on the porch. He is just standing there, looking over. And he said, he had such a presence that the whole present become complete tranquillised, calm, the whole village stopped, all the activities stopped. And all their gazes turned to Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura. He said he was that kind of person.

So he has very beautiful deities there, Radha Gandharva Giridhari in the Caitanya Math. Radharani very beautiful, very shy looking, very modest, chaste, looking down. But anyway the history of those deities. When he made the math, Caitanya Math, he went to Jaipur where they make all the deities in marble. So they went to one shop and the owner of the shop, he said, here is your deity!’ In the shop there were many deities. ‘ Here is your deity!’ Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura said, how do you know thats my deity? No, first of all, how do you know I want a deity? But how do you know that is my deity? He said, because last night these deities appeared in my dream and he said, ‘Tomorrow one mahapurusa will come, one great soul will come here. And I want to accept his service.’ So he said, ‘This is your deity. Please accept your deities as donation.’ So he actually donated those deities to Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura. And they are considered his favourite, they were his favourite deities. Radha Gandharva Giridhari ki jaya!

So I was asking one of Prabhupada’s Godbrothers, Sridhara Damodara Maharaja. He used to live here, he was a neighbour, where the BBT building is, his house was there actually. And he would come and see Prabhupada all the time. Anyway I asked him this question. There Caitanya Math, you have the Radha kunda. You’ve all been to Caitanya Math yeah. So you’ve seen Radha kunda, Shyama kunda, Govardhana is there also. So I said, how come you’ve got Radha kunda there because according to Navadvipa dhama mahatmaya Radha kunda is in Ritudvipa, the other side of the Ganga, where Ritudvipa. So how come you’ve got Radha kunda here? And Govardhana is in Koladvipa, present Navadvipa dhama. How you’ve got them here? According to Navadvipa dhama mahatmaya they are on the other side of the Ganga. And he said, because my Guru Maharaja, he was doing such a, his vrata, such a vrata, his bhajana was so intense that his bhajana sthana, it manifested here. He said, my Guru Maharaja has an eternal place of bhajana on the bank of Radha kunda and because of the power of his bhajana here, Radha kunda or his bhajana sthana manifested here. He said now I am chanting at the bank of Radha kunda. And he said Govardhana is here also. Can you see? He said, ‘no we cannot see Guru Maharaja.’ But they said, ‘Can we excavate them?’ He said ‘yes’. So then they excavated those ponds, Shyama kunda, Radha kunda. And they built a Govardhana. But Bhaktisiddhanta he could see them, it was all manifested before him.

Gaura Kisora dasa Babaji Maharaja also, his samadhi was in Navadvipa. But then the Ganga was changing course all the time, by the will of Caitanya Mahaprabhu. And she was always washing away banks and villages and things like that. So she was washing the samadhi. So he got news that Gaura Kisora’s samadhi is about to go into the Ganga. So he went. Some men they rescued the remnants and then they brought them back. And then they put them on the in the temple there, you have seen Gaura Kisora dasa Babaji Maharaja’s samadhi temple, thats also on the bank of Radha kunda. And Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura said that, there were many offences being made against Gaura Kisora dasa Babaji in his samadhi site. He said, ‘He did not wish to stay there anymore! And therefore Krishna made this arrangement. So now he is here. This is where he is, his eternal place on the bank of Radha kunda. So Krishna made the arrangement. So now here he is doing his bhajana also at Radha kunda.’

So Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura, he invited the British Raj here. This was during the British rule, British Raj. Sir John Anderson, British old chap. But he was the Governor of West Bengal, the Governor, I believe the Governor of West Bengal, big position. And Bhaktisiddhanta preached him to come here, he got him to come here, thats not an easy task. You are in a village, there’s nothing happening here, the roads don’t go anywhere, because of the rivers nobody comes here, its a jungle. But he got the British Raj to come here and simultaneously he used this for preaching also. Of course he will get fame but he got him to establish the post office there, Mayapur post office, opposite the Yogapitha, government stamp. Because the other side in Navadvipa there was always the controversy, this is the birth place of Caitanya Mahaprabhu, Mayapur, going on for years and years. So he got the British Raj to establish the post office, Government recognised Mayapur. But he said we have to have a road, there are no roads, theres nothing, he will be coming from Krishna Nagar side. So he got everybody fired up, the chief of the village. We have to make a road, he is coming. So within a day they made this road. The raised road outside, Bhaktisiddhanta road, they got all the, local, everybody started digging. And I think they put banana leaves or something on top. There’s a story in the Bible about Jesus, they put palm leaf or something, when he came. (laughs) Well anyway he is not that saintly, Sir John Anderson but Bhaktisiddhanta was. Anyway he got the road constructed at that time. Now we have a road.

When we were here in 1971 when we first got the land, they build the bhajan kutir. And there were couple of devotees staying here. And there was a flood, it flooded that year, so flood was coming up and Acyutananda Maharaja was here. But the raised road acted like a barrage because the Ganga didn’t flood, it wasn’t coming. And so Acyutananda Maharaja he wrote to Prabhupada and he said that, ‘The road of Bhaktisiddhanta that barrage it saved our property, otherwise it would have come and flooded everything.’ And Prabhupada wrote back, he said, ‘Yes the path of Bhaktisiddhanta is saving millions and millions of people!’ (laughs)

So he got Sir John Anderson to come and so he said to his disciples, ‘Now these people are meat eaters. You have to give them food. They are not going to come all the way here and eat rice. You have to give them food that they like to eat.’ So Sir John Anderson means ministers and the assembly. So they said, ‘What should we do?’ He said, ‘You go to Navadvipa. The Kali pujaris they cut the goats, kill the goats. And you can get them the Kali brahmanas. They can come and cook.’
So they did that.

And Sir John Anderson came and so after the function had finished, the disciples they went to their Guru Maharaja and they said, ‘Please Guru Maharaja explain just what had happened! We are completely bewildered! We cannot understand what just took place! They cooked meat right onChandrasekara Bhavan, the site of Mahaprabhu’s uncle’s house! They cooked meat there. And we are completely bewildered. And there is some left, we don’t know what to do! Throw in the Ganga? How we can throw in the Ganga, how we can give it to Gangadevi, she is a pure devotee! We bury in the dhama? But the dust is pure dhama! We are bewildered Guru Maharaja! Please explain just what happened!’

Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura said, ‘Yes, I used to think like that also, one hundred births ago (?). But when I started this mission I promised to Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu, there is nothing I will stop, not stop at, to push on your mission, Caitanya Mahaprabhu. Whatever it takes to push on your movement, I will not hesitate to do it.’ So this was his great preaching.

Also when they were excavating that road, they found this Shivalingam, by the hospital, by the kolva, they found the Shivalingam there. So he said this is a confirmation this place is Shiva(?) And another time on that road, again Damodara Maharaja, HH Damodara Maharaja, he was with his guru, they were walking, taking a japa walk on the road. Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura he suddenly stopped. He looked up and he said, “Tch! Tch! Tch! Tch! How degraded this age of Kaliyuga! How degraded! Even on Chandraloka they are becoming so degraded! Tch! Tch! Tch! Tch!’ Then he carried on walking. (Laughs) Damodara Maharaja said, then I understood the meaning of Jagadguru. Usually we say Jagadguru, it means your country or something like this. He was, understood what was going on in other planets. And many of his disciples, their conclusion was that from here he went to Chandraloka to preach.

Prabhupada was giving a lecture here one time on the disappearance of Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura and he was talking about nityalila, how the sun rises here at 6’o clock in the morning, sets at 6’o clock in the evening, mid day its over here. For someone in the world they are seeing the sun us over here, for someone else in the world they are seeing sun is at 6’o clock, someone else seeing its, its a material example but its nityalila. Similarly he said, ‘My Guru Maharaja, he said he came with a mission to spread Krishna consciousness. And when it was finished he went to another place to do exactly the same thing. He said, this is called nityalila.’

So another time Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura, he was leaving Caitanya Math middle of the night. And one of his disciples who became Bhagavat Maharaja, saw his Guru Maharaja leaving middle of the night. Where is he going? Anyway he is walking down. He says, who is that behind me? Who is following me? Always your disciple Bhagavat bramhacari, Maharaja! Ok, come with me! So he walks past here,by the Sulabha kitchen, there is a big banyan tree over the road, just past Prabhupada kitchen, there is a big banyan tree about there. Then they saw a harinama party coming from the other side, from (?) ghat. This is at midnight! There are no boats or anything at midnight. Somehow or another this kirtana party, prema sankirtana, coming. Bhaktisiddhanta saw them and they met and embracing, rolling on the floor, symptoms of ecstasy were there. His disciple was astonished. He said who are they? He said, they are coming from Svetadvipa, from Svetadvipa. Come for a darshan of Caitanya Mahaprabhu. These Svetadvipa vasis they said to Bhaktisiddhanta, ‘We have heard about your glories. We are coming here to hear from you the glories of Gauranga! We want to hear from your mouth. We have heard of your activities here. So you please give us some Gaura katha!’ Bhaktisiddhanta was very humble of course, daso’smi he would say to everyone, you are all exalted personalities! ‘No, we want to hear.’ Actually they went back and he gave Gaura katha, chanting the glories of Lord Gauranga Mahaprabhu until the sun started to come Then they went off again back go Svetadvipa from where they had come.

So another time, this was right at the end of his vow. And he describes that he was at the Yogapitha and he said from the eastern direction he saw Panca Tattva coming, prema sankirtana, all the devotees were there, the Goswamis were there, Bhaktivinoda Thakura was there, Gaura Kisora was there, his own guru, they had all left the planet. But they were all coming in prema sankirtana. They approached him, and said, now you should give up your austerities. You should go out and preach. And they said, you don’t worry for anything. You need manpower, we will send. You need money, you don’t worry, we have unlimited resources behind! You just simply go out and preach fearlessly. Don’t worry for the, don’t worry for facility, we are all behind you. So then he took sannyasa after that and he went to preach in Calcutta, where Gaura Kisora das Babaji Maharaja said, don’t go to Calcutta, never go there! Realm of Kali, realm of Kali is there! But first place he went there. And people said,’ why did you do that if your Guru Maharaja told you not to go.’ He said, ‘if I have to preach I have to go where the people are. So they are all in the cities. I have to come to the city to preach. But actually I am not in Calcutta because I am simply preaching the glories of Mayapur and Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu. I don’t consider myself in Calcutta! I consider myself in Mayapur!’

So these are the extraordinary characteristics.

There was one devotee of sorts. He came here to see Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura. Then afterwards he went to Navadvipa to see Gaura Kisora dasa Babaji. He said, ‘Babaji Maharaja, I just went to Sri Mayapur. I saw, met your disciple there. But he is a little bit too much of Vaikuntha for my liking. He is like a bit too much, I am more attracted to raganuga bhakti and you are such a personification of raganuga bhakti.’ He said, ‘ I want to stay in Navadvipa with you and do my bhajana with you because I think Bhaktisiddhanta is too much Vaikuntha.’ And Gaura Kisora Maharaja said, ‘Yes the fact, he is a Vaikuntha man. But simultaneously he has a place in Mayapur.’ He said, ‘You are talking to me, I am in Navadvipa, I’ve got a place also there in Mayapur. But people with your envious mentality will never never be able to understand. Bhaktivinoda Thakura and his son Bhaktisiddhanta are executing pure devotional service to Sridhama Mayapur. And you are criticising.’ He fell down later on that so-called babaji.

So a very very powerful preacher, speciality was attacking mayavada also. ‘The evil fruit of India’, he called it, the mayavada philosophy. (laughs)

One time, they were going to Jagannath Puri with his disciples. Someone came up and gave him a box of mangoes, ripe mangoes. Of course Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati never ate ripe mangoes because when he was a small little boy he took a mango. Bhaktivinoda Thakura said, ‘Did you offer it? Was it offered? Why you are taking unoffered fruit?’ Bhaktisiddhanta was so sincere, he said, ‘Ok from now on I will never eat mango again!’ And Prabhupada said the whole life he never ate ripe mango. And if anybody ever offered to him he said, no I am sinful, I cannot eat mango. But he used to eat kuccha aam, green mango chutney, very nice. But he didn’t eat the ripe mango.

Anyway they gave a box of ripe mangoes. The trains were new in India, they weren’t so fast, so it was long time, long train journey to Puri. And these mangoes started to get a bit bad, a bit rotten. And on the journey there was a mayavadi. He was on the carriage and he was talking mayavada philosophy all the time and he was kind of having a joke that the devotees they are like sentimentalists and he was talking ice cold jnana of mayavada philosophy. So Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura said, ‘Bring the mangoes down!’ By that time some had become really bad. He said, ‘Pick out the worst ones!’ So they picked out really bad stinky ones. He said, ‘Go and offer to that mayavadi. Tell him, my guru is offering you a mango!’

So he took these mangoes and they were stinking, bad smell was coming. They gave it to the mayavadi, ‘Here please accept this from my Guru Maharaja.’ He said, ‘Bad smell is coming, they are all bad!’ No but you’ve been preaching for the last half an hour everything is one. kuccha mango, ripe mango, its all one, take it! So he couldn’t take it! So all the carriage, everyone was laughing at the mayavadi philosophy. He lost all of his credit. Everybody laughed, saw the futility of his philosophy.

He was known as simha guru, very very courageous.
It was seen in Calcutta one time, he was walking with his disciples. They said, ‘Guru Maharaja, look! Here comes that mayavadi sannyasi, big mayavadi with his disciples, coming this way!’ Bhaktisiddhanta he crossed over the road, directly walked straight up to him and slapped him on his face! Why you are teaching this philosophy which denies the living entities eternal love for Krishna? He could not reply. (laughs) Simhaguru! Jagadguru!

So yeah this was one lesson that he often used to tell to his disciples, to his preaches, and sannyasis that you don’t worry for anything. This Trivikrama, like they told him at the Yogapitha, we are all behind you, the whole parampara is behind you. So he often refers to Trivikrama, Vamanadeva. He took three steps, He stuck His toe through the universe with His second step, thats who is behind you, he said! He is Krishna, we are in His line. He is only this big, a little boy, but He can stick His toes, what can He not do? So remember this! Always behind you have, Trivikrama is behind you, what can you not achieve? If your protector, who you are have shelter of, who you are surrendering to, if He can put His second step in the universe, what cannot be achieved. So always be confident of who is behind you. Just go out and fearlessly preach! Have that courage!

So he was a very courageous preacher, very bold and he gives us this lesson that its just not us and our spiritual life. Their is a whole parampara there, there is a whole family still very much living and very much alive. So we are not alone, we have so many friends in our spiritual life ready to help us.

Jaya! Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura avirbhava mahotsava tithi ki jaya!
Srila Prabhupada ki jaya!
Samaveda Gaurabhakta vrnda ki jaya!
Nitai Gaurapremanande Hari Haribol!

We have commenced the stainless steel structure of the kalashes.

What you’re seeing now is the first segment for the small dome. There will be 3 more layers on top of that. This will give an indication of how big it will be. Soon we’ll start the kalash for the main dome.

The post Beginning of West Wing Kalash Installation. First Segment appeared first on Temple of the Vedic Planetarium.

21.02.2016 H.H.Indradumnya Swami_SB-06.05.23

February 29. ISKCON 50 – S.Prabhupada Daily Meditations.
Satsvarupa dasa Goswami: I Had So Much Hardship.
About the Jaladutta voyage to America, he said, “It is a great history. There were two days I had heart attacks on the ship. I had so much hardship.” We may only try to think of how Srila Prabhupada put up with such difficulties: vaiṣṇavera kriyā mudrā vijñeha nā bujhaya. One can never understand the mind of a great Vaisnava, and although we are advised not to try to read his mind, yet we may worship Prabhupada’s example of tolerance and distress. There is a great risk in assuming we can read devotees’ minds and motivations. Yet we can just remember that on the Jaladutta voyage to America, Prabhupada twice experienced heart attacks. And he continued to suffer strokes and many other maladies while discharging his duties on behalf of his spiritual master.
When we are physically disposed, we may also meditate on how Srila Prabhupada does not reject us because of illness, and how he did not stop because of hardships. We should not feel sorry for ourselves, or think that our spiritual master is unsympathetic to our material condition. He himself has gone through pain; he knows that we are sincere and that we will work more actively on his behalf if we were fit.
To read the entire article click here: http://www.dandavats.com/?p=20490&page=5

I Had So Much Hardship

QUESTION: What is the Vaishnava feeling on silent maha mantra mediation? I read that Prabhupada said that loud and silent Japa were both “good” as long as they were sincere.

I will reproduce an edit of a section from a previous post: Step One (of one): Improve Japa Chanting

Śrī Rūpa says that japa is “sulaghu” – “very light enunciation the mantra.” Don’t try to wake the dead. Chant very lightly. Aim to bring the sound to the inner ear by increasing the “lightness” of our enunciation.

Hari bhakti vilāsa identifies three valid approaches to japa (1) audible, (2) mouthed, (3) mental; saying that each one is more powerful than the one before it. Thus the opinion of the founders of Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇavism is that silent chanting is the most powerful, but they wouldn’t have enumerated three other types unless those other types were also useful. My conclusion here is that we have to proceed from audible chanting to mouthed chanting to silent chanting. Going straight to silent chanting prematurely is too difficult and amounts to almost not chanting anything at all.

In other words, though silent is best, for some people audible may be the best. If we are not very attentive, audible is better than silent because with audible chanting at least we are making the noise associated with the pure name. When silent chanting is inattentive we are doing nothing at all besides daydreaming. 

If we are not very attentive, audible is better than silent because with audible chanting at least we are making the noise associated with the pure name.

Silent chanting is not inaudible, it is heard by the internal ear. Everyone has and uses an internal ear all the time. Imagine some sound, and you are using your internal ear. When you dream you also often solely use your internal ear. Whenever you hear, actually, your external ear is merely feeding data to the internal ear, which is the actual sense of hearing itself.

The second type of japa (“mouthed”) is the transition from external to internal hearing. 

Silent chanting is the best because the focus is full. But if we do silent chanting prematurely, or as an imitation of something “advanced” we will still be rocking around, swaying, shaking beads, etc. so that we can keep progressing from one bead to the next without actually hearing the mantra with our inner ear at all.  With audible chanting, even on autopilot at least there’s some sound drifting in our ears occasionally catching our interest. With mental chanting, when we go to autopilot, what’s left? Basically nothing except wasted time.

Vraja Kishor das

www.vrajakishor.com

Tagged: Japa, Mantra Meditation, silent chanting

Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura appeared in Jagannatha Puri on February 6th 1874 as the son of Srila Sacidananda Bhaktivinoda Thakura. In his childhood he quickly mastered the Vedas, memorised the Bhagavad-Gita, and relished his father’s philosophical works. He became known as “The Living Encyclopaedia” for his vast knowledge.

 

He preached convincingly against casteism and philosophical deviations from Gaudiya Vaisnavism. He tried to unite the four Vaisnava sampradayas by publishing their teachings. Srila Sarasvati Thakura earned the title Nrsimha Guru for his fearless and powerful delivery of the Vaisnava siddhanta.

Besides being a courageous preacher, he was ornamented with all divine qualities and full of ecstatic love of God. He established 64 Gaudiya Math temples in India and for some time centres in Burma, England and Germany.

(Kadamba Kanana Swami, 21 February 2016, Durban, South Africa, Nityananda’s Appearance Day)

Srila Prabhupada’s spiritual master glorified him greatly for writing a poem in his Vyasa-puja offering and in that poem, one sentence was highlighted by Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakur. It was, ‘Absolute is sentient thou hast proved, impersonal calamity thou hast removed.’  

The English is a little bit classic and archaic but basically we can simplify it and it means that ‘the Lord has a heart’ and this is at the very core of our movement, that the Lord has a heart! It is said that the devotee is always in the heart of the Lord and the Lord is always in the heart of his devotee, there is a loving exchange.

So the compassion of Lord Nityananda is not an impersonal compassion – some sort of warm, wet blanket of loving feeling for every living species. No, it is very personal. Lord Nityananda gives causeless mercy to those who do not deserve it and even then, if they do not respond still he is loving. But when they start to respond, his heart goes on fire! ‘Absolute is sentient thou hast proved, impersonal calamity thou hast removed.’  Lord Nityananda has a heart and his heart is very deep and the love in his heart is very deep as he reciprocates with his devotees.

His mercy is causeless so it reaches out to whoever is in his reach, but whoever responds is showered with unlimited greater mercy and Lord Nityananda develops attachment to such a devotee. When the Lord has attachment to us, then you know how it is – when you are attached, your vision becomes covered by emotion, you begin to see things through those feelings, and you cannot see things neutrally any longer. So Lord Nityananda is not neutral! Lord Nityananda is overwhelmed by attachment to his devotees!

I am thinking for a moment of His Holiness Bhakti Tirtha Maharaj who in his final days was embodying that quality of attachment to the devotees. I thought about it – he was entering into such deep loving exchanges and crying in his final days. One might say, ‘Isn’t that attachment?’ Yes, but it was to the devotees – devotees who have somehow or other done service and who are trying so hard, who are such nice people, who are just wonderful people! Lord Nityananda sees in that way, experiences in that way. Therefore we are living in an intimate relationship with Lord Nityananda when we are engaged in devotional service.

By Madhava Smullen

“I am grateful to be able to serve in New Vrindaban,” said ISKCON New Vrindaban (INV) President Jaya Krsna Das, looking out at an audience of GBC, board members, temple residents, and community members.

He expressed the emotion as he introduced the Department Head Presentations on December 5^th, part of the biannual INV and ECO-Vrindaban (ECO-V) Board Meetings.

Looking back with fondness on 2015, Jaya Krsna said that the past year had seen INV and ECO-V’s organizational structures, led by 14 department heads, become smooth and stable.

“We started out in 2011 with many new department heads,” he said. “Now most are experienced, and have strong, cooperative relationships with each other.”

He added that visitors could see INV improving on many levels, including its welcoming mood and the physical upgrades to its buildings and facilities. As a result, many senior devotees are now visiting, as well as large numbers of locals through events like Festival of Colors.

Other developments, he said, were showing that “Krishna’s magic” is in full swing.

On their own volition, community members Sundari Dasi and Mercy started the Gopal’s Garden Preschool. Devotees banded together to start the Village Association, which will give New Vrindaban residents more influence on how their community is run. Second generation devotees who grew up in New Vrindaban have moved back, like Nityananda Dasi with her husband Vrajadhama, and Bhagavan with his wife Ananga Manjari. And two other devotee families are about to settle on their own land sold to them by INV.

The Department Head Reports of 2015 followed Jaya Krsna’s introduction, highlighting the stability and cooperative relationships he had praised.

The Deity Department, headed by Abhinandana Das, reported making regular improvements in the standards of worship, cooking and dressing. Particularly exciting was the news that Deity outfits are again being homemade in New Vrindaban, which was once famous all over ISKCON for having the best seamstresses and jewelry designers. So too was the news that in 2015 the Deity Dept. hosted a Deity Worship Ministry Pujari training program for 48 East Coast pujaris for the second consecutive year.

From Govinda’s Restaurant, Vasudeva Das said that visitor numbers had notably increased throughout the year. This was probably due in no small part to the expanded menu, with world cuisine like sushi, tacos, and lasagna, as well as doughnuts, cakes, and vegan items. New décor was also added, including a book table; and increased kitchen space and a new altar made the atmosphere more pleasant for staff.

Vasudeva also presented for Madri Dasi from the Devotee Kitchen, who had to return home to Northern Ireland to be take care of an urgent family matter. Madri introduced a much-needed more healthy, balanced diet for the devotees, a consistent cooking schedule, and the use of ghee rather than oil. The Devotee Kitchen was also brightened up with a newly painted hallway and new doors.

Palace Lodge manager Gaura Bhakta Das, reported that the Welcome Center is beginning to fulfill its central role – it’s now receiving all the mail for ISKCON New Vrindaban; has warm customer service from senior devotees Lilasuka and Lokadristi, and has become the first stop for all visitors. Meanwhile in the Lodge itself, four new rooms with attached bathrooms – one of them wheelchair accessible – have been added, with nine more planned for this summer.

“We’ve received a lot of positive feedback about the improvements in the facilities, and the way we take care of and welcome our guests,” says Jaya Krsna.

One newcomer to Krishna consciousness wrote to Jaya Krsna recently, listing the names of seven different devotees who had introduced themselves and talked to him.

Meanwhile in a Dandavats article, Taraka Das wrote that during his travels to various ISKCON temples, “The place that stood out for me as welcoming and warm was New Vrindaban. Every devotee that I encountered said, “Haribol. How are you?” or similar or just smiled. It warmed my heart!”

Another draw of New Vrindaban for visitors are its Festivals, reported on by Vrindavan Das. In 2015 hundreds participated in the Festival of Inspiration, the June and October 24-Hour Kirtans, and the Festival of Colors. Janmastami attendance tripled over the previous year, with 3,000 attendees. And devotees enjoyed a sweet community Rathayatra festival and an inspiring retreat with Bhakti Charu Swami.

Perhaps the highlight of the year, however, was the Srila Prabhupada’s Arrival Festival in Butler, PA, which saw 200 devotees tour the YMCA building where Prabhupada stayed, hold a huge Harinama on the way to the Agarwals’ old apartment, and praise the ISKCON Founder-Acharya in a Grand Ballroom event.

Vrindavan also presented the accomplishments of the Communications department, which had seven articles published in local newspapers about many of these festivals. Communications staff also improved the design and content of monthly email newsletter Brijabasi Spirit; created archives of New Vrindaban photos and articles from over the years; improved social networking; and published monthly articles on ISKCON News and Dandavats.

In Devotee Relations, Sukhavaha Dasi had a very busy year caring for residents. She offered personal development course The Hero’s Journey; had certified family life educator Krishnanandini Dasi give a couple’s course for future grihastas; and gave one-on-one counseling sessions to devotees with spiritual, emotional or financial challenges.

She also established a child protection team; brought ISKCON North American CPO Lilasuka Dasi to train its members; secured an apartment for a hospice for terminally ill devotees; and established experienced caretaker Jasoda Gokulananda to care for them.

The Congregational Development department with Gaura Nataraj Das, meanwhile, is caring for pilgrims. They offer them a japa introduction course, a visit to the goshala, and a guided Govardhana parikrama when they visit, as well as a live weekly class via webcam. The CD team also keeps in touch with pilgrims at home, sending them gifts for birthdays and anniversaries, calling them up regularly, counseling them in their personal lives, and encouraging them in their chanting. As a result, registration increased by 25%, long weekend turnout by 50%, and 1,500 new familes visited New Vrindaban and registered with the CD office.

Of course, to ensure all these departments run smoothly, good Accounting is essential. In 2015 Laxmi Honest upgraded to a new bank, Chase, that makes transactions much more efficient; and a new, more reliable payroll company that ensures devotees get their direct transfers on time. She also ensured that monthly closing is done and financial data presented to the Board within ten days.

Moving up from the temple to Prabhupada’s Palace, Jaya Krsna reported for Tripad Vibhuti Das that visitors increased 10% to about 20,000 in 2015. In addition, the first chattra was repainted, its pillars replaced, and work begun on the second; the Rose Garden was set on its way to becoming sustainable and chemical-free; and monthly Prabhupada sangas were held in Srila Prabhupada’s altar room.

At the Apartments, new department head Lalita Gopi Dasi did a major cleanup of the building, planted flowers, and cleared the maintenance shed. She also had the toilets fixed, bathroom renewed and the stairs and decks renovated. “The devotee tenants are really happy with how helpful and supportive she is,” says Jaya Krsna.

Finally in Facilities, Gopisa Das oversaw the infrastructure improvement that has drawn the appreciation of visitors. At Prabhupada’s Palace, he had the upper main stairs beautifully renovated by recycling the old pink granite, and adding new black granite treads with polished front edges. The parking lot was expanded from 15 spaces to 70. And contracts have been signed for a construction company to renovate the outer wall.

The Palace Lodge received a new floor in the community hall and attractive and durable new hardy board siding on the side facing the playground – which is also brand new and much safer for the children. The temple got insulated doors and windows to keep the heat in, an efficient gas furnace, a new roof over the guest wing with high quality lifetime shingles and Swiss Velux skylights.

Some of the cabins and apartments also received new roofs, the cracked sidewalks around the temple and Lodge were repaired, and two new apartment buildings are under construction.

Next, introducing the ECO-Vrindaban department head presentations, ECO-V Board Chair Bhima Walker summarized the year’s highlights.

2015, he said, had been all about building the ECO-V team. Two new managers were engaged and brought up to speed: Project Manager Mukunda Das, who started in May, and Garden and Ox Training Manager Nitai Candra Das, who joined the team in September.

Vyasasana Das completed exterior renovations on the once dilapidated Bahulaban Barn. It will now be used as a summer pasturing ground for retired milking cows and some of the elderly oxen.

The purchase of the former ISCOWP farm, which has been named Nandagram since the 1970s, was finalized the day before the presentations. The Nandagram Farm’s excellent ox training facility including barns and outbuildings — built over 20 years by Balabhadra and his crew – will be used to accommodate and train ECO-V’s three teams of young Brown Swiss oxen. The farm also includes two houses: one is already home to ECO-V Project Manager Mukunda and his wife Bhakti-lata, while the other will accommodate other staff members.

Following Bhima, new Garden and Ox Training manager Nitai Candra Das introduced himself. He described his four years of experience taking care of the ISKCON Escondido farm in California, which supplied local temples with vegetables and protected cow milk.

He then explained how he had put the New Vrindaban Community Gardens to bed for the winter; helped Vidya and her crew at the end of the growing season in the Teaching Garden; attended a restorative agriculture course with project manager Mukunda; and begun developing his relationship with the three ox teams. He hopes to have the oxen ready to take Prabhupada’s murti on a parikrama around New Vrindaban by fall 2016, and to take visitors by summer 2017.

Next Ananda Vidya Das reported steady success with the Cows. He and his wife Lalita Gopi are currently milking seven cows, with a yield of 17 gallons a day; keeping the Deity kitchen stocked with fresh butter, and even starting to make and supply ghee to the devotee and Deity kitchens. Two new calves, Shriya and Shiva, were born recently, and three more cows are pregnant and due in March.

Last but not least was new Project Manager Mukunda Das. Mukunda described how he had overseen repairs at the milking Goshala and Palace Rose Garden, including a full renovation on the Rose Garden’s greenhouse with a new fan system, heaters, and electricity upgrade. He also fully renovated the long-neglected conference room at the ECO-Vrindaban Valley Barn, which will now be used for meetings on a regular basis.

Another major part of Mukunda’s work is community building – every week, he leads a number of ISKCON New Vrindaban department heads in exercises on how to deepen their relationships and interactions with co-managers, staff, and guests. He also serves as the chair and secretary of the Steering Committee that is developing the New Vrindaban Village Association.

“During previous years, ECO-Vrindaban spent a lot of time clarifying its mission,” says Bhima in summary. “2015 was all about building a team to realize that vision. And 2016 is the year we anticipate major progress in the gardens, ox training, and facilities upgrades.” He grins. “ECO-V is gonna make a splash!”

“In general, 2015 was a very successful year for both INV and ECO-V,” Jaya Krsna concludes. “We made a lot of progress on many levels. Now we have cooperative, stable teams which allow us to better serve Srila Prabhupada and Sri Sri Radha Vrindabanchandra. And that gives us a lot of potential for the future.”

The fifth day of the ILS was the Appearance Day of His Divine Grace Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakura, the spiritual master of Srila Prabhupada. ILS delegates were given a break from seminars on this holy day so that they could spend a day in prayers, meditation, hearing and chanting.

Congregational Preachers to be awarded in Sridham Mayapur!
This year, for the first time ever, we will be hosting our annual award ceremony during the ISKCON Leadership Sanga in front of all the leaders. We will be awarding those devotees around the world who have done an outstanding service in the area of congregational preaching.
During the 2016 Annual Award Ceremony, the congregational ministry will recognize devotees in a variety of areas. From pioneers and supporters of the preaching mission to those who have had long-term achievements with their congregations, or in the area of production of preaching material and even those devotees who may have given substantial financial contributions for the preaching will receive due recognition for their endeavours. Another important award is for those devotees who travel far and wide trying to encourage and train congregational devotees in their spiritual life. Other significant areas are prison preaching, festivals and youth.
In celebration of ISKCON’s 50th year, we are humbly presenting medallions to devotees who have made exceptional progress in their preaching endeavors.
To read the entire article click here: https://goo.gl/Es2AFv

28^th February 2016, Mayapur, India

By Romapada Das

The fifth day of the ILS was the Appearance Day of His Divine Grace Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakura, the spiritual master of Srila Prabhupada. ILS delegates were given a break from seminars on this holy day so that they could spend a day in prayers, meditation, hearing and chanting.

After mangala-arati, His Holiness Niranjana Swami and His Holiness Radhanatha Swami delivered a special class to mark the occasion.

Niranjana Swami explained that one can learn Prabhupada’s mood of humility from his diary entry on board the Jaladuta on 10^th September 1965, where he says, ‘Today the ship is plying very smoothly. I feel today better. But I am feeling separation from Sri Vrindaban and my Lords Sri Govinda, Gopinath, Radha Damodar. The only solace is Sri Chaitanya Charitamrita in which I am tasting the nectarine of Lord Chaitanya’s Leela. I have left Bharat Bhumi just to execute the order of Sri Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati in pursuance of Lord Chaitanya’s order. I have no qualification, but I have taken up the risk just to carry out the order of His Divine Grace. I depend fully on Their mercy so far away from Vrindaban.’

“The criteria of the devotees’ success is not that he thinks ‘I am authorised, therefore I am qualified’. One should think, ‘I am authorised, but I need to be aware of my lack of qualifications, and will always become dependent on the Lord’. Success is always guaranteed to those who are conscious of their subordinate position,” said Niranjana Swami to the delegates, many of whom had lined up 30 minutes before the lecture to hear the two speakers. “Srila Prabhupada always gave credit to his higher authorities, his spiritual master and Lord Chaitanya, and never took credit for himself.”

Niranjana Swami recollected how Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraaswati Thakura instructed Srila Prabhupada in 1936 to push the Krishna consciousness movement to the English speaking world.

“Srila Prabhupada told us that if we strictly try to serve the spiritual master seriously, Krishna will give us all facilities,” concluded Niranjana Swami. “Therefore he requested us to please take this movement seriously. Prabhupada told us, ‘I shall go away and you will live, but you should push this movement’. The rest is dependent on ourselves – in how we keep ourselves in this humble and subordinate position.”

In the next address, Radhanatha Swami recalled Srila Prabhupada’s instructions delivered on a previous appearance day of Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakura. “Srila Prabhupada told his followers that Lord Chaitanya had instructed all those born in India to accept this message and share it with the world. He explained that it was Srila Bhaktivinoda Thaura’s desire that people from the West and the East should accept this movement equally. Bhaktivinoda Thakura has asked: Oh, when will that day come when people from America, England, France, Germany and Russia will take up karatals and mridangas and chant Hare Krishna in their towns?”

Radhanatha Swami mentioned that Srila Prabhupada always felt the presence of his Guru Maharaja, and never felt alone. “After one year, Srila Prabhupada had only $200 left from the sale of his books. He invested everything he had in renting 26, Second Avenue. He had nothing more. In this way, Srila Prabhupada was always reminding us that our existence is fully reliant on how we humble ourselves, and how we depend on our spiritual master, and Lord Chaitanya.”

Radhanatha Swami read out a letter from Srila Prabhupada in which he ended the letter by saying, “I am trying a little bit and you are all helping me. So, I have to thank you more. You are actually the representatives of my Guru Maharaja… because you are helping me in executing the order of my Guru Maharaja.”

Radhanatha Swami explained that in the recording, Prabhupada said his last words in a choked voice. He urged everyone to keep aside differences, since they were all insignificant and did not matter in light of the instructions from our spiritual masters.

“This is Kali Yuga,” said Radhanatha Swami at the end of his address. “Kali knows he cannot strike the movement from outside, but only from inside, when we fight over petty issues. So let us chant humbly and let us pray, and let us cry…so that we can reciprocate with Srila Prabhupada by being united.”

After the two classes, over 1000 ILS delegates led by Lokanatha Swami went on a parikrama to the Samadhi temple of Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakura. They returned after paying respects at various holy sites such as Srivasa Angan and the Yogapitha temple.

After offering pushpanjali to Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakura, a huge feast was served, followed by a kirtan festival which lasted six hours in the evening.

“This has been a day for reflections, prayers, chanting and katha,” said Devaki Dasi from Bhaktivedanta Manor, London. “It is an appropriate break from our seminars on such an auspicious day. We can now go back to our discussions tomorrow, feeling rejuvenated and re-energised.”

THINK 50! Act 50!

Beautiful Vrindavana (Album with 112 HR photos)
Srila Prabhupada: These four principles: Always think of Krishna, become Krishna’s devotee, worship Krishna and offer your respect, obeisances to Krishna. That’s all. This is Krishna consciousness. Hyderabad, November 17, 1972.
Find them here: https://goo.gl/SpRQ87

Harinama at Burleigh Heads (a suburb on the Gold Coast in Queensland, Australia) - 28 February 2016 (Album with photos)
Srila Prabhupada: The principle of chanting is to glorify the Lord and not to attract a crowd. If Krishna hears nicely then he will ask some sincere devotee to gather in such place. Letter to Subala, November 12, 1967.
Find them here: https://goo.gl/vU0sfQ

Bonds of Love: Brahmi Devi Dasi.
Brahmi Dasi: My first memory of our beloved Srila Prabhupada was my discovery of him in a book I found in a secondhand bookshop called Krsna Consciousness: The Topmost Yoga System. I also found Easy Journey to Other Planets. I was so intrigued by these titles that I bought them both. One paragraph made such an impression on me. It was, as I remember it, “Why are we sending all these young men to the war in Vietnam when there is a fighting class of men?” That is when I recognized my spiritual master, and I said aloud to myself, “This man is beautiful.” I looked at the back of one of the books, saw the number of the Toronto temple, and called and asked if I could visit. When I was told I could, I took my baby daughter, Visakha, and went to meet the devotees.
I have loved Srila Prabhupada from the moment I read that first one of his books. He has been my life and soul from that moment on. I am, by Krishna’s mercy, now in a 77-year-old body – in the dwindling stage, to be precise. When I think of how my life would have been without Srila Prabhupada’s loving guidance and teachings – well, I shudder to think about it.
I first saw Srila Prabhupada in person at my initiation in West Virginia. We were like excited children, and I felt completely inadequate and unworthy. When I approached his dear lotus feet, he looked at me with his beautiful, noble, dark eyes and said, “Your name is Brahmi Devi.” I felt so ashamed to dare to stand before him. He was sitting on a vyasasana outside in the open, and all the devotees present were looking at that glorious figure of nobility and purity with adoring eyes. We were all his children, lost in the material world and coming to his dear lotus feet for security. There was a dog sitting under his vyāsāsana. When the devotees tried to move him, he said, “Leave him there.” How fortunate to be that dog!
Well, we simply felt jubilant to have Srila Prabhupada with us. The joy of it all! I remember dancing in the temple with maybe fifty devotees, and there was a devotee who had been a ballet dancer. He was jumping high in the air while the rest of us danced in unison, like in a ballet. I swear I felt time stand still, my heart felt such joy I couldn’t feel my feet touch the floor. The arati bell was ringing, and I just felt suspended in time.
I felt had this before in the Toronto temple during Radhastami – the fire sacrifice, the chanting of the maha-mantra, and time suspended, just the chanting of Hare Krishna.
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Varnasrama series.

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Radhe Kaise Na Jale Bharata Natyam Candrakanta and Narayan’s Wedding (7 min video)
Champakalata Devi Dasi: With guest dancer Malini Devi, our Padma Academy dance troupe presented Radha Kaise Na Jale from the movie Lagaan performed in Bharatanatyam style. Malini (playing Krishna) is a student of Srimati Viji Prakash of Shakti Dance Company and Champakalata (playing Radha) is a student of Srimati Sudha Chandrasekhar of Hindu Temple Rhythms. Both dance gurus come in line from the famous Tanjor gurus of Sri Raja Rajeshwari Bharata Natya Kala Mandir in Mumbai.
We danced for the occasion of Candrakanta and Narayan’s wedding on February 26th, 2016 and especially chose this song as a gift to the bride. Please excuse the “rough” beginning as we could barely hear the music at first. But once those drums kicked in, we were off! …into the land of Vraja where Radha and Krishna enact Their lila.
Dancers as seen in the line-up at the end: Right to Left (since the camera pans that way) Ramani Shiromani, Rupa Kishori, Karika, Champakalata, Malini, Kali Lalita, Tarani, Vinodini, Shrida, Nadia.
Watch it here: https://goo.gl/3Ci1fc

ISKCON-Delhi - Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakur Appearance (Album with photos)
Srila Prabhupada: There are two ways of association—by vani and by vapuh. Vani means words, and vapuh means physical presence. Physical presence is sometimes appreciable and sometimes not, but vani continues to exists eternally. Bombay, November 10, 1974.
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Photos from Sridama Das

By Romapada Das

On the fourth day of the ILS, delegates at the plenary session heard a presentation by Anuttama Das, GBC Minister for Communications on the topic, ‘Srila Prabhupada, the greatest communicator’. He explained that we normally associate Prabhupada with his books, letters, conversations and speeches, but we should also remember that Prabhupada was a skilful communicator.

“Prabhupada tried to create a favourable environment for preaching Krishna consciousness by meeting influential leaders of the day such as Allen Ginsberg, Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, George Harrison, and others. He met several religious leaders, VIPs, government leaders, and businessmen,” said Anuttama Das. “Prabhupada made it clear that he did not want to convert everyone or make them into devotees. Instead he wanted influential people to become ‘sympathisers’ so that a favourable environment could be created for spreading Krishna consciousness.”

Stressing the importance of how much communication mattered to ISKCON in the 21st century, Anuttama concluded, “We generally emulate Prabhupada to build temples, distribute books, make devotees and distribute prasadam. But we should also emulate him and follow his communicating strategies. The question every ISKCON temple should ask itself is: are we communicating like Prabhupada wanted us to?”

Almost 1200 delegates and presenters at the ILS have been fed three full meals every day by the organisers. The massive task of cooking these meals is being overseen by Bhavamrita Krishna Das from Mayapur. A team of over 30 devotees cut, clean and chop big mounds of vegetables, cook in large vats and woks, and transfer the cooked prasadam to big drums3.

“There are many western devotees at ILS, hence we are careful with the amount of spice we use in the prasadam,” said Bhavamrita Krishna. “We try to maintain variety in tastes and diversity in the cuisine by including South Indian, Punjabi, Bengali, Chinese, Italian and continental dishes every day. It is our great fortune to cook for so many senior Vaishnavas who are assembled together at the holy dham in the service of Srila Prabhupada.”

Complimenting the cooking team of 30, is the large service team of 100 devotees that transfers the cooked prasadam from the kitchen to the dining areas and carefully serves them to the ILS delegates.

Vanamali Mukunda Das, a sankirtan devotee who has been staying in Mayapur for seven years, is one of the 100 people who serve prasadam to the delegates. He feels that serving senior Vaishnavas at the holy dham of Mayapur is a rare opportunity that makes him a happier person. “When Vaishnavas are happy, the Lord is happy too,” he commented. “We feel so energised to see senior sannyasis, GBC members, Temple Presidents and ISKCON leaders all gathered together in the dining area, and even more so when we see them appreciate the prasadam and the service.”

The variety and range of different cuisines was appreciated by several ILS delegates.

“We are spoilt for choice,” laughed Vijnan Rajsatyal from Nepal. “The different tastes are balanced and the invigorating recipes are nutritious. Even if we eat a little bit, we feel totally satisfied. The devotees who serve the prasadam are truly humble and care for every small detail. I have so much to learn from them in terms of Vaishnava etiquette.”

Paramvyoma Das from Brazil has visited India fifteen times and tasted prasadam at innumerable locations in the country. “I feel that this is the best prasadam I have eaten in India in all my 15 visits. This is because the food is not too spicy, and also because of the incredible number of gourmet dishes and flavours they serve.”

Laxmimoni Dasi who oversees the organising and logistical parts of the ILS on behalf of the GBC Strategic Planning Committee is committed to maintaining the quality of the cooking and the service. “However, we need help to maintain the same quality for the ILS. In addition, many devotees who are not formally registered for ILS do walk in and ask us for prasadam. If we had more donations, we would be able to feed all of them too. We appeal to all generous devotees out there to please consider sponsoring the prasadam service at ILS, which is such a pleasing part of the whole event.”

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Speaker: HG Vaisesika Prabhu
Venue: Mayapur Chandrodaya Mandir
Date: 27 Feb 2016

Reading from Srimad Bhagavatam Ninth Canto, Chapter 11, Text 25.

sri-badarayanir uvaca
athadisad dig-vijaye
bhratrms tri-bhuvanesvarah
atmanam darsayan svanam
purim aiksata sanugah

Translation
“Sukadeva Gosvami replied: After accepting the throne of the government by the fervent request of His younger brother Bharata, Lord Ramacandra ordered His younger brothers to go out and conquer the entire world, while He personally remained in the capital to give audience to all the citizens and residents of the palace and supervise the governmental affairs with His other assistants.”

My humble obeisances to all the exalted Vaisnavas. Thank you very much for this opportunity to be with you. In this purport Prabhupada comes to this military terminology, Prabhupada’s vira rasa, where he wants to fight with the world to speak Krishna consciousness is evident in the way he wrote his letters when he wrote at the top of them ‘Camp Baroda’, ‘Camp Los Angeles’ and he saw it as a war against maya. In fact he used military terminology when he talked about book distribution. He said, ‘We are fighting with maya. It’s a war. And to fight maya means to go out and drop hundreds and millions of books into the laps of conditioned souls. Just like during war time people drop bombs.’

So in this verse also which is talking about the way in which Lord Ramachandra sent out His brothers to conquer the different directions which was the custom at that time. Prabhupada immediately relates it to the sankirtana movement and how one must become dig-vijaya and that way that one becomes dig-vijaya is to take the open order of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu. And that is about the best deal there is in the whole universe because Caitanya Mahaprabhu’s words’s are inviting us to engage in the sankirtana movement and as Prabhupada phrases it, it’s an open order. That means anybody can take it at any time to their full capacity, whatever capacity one has, one can take that order and when one takes the order of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, its immediate that one becomes connected to the internal energy of the Lord because as Srila Prabhupada says in the Second Canto of the Srimad Bhagavatam in relationship to the catur sloki Bhagavatam, that the direct order of the Lord is a manifestation of His internal potency. It is by that potency that one comes to see the Lord face to face. So it is pretty exciting there is an open order, isn’t it?

So what is the open order. Its just a small thing that can be taken care of within a few days, right! And not much room for many people. No! Its open for the whole world, the whole universe. Anywhere and everywhere one can go and spread this sankirtana movement. Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu is deputising everybody as a representative who just takes the open order. In fact when Prabhupada was speaking to the devotees who were asking him about how the movement would go on, and specifically they were asking how about initiation, how would that go on? Prabhupada had a few things to say and then he interjected as an afterthought, he said that ‘One who understands the order of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu, he can become guru, or one who understands the order of his spiritual master which is the same order, he can become guru.’ And this is the prerequisite, one simply has to understand that there is an open order, that Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu is the Supreme Personality of Godhead and one has to take the order.

So leadership is defined in the Fifth Canto of the Srimad Bhagavatam as the ability to understand this principle that one must deliver people and I love the word Prabhupada uses in this purport, he says induce. At first it sounds like when you are inducing somebody it may be a little bit aggressive. Does it to you? Just a little bit, maybe! I looked at the word. It comes from Latin, inducere which means to lead, ducere means ‘to lead’ and in means ‘in’. So inducere means to lead someone in a particular direction. So to inducing means to bring somebody along in the right direction. Well not necessarily in the right direction but in our case following the order of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu and the spirit of the sastra, which I mentioned in Fifth Canto,

gurur na sa syat sva-jano na sa syat
pita na sa syaj janani na sa syat
daivam na tat syan na patis ca sa syan
na mocayed yah samupeta-mrtyum (SB 5.5.18)

Didn’t get it completely perfect the second time either, but the verse says that whatever kind of leader one is attempting to become or whatever leadership roll one is taking, whether its as a diksa guru or as a mother or a father or any worshipable position. Whatever position one is either asserting oneself for or finds oneself suddenly pushed into, which often is the case, one should keep this principle in mind, na mocayed yah samupeta-mrtyum. One’s idea should be to induce people to become free from birth, death, old age and disease and take to Krishna consciousness. Its an inducement.

In fact the whole material world if you think about it is a huge chance for Krishna to induce the living entities to go back home, back to Godhead. It’s the srishti lila, during which in the exhalation of Maha Visnu there is unlimited opportunities for living entities to come in contact with the various incarnations of the Lord, the various representatives of the Lord, the Ganges, different sastras, and its mentioned also in the Srimad Bhagavatam that the process of destruction takes place when Anantadeva becomes a little annoyed, actually angry it says. Annoyed is a more modern word. (laughs) He becomes angry that the living entities who have being offered so much opportunity to take to Krishna consciousness and Prabhupada says in the purport – to close down their business in this material world. Everyone’s got a little business going on, they have a little chip in the game here and Krishna comes along and gives a better deal, much better deal and says you kn ow, ‘Just close your business. I’ll take care of you, go back to Godhead.’ But people keep playing in here, keep playing their little business game and they don’t close it down, they don’t listen. So Prabhupada says, Anantadeva becomes angry. And from the forehead of Sankrsana comes out the eleven Rudras. They come shooting out of His eyebrows and they begin their dance of destruction, they burn down this universe because people aren’t using it properly.

So this indicates the intention of the Lord for the world. And the open order is that one can help Him in the mission which is to induce people, to lead them, to bring them closer to Krishna. And in the Caitanya Caritamrta Antya Lila its mentioned that Haridasa Thakura was particularly dear to the Lord. Prabhupada says, he understood Caitanya Mahaprabhu’s mind that He was in anxiety because the living entities are suffering in the material world. Caitanya Mahaprabhu’s anxiety can be relieved by those who take the open order and go out and induce people to take to Krishna consciousness. And Srila Prabhupada says that this is how one become an intimate devotee of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu, by taking this idea to induce the living entities to come back.

As far as our organisation goes, our organization meaning our ISKCON society, there is a way in which we are organised around this principle as well and it seem natural that when we keep this principle in the center, of inducing those who come, leading those who come to Krishna consciousness, to hear and chant about Krishna, to come closer to Him. And the leaders also, a leader means one who also takes this very seriously. I particularly noted the first verse in the Upadesamrta which says that one who can control all of one’s urges,

vaco vegam manasah krodha-vegam
jihva-vegam udaropastha-vegam
etan vegan yo visaheta dhirah
sarvam apimam prthivim sa sisyat (Sri Upadesamrta (1))

That one who is controlled becomes a teacher for everyone else in the universe, its says everyone becomes his sisya, his disciple. So first of all one must, one has the opportunity to carefully take up the process of Krishna conciseness and cultivate it and by that one feels inspired and then can lead others by that potency and can induce other people to take to Krishna consciousness.

So leadership means, first one must be the leader of one’s senses, which are described in another sastra to be like bad masters and one has to overcome the bad masters of the senses.

kamadinam kati na katidha palita durnidesas
tesam jata mayi na karuna na trapa nopasantih
utsrjyaitan atha yadu-pate sampratam labdha-buddhis
tvam ayatah saranam abhayam mam niyunksvatma-dasye (Bhakti-rasamrta-sindhu (3.2.35)

The devotee who is advancing says, for how long and how many ways have I obeyed the bad masters of my senses but no longer will I obey them. They have never given me time off. They have never given me mercy and I never questioned them. But now my intelligence has awakened, labdha-buddhi, and now I am looking for personal service to Krishna, no longer serving my senses.

So this the foundational point of our Krishna consciousness movement, of our leadership, is to become the leader of one’s own senses. And to aspire for and be engaged in service to Krishna and Krishna’s devotees. And then one can go out as the dig-vijaya, as Srila Prabhupada is mentioning in this purport, Lord Ramachandra sent out His younger brothers to conquer all the world. So Prabhupada says we must also do the same thing, and this is victory. So victory over one’s senses and then one can go out…(reads from the purport of SB9.11.25)

“This is the order of the Lord, who speaks as the supreme emperor. Everyone should be induced to accept this order, for this is victory (dig-vijaya).”

And inducing people all over the world to take to Krishna consciousness. We see Caitanya Mahaprabhu did in various ways. He took sannyasa as an expedient measure to allow people to honour Him so they would make advancement in Krishna consciousness. And Sarvabhauma Bhattacarya, he was very patient with Prakasananda Sarasvati, he was very humble. But his full intention was to induce them to take to Krishna consciousness. So there are various ways of inducing people.

There is a devotee of Lord Nityananda whose name was Gadadhara dasa and he was given the mission to go all over town, door to door, and induce people to chant Hare Krishna and he was angry with the Kazi because the Kazi was trying to hinder the sankirtana movement. So he went right in the Kazi’s house and he began screaming out that the Kazi had to come down, he had to take to Krishna consciousness and the Kazi came down, normally a very brutal kind of person but he was a little amused by the audacity of Gadadhara dasa and said, ‘Listen why don’t you go home! Maybe I’ll take to this Hare Krishna chanting another day!’ Gadadhara dasa began to dance in ecstacy and said, ‘Why do I have to wait for another day? You just said Hare Krishna!’ This is the prerogative of the devotees. They are always trying to induce people to chant Hare Krishna.

And it reminds me when we are going door to door, not too long ago, I think it was in San Deigo, or Laguna beach, anyway somewhere in Southern California, there are all these apartments that you can go to. There are so many, you can’t even count them all in one life time and behind them are people just sitting in there, as Prabhupada said in his poem before he came to America, looking down the road waiting to see when are Nitai and Gaura going to come and rescue me! If you are wondering what people were doing in there, thats what they are doing! They are looking out of the window, ‘When are Nitai and Gaura coming to rescue me?’ So when you knock on the door don’t be surprised if they are happy to see you.

And I knocked on one door, there was a very nicely dressed gentlemen in his early forties, he was on way to work. He managed a fast food restaurant and he was a devout Christian and a very civil person. And he talked to us for a while and declined our inducement to purchase a book. So then we tried to induce him in another way by saying, ‘Do you believe in the power of prayer?’ And he said, ‘Yes I do!’ I handed him a card and I said, ‘Then this is a beautiful prayer in Sanskrit that’s meant to wake up pure love for God in your heart. Repeat after me. Are you ready?’ Which is what I usually say, because people might say no! So I say, ‘Are you ready!’ And then he said, ‘Oh no! I can’t do that!’ And there were several devotees, maybe about seven, we were watching him and taking to him and he gave a long explanation and he said, ‘Yeah, I just cant do this!’ I said, ‘Can’t do what?’ And he goes, ‘Say Hare Krishna!’ (laughter) And all the devotees who were standing there went, ‘Haribol!’ They were so happy that he said Hare Krishna! And according to the sastra,

aho bata sva-paco ’to gariyan
yaj-jihvagre vartate nama tubhyam
tepus tapas te juhuvuh sasnur arya
brahmanucur nama grnanti ye te (SB 3.33.7)

Devahuti says, oh how wonderful it is, somebody if they just one time say Hare Krishna, even the tip of their tongue, even just one time, then this person is the greatest amongst all the other kinds of living entities. It is considered by sastra they have already performed so many pious works, gone to many pilgrimage places, so forth. They are qualified people, become elevated so quickly.

So in the overall, the over arching goal of the Krishna consciousness movement is to take to Krishna consciousness very seriously. One of the ways in which we can connect ourselves and induce ourselves to always think of Krishna is by everyday reading the Bhagavad Gita because Krishna is personally present there and speaking to us directly.

So to that end we started an organization called CHAD, A Chapter A Day, where everyone has the right if they would like to. No one can stop you. Even if you are put in prison you can still do this, to chant one chapter of Bhagavad Gita a day. Try it and see. If somebody tries to stop you, just say, ‘No, I won’t stop! I am going to chant Hare Krishna! And read my chapter of Bhagavad Gita every day!’

And so if you chant one chapter of the Bhagavad Gita everyday then you’ll stay close to Krishna because He is personally present in the Bhagavad Gita. And also reading Srimad Bhagavatam which is, where Prabhupada is most available in his purports. Just by staying close to the Srimad Bhagavatam everyday, everyone can be guided very properly by hearing his purports. And sometimes it seems intimidating to read the whole Srimad Bhagavatam. But if one divides it up into small segments and reads a measured amount everyday, one can finish the whole Bhagavatam within a given period of time.

So if you read just 8 pages of the Bhagavatam everyday, you’ll finish the whole Bhagavatam in five years. And you’ll be five years older in five years anyway. But if you read the whole Bhagavatam in five years then you’ll conquer maya and you’ll be directly connected to Krishna in a very profound way. And if you read 41 pages everyday of the Bhagavatam, you’ll finish in just one year.

So this is the inspirational part of this purport that I picked up about dig-vijaya, conquer the senses and take this spirit out and induce people to chant Hare Krishna and organise whatever community you have, and whatever project you are doing around this principle of guiding people to hear and chant and the spirit of going out and giving Krishna consciousness to other people.

And now I am going to take a few reflections just to see if we can pull something else out.

HH Kesava Bharati Maharaja: Thank you very much Vaisesika Prabhu for this inspirational class. (audio indistinct)

HG Vaisesika Prabhu: Kesava Bharati Maharaja says he found this to be an inspirational class. He’d like to document the last point that I made, about how important it is to read all of Srila Prabhupada’s books and to continue reading them for the rest of all lives. Not just start reading other things until one has assimilated what Srila Prabhupada has given. In the Madhya lila Chaper 25, text 178, there is a wonderful purport. He is going to try to repeat it, verbatim.

“Everyone connected to the Krishna consciousness movement must read all the books that have been published. Otherwise after some time, they will simply eat and sleep and fall down and miss the opportunity for an eternal life of bliss and knowledge.”

Hare Krishna!

(Applause for HH Kesava Bharati Maharaja!)

HG Vaisesika Prabhu: Yes. Just something else about inducement on my mind and that is that, living entities in this world are called tatastha. And tatastha means that they are open to suggestion. You can experiment with this but living entities everywhere, if you make a suggestion to them, they will consider it. And Krishna consciousness movement is meant to give this very strong suggestion to people that they can improve their lives, they can go back to Godhead simply by taking to Krishna consciousness. And everything we do is going towards helping the living entities do that, jive doya, krsna-nama—sarvva-dharma-sara, (Ajna-Tahal, Bhaktivinoda Thakura) The essence of our process is to show mercy to the living entities by widely distributing the holy name of Krishna.

One more? Yes?

Devotee: What about listening to Prabhupada lectures?

HH Vaisesika Prabhu: Yes, you could get all the Prabhupada lectures and you can even get them in chronological order and then you can go through each one and listen to them from the very beginning to the very end and then start over again. And in that way you can constantly hear from Srila Prabhupada.

Someone else?

vañcha-kalpatarubhyas ca
krpa-sindhubhya eva ca
patitanam pavanebhyo
vaisnavebhyo namo namah

Gaurapremanande Hari Haribol!

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From Sri Mayapur Chandrodaya Mandir

Date: February 21, 2016 Speaker: HH Bhakti Vidya Purna Maharaj

Subject: S.B.7.1.45-46

TEXTS 45-46

tatrāpi rāghavo bhūtvā

nyahanac chāpa-muktaye

rāma-vīryaṁ śroṣyasi tvaṁ

mārkaṇḍeya-mukhāt prabho

TRANSLATION

Nārada Muni continued: My dear King, just to relieve Jaya and Vijaya of the brāhmaṇas’ curse, Lord Rāmacandra appeared in order to kill Rāvaṇa and Kumbhakarṇa. It will be better for you to hear narrations about Lord Rāmacandra’s activities from Mārkaṇḍeya.

tāv atra kṣatriyau jātau

mātṛ-ṣvasrātmajau tava

adhunā śāpa-nirmuktau

kṛṣṇa-cakra-hatāṁhasau

TRANSLATION

In their third birth, the same Jaya and Vijaya appeared in a family of kṣatriyas as your cousins, the sons of your aunt. Because Lord Kṛṣṇa has struck them with His disc, all their sinful reactions have been destroyed, and now they are free from the curse.

PURPORT

In their last birth, Jaya and Vijaya did not become demons or Rākṣasas. Instead they took birth in a very exalted kṣatriya family related to Kṛṣṇa’s family. They became first cousins of Lord Kṛṣṇa and were practically on an equal footing with Him. By personally killing them with His own disc, Lord Kṛṣṇa destroyed whatever sinful reactions were left in them because of the curse of the brāhmaṇas. Nārada Muni explained to Mahārāja Yudhiṣṭhira that by entering Kṛṣṇa’s body, Śiśupāla reentered Vaikuṇṭhaloka as the Lord’s associate. Everyone had seen this incident.

………………………………………………………………

HH Bhakti Vidya Purna Maharaj

The point of discussion is about the equalness of the Lord, because we have our own particular idea of what equalness should look like. Sometimes the Lord’s actual nature of equalness is hard to appreciate. It seems that so many people get benefit and so many people get difficulties. Nice people are getting difficulties, not so nice people are getting benefits. What is the position, how do you judge equalness? This is the actual crux of the whole spiritual and material consciousness. What do you use as the factor of judgement?

How do you define something? There are unlimited ways you can define, depending on all the varieties of mundane consciousness. Spiritual consciousness has only one way to define it. That makes it easy.

Once you get to spiritual world, whatever aspect is in there, Vaikuntha, Dvarka, Vraja, they all think in one way. It’s all about the connection to Krishna, the pleasure of Krishna. Therefore, there, the decision making point is about how it pleases Krishna. From there you work back into your particular mood, your particular relationship, the particular nature of the rasa that you are serving in. So that will have its unique expression. The central point is always about the Lord’s pleasure, nothing else.

In the material world, then, because every living entity is thinking about themselves, then our view is going to be based on what’s good for me. So something that is not nice, but may good for me, I’ll say it’s nice, but if it’s not good for me, then I’ll say it’s not good. Then we become confused.

From the transcendental platform it is simply, what does Krishna want, what does He like, what pleases Him as a person? That’s what is defined in sastra. Sastra defines what pleases Krishna.

Depending upon the individuals, their particular conditioning, their values and interests, then the pleasure of Krishna will be presented in a variety of ways. From more subtle, more metaphysical, more gross, more intellectual, more sentimental, more attachment or more detachment, any combination.

All the different sastras give the same points, they just use different words to explain it.

Just like you have synonyms, they explain the same thing. But depending on the flavor, the mood, or the situation, you use a different word. The sastras are like that. All they are defining is what pleases Krishna.

What is comes down to is that since it is about Krishna, then how He constructs things, how He arranges things, is going to make for His pleasure. Someone who follows the Vedic recommendation, whether it is known or unknown, will please Krishna. If you know it and you follow it then that will please Him more. If you don’t know it and you follow it, then it’s nice. It’s better than not following.

That is actually the bottom line. How close is it to what Krishna wants. What does He like as a person. That’s why you will see that somebody who is not necessarily a nice person may somehow or another being doing something right.

Let’s say like Robin Hood. You steal from the rich. Stealing is never good. It doesn’t matter if they are rich or poor, it doesn’t matter who they are. Stealing is not proper. But then he gives in charity. He takes gives to people who are in need. That part is good. The other part is not good. For one part he will get a bad reaction and for the other part he will get a good reaction. It’s not that oh he is a thief, everything is bad.

It’s based on what you do. What part is good, is good. What part is not, is not. To take things a bit further, there is the intent on why you’re doing it.

Now, he’s stealing from the rich and giving to the poor. What’s his intent on doing that? That will also have a flavor. Now if he’s giving to the poor because he wants to be well known and famous among that group of people, then he will get less benefit. If you are proud of your charity then you lose the benefit. You boast yes, I gave this much, you know, this and that. You will lose the benefit. Intent is also there.

We see this combination. Krishna is sitting in the heart, He knows what you think. He knows what you feel. He knows why you do everything. That’s the whole point. He knows all of these things. Depending on how you deal, He responds. If you do things right, you get a good result. If you do things wrong then you get a bad result. That’s the equality.

For every living entity, no matter who they are or how they deal, Krishna will see in this way. Therefore, it doesn’t matter your position, you will be taken care of according to how you are reciprocating with Him either directly or indirectly.

Then you have the devotees. That will be a step beyond. For the general public, that’s called sthana, that’s just the maintenance of the universe. For the devotees though it is nourishment. He’s nourishing them because they are doing it consciously with devotion.

Therefore, for the other things, you do one unit and you get one unit – one unit good you get one unit good, one unit bad and you get one unit bad. But for the devotees, because they are doing something to please Krishna then they get so much more, so much greater. The results are much more. Therefore, nourishment.

This, then, is bewildering in general because you can’t tell why people are getting such good situations, who don’t seemingly deserve it. Why do these things happen? For the devotee, the idea is that if you always look at according to how Krishna would look at it, what would please Him, according to His standards, not our standards…sometimes you hear devotees say, oh Krishna wouldn’t like that. But it’s because they don’t like it. Krishna might actually be ok with it.

For Krishna, it’s the devotion that is the main thing. When we say it’s something that Krishna likes, the only thing he actually likes is devotion. What we are referring to when we say the rules and regulations of the scriptures or the recommendations of the scriptures, we’re not talking about the primary, the devotional attitudes. We are talking about the secondary forms, the medium to express the devotion.

The mediums are not the devotion. Therefore, expressing the devotion. But it doesn’t mean that your intent in choosing a secondary medium doesn’t have some connection to devotion.

Am I choosing a secondary attribute because it pleases me or because it pleases Krishna. If it pleases Krishna, that’s sannyasa. I’m doing this work for Krishna. It’s already Krishna’s. If I’m doing it for myself and then giving it to Krishna, that’s renunciation. If I’m doing it for myself and eventually some little bit is given to Krishna, then that’s smaller renunciation.

That’s the whole thing that Krishna will be looking at, not about what secondary is being performed, it’s about the intent of it. Why do you choose what you choose? What is the reason that you do what you do? That makes for the greater point. Then you will see that for the action itself, that will get a reaction. That will come. That you don’t have to have to worry about. Beyond that, it’s going to come to what is the intent in connection to Krishna. That becomes the subtlety there.

It’s about the personal relationship with Krishna. That’s actually the whole point of everything. It’s not about the rules and regulations. It’s not about the forms. It’s not about that. It’s about the devotion. Because it’s about the devotion, it actually starts from devotion.

Here we are starting from the externals working towards devotion. But we have to remember that in the spiritual world, they start from devotion and then there is the secondary manifestation of that.

Mother Yasoda has love for Krishna. That’s the primary aspect. The secondary is that she expresses that particular parental love through cooking for Krishna, keeping the house nice for Krishna, making nice clothes for Krishna, worrying about Krishna. That’s the secondary.

That means how does this work? There the primary is first and then the secondary follows to support it. Then it reflects off the viraja of our desire. Then it reverses. If we look at it, what are we interested in? Are we interested in the devotion that Krishna gets, that love is there? Or is it about the facilities He has and the enjoyment He gets from it? Therefore, it reflects off of our attachment or lust for the secondary items.

The first thing that we do is only deal with the secondary. The primary we very rarely ever get to. It means the devotional we rarely get to, basically, unless we take up devotional service. Even on the mundane platform, actually the purpose of a secondary aspect, very few people know and do. What you do is always going to go back to some good quality.

Why does somebody work very hard to have a house? He has a mortgage, works very hard, saves his money, misses out on so many facilities that he could have, but he’s working for the house. What’s the point of the house? The point of the house is security, safety, and environment in which then members of the family can then have a relationship and express that relationship in a stable and steady way. Because you know it’s going to be the same every day. That’s the point. But the focus is all on the secondary, the external point. It’s about the house. Oh, you have a nice house? Then the family life must be great. You don’t have a nice house then you can’t have a good family life. It actually has nothing to do with that. It’s whether you appreciate the quality of that security, the quality of that relationship. Then you can have something.

That’s what actually makes things function. But by modern advertising, you don’t sell money off of that much. It goes by the secondary, the social, all of these different things, the economic. We are looking at the secondary.

With the scriptures, the first thing we’ll notice are the rules and regulations because that’s where we put all of our focus. So then there are recommendations: these secondary acts are followed by the residents of the spiritual world. This is what they do. This is how they eat, they talk, they walk, they sit, they dress, they dance, this is what they do. If you want to develop love like them, they use these secondary attributes to express that love.

If you use that, it’s a step in the right direction since we don’t have that love. By doing those secondary aspects, connected to the Lord, that we want to do it to please the Lord, it will purify us and bring us to that platform of devotion for Krishna. It’s not the forms we are using that makes the devotion, it’s the intent in using it.

The reason that we choose it is that it’s what has been recommended to us by the great personalities. What do we know about the spiritual world and what is going on there? But the great personalities, they know, they’re from there. They know what pleases Krishna. They know what their superiors do. They are just assisting them.

The devotee is doing these secondary things to please Krishna with the intent of developing that love. Therefore it’s nourishment. For the non devotees, they’re either just following the rules and regulations the vedas give by determination or haphazardly because human beings and nature tend to do nice things here and there. Then they get the reaction to that, the result of that.

If you look from this perspective then you can actually see how Krishna maintains, how He reciprocates with each and every one. If one uses another formula, one will find that it will be very confusing.

So this is what Narada Muni is explaining, that it’s the aspect of pure devotion that makes things work. That’s what is actually the functioning point. Everything else is simply something to support that. There are recommended aspects of support, things that are neutral, and things that are opposed. The acharyas discuss these things. Srila Prabhupada tells us what is useful and what is not.

He is pointing out here that because of their contact with Krishna, because of their absorption in Krishna, they are going to get something. They are thinking of Krishna. The point is that one should always be absorbed in thinking of the Lord.

Ravana, Hiranyakasipu, Sisupala, they are totally absorbed. Therefore being killed by the Lord, they don’t know He’s the Lord, but they get material facility. Understand that connecting oneself to the Lord gets benefit. They’re getting benefit. One could say they are demons, why are they getting this benefit? But they are getting benefit because they are actually connecting themselves to the Lord.

It’s just like we see that the demons follow Sukacharya, they surrender to him, he’s the guru, they do what he says, and they get elevated to the heavenly planets. Indra offends his guru and he ends up sitting in a lotus stem in the manasarovara hiding there. If you look at the lotus stems carefully you notice that they’re not very big.

That’s just how it works. It’s Krishna’s system, it’s not our system of how we say it should be. It’s how Krishna says it should be. That’s what’s going to get us something. We have to look at it from that point. That’s the perspective. It’s the International Society for “Krishna” Consciousness.

The point is that the consciousness is there. Not that we say oh yeah, yeah, what about this thing. No. That “is” the thing. Then you choose the best secondary to express it. It’s not about the secondary. It’s about what is best to express the primary. If you make it about the secondary then you’ll miss the point, you will miss the primary. It’s which one to do, which one matches the situation.

That’s what the vedas are all about. What are the time, place, and circumstance to see one’s Krishna Consciousness in connection to Krishna and to see that consciousness to engage it in Krishna’s service. That’s what the vedas are talking about. They talk about all the different situations, all the different activities, all the different results that you can gain. But that’s only so you can decide which one is best for serving Krishna right now. Nothing else.

It’s not time, place, and circumstance to get it practically done for me. It’s time, place, and circumstance to actually express devotion for Krishna. Then, by the practical activity, practical results will come. The point is that your consciousness will define whether you get devotion from that practical endeavor or not.

Are there any questions or comments?

A question regarding sannyasa and renunciation, ok. The difference between sannyasa and renunciation. Ok.

It’s a simple, simple point. We are talking about it in connection to Krishna Consciousness. We are not talking about sannyasa and renunciation outside of that.

Basically, you have an activity that you perform. And from the activity it will generate a particular result. That’s just how, by the laws of the Lord, His energy transforms. You follow the law correctly and it transforms in a particular way. You don’t follow the law then it transforms in some different way.

If I engage in a particular activity that will result in transformation of the energy that will produce a particular result, why am I doing that? It’s not the activity itself because we always take everything as it’s this or that. It’s why you’re doing it.

Remember, the jiva can desire. We are not the one that’s doing it. The energy itself is transforming. Just like if I put something in a blender and push the button, I don’t blend it. I can say I blended it, but I didnt. The machine blended it.

What’s your intent in doing that? So if your intent in doing this is that the result is Krishna’s, that means that before I start, it’s Krishna’s, then that is called sannyasa. The result has already been given to Krishna.

If I perform the activity and the idea is that it’s my activity, my result, and then I’m going to give the result to Krishna afterwards, that’s called renunciation. That can mean that I can give all of it to Krishna or part of it to Krishna. So it’s depending on how great is my own desire.

The more I see it all, that whatever I’m doing is in connection to Krishna and that’s it, then that’s sannyasa. That means that is the ideal in the vedic system. It’s that everybody should be sannyasa.

We have eight different ways to express that mood of sannyasa through the varnashram system. As we said, you have to have an expression for the mood. Socially we have the varnashram system.

Ekalavya das: Maharaj, could one say that sannyasa is bhakti and that renunciation is karma mishra bhakti?

Maharaj: You can say it like that. It could be karma mishra, it could be jnana mishra. The point is that there is something mixed. Because it’s connected to Krisna, you will get purified. By getting purified, knowledge and detachment come, so eventually by good association, you come to the platform of pure sannyasa. That means that anybody can come to the platform of sannyasa no matter what their situation. That’s what we are trying for.

When we talk about giving up the results of things, we mean that’s it’s done to please Krishna. We don’t mean that you don’t work in the field. We’re not saying that grihasthas don’t make money and take care of the family, but why are they making money? Why are they taking care of the family? Is it about Krishna or is it about themselves? If it’s about themselves, then it’s renunciation. If it’s about Krishna, then it’s sannyasa.

Therefore, you see very attached persons as grihasthas and you see the paramahampsas as grihasthas. Priyavatra is a paramahamsa. He was asked to become a grihastha and become the king. He was a paramahampsa all the way through. He’s simply using grihastha ashram to perform those duties to please Krishna.

Most people take up grihastha ashram because they like the results and working in that field of endeavor. They are comfortable there. So they do that for Krishna. So it will be renunciation.

But he would be in that position of sannyasa. Because it’s not about him, he does the duties nicely. Therefore he will look like an attached householder. That was the doubt and the questioning about it. How is it that by attachment, you’re not going to get devotion if someone who has devotion would never manifest attachment? How is it that the prajatas are in family life for a long time? I think it was for a million years. At the end, they became great personalities and went back to Godhead. That’s because they were great all the way through, but, you only see externally when they gave it up and took to the renounced order, then you see ok now they are detached. But they were detached all along. It was all about I’m following grishastha life simply because it will please Krishna. Therefore they do it.

It’s like a drama. A good actor plays his part well. It’s not that he thinks I am that. Except for, you know, the Stanislavsky-ists. They’ll say I am that. But technically you’re not, right?

They are there playing their part. And they are playing it well. To everyone else it looks like here is a very attached grihastha. You can tell by other symptoms that they’re not because family is happy, family is this.

It’s an interesting point that, I think it’s fourth canto, the discussion that Srila Prabhupada brings up is about attachment and hatred. When we see hatred we see all of the isms and all of the fractional kind of things. That comes up because there is material desire. If there is no material desire then you don’t see that. That’s how you see the symptoms.

When you see the Pandavas, do you see that they see there is us and them? No. But with Duryodhana, you do. He has deisre. Yudisthira doesn’t. That means Yudisthira is running his kingdom, he’s dealing with wife very gently and nicely. He’s not going, hey I don’t need this, I want to chant my japa, why are you being so trippy. No. He deals with everything. He deals perfectly with all of the household elements. It’s because Krishna says that is how the grihastha ashram should run. He’s doing it to please Krishna. That’s called sannyasa.

The idea is at the lastest, you attain that by the time you take sannyasa. When you take sannyasa, now you don’t have anybody else to work for so it should be that it’s about Krishna. At least there, then, if you haven’t developed it before, it’s like with the trapeze you have the net below. If it doesn’t work before that then at least by this time you get it right.

In the vedic system, it starts before, like Prahlad Maharaj. Here, he’s already sannyasa and he’s three years old. That’s the point.

Sannyasa is the mentality, then it has its natural, external form. The confusion comes because grihastha doesn’t look like sannyasa. If it’s done in Krishna Consciousness, then it is.

Is it about Krishna or is it not? That’s why we have to look at that as the first. Then we start looking at the secondary and the forms and how they match.

Vaishesika dasa: Hare Krishna Maharaj. Thank you very much. Very insightful, as usual. Recently, having a discussion with a god brother about agyata sukriti. His position is that in ISKCON, we depend on the idea too much of agyata sukriti. To support his point, he quotes the last verse, 28, in chapter 17:

But sacrifices, austerities and charities performed without faith in the Supreme are nonpermanent, O son of Pṛthā, regardless of whatever rites are performed. They are called asat and are useless both in this life and the next.

I was wondering if you could help to describe what happens in agyata sukriti.

Maharaj: It’s useless. That’s why you don’t get rid of them. And then others are not nice, useless, you’ve just forgotten about them because they got in the closet or you got busy and stuff.

We’re used to the idea that nice means useful and not nice means not useless. But actually, if it’s connected to Krishna, it’s useful, and if it’s not connected to Krishna then it’s useless.

That’s why there is so much discussion about these pious activities, the recommended activities, charity, austerity, penance, all the good qualities, tolerance, humility, respect, all of these different things. These are the ideal secondary mediums to engage in Krishna’s service. Unless they are engaged in Krishna’s service, it’s just so much niceness and temporary and ultimately, it’s useless.

That has to be clearly understood because otherwise we tend to judge useful and useless by its secondary position and by our value system, what we value as a secondary item by our conditioning. That tends to cloud the thing.

Agyata sukriti means unknowing devotional service. That means someone has done devotional service but didn’t know it was devotional service. That’s why it’s agyata sukriti. If they do devotional service and they know it’s connected with the devotees, that’s where it becomes devotional service.

That’s why the point I may be projecting here that we may be working from the point too much that we’re depending on agyata sukriti because we are exposing people to devotional service, but, due to sometimes shyness or anxiety that people won’t be comfortable with it, we don’t mention about devotional service. Then, all people get is agyata sukriti.

Let’s say that we are distributing prasada but they don’t know it’s devotees. They’re taking prasada, they’re getting devotional benefit, that will be eternal. Agyata sukriti is eternal. It’s pious activities not connected to Krishna are the ones that are temporary.

They will get eternal benefit but the problem is that they won’t contemplate devotional service or devotees. They will have to wait for that volume to pick up and there’s no impetus for it to pick up any quicker. Once agyata sukriti reaches a certain volume, then it will transform into sraddha or faith. If they see we are devotees and they are taking prasada, and they appreciate the devotees, now they are getting more agyata sukriti. Much more quickly they will come to the point of sraddha.

That’s why, if it’s at all possible, you always make it clear that this is connected to the Lord, that this is devotional service. The idea that if you just leave it in the background, it will happen, yes it will happen. But it’s not necessarily that we’re getting as much credit as we think we deserve.

These things are arranged. Krishna is already doing that. He is arranging that these things happen. He has arranged that the guy had some interest. “What’s going on? What’s happening in life? Why is my life like that?” So his alarm didn’t go off. He was late. He missed the carpool and had to take the bus. When he got off he had to walk some distance and walked by the harinam party. Krishna is already doing the agyata sukriti stuff.

The whole point is that he doesn’t press. But Lord Caitanya is worried about that. People don’t know. Advaita Acharya says I’m already arranging that, no one’s responding. He’s calling Lord Caitanya who is taking the mood of the devotee that so that devotees will tell you here’s Krishna. I know that you’ve done nothing to deserve it but hey, take it anyway. Where Krishna is only if you desire it, if you take a step forward, He’ll reciprocate.

That’s the point of devotees and preaching that they please Krishna more than anyone. That the first offense is offending the devotees. It’s because they actually go out and are bold about it. They preach. That’s the whole thing. That’s what preaching is, to get it across to the person in a way that they would be attracted.

That idea that I just kind of put it there and leave it and disappear, that’s ok. At least it’s around. The real credit is going to be that if I do something. Let’s say, for example, the husband has done something wrong, he’s upset the wife. The tendency is that he just sits there and won’t something and waits for the wife to respond to it. But she’s waiting for him to do something because she’s in the feminine position. He does nothing, she waits for a little while, then she gets up and leaves. He’s going, now what’s happened? When she was expecting him to try, and he’s worried that if I try something, she’ll reject it. But at least he should try – if I try something and she rejects this, or try that and she rejects that, until you get one that works.

That’s the thing that is pleasing, that effort, how? We’re presenting this, it’s more of a delicate situation, but what wording could we use? What examples could we use? What kind of setting could we use that would interest them in Krishna Consciousness? That they know that this is Krishna Consciousness. Because nothing is more attractive than Krishna Consciousness to the soul. Nothings is more sophisticated or refined. Nothing is more intellectual. Nothing is more practical.

If one has that faith, people will find it. If one doesn’t have that faith, well of course, the karmis are more sophisticated, more intelligent, more professional, more this, so who are we? We just kind of sit back and throw it out and maybe they’ll notice.

But if you have faith that there is nothing better than Krishna, he is the most attractive, he makes the atoms hold together. The gravity they talk about, Krishna enters, they say there is a certain mass. But what they forget is how does this mass hold together? You have to have gravity in the first place to get mass. That means Krishna enters each atom and because of that mood of Madan Mohan, they get attracted to each other. He is the attractive feature that makes everything work.

So if we can present Krishna in wording and examples that the individual can appreciate, then they can take up Krishna Consciousness more quickly. Otherwise, if we just leave it to chance, who knows how many lifetimes it will take. The way people are going these days, there are going to be a lot of lifetimes in between their next human life. It mentions in the sastras that they go to hell for so many times, they go through so many animal species, then they come back to the human form of life and they get another shot. By engaging them in agyata sukriti nicely, then that can be hurried up.

Agyata sukriti is always good, but like you said, to depend upon it, that it will work on its own without my endeavor – so another is thing is that I’m making the endeavor and then we leave it up to Krishna and it’s totally up to Him, that dependence is good. That’s proper. Not, oh, I did this preaching so therefore I made the devotee. No, Krishna.

But this thing that we don’t want to be too pushy and this and that, you know, why don’t we hide in the closet and that kind of thing, people would like that, right? How is that going to please Krishna? That’s why the devotees are there. That’s why Lord Caitanya took the mood of Radharani, so He could preach. That’s why Lord Caitanya is preaching. But then, is anybody else?

Rupa Gosvami said no, we’ll do this for you. Therefore, those in the line of Rupa Gosvami, they’re bold. It doesn’t mean they’re not nice. We take that it means oh it’s not nice. That’s why I’m saying we have to go by Krishna’s definitions, not ours. Modern says bold is not nice.

But if you look at it, let’s say you had a five year old kid. You’re sitting in the airport and this five year old kid just walks over to you and says hi, what’s your name? That’s bold. But you would say that’s nice. There’s no agenda.

Boldness without agenda is good. People like it. But boldness with agenda, that’s the problem. What we have to understand is that all of these good qualities are good when they are connected to Krishna. If they’re not connected to Krishna, no matter how nice they are, they’re still temporary.

The guy is a nice guy this lifetime. Next life, what’s he going to be? A nice deer? I just read about how they have these little miniature donkeys that are this big. People keep them as pets. They say they’re really, really nice, they like kids. Ok, so he becomes a nice miniature donkey in someone’s back yard. He takes care of the kids, loves kids. But he’s a donkey.

That’s the point. He’s nice. But next life he’s going to be a nice what? So only when that niceness is connected to Krishna does it become of value. That’s what the Bhagavatam does from all other scriptures. All other scriptures tell you how technique works, and how, understanding the technique, this is how it connects to Krishna.

All Bhagavatam does from the first verse is tell you this is how you connect to Krishna and these are the things that you can connect. It starts with the primary and then shows how the secondary has been used by the great personalities. All of the other literatures show what are the secondary and how people have connected it to Krishna.

Do you understand the difference? One shows the science and then there is the connection in a few verses. The Bhagavatam is all about the connection, and then the connections are given through the examples of kings and householders and sannyasis and brahmans, and all kinds of situations.

That’s why it’s the paramahampsas scripture, because it’s talking about pure devotional service. The other ones are talking about activities that you could engage in Krishna’s service or not. They’re pious activities. But they are the recommended activities. Devotees are supposed to be pious, live a pious lifestyle, pious by Krishna’s definition, not by ours. But do that for Krishna because being pious is not enough. It’s a nice way to spend your time here, but you’ll spend your time here. But if you do it in connection to Krishna then you’ll get out of here and go back to Godhead.

Last question, yes?

Devotee: Hare Krishna Maharaj. Since in Kali Yuga people can very easily make offenses to the holy name and Lord Caitanya is very merciful, why don’t the scriptures recommend chanting Lord Caitanya’s name instead of the Hare Krishna Maha Mantra?

Maharaj: Why chant Hare Krishna instead of Lord Caitanya’s name? Because He’s more merciful then why not chant His name?

The whole system is about pleasing Krishna. Krishna is the original form. That’s where His fullness in svarupa sakti is manifest. We see that there are five forms where Krishna is complete. Complete meaning manifesting full potency. Krishna, Lord Caitanya, Balarama, Nrsimhadeva, and Rama. They are called paravastu. So they are full manifestations. They are not expansions of Narayana. They are the original.

We see in all of these other moods, He’s manifesting less interaction with His internal potency. The full expression of His completeness is there in is pastimes as Krishna with Radharani in Vraja. That is the topmost.

To come to that position then we need that mercy. That’s when Krishna, who is Mukunda, who can liberate us, takes the mood of the devotee so that we can actually see the importance of chanting. That’s why we follow the order of Lord Caitanya, respecting Lord Caitanya. Then on His order we chant Hare Krishna. Lord Caitanya said that we should chant Hare Krishna. That’s what He would do.

Therefore, before we start chanting Hare Krishna, we chant Lord Caitanya’s name, but it’s actually about chanting Hare Krishna. That’s what pleases Lord Caitanya.

Again it comes back to this thing that what please Krishna is the actual standard. Otherwise, logically it would look like if I chant Lord Caitanya’s name and He’s the most merciful, I’ll get the most benefit. But He’s the most merciful if we follow what He wants. What He wants if for us to chant Hare Krishna.

We’ll end here.

20 02 2016 H G Deena Bandhu Prabhu Nityananda Appearance

February 28. ISKCON 50 – S.Prabhupada Daily Meditations.
Satsvarupa dasa Goswami: A Further Prayer to Prabhupada.
Our heartfelt prayers to Prabhupada should be guided by śruti smṛti purāṇādi-pañcarātra vidhiṁ vinā. I am praying to Prabhupada to please direct me in the best way for my spiritual life. In one sense, we are waiting for an immediate response from Prabhupada, although we must also understand that prayer is itself a process. It is an ongoing meditation, rather than an isolated event with a set result.
Dear Srila Prabhupada, today I asked a devotee how to pray to you. The answer I got was that we should speak in prayers composed by the previous acaryas. I thought one of the most obvious prayers is the pranama mantra, which you yourself gave to us. “I offer my obeisances to His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, who is very dear to Krishna on this earth, having taken shelter at the lotus feet of the transcendental Lord.” And sometimes we pray to you spontaneously in our own words, “Prabhupada, please help me,” “Prabhupada, thank you for allowing me to serve and function as your assistant.”
Prabhupada, please let me go forward in Krishna consciousness, please let me serve you, please let me remember you, please guide me. I want to especially concentrate on that prayer – please guide me. You yourself were so confidential, private, and grave that you didn’t even tell us about it. You knew that preaching to us meant stressing the Bhagavad-gita and convincing us that God exists. But you also gave the postgraduate study, Srimad-Bhagavatam, and beyond that, Caitanya-caritamrta. You gave us the truth that Krishna came to taste Radha’s love in the form of Lord Caitanya. You explained to us that Lord Caitanya wanted to distribute that love, the love of the gopis, to the whole world. You introduced us to the Six Gosvamis. But you were also careful. You didn’t want to confuse us. You wanted to protect us.
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A Further Prayer to Prabhupada