So, what is mechanical chanting? The body is also like a machine- yantrarudhani mayaya and mechanical chanting, the body is chanting or the mouth is chanting but something is missing. Something is not there. What is not there? That is why it is called mechanical chanting. Feelings are not there or we could say heart is not there. Emotions, sincerity is not there. It is so mechanical.

Prabhupada said, the chanting; what kind of chanting? Chanting like a baby. That is not mechanical. Crying is not mechanical. It’s emotional, feelings are involved, he is fully into it. Not that the mind is elsewhere and he is just crying. No, baby is in fact thinking of mother; thinking of “Where is, where is she, why is she not coming?”
The mechanical chanting will not work. When Draupadi chanted “Hye Krishna! Hye Govinda!” What was that? A cry was originating from deep within the heart, cry of the soul and how did Lord respond to that call?

Krishna was right there! Because we are not calling out the way Draupadi called out for Krishna! That’s why He is not coming. So, anytime, every time, anybody, anywhere, everywhere, if their call is like that of Draupadi, Lord must reciprocate the similar manner as He reciprocated to Draupadi’s call. Lord is not partial. He doesn’t come only when Draupadi calls out. When Draupadi-like call, that quality call, the Lord makes His appearance. The mechanical chanting will not work.

“Results of disrespecting our superiors”
January 16th 1994
New Delhi, India

tasyayam anayasyasit
parebhyo vah parabhavah
praksinebhyah sva-vairibhyah
samrddhanam ca yat surah [SB 6.7.22]

Tranlsation:
Because of your misbehavior toward B?haspati, you have been defeated by the demons. My dear demigods, since the demons were weak, having been defeated by you several times, how else could you, who were so advanced in opulence, be defeated by them?
Purport
The devas are celebrated for fighting with the asuras perpetually. In such fights the asuras were always defeated, but this time the demigods were defeated. Why? The reason, as stated here, was that they had offended their spiritual master. Their impudent disrespect of their spiritual master was the cause of their defeat by the demons. As stated in the sastras, when one disrespects a respectable superior, one loses his longevity and the results of his pious activities, and in this way one is degraded.

So, this is yet another incidence from the history which took place long time in the past have been shared with us by Srila Vyasadeva in the form of Srimad Bhagavatam and this takes place here. We are here and history repeats. Meaning what happened in the past could and does happen all over again. So here, what we are understanding from this part of Bhagavatam is what happens when your superiors are disrespected or misbehave our relationship with our spiritual master and our respectable superiors. The results has been given.

We could say that happened in the past, that has nothing to do with us or with the present time. Can we say that? No. This is the rule. The world is governed by different rules, different sets of rules. Big and small rules. They do not change. So we cannot say that one time this had happened and this was the results of the misbehavior or misconduct in the part of demigods, Indra. They offended their spiritual master, Brihaspati, and he left their company disgusted and unsupported of their behavior. Then he walked away but the result was there was a fight which is a normal again – fight between demons and demigods.

Prabhupada is using the term perpetual. This fight is perpetual. Devas are celebrated for fighting with asuras perpetualy. Now there are only two kinds of people in this world,
Two kinds of persons, devotees and demons, and they always fight for their rivalry, one wants to defeat the other one. And who wins ultimately? Demigods always win. This time, they were defeated.

So, Brahma has personally asked them questions, “How come? In the pasts, you defeated the demons so many times, but this time you are defeated! You have been continually defeated these demons, they had become weaker. The strong demons you have defeated. After so many defeats, the demons have become weaker. Those demons you could not defeat. Strong demons you have defeated, but now weak demons you are not able to defeat. Can you think of some reasons? What do you think what is the difference? That time when you defeated the demons and now the demons have defeated you. What is the difference? Just think for a while. There must be some thing.”

Now the demigods had no answers to the questions. Brahma is going to reveal the facts to them as he is going to make it clear that the reason is that in the past you had several of your superiors including Brihaspati, your spiritual master, but now, this time, you are not favoured by your spiritual master. As a result, you lost all your powers and now you are defeated.

We get powers from whom for our spiritual advancement? If we want to make this advancement, we get powers from Krsna. Krsna’s powers come through the previous acaryas and they come to us through our spiritual master, diksha guru, shiksha guru, caitya guru, vartma-pradar?aka-guru – varieties of gurus. One diksha guru, many shiksha gurus, our family – Prabhupada’s family. There are so many gurus. Some are giving us initiation and so many more giving us instructions, sharing their realizations, giving us guidance, inspire us. They are also gurus and by their mercy we are making some progress. It is not automatic.
According to Cakravati Thakur,

yasya prasadad bhagavat prasado
yasya aprasadan nagati ko to pi

You will not make any progress if there is no prasad or the superiors. We thrive on prasad. If there is no prasad or the supply is cut, we will starve. First of all we have to manage to get some food to eat. But there are other kinds of benediction and mercy that we need which is not some material sustains. There are some mercy in the form of plate of prasad that we eat and some other necessities are coming also: devotees care and maintenance, soaps, toothbrush, toilet kit. These things, are they mercy? Are they prasad? These things are healthy in the service of the Lord. So it’s some kind of mercy.

Yet, there is another kind of prasad that you do not even see. It is so subtle. Because it is so spiritual then mercy flows. Mercy flows from high potential as there is the electricity flows. If we keep ourselves at the higher potential or the higher level than the spiritual masters or others vaisnavas, how will the mercy flow? So we bow down at the feet of vaisnavas, spiritual superiors, spiritual master. Where do we touch our hands and head? We touch by their feet or we touch the feet. We bow down or our head goes down. We try to put ourselves at a very lower level. More lower position we take, what will happen? More flow will there be. Is this easy to understand? Yes.
In case we put ourselves like Indra who thinks he has so much opulence and “that makes me superior to my spiritual master or other superiors,” so, immediately, mercy flow is stop. So, one has to be always watchful and always careful so that this mercy is not cut off. We need mercy all the time. We are at the mercy. Just like mercy case, so that is our case. Without the mercy of Krsna, vaisnavas, spiritual masters, we can not make any progress. We need mercy all the time, not that certain time in our life we would not require or need mercy anymore. There are various examples, because they thought, “we are superior, we do not need the superiors.”

There was a mouse and he was always harassed by a cat. He was wondering, “what should I do?” So the mouse went to a sage, some mystic yogi like sai baba. He said, “There’s a cat who is always harassing me. Do something and make me a cat.” He chanted some mantra and “chu-mantra”. So he became a car. You want to become someone superior to you, by position or body you are. Now he was cat but mouse was not harassing. Who was harassing them now? The dog was harassing, always chasing the cat and again he got into trouble.

He went back again to the same yogi. “My problem is not from the mice but my problem is from the from the dogs. So please make me dog.” Another mantra was chanted and he became a dog. No problem from cat anymore but now problem from lion. So he goes back again, “could you make a lion?” “Yes, yes, why not? You are approaching, begging me for mercy and no other shelter, just me.” The yogi did a mantra again and he was made a lion. Then he started roaring, “I am the king! There is no creature as powerful as I am.” So he wanted to make someone around him his first target and this was the sage in front of him. So he went wandering in the forest to find someone to eat or scare.
So on whom he was going to try his power on? The sage! Roaring him up. And then what happened? Before he could do something to the sage, the sage chant another mantra and that mantra was meant to make the lion back into mouse. He became mouse again by that mantra. He took all his powers that made him into the cat, the dog and the lion and he was mouse again – back into trouble. He could have let the lion by the mercy of this powerful sage, by his mantras, he could have let him alone but the person who gave him all these powers and vision, he was trying to get him. Ungrateful, “namakharam.” “Namak” means salt. You eat somebody’s salt then you owe him something or you have some obligation towards him as you are eating his “namak”, his salt. You do not eat only salt, it is part of the whole meal. It is not just salt that you are eating. He was someone ungrateful so, he lost all his powers.
This could and this does happen. This has happened, also. We have seen many some of our godbrothers and devotees also. Position is no big thing but losing service or not having desire for serving Krsna anymore or the mantra does not come, or if one does not want to chant mantra anymore, would there be any worse defeat than that? One may think, “oh, demigods had to fight. They were ksatriya and they had to fight, physically, with the demons. We are just simple people. We are not emperors or kings, we do not have army and there is no fight and battle and no victory and defeat. So why should we learn anything from this example? What kind of defeat is no defeat?” But we have enemies.

These demons represent, they are personification of, bad qualities. Demons represent what? “Anarthas.” Which also, broadly speaking, big, big anarthas. Big enemies are in how many numbers? Six enemies are there – kama, krodha, mada, moha, lobha, matsarya. So, who would defeat us? If we do not have the mercy of the superiors, mercy of the spiritual master, who will save us? When the kama is powerful, the lust is trying to devour you, who will save us? When krodha, so much energy. When a person becomes angry, he is losing so much of his power. When you go through this anger thing you become physically weak, you begin trembling, you can not think and lot of energy is drained by this kama. Kama is powerful, it defeats us. Krodha is powerful.

Lobha is powerful. Greed keeps us busy. There are two things. One thing a need yet other thing is a greed. Need is okay. You need somethings, few things. As soon as those things are provided which you need, you should be happy. But if your enemy called greed is very, very strong then there is no end this greed will make you work and work as you will never be satisfied with few necessities of your life. If there is greed then you will have no time for Krsna and you will not chant Hare Krsna. Like that, it is to explain that how kama, krodha, lobha, mada, moha, matsarya defeat us when we have no mercy of the respectable spiritual superiors. So, we have to be very, very careful.

We were talking to one devotee in Melbourne, last week. He was saying, “I rather be careful as I turned up my eyes and I see some senior devotees, some leaders having difficulties and they had to leave and they are no more serving. Am I the next?! That makes me fearful which makes me more careful. Or am I an exception?”
So we have enemies and in order to become victorious, we are in need of mercy. We are a mercy case. But when the superiors become merciless, no more mercy – can you think of that state of existence that you do not get, anymore, mercy? If you are told, now, no more mercy. If you are beginning trembling and will you know what to do and how you would survive? What will happen to you? Because we are not here with our own strength, we are not lively because of our own powers or strength, adjustment or physical strength or material opulence, no. None of these things are called of our present spiritual status. Whatever all we have attained is all simply mercy. What kind of mercy? Causeless mercy.

We do not even deserve it. We do not even talk of our past. Not even take a look to go with the history case. Our own history is so bad and still we are here and around Krsna and devotees. It is amazing. We are amazed that we are here. What is the cause of us being here? It is the causeless mercy. Those who are giving us mercy, even Krsna is giving us mercy through the spiritual master. Krsna is giving us mercy to the association of devotees. Somehow, we deserve that mercy. As soon as you start thinking otherwise, immediately, the enemies are here. It is not the regular demons but our own anarthas. We have not conquer all so there is a remain in our bhajana kriya. The result of bhajana kriya is what? “Anarthas nivrati”. Before bhajana kriya us what? Sraddha, sadhusanga and then comes bhajana kriya. As we begin bhajana kriya, then we become free from our anarthas, conquering our enemies.
So we cannot forget that we have enemies, very powerful enemies. We can conquer or defeat our enemies by mercy of Krsna and the spiritual master and vaisnavas. Arjun and the pandavas were only 5 in number, their army was much smaller in number but they became victorious and what is the cause? They have mercy of Krsna.

vijayatu panduputranam
esam pakshe janardhanam

“Panduputranam”, Pandu putras became victorious because they were inspired by Janardhana Krsna, inspired of Krsna. That was the cause of their victory. So stay in the side of Parthasarathi, of Prabhupada and the devotees we become victorious by conquering all of our enemies, lust, greed, etc. Being small we have so many enemies, hovering around, just around the corner they are waiting to get us. As soon as you are not alert, immediately, they are going to grab us. So keep serving the devotees and also for protection by the mantra

Hare Krsna Hare Krsna Krsna Krsna Hare Hare
Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare

This is our ISKCON bullets, gulab jamuns. Do not eat too many, otherwise, you will be fat then you will be defeated.
Okay, thank you. Sri Sri Radha Partha Sarathi ki, jai!

Spirituality and Youth
Prerana Festival
Zoom lecture for Iskcon Chowpatty
23rd January 2021

So Hare Krishna to you all assembled youths. Radha Gopinath ki jai! Yes there were the days where the Prerna festival used to take place right there in front of Radha Gopinath. I understand today is the one hundred and eightieth Prerna festival. That’s what I was told so I am very happy with the organizers of today’s event and especially with those who started this Prerna festival a long, long time ago. Maybe fifteen, twenty years ago the Prerna festival started.

I suppose Gauranga is one of the organizers or inaugurator of this festival. This is our oldest youth program in India so I once again thank and congratulate the organizers of this Prerna Iskcon youth forum festival. Of course without you students, the Prerna festival is not possible and so I am very happy today. I don’t see many of you but I suppose many of you are there, not visible but wherever you are in different forums.

Yes, those were the days, during my days when I was a young man like you, and of course there were so many other millions of other young men, youths like me some fifty years ago. They coming to satsang, coming to the temple and joining program like Prerna festival, forget it!

But now things have changed and revolutionized and now there are thousands of youths stepping forward and participating in this program of Iskcon youth forum all over Bombay and all over New Delhi and all over Bangalore, all over everywhere. Thousands of youths are part of these Prerna-like festivals. So I am very, very glad, some fifty years ago as you heard the announcement, in the early seventies I was also a young man, right? One day I was also a young man and a youth like you and I was also studying right there in Mumbai, Kirti College Dadar. Do you know Kirti College of Dadar? So some of you know it and I was a student of Kirti College. I was a student of the Willing don College, Sangli. I was a student there but by the grace of the Supreme Lord- I realized that later on. When Krishna is kind to us he brings us to his devotees.

So Krishna kindly took me to His devotee Srila Prabhupada ki jai! Hari Hari. And as I was studying I came in contact with Srila Prabhupada. I came in contact with Srila Prabhupada’s followers at Cross Maidan near Church gate Station. There was a huge festival- Hare Krishna festival and there was a huge advertisement all over the town that said ‘American Sadhus are here! American Sadhus are in town!’

I was along with so many Bombaikers, so many Bombay Wala’s surprised to hear. American Sadhus? How is that possible? American scientist is okay but American Sadhu?! Forget it! So the huge crowds were rushing and participating in Hare Krishna festival and so I also was one of the participants. So this is how I was put in contact with the devotees of the Lord and with Srila Prabhupad as well as his followers.

I considered and consider that even today that that was my great fortune and likewise now Krishna is calling you.

Jiva jago jiva jago gaurachandra bole.

I’m sure you’ve heard that song which says ‘Gauranga is calling Gauranga is calling. Wake up sleeping souls. Wake up youths of India, Gauranga is calling.’ So you are hearing Gauranga’s call and you are responding to that call. You are running, rushing and you have already ran and rushed and you are in the association with the devotees of Krishna and they are guiding you on the path, on the journey of life.

Life is a journey so it’s good to have, it’s the best to have the guidance of devotees of Krishna otherwise certainly you will be misguided- guaranteed. Because that is what this world is, of cheaters and cheated. No one knows the truth and no one shares the truth with you. Because if they don’t know the truth then how could they share the truth with you?

They do not know the ultimate reality in all that you see around or touch or smell, that is not all that exists. There is a lot more that exists out there or up there. But you cannot study and understand that world, the spiritual world and Vaikunthaloka and the Supreme Lord Sri Krishna Panduranga. He exists and His kingdom, so much exists! The spiritual life exists, spirituality exists and so we have to study and understand that the ultimate reality is something that is eternal. We are also eternal and to even understand that we are eternal.. We get to know all these truths by coming in contact with devotees of Krishna. That is why sastra says:

Sadhu sanga sadhu sanga msarva sastre kaya
lava matra sadhu sange sarva siddhi haya (CC Madhya 22.54).

So in this Iskcon youth forum, you get sadhu sanga. Sadhus come where you are based and you also get to go to Sadhus, Hare Krishna devotees. You can go to the temple or even on pilgrimage and then they open our eyes and this is called Sabda Praman. There are different evidences, different ways to know the truth.

So there’s a Pratyaksha Praman and this is where seeing is believing. So we try to see with our eyes but you cannot see Sac Cid Ananda Vigraha, the spiritual existence and spiritual personalities with your eyes. You can’t perceive that spirituality with your blunt material senses which are imperfect. This material world has so much faith in the power of their senses so to acquire knowledge they use their senses called Prayaksha, prati and aksha-Right in front of you is whatever you perceive, whatever you can smell- but there is an existence of not only pratakshya but parokshya, something that is transcendental above or beyond this material reality and to understand that we need sastra praman, sadhu, Sastra and Acarya’s. If you hear from them and if you hear Krishna in Bhagavad-gita then you will know so much more.

And true reality is a science; it is a science of self realization. Srila Prabhupada was a scientist or even Tukaram Maharaj was a scientist. Ramanujacharya was a scientist, not just Galileo or Newton – what do they know? They don’t know much, they don’t know much but these spiritual scientists they know so much more. So after we come in touch with these great personalities and often they make the Gita syllabus, textbooks and they become teachers and professors they teach us, teach you.

So this has to be done in this human form of life which is a very, very rare gift which we have been gifted by the Lord, this human form of life and we have to make the best use of it by approaching devotees and making an enquiry from them.

athato brahma jijnasa
It is said and they will reveal the truth unto you, ‘oh youths of India wake up.’ I mean you have woken up so now wake up others. The rest of the youths, also your friends and neighbours or other youths.

Now Prabhupada wanted youths. Youths wanted! When he was contemplating or planning the propagation of Krishna consciousness worldwide, at one point he was in Jhansi. You know where Jhansi is. At one point Srila Prabhupada was advertising in newspapers, advertising for what? Youths wanted! He wanted youths to come forward, get trained and propagate Krishna consciousness, God consciousness and India’s culture all over the world.

The gift of India – India has beenWgifted; I would not even say India. Bharat Varsa has been gifted, and why? This Krishna consciousness gifted along with Krishna- ‘we have Krishna, we have Sri Rama!’ Jai Sri Ram! So this is our wealth. Ramayana is our wealth, Mahabarata, Bhagavad Gita, Srimad Bhagavatam is our wealth. The ancient culture of India, not the modern culture of India is India’s culture.

So Srila Prabhupada wanted this to be shared with the rest of the world. Prior to that while the Lord was on the planet, Sri Krishna Chaitanya Mahaprabhu ki jai! Some five hundred years ago Sambhavami yuge yuge happened and the Lord appeared in the form of Sri Krishna Chaitanya Mahaprabhu and Chaitanya Mahaprabhu became a preacher.

The Lord took sannyasa and he was travelling all over India and sharing the wealth of the holy name.

Hare Krishna Hare Krishna
Krishna Krishna Hare Hare
Hare Rama Hare Rama
Rama Rama Hare Hare

This is the wealth of India, Bharat Varsa. So Mahaprabhu was sharing this all around and while he was doing this, as in Chaitanya Charitamrta He says ‘I am the only malakara. I am the only gardener and oh! How many fruits can I pick up alone? And fill the baskets and share them, distribute the fruits of love of Godhead? I’m the only one! Distributors wanted! Distributors wanted! Please come forward and fill up the baskets with the fruits of love of Godhead and distribute them freely everywhere!’

And he wanted the distribution to take place not just in Mumbai or not just in Maharashtra or Bengal, Orissa or India but all over the world. The Lord cares right? The Lord cares for every single person and every single entity because they are his people wherever they are.
So the Lord said:

prthivite ache yata nagaradi grama
sarvatra pracara haibe mora nama (Chaitanya Bhagavat)

My name will be chanted and shared in every town and every village of this world. So Mahaprabhu was appealing ‘please join me please join me.’ So then Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s representative Saksad Hari, Srila Prabhupada also had the same mood and he was also welcoming and inviting, ‘youths wanted youths wanted’ because he wanted to make Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s prediction come true!

Chaitanya Mahaprabhu wanted everybody and youths also, Srila Prabhupada wanted youths and in that parampara now we also want youths. We want all of you to come, join Sri Krishna Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s movement. You may join the temple or you may practice this Krishna consciousness at home.

grihe thako, vane thako, sada ‘hari’ bole’ dako
sukhe duhkhe bhulo na’ko,
vadane hari-nam koro re (Gitavali 2)

So this is also an appeal, everyone please chant the holy name of the Lord wherever you are. Grihe thako householder, Grihastha, make your home into an ashram or a mandir. Dil ek Mandir hai, Ghar ek Mandir hai. Every home could be a temple and the temples are already temples and brahmacari’s reside there. So wherever you are you could practice and relish Krishna consciousness. So we want or Krishna wants, our founder acarya wanted and we also want youths to come and join this effort of sharing this Krishna consciousness all over the world.

Or you could share that in big circle as possible within your home town or your home state or your home land, your motherland. Or you could go overseas. So when Srila Prabhupada once was in London one newspaper reporter asked him, ‘Swamiji, why have you come to our country?’ And Prabhupada possibly said ‘oh you also came, you Bristishers, you also came to our country so now I have come to your country.’

‘But why have you come?’ So Prabhupada was explaining that ‘I have come sir to give the gift of India, India’s gift. I have come to do the home delivery. You had come and whatever was valuable you thought, you took that away and you looted our country. But whilst doing that you left behind the most valuable asset, the gift of India. So now I have come to share that with you.’

When asked ‘Oh what is that gift? Is it a Rolls Royce during british Raj that may have been left behind?’ Then Prabhupada said ‘Krishna consciousness.’ Or then Prabhupada said ‘This Vedic literature from India or the holy name of the Lord. This is the gift.’ And then Prabhupada also used to say ‘You know I have come to your country or ‘I have come to America.’ Prabhupada very proudly used to proclaim ‘I haven’t come to take anything from you. I have come to give.’

And Prabhupada was the first Indian to go to the west to give and not to take. And because we are going, Indians are going, politicians are going or even youths are going for higher education – it’s not higher education (laughs). So they are going ‘Give us education, give us loan, give us super computers, give us give us give us!’ As a result we have become very popular in the west at least.

You know forty years ago when I went for the first time, seventy eight was the first time I went to America and they were asking me ‘oh where are you from?’ And I would say ‘from India.’ ‘Oh that India? The beggar’s country?’ That India what? Beggar’s country. Because we had been going and begging ‘give us give us.’ So Srila Prabhupada was that Bharat Ratna, the jewel of India.

He knew the wealth of India, the importance of India. Bharat desh mahan. In fact India is great but that greatness of India was in true sense realized by Prabhupada and he wanted to share that with the rest of the world and he did that. To do so he wanted.. In fact the youths of America, the first ones to join Srila Prabhupada, the American boys and girls, became his disciples.

America is suffering like anything, you know that? All that glitters is not gold, friends. So America and not only America but the whole world is suffering. England is suffering and not because of Covid 19, that’s yet another reason for suffering. This world is full of suffering and it’s meant to be like that. This world is duhkhalayam asasvatam (BG 8.15). There’s no way we can change the nature of this world, God has made it that way and this is no place for a gentleman, Prabhupada used to say.

So one time I was in America and read- I’m sure some youth had written something on a wall and he had written -listen to this. American youth writes like this on the wall, his realization and his thoughts. ‘Life is tough and then you die.’ Did you hear that? He says ‘life is tough and then you die.’ There was a pause and then he writes ‘You’re born again and as you are born again what is going to happen? Life is tough.’

That life is going to be tough so life is tough and then you die and you are born again and so this goes on and on. And this is what India could do. India has to take leadership in propagation. Yes let the western world propagate materialism, the mundane sciences and technology and this and that and then let India share it’s culture Krishna consciousness, knowledge of Bhagavad Gita with the rest of the world. They are badly in need of it!

Then Prabhupada used to say ‘andha pangu nyaya.’ The west is blind and India is a little bit lame. Then he used to talk andha pangu nyaya. East and west could combine, you don’t have to condemn and discard the progress made by technology and science. That could be utilized, or this blind man and lame man could get together, the east and west could get together. So when this blind man and lame man are together, what could they do and how could they help each other?

If they wish to go someplace certainly they could help each other. The blind man could walk and the lame man sitting on the shoulder of the blind man could show the way. So the world is blind and India has torchlight of knowledge. So our culture teaches simple living and high thinking. So simple living high thinking, simple living high thinking but the propagation, Prachar is high living and no thinking, you understand?

The Prachar, propagation the breaking news and all that happens through internet, the propagation, the Prerna will give inspiration to high living and no thinking. Our Srila Prabhupada used to say that they want the kingdom of God, opulent kingdom, country like God’s but country without God. Kingdom of God without God. ‘What do I need God for? I am God! I am Bhokta. Aham isvaro.

aham bhogi aham balavan aham sukhi’ (BG 16.13-15)

Krishna has said this in Bhagavad Gita. The demoniac nature is like that so simple living high thinking. So again I was in America and some team, some gentlemen they approached me and they said, ‘Swamiji Swamiji we have one formula that we are practicing these days.’ I said ‘what is that formula?’ They said ‘kiss formula.’ I said ‘I’m a sannyasi and I have nothing to do with kiss. No no kissing.’

They said ‘Swamiji not that kissing.’ I said ‘What kiss are you talking about?’ And he said – listen to this what he said. He said ‘Keep it simple, stupid.’ Did you get that? The kiss formula is ‘keep it simple oh stupid.’ So this is also a message? Keep it simple stupid world or mad mad mad world. Or this bad bad bad world is they have to keep themselves simple. On the contrary I was again talking about simple living and high thinking, lots of people or this is again a propaganda. The youths you see sometimes wearing t-shirts and what do they write on the back? Just do it! Have you read that? Just do it! Just do it! Meaning if you feel good, kuch kuch hota hai. Then if you feel good, do it! Do not even think or think later on but just do it! So this is high living no thinking. Not even simple thinking but no thinking. Just do it! So this is how the youths are being misled all over the world, all over India. Just do it. If you feel good just do it!

I was in Bombay many years ago and we were going for some function downtown and I saw a big board, a sign board billboard and when I looked at it there was a young man, some Mumbai wala (from Mumbai) and he had opened his chest (Maharaja makes swooosh sound) like Hanuman. But when I took a closer look at it what was in his heart? It was a Limca bottle. There was no Jai Sri Ram or there was no Sita Ram, the young man had a Limca bottle in his heart. So this shows what is their thinking, what are they contemplating, what are they planning to enjoy. So whatever you do, these things in your youthful days, that makes an impression upon you and that governs your thinking, feeling, willing.

That is the function of the mind thinking, feeling, willing and that stays with you even to the last breath of your life. There was an old man dying and his family had gathered around him and the children were saying ‘daddy daddy, you have only have one or two breaths to go before you leave. Could you say Bhola Bhola?’ They were followers, worshippers of Bhole Nath Shankar so they said ‘please say Bhola.’

But did father say ‘Bhola?’ What did he say? The father said ‘Cola Cola.’ And this was the last thing he said and he was out of there. So possibly he went to Coca Cola Loka? By thinking of Coca Cola

Yam yam vapi smaran bhavam
tyajaty ante kalevaram (BG 8.6)

Krishna says this right? Whatever you remember at the time of death that’s your destination. So be aware, be aware young men and ladies and gentlemen. We need good company. We need Hare Krishna devotee company, association of saintly persons to become like them. Men of character.

So the present day education is, I keep saying, it’s money making education. Education so that you can make money and then spend money but we would like to see the education that will make you man-making. Making Danavas into Manavas. There is so much Danavi, Rakshashi Pravritti all over the world and so this Hare Krishna movement is busy day and night revolutionizing the consciousness of people globally and there is a tremendous response.

From all over the world people are stepping forward, youths are stepping forward. Somehow everywhere the youths are the first ones to come and join. Youths come, so I was thinking that our Krishna is a youth. Our God is always youthful and so he is attracting youths from all over the world. Young boys and girls are joining- not just in India but in America. In Australia, in Africa, everywhere. And youths like singing and dancing so they chant

Hare Krishna Hare Krishna
Krishna Krishna Hare Hare
Hare Rama Hare Rama
Rama Rama Hare Hare

So they are becoming men of character. Money is lost, nothing much is lost. You know the saying it is very popular. ‘Money is lost nothing much is lost. Health is lost then something is lost however if you lose your character, Charitrahina (characterless) then everything is lost. So this Hare Krishna movement would like to see the men of character, youths building their character- character building.

So we pray and as we pray we propagate this,

sarve sukhinah bhavantu
sarve santu niramayah
sarve bhadrani pasyantu
ma kashchit duhkha bhagbhavet

This is high thinking. This is high thinking. Thinking of the welfare of the world. Sarve sukhinah bhavantu. Let everyone be happy, let everyone be happy. Others may also think that everybody be happy but the speciality of Hare Krishna devotees or the Hare Krishna movement is that not only do we wish that let everyone be happy, or we say ‘happy birthday to you’ or ‘happy new year’ but we tell the world how to be happy.

And that is chant Hare Krishna and what?
Chant Hare Krishna and be happy. So we wish happiness to everybody in this world and we know how they could be happier. How can we know? The Lord has told us how to be happy. So we are sharing that news, that formula with the rest of the world. So the same prayer

Sarve sukhinah bhavantu
Sarve santu niramayah

Let everyone be free from sickness and no more disease. Let everyone be free from disease. This is the prayer, Sarve santu niramayah. So I was reminded that many years ago one of my friends, he became a doctor and then he was opening his hospital and I was invited for the inauguration of the hospital.

At that time I said this prayer, Sarve sukhinah bhavantu sarve santu niramayah. Let everyone be free from diseases and free from sickness and my friend said ‘Maharaja, if that happens, if everyone becomes free from sickness- no more sick people no more disease, then what will happen to my hospital?! You are just now about to open my hospital and cut the ribbon right now and I have a fifty bed hospital and you are praying that let everyone be free from the sickness and disease.’

So that’s not very high thinking, my friend was thinking differently and that is how the rest of the world also thinks that way. ‘Let the world go to hell and let me be healthy and happy. I don’t care.’ So part of the high thinking is that we are- all the people on this planet are part of our family. As Krishna enters your heart then your thinking becomes big thinking or high thinking and you are no more low, low minded, narrow minded. As Krishna enters your heart and you are thinking of Krishna then what is your heart? Our scriptures say

ayam nijah paroveti ganana laghuchetasam
udaracharitanantuvasudhaiva kutumbaka.

Ayam nijah, ‘these people are my people. Paroveti, but these people are outsiders.’ Thinking like this is ganana Laghuchetasam. Laghu, one thing is Laghu and the other thing is Guru. Laghu is narrow, small minded and Guru heavy and broad minded. So Laghuchetasam, those who are small minded, narrow minded, low minded, they always think ‘oh these are some outsiders and they are my people’ but those who are udaracharitanam tu, magnanimous, broad minded, high thinkers, what is their though?

Vasudhaiva kutumbaka

Vasudha means the earthly planet and ‘everybody on this planet is part of my family. That big is my family and the head of that family is Sri Krishna or Sri Rama.’ And if you want to say Allah go ahead or Jehovah, these are different names of God. ‘He is the head of our family and we are all children of that one God. ‘This is right thinking and this is high thinking. The world needs this kind of thinking very badly otherwise so much fighting and quarrelling.

What not is going on all over the world. Again when I was a child I was reminded. In my village I think it was early sixties, sixty two or in the sixties that China and India were getting ready to battle, fight so India is a peace loving country and so children all over the home villages were shouting the sloka ‘Hindi Chini Bhai Bhai, Hindi Chini Bhai Bhai.’

So I was a little, small boy in the village, so small that I did not know what I was shouting or what I was saying ‘Hindi Chini Bhai Bhai.’ So I was thinking that Hindi is the language and Chini is what? Sugar. And Hindi language and the sugar that you eat were Bhai, Bhai. They were supposed to be brothers. So only when I grew up I realized that Hindi referred to people of Hindustan and Chini referred to the people of China.

So all people of China and all people of India are Bhai Bhai, they are brothers. At least I understood the meaning or some kind of word meaning of what slogans were shouted, but only when I became spiritual and was brought in contact with devotees of Krishna, Srila Prabhupada and his Bhagavad Gita and when I read that Bhagavad Gita especially, then I realized. Two persons if they are brothers, what does that mean? They have a common father, they have one father and that’s why they are brothers. So I was wondering that who is the common father of all people in China and all people in India. Who is their father? Is it Mr Modi or the president of China, is he the common father? No!

aham bija pradah pita (BG 14.4)

Krishna says ‘I am the seed giving father of all living entities.’ So God is father of all people of China, of all people of India and in fact of all people everywhere. Krishna, God is the father and so this understanding is the right understanding and this kind of thinking, this understanding will make us men of character. Then we will live happily and peacefully on this planet otherwise this world is becoming unliveable. Unliveable, you cannot live on this planet, you better leave. Don’t live here, leave!

So thank you once again for giving me this opportunity to address you all today, all the youths. And I’m very happy to see you all and I’m happy to talk to you and see you some time again in the future. We are same family right? The same family and please keep chanting

Hare Krishna Hare Krishna
Krishna Krishna Hare Hare
Hare Rama Hare Rama
Rama Rama Hare Hare

And stay in the association of the devotees of Krishna or Hare Krishna devotees and study Bhagavd Gita and honour Krishna prasadam only. For the rest of your life do not eat anything else but Krishna prasad. Okay so any questions or comments or what else are we supposed to be doing?

Question: Maharaja, how do we handle failures in our life and still remain undeviated in our devotion?

Answer: Failure is the pillar of success, we hear that saying. Krishna’s advice is

sukha duhkhe same krmitva labhalabhau jayajayau (BG 2.38)

Sometimes happiness, sometimes distress. Transcend it and go beyond. Sometimes gain, sometimes loss. Sometimes success, sometimes failure. Yes, this is the world, this is the nature of this world. Krishna also says dvandvatito vimatsaraha (BG 4.22)

Dvandvatito, go beyond this dvandva of success and failure, gain and loss, youth and old age. Like that this world is full of this dual nature dvandva. That’s the meaning also of being transcendental or transcend, I would say just be successful at the time of death and do not ask for Coca Cola. Go for Bhola or go for Rama or Krishna. And if you do that you go back to Krishna. You re-join Krishna and there is no success like that. That is real success. Otherwise you may have so many gains and so many trophies and this and that but it’s no good.

ante narayana smrtih- that’s our goal.

itna to karna swami Jab pran tan se nikle govinda naam leke

Then you are victorious. So shoot for that and make that a goal. Other successes they come and go. You could learn from failure or you could do a review and you could reform or improve or learn from your mistakes. You can consult your councilor, your spiritual advisor or spiritual scientist and don’t repeat the same mistakes again. So making mistakes or even to err is human but not to learn from the mistakes and not to improve them..

There’s a difference between wise man and the fool number one. The wise man learns from his mistakes, from his failures and he is always improving, trying to rectify, plan to be better. Prevention is better than cure so try to prevent as much as possible learning from failure or some setbacks so that you will not repeat that failure again. The best thing is to get out of here and that’s param vijayate sri krsna sankirtanam.

That’s the supreme victory and all these other successes and failures are not much important.

Question: Maharaja, we are chanting the holy names, we are doing seva but still we are attracted to the material world and our mind is still thinking about worldly affairs.

Answer: Yes, so? That’s not new. We have been thinking of worldly affairs for such a long, long time and all the affairs that we were thinking of were only material. All this time. So don’t expect that those material thoughts are just going to disappear just like that. That they are going to leave you alone instantly. No, it will take time and you have to practice.

man mana bhava mad bhakto
mad yaji mam namaskuru
mam evaisyasi satyam te
pratijane priyo ‘si me (BG 18.65)

‘Remember me’ Krishna says. Or chant Hare Krishna and become Krishna’s devotee and attempt to become Krishna’s devotees. Endeavour to remember Krishna, practice to remember Krishna and as you remember Krishna more and more, you’ll forget the material world and worldly affairs more and more. So ‘Ye yatha mam prapadyante’ Krishna says.

The more you remember Me, the more you surrender unto the Lord to that degree the Lord reveals himself unto us and to that degree we get free from Maya.

mam eva ye prapadyante mayam etam taranti te.(BG 7.14)

Otherwise Maya is very strong. Krishna the owner of Maya says ‘mama maya duratyaya’ (BG 7.14). ‘Mama Maya, my Maya is very difficult to overcome’ so giving up the worldly thinking is not an easy thing but it could become easy by mam eva ye prapadyante, by surrendering unto Krishna. Call out for help, ‘help, help Krishna help.’ And that is

Hare Krishna Hare Krishna
Krishna Krishna Hare Hare
Hare Rama Hare Rama
Rama Rama Hare Hare

That is our call out to Krishna. ‘Help help, Krishna help!’ And you could get Maya out of your way and the path is clear and you could proceed. Yes? So this process of Krishna consciousness is to achieve that goal. We want to get rid of these mundane thoughts, worldly thoughts.

dhyayato visayan pumsah
sangas tesupajayate
sangat sanjayate kamah
kamat krodho ‘bhijayate (BG 2.62)

As soon as you contemplate on the objects of the senses what happens? Sangas tesupajayate. You develop attachment and then sangat sanjayate kamah, lust. And when that lust is not fulfilled you become angry. This is the cycle, the vicious cycle. Dhyayato visayan pumsah. Instead of thinking of Visayas, the sense objects, if you are thinking of Krishna, if you think of Krishna’s form, think of Krishna’s qualities and pastimes, think of Krishna’s devotees then what will happen?

Sangas tesupajayate You will also develop attachment for Krishna. Krishna’s name, Krishna’s abode, Krishna’s name, Krishna’s pastimes, Krishna’s devotees. And what will be the outcome? Earlier there was sangas tesupajayate sangat sanjayate kamah and here in this case you have contemplated on Krishna, Krishna’s form, Krishna’s qualities, Krishna’s devotees and then instead of developing Kama you will develop Prema, you will develop love for the Lord.

So this is how you transform lust into love or thinking of worldly affairs into thinking of Krishna by changing your contemplation, what you are thinking about. And we are thinking day and night so Krishna says ‘think of me’ and then you don’t have to think of Maya if you think of Krishna. Hari Hari.

Question: Preaching is becoming more and more difficult with the advancement of modern civilisation. How can we maintain patience and perseverance in spite of lack of interest from the youths?

Answer: I thought it was becoming easier in the sense that now a lot of preaching goes on online and with virtual programs happening. And it is also so easy now I am preaching to you right now, I am talking to you. The Covid-19 situation I think has compelled us to the modern means of communication and so that way through the Internet and through these virtual- online communication programs and preaching, things are becoming also very easy or economical and faster.

So in some sense it is becoming easier due to what the world has gone through. The kick of the Corona Virus has given us a kick, a big kick! Those super powers, America bow down, China bow down, bow down Russia. You could tell them this is what happens, from Bhoga comes Roga.

So the world had been in this enjoying spirit Bhoga enjoyment, and that results in Roga. And as this Roga, this Covid-19 has beaten off the human race, I hope they are coming to their senses and turning to God. So hope that they become more submissive and receptive to the message of Krishna consciousness. Now you could tell them ‘you better change your diet.’ Wuhan right? That was a city in China where that market place where all sorts of meat and this and that, a big kind of mix up- that’s where this virus was born and spread and was exported all over.

So yes, better go for this patram pushpam phalam toyam. No more muttonam chikanam this and that. So you could point out and bring this to the attention of the people of this world so that they can change their lifestyle and diet and the whole value system, their attitude. So I think that we have an opportunity to preach. This Covid-19 is providing us with a great opportunity and great forum, channel also. So don’t get discouraged and face the challenges if there are any.

Super excellence of Gaudiya Vaisnavism

27 Nov 2020

Online class for Middle East Sanga

Few years before during ILS ISKCON Leadership Sangha I made one presentation, which was appreciated and then after that I have shared this presentation with few other groups and now it is your turn. And the topic is ‘super excellence of Gaudiya Vaisnavism’. ‘Understanding the Super excellence of Gaudiya Vaisnavism’, so we are Gaudiya vaisnavas, ISKCON devotees, followers of Caitanya Mahaprabhu. There are so many other religions and sampradayas, paraparas and dharmas. Amongst all those this is the top notch practice of God consciousness, we call that Krishna consciousness. And it is super excellent. So this is the point I want to get across to you.

So, these are some of the topics, all these topics, I am going to talking about. As you see them listed and I wish to add in some more topics in future, but for now this is what we have. ‘Acintya Bhedabheda Tattva’ we will be talking about that philosophical conclusions and how Acintya Bhedabheda tattva, Gaudiya vaisnavism is super excellent, the top most. Many sampradayas and Gaudiya sampradaya’s excellence; Raganuga sadhana bhakti, as there are so many types of bhakti and sadhana and practices and Raganuga sadhana, as Gaudiya vaisanavas’ sadhana and that is super excellent. And there are so many abodes, holy places and destinations and Goloka is the topmost.

goloka eva namni nija dhamni taleca tasya

That is the super excellent, the top most. Then Rasa-vicar, different rasas are there. You know that 12 rasas are secondary and 5 primary, and amongst those which rasa is the top most, which Caitanya Mahaprabhu has delivered, that we will be talking about. And then so many scriptures, types of scriptures, globally and amongst them Srimad Bhagavatam and Caitanya Caritamrita are super excellent. And there are so many objects of worship or religionists have understanding of this god that god, this name that name, demigod or long list. Then Krsna and Sri Krsna Caitanya Mahaprabhu are the Supreme Personality of Godhead, that point we will make. Then there are many mantras and Hare Krsna mantra is Maha mantra. Others are mantras, but this is Maha mantra, the best in all the mantras. In conclusion Gaudiya Vaisnavism is Krsna consciousness. We will just conclude by making that point. So, we will start one by one.

Sri Krsna Caitanya Mahaprabhu ki jai!
aradhyo bhagavan vrajesa –tanayas tad dhama vrndavanam
ramya kacid upasana vrajavadhu vargena ya kalpita
srimad bhagavatam pramanam amalam prema pumartho mahan
sri caitanya mahaprabhur matam idam tatradaro nah parah

This mantra is from ‘Sri Caitanya-mata-manjusa’, the foundation of what I am presenting here. This is Caitanya Mahaprabhus’s mata-midam, at the end it is said, this is the opinion of Caitanya Mahaprabhu and He is the one who is saying, ‘when it comes to aradhana or worship, then worship of Vrajesa tanaya, Sri Krsna, is the top most.’ And the same time tad-dham vrndavanam and worship of Vrndavan abode is the top most amongst all the abodes or dhams. And the mode of worship ‘vraja vadhu vargena ya kalpita’, the mode of worship adopted by the Gopis, that is the topmost. ‘Srimad Bhagavatam pramanam amalam’, so amongst all the scriptures, Srimad Bagavatam is the top most and spotless Purana. And ‘prema pumarto mahan’, and pancham purusartha, everyone else is busy with the four purusarthas, dharma, artha, kama and moksa and we have one additional purusartha, called prema pumarto mahan, that is ‘Love of Godhead’. Sri-caitanya-mahaprabhor matam idam, this is the opinion of Sri Krsna Caitanya Mahaprabhu. And ‘tatra daro nah parah’, we honor that and we respect that opinion of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu.

Sad-Goswami vrinda ki jai!
These are our acaryas. Besides the Lord, these are the associates of Sri Krsna Caitanya Mahaprabhu, Goswami’s of Vrndavan. They have also done ‘nana sastra vicaranaika’, scrutinizingly studying of all the sastras and essence of that is Krsna consciousness, Gaudiya Vaisnavism, which they have established.

Acintya Bhedabheda Tattva is the specialty of the Gaudiya Vaisnavism. Going back into the history, or we will cover half the way of history. 2500 years ago, Buddha appeared and He presented Sunyavada which is voidism we call it, sunya everything is zero. What we have to attain? Our goal is zero, void. Then appeared Sankaracarya, he appeared some 1100 or 1200 years ago. First vada was sunyavada and this one is Mayavada or Advaitavada. Before his appearance, he (Sivaji) had said this to Parvati that, I am going appear as Brahman.

kalau brahmana rupina

I am going to appear in Kerala and I would be propagating Mayavada, which is asat sastram, falsehood, I am going to talk some speculation. So, that siddhanta or philosophy he propagated is known as Nirvisesavada, impersonalism. First one was voidism and this is impersonalism, also known as Advaitvada. There are so many other vada-vivada, that had taken place in the world, but we are mainly going to deal with this Sunyavada and Nirvisesavada or Advaitavada. Also Nirvisesavada, as you could see the finger, ‘one’, there is no difference between Lord and ourselves. We are one. Ultimately we will merge into that Brahman and become one with the Lord. So that’s the kind of understanding, which is misunderstanding, which was propagated by Sankaracarya.

Then comes, first was everything is zero or we have to attain Zero, become zero, that is Sunyavada and then Advaitavada, become one with the Lord, advaitavada by Sankaracarya and then comes our whole batch, battalion of our acaryas, the four sampradaya acaryas and they talked about Dvaitvada. Especially Madhvacarya emphasized and whenever we see his portrait, he is showing two, two, not zero, not one, two. So there is a living entity, that is one and other one is Supreme Lord, that is two, they are two simultaneously and eternally they exist as two entities.

So here are the four sampradayas.
1.Brahma sampradaya
2. Rudra sampradaya
3. Kumar sampradaya
4. Sri sampradaya

Four acaryas appeared in those sampradayas. What they have presented, their philosophies are known as Dvaita siddhanta, Visista advaita siddhanta of Ramanujacarya, Suddhadvaita siddhanta of Vinsuswami and Dvaitadvaita siddhanta of Nimbarkacarya. So basically they are talking about the advaitvada with some variant degree but bottom line is adavita siddhant, the living entity and Supreme Lord are anu atma and vibhu atma, that is Paramatma, they are two and they eternally and simultaneously exist. This was a concluding philosophy or siddhanta of all the four sampradaya acaryas.

And then comes Gaudiya Vaisnava siddhanta, presented by Baladeva Vidyabhusana, which he is presented in Jaipur; some 300 years ago he wrote a commentary on Vedanta sutra, which is known as Govinda bhasya and that is known as Acintya Bhedabheda tattva. As you could see here, the fingers are or you could read also, simultaneously one and different. So the four sampradaya acaryas emphasized the two, we are two. Our contribution is or amendment made by Gaudiya Vaisnava acarya, Baladeva Vidyabhusana is Acintya Bhedabheda tattva, living entity and Lord are two and one simultaneously. So, quantitatively we are two or different, and qualitatively we are one, non-different. So while emphasizing, these four sampradaya acaryas, they were emphasizing dualism or this dvaitavada, as a result living entity and the Lord are separated, stay away living entity, stay away, but the Gaudiya Vaisnava siddhanta brings that living entity closer to the Lord also and right in the lap of the Lord or sometimes climbing up on the shoulder of the Lord and like that. So Gaudiya vaisnava siddhanta of acintya bhedabheda tattva, is bringing closer to the Lord and even mixing and mingling and dealing with the Lord like that and not just maintaining the owe and reverence of God and He is great and stay away or stay at the feet only, like that.

So that is a long journey, have taken two thousand years, so Buddha to Sankara and to others also, four sampradayas and Caitantya Mahaprabhu, this is 2000 years period; so from zero to one to two to simultaneously one and two siddhanta of Sri Krsna Caitanya Mahaprabhu and His parampara.

‘namaste saraswate deve gaur vani pracarine nirvisesa sunyavadi pascatya desa tarine’

We chant this pranam mantra everyday at the lotus feet of Srila Prabhupada, and there in we say, Srila Prabhupada propagated Gaura vani, the message of Gauranga Mahaprabhu and what was the outcome or what was the result? Nirvisesa sunyavada, then sunyavada, advaitvada was defeated and the western world or the whole world was saved, we are saved from this sunyavada andnirvisesavada as Gaura vani pracar, gaur vani message was propagated by Srila Prabhupada and his Hare Krsna movement.

Gaudiya sampradaya, that is our next title, the relationship between Gaudiya Vaisnavism and four sampradayas! We already talked about this. Just one more point that we will be making here. So, even before 500 years, before Caitanya Mahaprabhu’s manifested lila, all these sampradaya acaryas, whenever they were on the planet, like Ramanujacarya was on the planet thousand years ago and Madhvacarya 800 years ago and like that, all the four acaryas appeared before Caitanya Mahaprabhu’s advent and whenever they were on the planet they were visiting Mayapur dham. And they all had encounter with Sri Krsna Caitanya Mahaprabhu or darsana of Caitanya Mahaprabhu. So what I am about to present, just short presentation, it is from Navadvipa dham mahatmya, parikrama khanda of Bhakti Vinod Thakur.

So, here what you see is Nityanada Prabhu is taking Jiva Goswami on parikrama of Navadvipa dham. And there is a dialogue, they are talking, basically Nityananda Prabhu is going to be mentioning, there is a statement of Caitanya Mahaprabhu wherein He says that, ‘I am going to accept two qualities from all these four sampradayas. Two of their best qualities I will accept in my sampradaya.

From Sri Sampradaya I will accept these two qualities: ananya bhakti and bhaktajana seva, serving devotees and unalloyed devotional service, these two qualities from Sri sampradaya, Caitanya Mahaprabhu accepted these qualities from Ramanuja sampradaya.

From Madhvacarya sampradaya, keval advaita nirasana, that the way he defeated Advaitvada, Madhvacarya did, there is a whole presentation. So I accept that within My sampradaya and also nitya krsna murti sevana and the way Madhavacarya served the Deities, his Krsna, Udupi Krsna, so that I will accept in My sampradaya. This is all stated in that Bengali prayer from Navadvipa dham mahatmya.It is stated there at the top.

And from Rudra sampradaya, tadiya sarvasva bhava, fully surrender unto the Lord and Raga marga, following ragamarga, these two principles from Rudra sampradaya. Okay, moving on, Kumar sampradaya, Ekanta Radhikasraya and Gopibhava. I think you could understand what is talked here of these two principles from Kumar sampradaya. So, this way Caitanya Mahaprabhu made His sampradaya, parampara wholesome and complete. We have our own philosophy and siddhanta and bhava and bhakti and all these additional dimensions were added by Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu to Gaudiya Vaisanava parampara, making this as a super excellent Gaudia Vaisnavism.

Next Raganuga sadhana, this we will be talking about, next. As you could see, sadhana bhakti has vaidhi sadhana bhakti and raganuga sadhana bhakti. We do practice Vaidhi sadhana bhakti, but soon we evolve or rise and get on the path of Raganuga sadhana bhakti, that is Gaudiya Vaisnavism. This is Krsna. He isstill in Goloka. Krsna’s contemplation before His advent in this world as Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu. Krsna is thinking, contemplating, preparing His strategy, ‘now I appeared, what I am going to do’. This is from Caitanya Caritamrita

‘premarasa niryasa karite asvadana ragamarga bhakti loke karite pracarana’ (Cc Adi 4.15)

Here it is like two pronged strategy, one is to do premarasa asvadan, He would like to relish premarasa and do the pracar, propagation of that Raga marga. So relishing and propagating, sharingthat prema rasa or love of godhead.
More of the same thing,

‘aisvarya jnanete saba jagat misrita aisvarya sithila preme nahi mora prita’(Cc Adi 4.17),

The love weakened by the sense of majesty does not satisfy Me. I do not become subservient to such love. And then He says ‘If one thinks of Me as his son, his friend, his beloved, his equal or inferior, then I am satisfied with him.’ (Cc Adi 4.18)

Rupanuga is Raganuga. Rupanuga sadhana was given by Rupa Goswami. Here we could see at Radha Damodar temple and at the courtyard there is a samadhi of Rupa Goswami and bhajan kutir also, of Rupa Goswami. Srila Prabhupada is contemplating and imbibing all that raganuga bhajan sadhana bhakti and pouring that into his purports and he is relishing himself, Srila Prabhupada is propagating same all over the world as he would be founding International society for Krsna consciousness.

Goloka dham ki jai!

So the famous statement we know from Bramha Samhita,

‘Goloka namni nijadhamni tale ca tasya devi mahesaharidhamasu tesu tesu’

Goloka is at the top and underneath is Devidhama and that is middle east, where you are, we all are and there is Mahesh dham, and there is Hari dhama, Vaikuntha dham and there is Sanket dhama. I think it is all shown here also. We could see Brahma and his creation underneath, there is Devi dhama underneath Viraja river and you cross and you get into Mahesh dhama, which is Lord Siva’s dhama. Half of Siva’s dham is part of Devi dhama, material existence and upper half is part of Vaikuntha dhama. That is very special feature of Mahesa dhama. And then, Saketa, it is Rama’s abode, Ayodhya, up there in spiritual sky. And at the top there is Radha and Krsna residing and performing Their pastimes. It is Goloka dham.

Further details are there, as you could see 1/4th Brahmanda, cross section, 14 planetary systems and Brahma’s planet on the top and we could see so many other planets floating in the universes.

Sadasiva, He stays in the upper half of Mahesh dhama which is part of Vaikuntha. And Rudra and other forms of Siva, they are in lower part. They are the party that destroys the world, and there are other Rudras, 11 Rudras. And this is Vaikuntha and this is finally Goloka. Gaudiya Vaishnavas, their goal is Goloka. They do not stop not in svarga, not here and there, not in Vaikuntha. And the topmost abode is Goloka and that is super excellent and that is the destination of Gaudiya Vaisnavas. So, karmis go only upto heaven and jnanis they merge into Brahmajyoti and vaidhi bhaktiwalas they go to Vaikuntha and Raganuga bhaktas they go to Goloka, the supreme destination.

So moving on, rasa vicar. It is a very vast and deep topic, rasa vicar. Considering, contemplating and understanding the rasas, mellows. As I said earlier, there are seven rasas which are gaun or secondary rasas and this is all described in the Nectar of Devotion purports. Five principle, pradhan rasas are displayed here. So, santa rasa – Krsna nista, they are attached to Krsna and trisna tyaga, they are detached from worldly affairs. So that is their specialty or character of the Santa rasa is this, Krsna nista and trisna tyaga.

Then Dasya bhava, dasya bhakti, dasya rasa, so they have previous two characteristics and additional one is sevana, they become active and they act, they serve. The other party santa, they may just appreciate sitting around. But in dasya, they jump into the action. Going higher, sakhya rasa, you could see all those three characteristics are there and additional is visrambha. Visrambha means this is where the acintya bheda bheda, this is abheda, this comes into the picture. Bheda is there but abheda that is visrambha. We are closer to the Lord. We have similar qualities of the Lord or we are around the Lord or devotees are around the Lord, and even equal to the Lord, sakhya rasa, that is called visrambha. Sakhas will say to the Lord sometimes,

‘oh tuni ami sama tum kaun badalog’

Who do you think you are? We are equals. Let’s play! Vatsalya rasa, so all previous four and additional is palaka jnana. Palaka jnana, this is parenthood and the parents of the Lord, some devotees become parents of the Lord and they think I have to take care, I have to look after my child, my son Krsna or Rama or whatever name They have. So, this palaka jnana. They take care of Krsna, Lord.

Then Madhurya rasa, this is conjugal dealings and additional thing is nijanga dana, and here is full surrender and full evolution in Krsna consciousness and they surrender everything including nijanga dana, even their bodies at disposal by Lord. So, no reservation, no holding back, nothing; everything is for Your pleasure my dear Lord. So that bhava or that rasa, that kind of bhakti is called Nijanga dana, dana is giving, offering. That is madhurya rasa. And this is, Caitanya Mahapabhu has spoken (CC Madhya 19.215-235) or taught these things to Sanatan Goswami, this is Sanatan siksha inCaitanya Caritamrta Madhya lila chapter 19. You could read further details also.

So these are examples of santa rasa bhaktas. One time of course, they were santa rasa or brahmavadis. Later on they progressed and one time, these four Kumaras, they came into the category of santa rasa bhaktas, jnani bhaktas. And this one is dasya rasa, the whole Vaikuntha world is filled with dasas or servants. Every Vaikuntha planet have their masters, different incarnations or avatars of the Lord, They reside in different Vaikunthas. They are all great and reverence exhibited between Lord and devotes. So there servitude is all pervading, predominating in Vaikuntha lokas.

And then sakhya rasa, but now we are going to be very briefly talking or presenting sakhya rasa, vatsalya rasa and Madhurya rasa and they, all three of them are of two different kinds. Sakhya rasa- aisvarya misrita sakhya rasa, the friendship is there but it is mixed with aisvarya, God being great and that understanding is also there at the back of their mind. And then they relate with Lord as sakhas, but understanding God is great. Here this is also sakhya rasa but this is Visrambha sakhya rasa. This is abheda, abheda part is exhibited here. No difference! So, these are also sakhas, Arjuna is also sakha but these are the cowherd boys, His friends in Vrindavan. This is Visrambha sakhya rasa.

And then aisvarya misrita vatsalya rasa, this is in the prison house of Kamsa, and Lord has just taken birth. And He is showing His four handed form and this is Vasudeva and Devaki. So this relationship is that of vatsalya, but there is aisvarya misran or they are even offering prayers, you could see. Prakrutepurusam param, there is a whole prayer. They are offering prayers to their son. So this is Aisvarya misrita vatsalya rasa in Mathura.

And then, this is also vatsalya, jai Damodar! This is visrambha vatsalya rasa, which we have been experiencing throughout this month of Damodar. There is no aisvarya, not even a drop of aisvarya, or it is only visrambha vatsalya here.

And here is a madhurya rasa, in Vaikuntha, there is madhurya rasa, sringar rasa. Laxmi Narayan or Laxmi Narsimha or Laxmi Varaha like that every Lord of Vaikuntha has His consort, Laxmi with Them and that rasa They experience is aisvarya misrita madhurya or sringar rasa. And this one is Visrambha madhurya rasa, super excellent rasa and it in Goloka, and in Radha and Krsna or Gopi and Krsna. There is nothing like this and this is the top most rasa,
‘parakiya bhave jaha vrajete pracar’

This is the propagated, practiced in Braja, Goloka and Sri Krsna Caitanya Mahaprabhu He appeared in fact to relish this and to propagate this.

The super excellence of Srimad Bhagavatam, Caitanya Caritamrta and the whole Gaudiya literature- you see Brahma, he is four headed and from each of his mouth one Veda has emanated, but he is not compiler or he is just repeating. The Vedas are coming from the Lord, but we are getting them from the mouth of Brahma.

Vedic knowledge again has two branches-Sruti and Smrti. I think I will not now define this, I expect you understand smrti and what is sruti. Yeah you will understand here also, there is Sruti, Vedas have four divisions, first of all four Vedas, Rg, Yajur, Sama and Athava. And in each Veda you will find there are four divisions called samhita, Brahmana, upanisad, and Aranyaka. Just take a note that Upanisad, they are part of Vedas. They are not additional scriptures, they are part of Vedas, one division of Vedas. Other three divisions are there, Upanisad is one of those divisions of each of the four Vedas.Okay, Smrti, there are 18 puranas, itihasas, Mahabharat, Ramayana this is all itihasa, part of Smrti. And Sad darsana, as listed here, you could see sankhya, yoga, Vaisesika, Nyaya, Purva mimamsa and the top most is Vedanta. So this Sad darsana, they are popularly known as sad darsana, six different philosophical presentations and they basically, each one states what is the origin of this world, where the world originating from, what is the source of the world, or universe? One of these sad darsan will say, atom is the source and another one will say, no the combination of atom is the source, another one would say that nature is the source, another would say that consciousness is the source, another one will say mimasa it’s all governed by our activities and finally Srila Vyasdeva is going to say ‘No, janmadyasya yatah’, Lord Himself is the source of everything. So that makes the Vedant of Vyasdeva as the top most. And then take note of this, this is mentioned in Garuda puran and some other puranas also, quoted in Caitanya Caritamrta Madhya lila (25.143-144) ‘artho yam brahma sutranam’, Srimad Bhagavatam is the commentary of Vedanta sutra or Vyasa sutra, they are different names. Srila Prabhupada always writes, the natural commentary of Vedant sutra is Srimad Bhagavatam. Amongst these sad darsana the Vedant sutra is topmost and then Srimad Bhagavatam is natural commentary of that Vedant sutra, so that makes Srimad Bhagavatam super excellent.

So these are the scriptures that we go for; Prabhupada have presented these scriptures Bhagavad gita, Bhagavatam and Caitanya Caritamrita and they are all super excellent, complementing each other or one leading the other. Bhagavad Gita is preliminary study and Bhagavatam is graduate study and Caitanya Caritamrta is post graduate study. And what is described in Caitanya Caritamrta and Caitanya Bhagavat which is post graduate course is further elaborated by our Gaudiya Vaisnava acaryas and the vast literature that they have left behind and complied and presented and this is just a matchless gift. There is nothing like in the creation. So this is at the level of Caitanya Caritamrta, post-graduation and excellent scripture and pure, eternal truth in, whether it is Vrndavan mahimamrta or Caitanya Bhagavat or Brhad Bhagatamrta, or Manah siksa or Bhakti Rasamrita sindhu or hundreds and hundreds of these whole granthas and the whole treasure is available, ISKCON is making this available for the world.

This is our specialty also, Krsna and Sri Krsna Caitanya are the Supreme Personality of Godhead. The Godhead They have exhibited, that is of the topmost order and excellence.

‘ete camsa kala pumsahkrsnas tu bhagavan svayam’

All these are kalas and asas, amsasa, plenary portion, portion of plenary portion, but, tu kintu, there is kintu, and that is Krsna is Supreme Personality of Godhead which Srila Prabhupada presented, that Krsna and Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu. Brahma samhita says that, paribhasa sutra in fact, Srimad Bhagavatam, this is foundational statement of Srimad Bhagavatam, I just said, ete camsa kalah pumsah krsnas tu bhagavan svayam. So, whole Bhagavatam is based on this paribhasa sutra, krsnastu bhagavan svayam.

Then Krsna’s 64 qualities, of which 50 are found in living entities, 5 additional qualities are found in Brahma and Siva. Five additional qualities are found in different incarnations, and there are only 4 qualities or there are qualities four of them are found only in Sri Krsna. What are those four qualities? They are listed here. This is from Bhakti Rasamrta Sindhu. Lila madhurya, venu madhurya, prema madhurya and rupa madhurya, this is specialty of Krsna. These are found in no one else, not even in Rama or Varaha or Narasimha or Parasurama. So that makes Krsna the Supreme Personality of Godhead.

Then this is the famous statement, sri krsna caitanya radha krsna nahe anya, Radha and Krsna combine, this is Caitanya Mahaprabhu. Namo mahavadanyaya.. you know that one. And then Hare Krsna Mahamantra.. so this is in Kali

santarana Upanisad, famous statement that,
iti sodasakam namnam kali-kalmasa nasanam,
natah parataropayah sarva vedesu drsyate

When Brahma was approached by Narada muni and he inquired, ‘O! This age of Kali is here. What process they should be following now to become God conscious, Krsna conscious?’ and this is Brahma’s statement in fact, Brahma says, Hare Krsna Hare Krsna Krsna Krsna Hare Hare Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare, iti all these, sodasakam, these 16 names, this will destroy all the bad qualities of this age of Kali and I do not see anything that is better than this. Natah paratara upaya, other upaya, solution does not exist in entire Vedic literature.’
So you will find in Brahmanda Purana, in Laghu Bhagavatamrta statement, glorifying, ‘thousand names of Visnu is equal to one name of Rama and three names of Rama equal to one name of Krsna.’ And in Caitanya Bhagavat, we find this statement, Caitanya Mahaprabhu said this, this is rare statement, where Mahaprabhu said Mahamantra and said,
‘iha haite sarva-siddhi haibe sabar, sarva-ksana bala ithe vidhi nahi ara’ (CB Madhya lila 23.74-75)

‘By chanting of Hare Krsna Mahamantra, Lord said you will attain perfection and other than this process of chanting, there is no other vidhi, so go for this chanting of Hare Krsna’ this is Caitanya Mahaprabhu.
Anantasamhita talks about Mahamantra, jivatarane, for liberating living entities, this Mahamantra of 32 syllables, dvatrinsad varnakani hi kalau yuge mahamantrah sammato jivatarane.

Nama sadhana-> mantra siddhi, as we chant Hare Krsna we end up in perfection of chanting and every mantra has mantra devata. Hare Krsna Mahamantra’s mantra devata is Radha Krsna and wherever that Devata resides, that is where the chanter of that mantra ends up or he achieves that abode. Hare Krsna chanting brings you to Goloka. Tukarama by chanting ‘Jaya jaya Rama Krsna Hari’ similar to Hare Krsna Hare Krsna, you could see him on the way to Goloka here. This is Dehu, near Pune, Dehu goan of Tukarama and as he was chanting, Lord sent plane, Garuda Vahana and he is on his way back.

Param vijayate sri krsna sankirtanam, all those who chant Hare Krsna, victory is guaranteed for them and what is the victory? No more birth, no more death, that is the victory. Again and again dyeing is the defeat. Victory is you are heading back home by chanting Hare Krsna Hare Krsna. Victory flag, Jaya-pataka is here.
Okay there is more, but we could stop here.

Question: Maharaja, you talked about various rasas and bhava, those who have all connection of devotees with Krsna, is there any rasa or bhava between sisya and guru? Which type of rasa-bhava sisya follow for his guru?

Ans: Brahmacari gurukule vasan danto guror hitam, that is what we hear from Narada muni in Bhagavatam. Brahmacari, he resides in the asram of guru. Some sisyas may be residing at home, at their residence. So what do they do, guror hitam? They serve or they exist in fact for the benefit or service unto their spiritual master. And Narada Muni also said, nicam, they take humble position in front of guru and they serve. Also the word used is suhrdam, there could also be some friendship as we talk of the visrambha, either awe and reverence is there for guru or there may be in some cases, there is visrambha, friendship, relationship with the spiritual master. And basically spiritual master is trying to establish his disciple’s eternal relationship with the Lord. He is the transparent via media. He doesn’t become a stumbling block and just him and disciples, no! There is Krsna also; Krsna is in the center of that relationship. And not that, ‘Okay, I am swami and you are dasa’ and then one fine morning he declares that, ‘O! No, I used to be Swami, but now I am Narayana, Swami Narayana!’ Not like that, this is cheating. There could be also the different relationship, that guru bhogi, guru tyagi, guru drohi and then guru sevi. There are four kinds of relationships. So the best of all and the appropriate one is guru-sevi, the disciple serves the guru and not exploits guru or guru’s property or doesn’t try to take over, being envious of guru or abandon guru means no relationship. So there is something right thing and other wrong relationships.

Question: Maharaja you said from each sampradaya Mahaprabhu took best of each vaisnava school and formed the acintyabhedabheda tattva. So are we also the part of Madhva line or are we completely separate line from Madhva line?

Ans: Srila Bhakti Siddhant Saraswati Thakur established the temple of his Caitanya Gaudiya matha in Mayapur. And if you go around the parikrama of the temple then you find four sampradaya acaryas, they are there. So making the connection, Srila Bhakti Siddhant Sarasvati Thakur is honoring and respecting and accepting all the four sampradaya acharyas. In our sampradaya also, we call it Brahma Narada Madhva sampradaya, and Srila Vyasadeva is on the list there, so Brahma is the one who had the darasan of Vyasadeva and he accepted Vyasadeva into that parampara. That is another reason that we connect with Brahma very closely because he is connected with Vyasa and Narada. In fact he took inspiration from Vyasadeva for his writings or Vyasadeva is dictating and he is writing. I recently read somewhere, one reason why Caitanya Mahaprabhu or gaudiya sampradaya is aligned with Madhvacarya, we are connected with Madhvacarya more closely is because of the Madhvacarya’s staunch preaching against the mayavada and Advaitavada and if anyone has emphasized the dvaita, he is the one, very distinctly and obviously dvaita has been emphasized and then the mayavada is being defeated by Madhvacarya. So Caitanya Mahaprabhu is impressed with that and He has aligned and connected His parampara with Madhvacarya.

Mayavada bhasya sunile hoila sarva nasa

Caitanya Mahaprabhu, all the time, ‘don’t listen this Mayavada philosophy.’ Where from it is coming? I think He has taken that from Madhvacarya. So like that Laxmipati Tirtha, one of the acaryas in Madhva line, he became the spiritual master of Madhavendra Puri and from there we are branched out. We became like a fifth sampradaya, officially four sampradayas, but Gaudiya vaisnavism became one additional, not counted in sampradayas which are mentioned in sastras, but we are there, connected with the Madhvacarya sampradaya through Laxmipati Tirtha.

Also where I am sitting, Pandharapur Dham ki Jai! When Nityananda Prabhu visited Pandharpur, He also took initiation from Laxmipati Tirtha, who was acarya in Madhva line. So there are two understandings, Nityananda Prabhu took initiation from Madhavendra Puri is the one and the other one also, He took initiation from Laxmipati Tirtha, which is mentioned in Caitanya Bhagavat. And that Laxmipati Tirtha is from Madhva line. So our connection is made like that.

The Lord is very near and dear
November 14th, 1994
New Delhi, India

na hy asyasti priyah kascin
napriyah svah paro pi va
atmatvat sarva-bhutanam
sarva-bhuta-priyo harih [SB 6.17.33]

Translation and purport by Srila Prabhupada, Jai Srila Prabhupada!
Translation: He holds no one as very dear and no one as inimical. He has no one for His own relative, and no one is alien to Him. He is actually the soul of the soul of all living entities. Thus He is the auspicious friend of all living beings and is very near and dear to all of them.
Purport: ‘The Supreme Personality of Godhead, in His second feature, is the Supersoul of all living entities. As one’s self is extremely dear, the Superself of the self is still more dear. No one can be the enemy of the friendly Superself, who is equal to everyone. Relationships of dearness or enmity between the Supreme Lord and the living beings are due to the intervention of the illusory energy. Because the three modes of material nature intervene between the Lord and the living beings, these different relationships appear. Actually, the living entity in his pure condition is always very near and dear to the Lord, and the Lord is dear to him. There is no question of partiality or enmity.’

na hy asyasti priyah kascin
napriyah svah paro pi va
atmatvat sarva-bhutanam
sarva-bhuta-priyo harih

This is the statement of Sri Rudra uvaca, Lord Siva is speaking. Yesterday we saw, because Lord Siva is humble, he said, no I don’t know the Lord. Not only me but others also, na kumara naradau na brahma putra munayah na suresah, no one knows.
na surasura-gana devaya tasmai namah, na viduh surasura-gana,
No one knows. The suras- the demigods don’t know, asuras also, no one knows. So point was made, that these exalted personalities talk in this language out of humility. They say they do not know the Lord, that is also all right; if they say they know the Lord, that is also all right. Sometimes they may say, ‘Where is Krsna? Where is Krsna?’ Six Gosvamis may say as if they have not seen where is Krsna, they may say so. Some other devotees will say, He is always with me. I am always seeing Him. As we saw yesterday, Prabhupada said, I am always seeing. So some contradictory, as Lord also has described in Isopanisad, He is very near and He is very far as well. So these contradictions could be reconciled. Both things are possible and this is how He is Purnam. So devotees also take two different stands, I know and I don’t know the Lord. He is with me and He is not with me.

Lord when He is with them, like in case of Radharani, one time He was sitting next to Radharani, but she started crying thinking that He has gone away. And Madhumangal had come and he came with the stick; Madhumangal the friend of Lord Krsna. He is very humorous friend, very jolly and joking and keeps Lord Krsna in humorous mood. He came with the stick because of the bumble bee and Madhumangal thought, this bumble bee is disturbing the mood of Radha and Krsna. He came with the stick to drive away this little honey bee, Madhu. And He said, ‘Oh, I drove him away. I got rid of Madhu’. As soon as Radharani heard this, what was Her conclusion? She thought ‘This Madhumangal is fool. He got rid of, I had been waiting for ages to meet Krsna—They had just met last night and now They were meeting again this morning, but Radharani thinks, She is meeting Krsna after long-long time.– After long-long time, I had met, but this Madhumangal, what did he do? He drove away my Madhusudan.’ Thinking like this, what She did? Started crying, tears were gliding down her chicks, down Her body and to the ground and into the nearby lake.

When Krsna saw Radharani crying, He was wondering why She is crying? He also couldn’t control seeing Her crying, and He also started crying. And the tears from the eyes of this divine couple, they flow in a big stream and this made a big lake. Between Barasana and Nandagrama, there is lake called Prema sarovar and this lake is made up of tears of the divine couple. So this Radharani, the supreme devotee and She is thinking, Krsna is not with me, even if He is there. Somehow someone got rid of Him and He is not with me. So Krsna is with the devotee and He is not with the devotee. Devotee is scared of loosing Him and when He is away, he is trying to gain Him, again take Him back, get Him back, so these both moods are found in the devotees and they express their mood.

Now as we read this statement of Lord Siva, Rudra uvaca, we can only say that Lord Siva knows the Lord, knows the Supreme Lord. We always talk of knowing God. So with the help of someone like Lord Siva, vaisnavanam yatha sambhu, we could know the Lord. We could take help of other devotees. And Siva is one of those devotees, Mahajana. If anyone knows the Lord, Mahajana must know the Lord.

Mahajano yena gatah sa panthah

First of all follow in the footsteps of Mahajana and svayambhu naradah sambhu these are the Mahajanas. There are more, we are mentioning these three. Naradah Kapilau Manu, Prahlad, Janaka, Bhisma, including Yamaraja, the twelve personalities. So when they speak, then that is all knowledge. Lord is what? na hy asyasti, for the Lord there is no one who is priya or apriya, someone is dear, someone is not dear. Jai Radha Parthasarthi ki jai.

The same case is with Radha Parthasarathi. We are just trying to know Radha Parthasarathi. So for Radha Parthasarathi, no one is priya, apriya, this person is dear and this person is not dear; this is not applicable to the Lord Radha Parthasarathi. Then svaparo api va, someone is sva, His own party, Lord’s party, this party is parah, outsiders, others. This is also not the case with the Lord, na svaparo api va.

ayam nijah paro veti ganana laghuchetasam

ayam nijah-These people are my people and paro veti- one who thinks these people are outsiders, ganana laghu cetasam- as soon as you begin to think like this, you become person of laghu cetasam, whose cetana, consciousness is laghu, he always thinks- ayam nijah, these are my people, these are paro veti, veti means to know, veti tattvatah. So when one thinks like this, he is laghu, laghu cetasam. One who is guru, he doesn’t think like this; laghu and guru. Laghu means small minded and guru means heavy minded. Laghu also means light and small minded and guru means heavy and broad minded. So this heaviness and broad mindedness where does it come from? It has to come from Krsna. This is standard answer, very easy answer. Where anything comes from? You can close your eyes and say Krsna. You don’t even have to think. This is very easy answer. Everything comes from Krsna including this one. Lord is heavier than heaviest, but He is Purnam so He is lighter than lightest also. So the guru, spiritual master, he is very close to God, very close to Krsna. So Krsna’s quality he is exhibiting.

So Krsna is broad minded, sarva bhuta priyo harih, devotees are very dear to the Lord and Hari is sarva bhuta priya, very dear to all the living entities. The reason why all the living entities are very dear to the Lord is atmatvat sarva bhutanam, and the Lord is their soul. We already have a soul. The body has a soul. Body is there because of the soul, but the soul is because of Supersoul. So that Supersoul is the soul of all souls. This is how Prabhupada translated, soul of all souls, due to being the soul of all souls. And in purport Prabhupada is explaining, what is dear to all of us? Ourselves! Of course, lot of time we don’t know what is our self. So we think the body is our self and we try to love and serve the body; that is big mistake. But because we think we are bodies, we love, serve the bodies. But in fact love for the body, we are supposed to serve, love our soul. We love our soul and one who is loving the body, his target is the soul, love the soul itself. So if we love our soul so much then Prabhupada is making the point, what then about the soul of the soul. We would love that soul of the soul more than we love our soul. We love our soul so much that how much love the soul must have for the soul of the soul, who is Supersoul, atmatvat sarva bhutanam.

So the verse is talking of sarva bhuta priyah hari, the Lord is very-very dear, sarva bhuta priyah hari, who is dear to who? Living entity is dear to Hari or Hari is dear to the living entity? Of course both! But in purport, Prabhupada is talking, to the living entity the Lord is very-very dear’.

Question 1: Lord is very dear to the living entity, living entity is very dear to the Lord; they are so intimately connected. The living entity is part and parcel and the Supersoul is described here as the soul of all souls. Then why there are no feeling of being dear to the Lord and why so many people do not exhibit that love for the Lord.
Answer: From Lord’s side He is always loving, all the living entities, whether that devotee is demon, Lord is not seeing that. na me dvesyosti na priyah, Krsna says in Bhagavad Gita. So what comes in between this love of both parties? Why there is no reciprocation. Love is reciprocal. Love means two parties. There can not be just one party loving. You love somebody. There is always object of love, otherwise love has no meaning. So from Lord came all the living entities and don’t ask from when. And this expansion, Lord wanted the plural number around Him. What for? To enjoy, love them, the dealings, reciprocation. But we do not see that. In this world we do not see the people on the road, we do not see them loving. They are not rushing, running, the gate is wide open for darsana, but how many of them are rushing in for darsana? Instead they are rushing running to a cinema house, or Kapil comes in the town, Kapil, the captain of cricket team or the miss universe, they stay in Delhi. People are rushing, running, that shows their love, they are loving someone else. They are not loving the Lord. So the question is why is that? Lord is talking that He has love for everybody. Living entity is also supposed to be loving the Lord. Lord is soul of all the souls. But why there are such things? Where is that reciprocation of love, we don’t see that’s happening. This is the question. Very common question!

And the reply is there in the purport. Prabhupada is explaining. What is the explanation? Standard answer is Maya. In technical term, daivi hy esa gunamayi mama maya, gunamayi maya means trigunamayi maya. Tri-guna- sattva guna, rajo guna and tamo guna; gunamayi maya. Duratyaya, means very difficult, this tri-gunamayi maya makes it very difficult. So who is in between? The living entity and the Lord, they both have such intimate relationship and love for reach other, but that love has now transferred into lust. Living entity is seems to be lusty and not loving. And what is the relationship between love and lust? Perverted reflection, one is reality and other one is reflection. Like a moon and it has a reflection in the water or milk is transformed into yogurt. There is relationship, but that is a different thing. Love is divine and it is there, so as soon living entity is pure, he takes that Maya away, this three modes of material nature out and then immediately there is reciprocation of love, pure love.

So from Lord’s side, He has no problem. Not that He loves somebody and He hates somebody. Like parents, they love their children. Someone has five ten children, sometimes they have. They love all their children. It is choice of some child to disobey the parents, or to go away from the family. They do so many things, try to beat, kill parents sometimes. Like this conditioned soul is trying to blaspheme the Lord, offend the Lord. Family and children are doing same things. We are also children, of whose family? Krsna’s family! He is head of the family. He is father, He is mother, He is Bandhu, mama sarva deva devah, He is all in all and the living entities, as they are in illusion, as children when they are young, they get carried away, they get constipated, not just like drinking, but they misuse their power, and whatever. Youth makes you pramatta, half mad, crazy. Then you don’t behave properly, shistachar, etiquette you forget. And you do so many things against the parents. Same thing is happening here in the world. The parents are nothing against the children, but children take that stand somehow, the misunderstanding, why parents why not me. How long he is going to hold on to the key of the treasury. Why does not he giving the charge to me? Same thing! Why Krsna why not me? There is no God. I don’t care for the parents; I don’t care for the Lord. I don’t care for anybody. I care for myself.

So Lord’s view point is all children He loves and He is waiting and everyone, they are all children of the Lord, not only human beings but other beings are also Lord’s children. Lord was in Jharkhand forest, Caitanya Mahaprabhu was walking through the forest and then what happened? Everyone joined the Sankirtana party, there was Maha-harinam party, joined by lions, tigers, elephants, deer, snakes, birds, peacocks, in other words everybody joined kirtan. Everyone was so joyous. They were all happy. Some were walking, some were crawling on the ground, some were flying in the air just above Mahaprabhu. There is a big crowd. In the painting which we see, the painter just chose one or two lions, three elephants, ten birds, few snakes. But do you think there were so many, if you look at their painting? How many do you see? There are thirty creatures. Do you think, thirty, grand total of residents of forest joined Mahaprabhu? Everybody, all of those who were residing in that forest, they were all influenced. There was no blood shade. Not drinking of blood. They were embracing each other as brothers and sisters do, as loving members of family do that; that is how they did for this period. They have these different bodies. Elephants, tigers, they are enemies. Elephants, tigers, they are not friends. The deer and the lion, are they friends? Do they sit together to take lunch? One party is lunch of another party. But when Caitanya Mahaprabhu was there, they did not think that this is some enemy or something that I should eat this bird, this animal. They were like a pure spirit soul. They are dancing in ecstasy in the presence of the Lord.

Lord, sarva bhuta priya harih, Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu exhibited His love for all the living entities. He proved and please don’t think this is some fiction. This is not mythology. This is a history. Krsnadas Kaviraj is not imagining something happened in the forest. There is no exaggeration, no cheating. He is not that kind of authority, not that kind of writer. Free from all this! So this happened just 500 years ago when Caitanya Mahaprabhu was there. Lord’s love is not limited only to the human beings. But as soon as we become conditioned, we begin acting as a crazy; we love only ourselves, and in that self, we love only our body. And in fact we forget the soul, the interest of the soul and what to speak of the interest of the Supersoul. We forget all this. We begin making groups. Divide the society; divide the family. Broadmindedness is finished with this maya. Maya divides and who unites? Krsna unites. Krsna unites, maya divides. If you are a follower of Maya, mayar chela, disciple of Maya, close follower, then you will be agent to divide. You will divide, country, family, society.. Your job will be how to divide, if you are into maya. So acting on behalf of maya! But if you are Krsna conscious, you will think everybody is Krsna’s family, part of Krsna’s family and you will try to unite. So world needs unity and the party that unites the world, who is that party? Krsna conscious, then you are that person who could unite, they are qualified to unite the world.

So, not that these qualities are found only in the Lord, but these qualities of the Lord are also found in the devotees of the Lord.. Bheda abheda, simultaneously we are one and different from the Lord. Qualitatively we are one with the Lord, all qualities of the Lord are found in living entities also , but the quantity is different. Quantity of that quality is different, but all qualities of the Lord are found in the living entities.

The parents, they want their children united, right? Similarly, the Supreme father, Lord Krsna also likes to see all His children to stay together and we are dividing things. Oh these are Hindus, these are Muslims. Does Lord Krsna love only Hindus and He hates Muslims? If He would do that then He is not the Lord. Does Allah, He loves Muslims, He hates Hindus? No! He doesn’t even hate the lower species, non humans. What to speak of Lord hating Muslims. If we hate muslins, if we hate Sikhas, this hatrated is not pleasing to the Lord. Try to understand! Even in Bible it is given that, one hates the sin and not the sinner.

Yadrccha labha santusto dvandvatito vimatsarah, Lord Krsna says, My devotee is yadrccha labha santusto, whatever comes naturally, he is happy, santusta with that and dvandva ati, he is above dvandava, duality, Hindu, Muslim, eastern, western, man, woman, all these, my people, other people, my disciples, all these. Dvandvatit, free from dvandva; so this is expected or these qualities are found in the devotees, then what to speak of the Lord. Lord is dvandvatit, free form these dualities. Sva, same thing, someone is priya, someone is apriya, same thing. Someone is sva, his own, someone is parah, outsider, this is dvandva. Dvandvatito vimatsarah, no matsar, no envy is found in the devotee of the Lord and no duality is found.

Prabhupada always says that, there is so much only the talk of Lord, but who knows the Lord? Few things they say like God is great, God is love, but they can’t describe more. So here is the way to know the Lord, who Lord is, how are His qualities, His love for the Living entities.

Q 2:
Answer: So advice is asat sang tyagat eyi vaisnava acar, avoid those persons who are asat sanga. Stay away from asat sangies. First of all become Krsna conscious. This advice is for those who are in our possession. We are kanistha adhikaries, and we are madhyama adhikari. This advice is not for uttam adhikari. Uttam adhikari is paramahamsa. So he is transcendental. Sinners cannot influence him, change him. He is now nistha, his sraddha is irrevocable. So he could be anywhere, like Namacarya Haridas Thakur converted prostitute, so it works. But that is not advice for us. So, depending on your level! This advice is not for everyone. Those who are uttam adhikari, they see everybody is serving Krsna. So for our protection, ourselves we are asat, just recently, few months, few years ago, so if we will associate with them then our bad qualities will get revived, will get remembered. So better to stay at a distance and develop good qualities. And once you are fixed up in the good qualities then you could be anywhere.

Q 3: Why Lord Siva says he does not understand Lord Krsna?
Answer: Sometimes Lord Siva, sometimes he does not understand Lord, but we never understand. To make us realize, how difficult it is to know the Lord, Lord Siva exhibits this ignorance. Some of his activities looks like he is bewildered in the presence of Mohini murti, but there are some lessons for us to learn from that. By those activities of Lord Siva, no knowledge or ignorance of Siva or bewilderment of Siva, we should not think of offending Siva. We should not think that he is like us. Looks like Lord Siva has fallen down. Spread the news. Call the press conference. Lord Siva has fallen down. No! We should not offensively think like this. We could explain that Lord Krsna is using Lord Siva and Brahma, Lord is using His dear devotees to teach us. Lord Krsna put Arjuna in illusion, and immediately brought him out of the illusion. So Krsna may put His devotees in so called illusion, to create some history, some example, for whole world to learn from it. So, this happens, Siva, Brahma, Indra, there are so many big-big personalities, they seem to be doing something wrong. But their doing wrong is different from our doing wrong.
Q. —
Answer: You are mother yourself. Are you envious of your daughter? When there is talk of topmost love in this world, then the best example is mother’s love for the children. Abortion, they are killing their children. They are not even allowing them to take birth. Is this their love towards their children? It is killing, killing helpless children in the womb. In general, the point is they don’t know what the best interest of their children is, but they have the sentiments. They are the well wishers of the children. We say wishing well is not enough, we have to do something right. Like, if someone’s family member is sick, you wish that he get cured, but that wishing is not enough, what is necessary is to bring the right doctor who will diagnose and do the right prescription. So parents have the sentiments, they wish well, but these days these parents are not well trained, not guided by superior authority, guided by three modes of material nature. Na te viduh svartha gatim hi visnum, the best interest is to attain Lord Visnu, na te viduh, this is Prahlad Maharaja talking to his friends. No one knows the destination is Visnu. So what I said is not absolutely correct example, but could be understood that, at least they could wish their children to be happy. They don’t know how to make them happy. Like we say, happy new year! On the 1st January, few months from now, phones will be ringing, billions of people they call their family, friends and what do they say? I wish you happy new year, but as soon as the phone conversation is over, something unhappy, something that gives them distress happens. So it is wishing, they wish them to be happy. I wish you to have nice time. ‘Oh thank you for flying American airline. We wish you happy journey to your destination. Please enjoy weekend!’ Whole weekend, there is no sun, all cloudy. For all year people are waiting to go to the beach and during Christmas they go and there is no sun. All cold breeze, and they are waiting for the sun. They can’t enjoy the holidays. Someone may wish, ‘I wish you happy journey, happy weekend’, but at least wishing is there. But they have no control on so many things and they don’t know the real way to become happy. When people are healthy, doctors are not happy. And when they get sick, doctors are in bliss. Not devotee doctors!

Prabhupada memories with Lokanath Maharaja
Interview
August 29, 2020

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : Hare Krsna everyone and welcome to another session of Prabhupada memories and we’re so fortunate that today we’ll be speaking to His Holiness Lokanath Swami, who is a direct disciple of Srila Prabhupada. This is your opportunity to hear directly from the disciples of Srila Prabhupada and to get that inspiration and that connection to get directly closer to our divine Grace. So we really want to welcome Maharaja today, thank you so much His Holiness Lokanath Maharaja for joining us and how are you today Maharaja?

Lokanath Swami Maharaja : (laughing) I am happy!

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : It’s so nice to have you and those who don’t know Maharaja, I think majority everyone knows Maharaja but just a little background about Maharaja. He became an initiated disciple of Srila Prabhupada in 1972 and then he received sannyasa initiation from His Divine Grace in 1975 and then at the age of 26 years old Srila Prabhupada ordered him to preach Lord Chaitanya’s message by organizing padayatra, the walking festival worldwide and the first leg of the journey was from Vrndavan to Mayapur. In the course of his padayatra service His Holiness traveled by foot to many of these major tirthas and sacred sites of India and also in 1989 he inaugurated the service in America and then for the centennial service, which is the hundred years of Srila Prabhupada and marking that celebration, him as the minister. He also created a celebration for this amazing event and it was unprecedented success. If I am correct Maharaja you organized a hundred padayatra around the world in 1996.

Lokanath Swami Maharaja : Not correct, more than a hundred they were Hundred and eleven.

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : Wow! Hundred and eleven and on top of that I think on that centennial festival there was like record-breaking number of books that were distributed, plates of prasada were served and like you said, festivals coordinated worldwide. Also, you’re the zonal secretary for Maharashtra and Noida and the Bureau member for all of India and in addition to his preaching in Maharashtra His Holiness has traveled the globe and is well known for his inspiring lectures, kirtans and his also amazing books. We’ll be talking about his books a bit later. He is also an initiating guru in our ISKCON today and has disciples all over the world. So it’s an absolute pleasure to be speaking to you today Maharaja and thank you for agreeing to come on. I just wanted to start with Maharaja, in 1971, I believe it was your first interaction with the Hare Krsna movement and in 1972 you got your first initiation. When you first met Srila Prabhupada, what were your feelings or recollections at that time?

Lokanath Swami Maharaja: In 1971, I attended the Hare Krsna festival in Bombay. I did not meet him then, I met him in 1972 and of course Srila Prabhupada was there and there were big advertisements all over Bombay saying,

“The Americans sadhus are here! The European sadhus are in the town!.”

So this was mind-boggling or catching our imaginations. So, we all rushed, ran through thousands of people, I was in the audience. The devotees on the stage, their performance of their kirtans was out of this world, I had never experienced anything like this. With all their heart, with all their strength, they were doing kirtan. That was it. I was wondering how Americans could be, European be sadhus. But when I saw their kirtana performance I was like, they are sadhus, they must be sadhus, otherwise this kind of ecstasy and you know! And I heard Prabhupada talking everyday. So what impressed me, the one take-away would say from that festival or Prabhupada’s talk was, from my very childhood I had an inclination and thoughts of serving people, serving society, serving humanity, I had this but I did not know what to do, where to start, what are the resources.

So, Prabhupada quoted Bhagavatam one day and he gave that example, how by watering the water on the roots of the tree or by putting fertilizer on the roots of the tree and that’s it, the trunk of the tree, the branches, the flowers, the fruit, everything is nourished. So Krishna is the source of all of us and so, if we serve Krishna, everyone is served. So, that was it. I was looking for it and I got it. So I would say, that was my meeting or Prabhupada really met me and he caused a stir in my heart. I was sold out and I became his.

Like that and I bought some small books of Srila Prabhupada, I did not have much money, so I bought small books and then I started singing and chanting myself. I was studying in college and was sharing a room with my roommates so whenever they were all out, I would close the doors and windows and curtains, latch the door by myself and I would jump remembering the devotees, dancing on that stage. So the kirtana influenced me the most and then later on there was another festival in 1972 at Hare Krsna land, Juhu. I ran back, I got my life back again and then at the end of that festival I decided to join. I wrote a letter addressed to the temple president saying I liked your dazzling arati and ecstatic kirtanas and sumptuous prasadam, I did not know the meaning of what is sumptuous, that word was not in my dictionary before and dazzling arati. I had a flyer from their festivals, I copied some of the things I liked and I agreed to follow the four regulative principles, please accept me.

So I went to the Juhu temple and found out the president and he read my letter on the spot and he was so delighted because those days you know, Indians or Indian youths, coming forward to become full time devotees, this was a rare occurrence. So immediately, that was Giriraj Prabhu then, he was a brahmachari, announced to the brahmacharis, “Hey! We have a new bhakta here! We have a new bhakta here!”. Soon after a while they brought me behind the asram and I did not know where they were bringing me to and the barbar was waiting for me and I was shaved up. Same evening there was a program in a school, Garga Muni Swami Maharaja was heading up, so I accompanied him and the boys in the school did not know English, so I was handed the microphone and I became the translator of Garga Muni Maharaja’s talk of preaching. So I became a preacher the very first day.

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : Oh wow!

Lokanath Swami Maharaja : Hari bol! And then later on, at the time of Kartik Giriraj Maharaja Prabhu wrote the letter of recommendation and I traveled along with many other devotees from Bombay. In Vrndavan, Kartik at Radha Damodar temple, I was initiated. My encounters and talks and meetings started from that time onwards.

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa: Thank you so much for that information and it’s amazing to see how so quickly you transitioned to become a speaker on your first day. That’s just phenomenal. I wanna show everybody your lovely poster behind, Padayatra Worldwide! Srila Prabhupada from early 70’s was talking about starting padayatra and of course you took on this mission and there are so many little pastimes about Mercedes-Benz turning into a bullock-cart using those as going forward. But can I start with why was Srila Prabhupada so close to this idea of padayatra, what was his feeling towards that because you had correspondence with him. Would you share?

Lokanath Swami Maharaja : Yes, Srila Prabhupada was Senapati bhakta, Chaitanya Mahparabhu’s Senapati bhakta, commander in chief of sankirtana’s army of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. He is representing Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, so what is he going to do? The prediction of Caitanya Mahaprabhu has to be made true, My holy name will reach every town, every village of the world. So this is on the mind of Srila Prabhupada. We had 100 temples or 5200 temple devotees going out and from those temples doing nagar sankirtana, spreading the holy name around. But that was not enough for Prabhupada. Prabhupada wanted to go faster and bring the holy name to even those towns and villages where there is no presence of ISKCON. So we were thinking how to spread the holy name, how to make Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s prediction come true.

So there was one gentleman, Parmananda Punjabi, and he had written to Prabhupada proposing why don’t you start padayatra and go to Indian villages. I think that clicked Prabhupada and Prabhupada was willing to do so. But he said my followers are westerns, they don’t speak the local language, if you come up with some local Indians then I could provide some Westerners.

And then on the day of Radhastami, in 1976 as we were visiting New Delhi because we knew Srila Prabhupada was going to be there. So we were travelling with German Mercedes. I was enjoying travelling North India all over, Panchabhuta Swami that time and myself were co-leaders. As we have comeback, Prabhupada on Radhashtami day, I was with Srila Prabhupada myself and Atmatattva, he said, “bullock cart”. That was it, we did not protest, no argument, although we had good time travelling with western, German buses but Prabhupada has bullock cart, so I was surprised and delighted and I was also amazed how Prabhupada found out. My cultural background, I come from Maharashtra and we are worshippers of the Lord Panduranga Vitthal, Sri Krsna in Pandharpur and all the pilgrims coming to Pandharpur, they come walking, they do padayatra. Even my Father have been walking 100 kms for coming to Pandharpur dham for darshan and walking 100 kms back. So, Prabhupada picked the right person at the right time. From there we went to Vrndavan and started, prepared and Prabhupada did the inauguration for our Bullock cart sankirtan party. Vrndavan to Mayapur, Mayapur was our destination. We were on the road with the a mission, with Prabhupada’s instructions and empowerment.

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : Maharaja, there are some lovely pictures which I want to share so that everyone can see. This picture is here “Welcome to the Padayatra”.

Lokanath Swami Maharaja : This is just outside of Dwarka in 1984-85. We started another padayatra, major padayatra from Dwarka to Kanyakumari to Mayapur. 8000 kms to be completed in 18 months. We arrived in Mayapur to celebrate the 500th anniversary of Chaitanya Mahparbhu’s appearance day in 1986. So this is the group we started with, this group then came bigger, bigger and bigger as we marched from one state of India to another state. This is just the beginning.

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : Then you could see the group getting larger here.

Lokanath Swami Maharaja : Yes, yes we had more than 20-30 country devotees. Lots of Gujaratis, Bengalis and Indians.

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : Maharaja, just coming back because kirtana is very close to your heart and there is one lovely picture that I want to show everybody. We can see you are in ecstasy, chanting with Srila Prabhupada. Can you give us a little hint about this story here right now.

Lokanath Swami Maharaja : Yes. So when we started padayatra or bullock cart sankirtana from Vrndavan and we were getting towards Mayapur. On the way to Mayapur, we arrived here at Prayag (Allahabad) on Kumbha Mela. This is the month of January, 1977 and Srila Prabhupada also has come from Mumbai on a train to Kumbha Mela. This is within our camp you could see the tent also in the background and this is in open. Prabhupada is sitting outside this tent and there is little audience sitting in front of Srila Prabhupada, this has become a little stage, we are singing there, this is in Allahabad. The Padayatra party has arrived also, so I’m with the padayatra party.

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : One thing that we are aware of is, you had a lot of communication with Srila Prabhupada through letters about padayatra, instruction through that means. Could you share? I would love to hear, if possible for you. How it felt to do this service number one and number two is there any specific instructions that Srila Prabhupada mentioned in letters to you regarding Padayatra.

Lokanath Swami Maharaja : Besides the letters, the day we started Padayatra, I think it was 10 September, 1976 in Vrndavan in Prabhupada’s quarter. He addressed us, we sat with Prabhupada for over one hour. He gave a lot of instructions and inspiration, including what kind of cart we should have, our cart should have tire wheels. When we go to the village where we should park, next to the well, because that’s where all the villagers come to fetch the water so you will be right there. We should have 2 blankets for each one of us because it was winter time. So lots of those instructions, Prabhupada as a caring father gave and very practical. So many letters exchanged.

As we have arrived in Kanpur from Vrndavan to Kanpur, before Allahabad, we had written to Srila Prabhupada, “Prabhupada send us some men and we need some money for maintenance”. So Srila Prabhupada said, “do not depend on outside havoc” and Prabhupada hadn’t closed sankirtana newsletter i.e., ISKCON book distribution course were there and he said, “Our institution is maintained by sales of our publications, so you have to distribute books in vernacular language and raise funds and maintain. So we took that seriously and gradually now we are distributing more and more books. Wherever we went and we became more than self-sufficient and the additional funds were now being donated to different projects including recently for Padayatra India, we contributed happily and rupees for TOVP.

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : Wow, Jai! Hari bol !!!

Lokanath Swami Maharaja : So like that our program was going on successfully within India and then he wrote another letter not to me but one Nityanand Prabhu at NewTall, America. Prabhupada wrote that, “Lokanath Swami’s Bullock cart Sankirtan party is doing well, or very successfully they are doing Padayatra”, and he said, “we could have millions of such carts all over the world”. So I don’t know whether that’s an instruction or Pabhupada’s wish, our prediction of future of padayatra and that is a big thinking of Prabhupada, millions of carts all over the world. He wasn’t thinking that the Bullock cart or padayatra program is just a service that he had given to me and is limited to me or my life time, Prabhupada was thinking beyond me and for the next 10,000 years this Padayatra should go on with millions of carts. May be in the future or when there is no more petrol, then our bullock cart could be in business and our bullock cart could pull the cars, passengers may be sitting in the cars, we would pull their cars with bullock carts.

Prabhupada one time, when we invited Prabhupada, he was so very happy with what we are doing with this subject. So whenever we met, he inquired about the welfare and how padayatras are going on and like that. When it was 1996, in our centennial time, every leader within ISKCON was thinking, what kind of offerings they would make for the pleasure of Srila Prabhupada. So I was also thinking, what I could do, of course I was made centennial minister, Prabhupada centennial minister. I was doing lots of planning and organizations with the help of all of the leaders together, GBCs, sannyasis. But as my personal offering I was thinking, what I could do? So we came up with this strategy of organizing padayatra in 100 countries at the 100th Birth Anniversary. So we expanded from one padayatra in India to 100 padayatras all over the world. So it is doable and it is happening, going on till this day.

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : On this part of this Padayatra because this is very close to your heart and like you said, this is meant to go on for, carry on even after everybody passes. We want to carry on this, something close to Srila Prabhupada’s heart.

So those that want to know more, please go to www.lokanathswami.com/ and there you will be able to find how you will get involved with this padayatra service and also find out much more, and also find out about Lokanath Swami Maharaja. Padayatra is one area but for you is kirtan, we all know, we all love your kirtan. You came to Birmingham 24 hours kirtan a few years ago and we were so grateful you came. So how did the kirtan aspect become prominent to you Maharaja. What is that because your kirtans are heard everywhere, we love them, but for yourself, what was that connection to kirtan?

Lokanath Swami Maharaja : Kirtana got me when I was just a young boy in a village and a kind of culture in our family, that practice, that culture and I came from, our family did kirtana, our village did kirtan and in our Maharashtra kirtanas are very very popular because of Sant Tukaram Maharaja. Pandharpur is known for kirtanas. So when I was just a little boy and especially used to do on Ekadasi, today is Ekadasai.

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : Yes

Lokanath Swami Maharaja : On ekadasi, all night long they do kirtana, sleepless nights and they stay up and do kirtanas. So I was a little boy, also sitting with them, watching them, hearing them, picking up notes. So this was imbibed, the kirtan spirit from when I was little in the village. And then as I said that triggered at my very encounter with the Hare Krishna Movement was that kirtan on stage. So that stirred up and then has become my life, my second nature. I know Srila Prabhupada kind of liked me singing.

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : That’s so nice. So you became the minister for the Harinam Sankirtan Ministry for ISKCON because of that. We’ll be talking about that later as well, if that’s okay. I just want to bring regards to Srila Prabhupada because of course the Padayatra has started, but is there any intimate pastime you can share with us of you and Srila Prabhupada, that is still resonating in your heart right now?

Lokanath Swami Maharaja : That’s a difficult one.

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : I am so sorry.

Lokanath Swami Maharaja : (laughing) There are several one!

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : Please, please!!! We are happy to hear.

Lokanath Swami Maharaja : Which one to take. When I was in the time of my sannyas initiation I think Srila Prabhupada was so personal and so considerate and a fatherly figure as I approached Prabhupada for giving me sannyas. In those days there was no sanyas ministry and you don’t have to get approved by GBC centres and waiting periods, those things came later on. Those days, our days, Prabhupada days, it was mostly the transaction that would be made between Prabhupada and the candidate. I had approached Srila Prabhupada earlier, so when I was 2 and half years devotee, I had approached Srila Prabhupada, “give me sanyas” and Prabhupada said, “wait”, and then I waited for 1 year.

One day I walked in Prabhupada’s quarters, this is in Bombay and I approached him and paid obeisance and sat across in front of him and a table in between. Then I again reminded Srila Prabhupada that I want sanyasa. Another reason why I was demanding sanyasa then was, there was Sridhar Swami, not Sridhar Swami Maharaja, my God brother from Canada. We were buddies, we were brahmacharis, we were preaching partners, we were together in Mumbai. His sanyasa was approved by Srila Prabhupada a few days earlier, so I was like me too, me too, like in a family, parents give toys or something to one son then the other one is also like mummy me too, daddy me too. So I approached Srila Prabhupada and then with a dialogue Prabhupada was trying to preach to me or taking me out of it. But then I kind of persisted, begging and bugging, so Prabhupada already said, “Oh you are already a sanyasi”. So I did not buy into that, I kept on saying no no Prabhupada. Then Prabhupada said go with Sridhar to Vrndavan, travel together. You take sanyasa in Vrndavan. So I thought it was very very personal and Prabhupada was so personal in those circumstances.

So, in 1977, Prabhupada was not well, everybody knows Prabhupada was in Hrishikesh with Bhakti Charu Maharaja and Tamal Krishna Maharaja. Anyway, I should just make the long story short, I will not start all the way from Hrishikesh. So you know Prabhupada comes to Vrndavan thinking he is going to leave the world, he wanted to go to America and stop in London. He was there for Janmastami and Vyasa Puja in London 1977. Again his health got worse and back to India and He was in Mumbai for sometime and I was there, serving intimately. Bombay is my office Prabhupada said and we were brahmacari, Bombay brahmacari, we were rightly stationed because as the office expands a lot of time is spent in office. Srila Prabhupada also used to spend a lot of time in Bombay, he travelled to USA back to Bombay, he would go to Australia back to Bombay, he would go to Moscow back to Bombay, so we were rightly situated. So I have this book called Bombay is my office and there I have shared many intimate movements with Srila Prabhupada. But then Prabhupada was not well, back to Bombay from London and then onto Vrndavan still not well. One thing is that I was traveling with a little bus, padayatra was going on, some other devotees were taking care. So then, we were travelling and we returned because we did not know Prabhupada’s health status.

So Prabhupada had kindly allowed us to have his darshan in his quarters and Prabhupada was lying on the bed. Still Prabhupada was enquiring, as we were distributing books, he asked, “Which book is selling the most?”. So you could see, Prabhupada has said that he would never die, he would be in the form of his books. So then a lot of long lengthy dialogue and a lot of things happened. Towards the end our party men were walking out of the room and I was the last one to walk out. Prabhupada signed me and said come back. I went back and I sat next to Prabhupada. We have to sit very close to Prabhupada, very close to his mouth because Prabhupada kind of whispered not even talk. Then Prabhupada said I would like to meet you, I would like to see you and he also said what time suits you? he asked a question. It was amazing, Prabhupada is asking me what time suits you? Then I said no question of my suitability, whatever time. Prabhupada said, “Is 4 o’clock okay?”. We settled for 4 o’clock. Then all day I was wondering, what is that Prabhupada wanted to say because Prabhupada was very serious and grave when he had said to me, I want to talk to you. The whole day I was wondering and not able to come to any conclusion on what Prabhupada wanted to talk about.

So at 4 o’clock I went back to Prabhupada’s quarter but then his secretaries directed me to Krishna Balarama temple at the guest house reception and there lots of Prabhupada’s servants and secretaries and busy men were sitting. As I entered they told me what Prabhupada wanted to talk to me at 4 o’clock, Prabhupada could not contain also, so he told what he wanted to talk to me about. So they told me that Prabhupada wanted to travel with the Bullock cart. So then we arranged myself, Trivikram Maharaja and Panchadravida Maharaja, three of us went to Mathura to arrange the bullock cart. So the bullock cart had come and parked in front of the Krishna Balarama temple and we were delighted in a sense. In those days when Prabhupada wanted to travel, that meant Prabhupada was not leaving us, so this used to be our conclusion. So Prabhupada wants to travel means he is staying longer, welcome.

So we were happy to travel the next day with the bullock cart, but of course then during the night some devotees, Tamal Krishna Maharaja, Bhakti Charu Mataraj, Bhavanand Prabhu approached and expressed their concern about the bunky road and this and that. So Prabhupada then dropped that program of travelling with the bullock cart.

Next day, although Prabhupada gave up the idea of travelling with bullock cart but there in mind that Prabhupada wanted to travel to all the holy tirthas all over India, as a trial run he said let us try within Vrajamandal with the Bullock cart. So this was Prabhupada’s mind traveling. He is so busy with ISKCON’s activities and preaching, so he had no time for himself or for pilgrimage. So he wanted to go to the holy tirthas.

So next day again we were in Prabhupada’s quarter, Prabhupada was lying on the bed and we all were around Prabhupada. Prabhupada said, “I want to travel with the busses, you replace the bullock cart with the buses”. So he did not give up the idea of travelling because he used to say that he wants to leave the world fighting with maya and preaching is fighting. So while fighting he wanted to leave. Now the plan was to travel with the buses and everyone was on board now. All those who were assembled around him were taking turns, appealing, asking for permission for them to travel with Prabhupada. Giriraj Prabhu said, “I am good at making life members, fundraising. So wherever we go I could make members, so could I travel with you Prabhupada”. Prabhupada said, ”Yes, you can”. Then Bhakti Swarupa Damodar said, “Wherever we go there are so many scientific minded people, I could organize some scientific preaching or some interview with you. Could I go with you”. Prabhupada said, ”Yes, you could go”. There was Bhakti Chaitanya, he was from Punjab, India, he was a sannyasi. He said, ”I am a good driver, Srila Prabhupada, Could I come”. Prabhupada said, ”Yes, you could come”. And then me too, I also in a humorous way, although I knew I had to go because a lot of discussion had taken place about the bus travelling and towards the end, could I come, could I come, this was at the end. I knew I had to go but still humorously I said, “Could I come, Srila Prabhupada”. Prabhupada said, ”You will be our leader”.

Then we got busy, we bought a big India map and we were deciding which route to take and where to get busses. Myself, Tamal Krishna Maharaja, Bhavananda and some others, we were putting our heads together and making plans. So travelling with the busses idea from the bullock cart idea, this was only 4-5 days before Prabhupada’s departure, on 14th he departed. So neither bullock card travelling nor bus travelling happened. Then, when we had to celebrate the 500th anniversary of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s appearance, the governing body commission (GBC) of ISKCON they were considering how we could celebrate. I think I was one of them to propose. Jayapataka Maharaja also proposed that let us have padayatra, bullock cart sankirtana party, let us start from Dwaraka and visit all the places of Chaitanya Maharprabhu’s pastimes in South India. And this way we will be celebrating Chaitanya Maharprabhu’s 500th anniversary as well as we will fulfill Prabhupada’s desire or you can call it the last will of Srila Prabhupada. He wanted to go on pilgrimage, so we will have Gaura Nitai in the chariot or in the cart and Srila Prabhupada also on the chariot, as if Srila Prabhupada is taking Gauranga all over India and sankirtana party in the front. So this was proposed and this was resolved, so this is what we did.

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : Maharaja these are the pictures. You can see yourself [display].

Lokanath Swami Maharaja : Yes, Yes. I think this is when we arrived in Orissa or Bengal, this may be Bengal because we passed through 8 states of India. And again this programme started on Radhastami, I was given instructions to do bullock cart preaching on Radhastami in 1976 and in 1984 Radhastami we started from Dwaraka and Jayapataka Maharaja and so many leaders were there. So this photo with Bhakti Charu Maharaja and Bhakti Raghav Maharaja, this is in Bengal.

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : Thank you so much for sharing. You know one session with you Maharaja will not be sufficient, will not be enough. Everybody if you want to know more about the pastimes, the conversations that Maharaja had with Srila Prabhupada then there are few books. There is a specific book which you can see in the corner, “In conversation with Srila Prabhupada.” I will put it on the top so that everyone can see it a bit clearer. You can get this in Amazon. As you were saying ‘Bombay is my office’, you can see that in the bottom corner as well and of course you have, The Mayapur Vrndavan Festivals. So there are all these festival books.

Lokanath Swami Maharaja : You see this backdrop, this is the front and back cover of a book called Padayatra Worldwide, this is a book.

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : Very interesting. Is this book released, is it going to be released?

Lokanath Swami Maharaja : Yeah, this is a trailer, this is just the first volume, two more to come.

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : Fantastic. So if anybody wants to now get hold of the Padayatra Worldwide book or any other books, Amazon is the best way to connect for those books. What we can do is we can also send links to everybody, we will try getting them on different networks but please do check Amazon. There is Amazon India, Amazon UK, do check and type Padayatra Worldwide, you will find this book. Thank you Maharaja, also we will be talking hopefully, that we will specifically focus on our session at some points on the In Conversation with Srila Prabhupada, the book has so many memories on that and it will be a nice way to speak on that as well. Thank you Maharaja for sharing such intimate pastimes with Srila Prabhupada and going forward we know right now there is a lot of work that is happening with Padayatra. So if anybody wants to get involved please check out the website, www.lokanathswami.com/

Lokanath Swami Maharaja : We have parikramas, kartik parikrama, Vrndavan parikrama, Mayapur parikrama. Not only should they read, they should come out, walk, experience, have firsthand experience.

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : So please everybody read and also action, these are the two points. Also right now we have got some other festivals going on, because of COVID we cannot get out but we are trying to do something. Our festival that is the world holy name festival, Maharaja which of course you are leading us in, so padayatra is one thing but also with the kirtana aspect and these festivals you are also leading. Can I just bring up the poster that I have got right now and I will just show it on the screen of the world holy name festival. Just wondering if you could just, please let us know the significance of this festival and how people can get involved.

Lokanath Swami Maharaja : This is the 24th time we are doing this festival. We started in 1996 as a world holy name day and this is to commemorate Srila Prabhupada’s arrival in America, you remember on 17th September, 1965 Prabhupada arrived in America and he arrived as ambassador of holy name. He gave the gift of the holy name to the world. So each year around 17th september as you could note this year also we are doing on 17th and goes on till 23. So from one day, holy name day then a few days and then gradually it is now a 7 days long festival. It is a global festival with lots of kirtanas. So this poster, the flyer you are seeing, everyday for 7 days from 4 to 5‘oclock we will have different presentations on the holy name. ISKCON’s sankirtana ministry’s different planning and strategies, how to spread the holy name, how to get ISKCON devotees involved and get them to propagate holy names.

So that is 4-5 and 5-6 we will have japa retreat. You know japa retreat, we would like that we reform, we do our chanting better, more attentively, so we have selected 7 best chanters and they are all leading leaders, Prabhupada disciples. So each day they will make a presentation, japa retreat interactive for 1 hour. Then 6-7, we have seven Bhagavatam classes, one day each and we have selected seven verses from Bhagavatam which glorify the holy name. So they’ll be Bhagavatam class given again by Ravindra Svarup Prabhu, Vaisesika Prabhu and you name it, all big names, big guns are going to be giving these Bhagavatam classes. Then 7-8 every day this is IST, Indian standard time you have to convert that into your time, your country’s time. 7-8 we have kirtans by Bhakti Bhringa Govinda Maharaja and there are so many Maharajas and Prabhus and even matajis are going to be singing for one hour. This will be globally broadcasted and then each day we’ll conclude in 8-9 session and we have picked up seven topics which again glorify the holy name and we have Jayapataka Maharaja and many other Maharaja like Anuttama Prabhu, Rukmani Mataji. Then there are special events, all day we’ll be doing a japathon. Devotees from around the world will be following in the footsteps of namacarya Srila Haridasa Thakur and chant, chant chant.

Then there’s one day 20th global connect, 24-hour kirtan in 24 zones, so that is scheduled. This is the day to do public chanting, go into the streets, go into the parks and there are many other events and we also have partnered with a fortunate team that is headed by Shaktavesh Avatar Prabhu. So that is also part of the campaign and we want you all to identify those prabhus or those fellow brothers, sisters, they had never ever chanted before or they did not even know what Hare Krsna maha-mantra is. Teach them and get them to chant Hare Krsna maha-mantra one time and do the recording. Are you going to show something?

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : Yes I’m going to show that right now.

Lokanath Swami Maharaja : Okay so like that, you will get to hear more about this festival.

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : So i’ll bring this up now because since it’s one of the ways that people can get involved with the world holy name festival. It’s a short video only two minutes long, so I really request everyone to see it.

In Video message by Lokanath Swami Maharaja:
Dear devotees, Hare Krsna. Our ISKCON Harinam Sankirtana has partnered with ISKCON online to promote the campaign, fortunate people. I invite you to participate in this outreach campaign; the goal of this fortunate people is to bring love and peace to the whole world. Because real love is love of godhead and once you have love of godhead then you become peaceful. Mahaprabhu brought the holy name. It is simple, open the whatsapp link below, say your name and location, say this chant is dedicated for love and peace. Chant Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare, Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare one time. Click send, all these instructions are given below. Your chanting will become part of the united offering to Srila Prabhupada and Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. Encourage the people around the world to become fortunate, start with yourself and become familiar with how it works and look around for those who do not chant. Encourage others to do this and also become fortunate. Maybe some of your family members are not chanting, maybe some colleagues in your office are not chanting, make yourself fortunate and then make others fortunate also.
Click the link and send your video today.

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : Wow, so this is the actual link. Thank you so much for that Maharaja that video is so enlivening. You could see right now we’ve a short version of the link www.bit.ly/chantnow ,if you put that into your browser or on your mobile device it will take you to the actual whatsapp number that is connected where you will be given instructions of what to do next. Really we request all of you to check this out, I can see we’ve had over 200 people on live, so if all of you can also spread this message that’ll be really appreciated. Become part of this world holy name festivals and let’s break some records.

So Maharaja, thank you so much, you’ve been an absolute inspiration to all of us and I know that we’ll be speaking to you more often with your blessings. Is there any final message before we unfortunately have to close, is there any final message that you would like to give to the viewers right now.

Lokanath Swami Maharaja : Yeah, the world holy name festival is just around the corner, we just mentioned that to you. So you all get ready, prepare, spread the word around and be a part of it and make the unfortunate world fortunate by you chanting and getting others to chant also.

Jagannatha Kirtanananda Dasa : Thank you so much Maharaja, thank you everybody for joining and finally please do click the link www.bit.ly/chantnow and please make the world fortunate as Maharaja said. So Hare Krsna and thank you Maharaja for all your time and we really appreciate you sharing these Prabhupada memoirs with us. Hare Krsna.

In the spiritual world everyone loves to talk about Krsna

1996
Vrndavana, India
Initiation Lecture

First of all, I would like to welcome you all and also thank some of you for being present here. Especially, few of my godbrothers are here. Vrndavana Prabhu is in the back. Who else? Any other Prabhupada's disciples here? Also, thank to Mukunda Datta Prabhu for accepting the chief priest of this ceremony which he described as auspicious ceremony. Which he said, also, the ceremony is taking place in a very auspicious place. 

It is a necessary for reminding you all this is a very auspicious place. Do you need reminder? First of all, this is Vrndavana. Do you remember you are in Vrndavana? That does not matter where in Vrndavana. Just being in Vrndavana is the top most situations. Any part of Vrndavana is very special part.

This area is called Seva Kunja. Seva Kunja is a place where Krsna not only used to but still is performing His madhurya lila, rasa dance pastimes. In Seva Kunja is temple of Radha Damadara, established by none other than Jiva Goswami, who is a topmost scholar of this world. The world has not seen scholars like Jiva Goswami, very rare. 

So, we are in the courtyard, backyard of Jiva Goswami's Radha Damodara. In that backyard there is the Samadhi of Rupa Goswami and we are all Rupanugas, sitting at the feet of Rupa Goswami and bhajan kutir of Rupa Goswami. This Tamala trees here, there are the shades of Tamala tress. You could have used some shade. In the presence of monkeys, our lives are quite exciting here. It will be fun for next 3 hours. 

Not only that. That is the window there. Prabhupada used to see through that window, meditating on Rupa Goswami's samadhi and thinking of the future plans. He was thinking of us, although, we were not even born those days but Prabhupada was thinking of our future. Because of Prabhupada's intense meditation and prayers
in the little room there which is the kitchen part of course, he also was meditating in other rooms – and contemplating and visioning the whole future of Krsna

consciousness movement. That Prabhupada's residence before he went to the West and, again, he stayed here in early 70.

Not only that. There is one more thing to add. Right here, between bhajan kutir and samadhi, Prabhupada used to sit here under those trees in 1972, Kartika month and gave his nectar of devotion classes. Here in this portion, there were some kind of structures – the bushes were here, broken walls, chirping birds, like you hear. So, Prabhupada used to sit here and gave his nectar of devotion classes.

During the Kartika of 1972, also something happened. Prabhupada was sitting here to give initiation to the initiates. I was initiated right here! At that time, I did not even think, I was not thinking. Those days we were not thinking. Prabhupada was there. We thought this will go – Prabhupada and us and Prabhupada's presence. We
thought that will go on and on and on. We never thought that there will be one day Prabhupada not with us and then there will be us who would be taking some of the business of giving initiations. We did not think like that. 

So, this place is certainly extraordinary and extra special place. There could be no better location than this. Especially, as I was thinking of giving initiation in Vrndavana, I thought I would like to go back into the history. Year 1972, that is quite some time. I was only 23 years old. It is quite different. I did not have grey
hair and sikha.

Hare Krsna Hare Krsna Krsna Krsna Hare Hare
Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare

Initiation ceremony as it is, is very auspicious ceremony as some conditioned souls or conditioned for a long time are getting an opportunity for getting out of this material existence. It is almost like getting released from the prison house. When someone is coming out of the prison house, they welcome you as a joyous occasion. So, I was also thinking of all the senior devotees are kind of already there, initiated and brahmin initiated and Prabhupada's disciples, as some initiates are getting initiation today, which is like getting out of this world. So, at the
entrance all prabhus and matajis are there to receive you, welcome you, encourage you.

Today, we have several devotees taking first initiation and two will be taking first and second initiation and one taking second. This is to give you a picture of what is happening here. Those taking first initiation which is harinama diksha, you are accepting this mantra,

hare krsna hare krsna krsna krsna hare hare
hare rama hare rama rama rama hare hare.

We will be handing mantra, delivering mantra, giving you hare krsna mantra and you will be chanting that mantra which is non different from Krsna Himself.  500 years ago, Lord Gauranga appeared. He brought the gift of holy name.

“golokera prema dhana harinama sankirtana”

Under the disciplic succession that were of the holy name of the hare krsna maha mantra is delivered from the spiritual master to the disciples and on behalf of Srila Prabhupada, we delivering that mantra up to you.

I was reading Bhagavatam, today. There was an example of how you cannot catch hold the tail of a dog who is right across this ocean. How far could a dog go in the ocean? What hope is there for you to cross the ocean if you are attempting to cross by holding the tail of a dog? Not much hope. So, Prabhupada explains there that nothing else will work out. If you want to cross this material existence and go beyond which is we called going back to Godhead, then one time Prabhupada said,
 
“When you catch, you catch hold of my dhoti.” 

Like little children always catch hold of dhoti of their father or saree of their mother and they are dragged along. They go where the father goes or mother goes. 

“mahajano yean gatah sa panthah”

That pantha, that path is the proper path which is shown to us by the mahajanas. So Prabhupada said,  "You just follow me, you catch hold of my dhoti and you will get there and you will end with Krsna." So, we are holding Prabhupada and Prabhupada is holding on to his spiritual master, like that, and you hold us. This is
the disciplic succession.

evam parampara-praptam
imam rajarsayo viduh
sa kaleneha mahata
yoga nastah parantapa [BG 4.2]

This Lord Krsna has spoken in the Bhagavad Gita. So, this ceremony is auspicious, it is very serious ceremony because there is a commitment. You will be committing yourselves. It is a big step forward and there is a big commitment of taking care of this holy name, not offending this holy name is quite a task and not sinning any more on and stay very active in Krsna consciousness. It is lifetime, if not, forever in the future. 

As we were talking the other day in class, we are eternal servants not in just one lifetime servants. In material world people could talk only in terms of one lifetime. But we are talking of being servants eternally being servants of Krsna, of the spiritual master, vaisnavas. This is our eternal connection. 

As you are taking initiatives, (I am just trying to make the meaning out of initiation), you are taking initiatives or coming forward to practice Krsna consciousness. This is, of course, most welcome. We will encourage you.

Sometimes it is observed that devotees are quite enthusiastic up till the time of initiation. Some cases I am saying. And after initiation, some of them then take it easy, take it for granted. They look forward to initiation time and once initiation is there, name is given, "Now, it is all done. I am part of the family." They take it too easy.  This we are talking also from own experience. One person I initiated and last time I saw he was sitting and he went to his home town and then never ever have I see him again. That is one case. Varieties of things happen. I thought to let you know that these things happen so you could make sure this does not happen to you. Today, you will be taking vows to follow certain principles. We have seen some devotees not able to do that. They follow 4 regulative principles for one year, 2 years, we keep them waiting long period, 3 years, because they know unless they follow these principles there are no initiation, there is no social acceptance. So, they want to be initiated, otherwise, they are called or addressed bhakta. They are embarrassed with bhakta this or bhakta that. 

Although bhakta is quite a good title. Bhakta means Krsna bhakta. It is the top most position, in fact, to be bhakta. To be bhakta is no ordinary thing. Sometimes, as it is understood, bhakta or bhaktin is someone new. For these reasons they want to be initiated and they struggle to follow principles. But then things fade and devotees back into intoxication, get back into illicit connections. Gambling we do not hear much or meat eating. Intoxication and illicit sex are the killers, the primary principle enemies of Krsna consciousness movement.

Up until initiation time and around the initiation time, everything look so good and normal, rosy. Then something happens. Time is there working on us. As soon as we take it a little easy and relaxed, immediately, the illusion returns. The gap is widened and wide opened and have Maya takes hold. Some devotees make a big change of ashrams. Devotees who were initiated, lots of them were brahmacaris. After some years, although they had think that they would be brahmacaris for the rest of their lives; especially, our days, early 70's. 

We thought that that most of us were brahmacaris and brahmacarinis. The spirit of renunciation was so high in presence of Prabhupada. It was easy as he kept us very very high in his presence. So we thought, at least, I was thinking that most of us will be sannyasis or brahmacari. But that was not the case. 

There is nothing wrong. At least now we say, "Those days we almost preached against this grihastha business. As soon as one of our godbrothers was thinking of getting married, we immediately would surround him by ten of us and make him sit down and make him understand Prabhupada said this and that, Bhagavatam says. We speak to him until he is convinced. But that fanatically in our early days – immaturity or immature. The reality is something different. This we have seen. Wanting is one thing. But it does not work like that, although, the scriptures will
encourage and we will be encouraging, sadhus or shastra will encourage.

Prabhupada says all brahmacaris should stay brahmacaris and all matajis should get married. How is it gonna work? And it does not work like that, but encouragement is there. The difference is just that brahmacari should stay
brahmacari.

So, things are changing. There are different mentions. Other mention is some grihasta devotees get so much concerned about their family and maintenance of their family and related business. Many of you will become, eventually, grihastas or brahmacaris. So keep this ongoing. We have repeated that in ancient days:

bramhacari, grihasta, vanaprastha, sannyasa. 

You are 25 years old brahmacari, you go to your home, you get married and have children but you never forget Guru or his mission, your promise or support. You are supportive of your Guru's mission. The 13 questions that you are asked to answer, in one of them said you staying in or supporting ISKCON. What does it ask about staying in ISKCON? "Why one should remain in ISKCON?" There was one question. So, it implies that one SHOULD remain in ISKCON and there are many good reasons. 

In our movement what is the inside and outside of ISKCON? You could stay outside and you are still in ISKCON but your consciousness, your service attitude, you are wanting to support, that always has to be there. So, we have seen that lots of time our whole grihastha asrama's situation has to be settled within ISKCON and because it is not settled, our movement is little bit unsettled and shaky. Because most of the devotees in our movement are grihasthas and less than 100 sannyasis and brahmacaris are maybe 20 – 30 percent. So, 70 – 80 percent of our populations are grihasthas. So how they are doing, how they are well connected with ISKCON, what is their situation, how they are supporting or not supporting, becomes the deciding factor, socially speaking, social
development.

So, you should all be concerned for International Society for Krsna Consciousness. What we are addressing is some social concerns and it is time to get concerned. And devotees who are getting initiated should have this concern. Your concern should be how you would like to see Prabhupada's International Society for Krsna Consciousness more developed as a society; to see how you could assist.  We have seen also some disciples after some time they keep looking for nectar. They think there is not enough in ISKCON, there is not enough in Prabhupada's
books, so they go looking, searching other books, other sampradayas, they minimize the process or the importance of chanting and they get into worshipping deities of some certain sampradayas. So this also we have seen happening. But this is already an experience and I'm sure this is a common experience of most spiritual masters in Krsna consciousness movement. That means each one of us has something additional, unique experience, some common experience also. 

The examples I am giving are some common examples of what happens to those who get initiated in rather 2 years, 3 years, 10 years. This is what happens to our disciples. That relationship, which is supposed to be an eternal relationship does not even exist. You do not even feel that any relationship exists. Then different offences are committed. Some of them becomes guru, bhogis. Guru bhogi, guru tyagi, guru drohi. 

Guru bhogi means they try to enjoy the property or institution of the guru sadhu or the position in guru's institution. They try to exploit, take advantage. Instead of contributing, they try to take away, take advantage for their own gratification. Guru tyagi means means just renouncing, giving up that connection, just turning the
back towards the guru institution. And guru drohi is betrayal, trying to assert the position of guru. Trying to become as good as guru. Or think, "I have become as good as guru. Now I do not need him anymore," as if you are using guru as some kind of stepping stone to go beyond him.

That also we have seen in Prabhupada's  institution. Some of them trying to take Prabhupada's position of becoming founder acarya or this and that. This guru bhogi, guru tyagi, guru drohi business dilute the consciousness and then weakens the relationships between spiritual master and disciple. When this relationship is weak then everything else remains spiritually weak as everything will depends on or starts off this sambhanda or this relationship. So this is not proper, this is not regular.

So, I thought I would just share these experiences. You will be taking vow so that you would not do such things, yes? As in Mayapur we had the social development conference. The society is weak or the Hare Krsna movement is weak or different difficulties are there and the cause was identified as the unqualified disciples.

Initiation that conducted too soon and all thing become cheap, fast in and out with very less commitment in the part of the initiates to push on the sankirtan movement. Prabhupada repeated, appealed to, he always said, very affectionately, "American boys and girls." And sometimes he would say, "European boys and girls." He never said Indian boys and girls, he had more faith in the Americans. 

About pushing on this movement. The movement is required so that we could do something effective, organised, it could influenced the thinking or revolutionize the thinking and consciousness. So, this commitment has to be lifetime, many lifetime or forever in the future. Commitment or accepting a spiritual master is not a fashion, Prabhupada said. My neighbor has car so I also buy car. My neighbor has dog, I also liked to have a dog. My neighbor went to Haridwar last week now he has goals and I'll also have  also goal. So, this is not a fashion.

Like in the west people like to "try it out." When there is something they say to try it out. Maybe some devotee from the west want to "try it out" this Krsna consciousness but he can try it out for six months but finally, if he is convinced, then only he should go for accepting initiation. So, we need you to practice and
propagate Krsna consciousness movement. The world is false alarm and need some positive alternatives and you have received, you know what the other alternatives are. What are they?

hare krsna hare krsna krsna krsna hare hare
hare rama hare rama rama rama hare hare 

Do you think it is that simple? So, any big problem and you say the alternative is just chant hare krsna , how would that work? The problems are huge, big turmoil and you say chant hare krsna? Is there alternative? Can you convince us? Name is bigger than the problems. Jai! The name is Krsna and the name is unlimited. That is a smart reply. It is no small thing. Maha mantra is no small thing. When we say maha mantra, it is Lord Himself. We convince like that and learn the association of Prabhupada. 

So, you just keep these few things in mind and see how these things are not repeated. You have some kind of reliable devotee power. Once a devotee, always a devotee. This is not something you do for 2, 3 or 5 years and we will never see your face again. When you stay out, whenever you make your mind after 5 or 20 years, you come back and get initiated. Stay a member of congregation, namahatta, folk members. We do not force you but you are taking this step of wanting initiation then you have to commit yourself for full lifetime, whole heartedly. 
What else is there to do? If you think you have something important to do other
than Krsna's service, Krsna consciousness, then you are in maya.

So, those who are taking hare krsna, maha mantra initiation, harinama diksha, we say to you please, take shelter. Normally, I do not speak like that but I thought I was keeping you waiting and one reason I was saying that is I did not have good experiences. Some of these prabhus are turning against, getting into maya, going back to the drugs, going to some sampradayas. Batch after batch we initiate and after 2 or 5 years, the scene is completely different and there is frustration. 

We take seriously; I took seriously. When you came and take initiation I thought you are going to be with us for the rest of your life and serve Prabhupada's mission, you would have chant for the rest of your life, you will follow principles for the rest your life. Do not do that. 

There are ten offences. We say them every morning. That is part of the program you have to say them again. The first offence is not to offend vaisnavas, they are worshipable, they are very dear to Krsna and those who want to worship Krsna and not His devotees they are called third class devotees. Simple definition of kanistha adhikari. They are very expert in worshipping the Lord but vaisnavas, they are ready to kick, punch in the face. Aarti to the Lord and punch in vaisnavas' face. This is third class. Krsna does not like that. "Love my dog. If you want to love me, love my dog," in the west they say. They love dogs so much. In India they would say "Love my cow." So, we are dogs of Krsna, devotees of Krsna and we have to love them.

Second offence is to consider names of demigods, there are so many of them. How many? 33 crores, 330 0000 demigods. To consider their names to be equal to or independent of Lord Visnu, of Lord  Krsna is an offence. The devotees from the west have no problem with this offence because they are not into any worship including demigods worship. But in India we have problems, Bangladesh, of some very popular God.

Third offence is to disobey orders of the spiritual master. So, do not disobey the orders. A lot of people in India do not accept guru because they know, "If I accept guru then I am stuck, I have to follow his orders." So they are smart. What do they do? They do not accept the spiritual master then they think they are not committing
this offence. You see how they are thinking. They also do not go to the discourse because they know the sadhus are going to say do not do this and that. You are just eating, sleeping, mating. They already know what sadhus will say so they stay away from sadhus and do not accept guru.

But of course sastras say,

tasmad gurum prapadyeta jijnasuh shreya uttamam

Sastras are insisting that if you want to be qualified human being you must accept spiritual master and once you have accept do not disobey. The holy name also is not to be offended.
 
Fourth offence is to blaspheme the Vedic literature. Common offences are sashtras are misinterpreted and read such sastras is an offence. So better in ISKCON, we stick to Prabhupada's books, read them and distribute books. Distributing means serving the scriptures. If you have committed an offence against the shastras you carry books and distribute them. Sastras will forgive you. Sastras will be pleased.  Fifth offence is to consider the glories of chanting to be an imagination. It is not imagination, no exaggeration. The holy name is powerful, none different from the Lord. Jagai and Madhai have attained perfection of their life just by chanting hare krsna. Sastra says harer namaiva kevalam. The glories of the holy name are true, no imagination, no exaggeration.

Sixth offence is interpretation of the holy name. So many interpretations are there. They say, "Why hare krsna mantra? Any mantra." Some asramas give you lists of all possible mantras you could chant. They say, "Chant the mantra of your choice. Why maha mantra has to chanted? Or any mantra is okay. Why a mantra? You
could just say any word and you would achieve the same result." This is also interpretation.

Seventh offence is committing sins on the strength of the holy name. This is commonly done in all the religions, in the Indian religions. That is why we go on the banks of Ganga. We sin all year long and then go at the time of Kumbh Mela, take a dip and think we have freed from sins and ready to sin more. Like that, thus is a dangerous path and should be avoided.

Eighth is to consider chanting of hare krsna same as some ritualistic activity mentioned in karma kanda section. Especially, to consider social welfare activities on same level as chanting. Chanting is bhakti yoga and social welfare work may be some good activity. So, there is a big difference between shudha sattva and sattva guna.

Ninth offence is to preach to a faithless person.
jare tako tare tako krsna upadesha

In general, we encourage everyone to chant, to read, everyone to take prasad and we talk of some general basic process. But to talk some confidential, deep subject matters to some new comers or wordly people, this has to be avoided. According to the person that we are preaching to, his elevation in Krsna consciousness corresponding topics should be preached. 

Tenth offence is not to have complete faith in chanting and maintain material attachments after hearing so many instructions on the subject matter. So this you understand. The final offence, which is not part of the tenth offence, is to be inattentive while chanting the holy name. So, be very attentive when you are chanting the names of the Lord. You are calling the Lord and once the Lord is there, you are not receiving Him, you are not paying attention to Him. This is like giving someone appointment or asking someone to come over to the party. He comes and you are not there. You have given appointment to someone and you are busy in something else or you just take off or you go out of station. How does that sound? Not proper, right? Certainly offending that guest. 

So, when you are chanting the names of the Lord, you are calling, "My Lord, please come. Please, engage me as your eternal servant." So, that the Lord is taking seriously and coming but once He comes, you are busy in something else, you are not there. You are there and not there at the same time. Physically there, mentally
elsewhere. At some time in our life, although everyday we recite the ten offences as a ritual. So we have to follow these ten offences so that we can quickly achieve the desired goal of life which is Krsna prema.

Those who are taking second initiation they become brahmins. We have European brahmins, American brahmins. Yesterday, I was talking to someone and I was reminded how Bhaktisiddhanta's disciples went to the west, went to England and one time they had an appointment with the members of the royal family and they have heard of this title brahmin and they were wondering, 

“Oh, could you make us also brahmin?” 
And Bhaktisiddhanta's follower said,  “Oh yeah, no problem. Yes, we could make
you brahmin.”

“So, what do we going to have to do to become brahmin?”

“No meat eating, no intoxication, no illicit sex, no gambling and few other things he were going to say and before he was going to make the list complete, their response was” 

“Impossible! We cannot do this, and can not to do! Then what do I do? There is
nothing else left to do.”

But now, by the grace of Prabhupada, we have some American, European, Australian and African are brahmins. Some them are becoming qualified, learned. So that is the thing. The brahmin have become learned and read and can teach.
They worship and they teach others. Brahmin is basically learned teacher, he is teaching by example, knowledgeable person.

vidya-vinaye-sampane 
brahmane gavi hastini
suni caiva sva-pake ca
panditah sama-darsinah [B.G. 5.18]

He has lots of vidya, knowledge, and he is also humble. And there are many other qualities of brahmin mentioned in the scriptures, the 18th chapter of Bhagavad Gita, text 42, Krsna talks about brahma karma svabhava ja, qualities of a brahma. When you come here you are promising to follow all the principles in all presence of spiritual master and Prabhupada is here and the priests, Vrndavana is here, the fire and paramatma. Keeping in mind that there are so many persons witnessing. You will be promising to follow rules, to chant 16 rounds and you will stay in ISKCON, serve ISKCON for the rest of your life.  Bhakti Caru Maharaj always say when he gives initiation, "And you will serve ISKCON for the rest of your life.”

Initiation ceremony starts.

Janmastami
ISKCON Noida
31/8/2015

There were pandals raised everywhere. Announcements were being made that Janmashtami celebrations are starting. All are cordially invited. Personal invitations are also being given. Press conferences are called for and the journalist are also told about the celebrations. ISKCON Noida is celebrating as well as the whole world. 50 years ago when Srila Prabhupada was travelling in the boat and when it reached the Atlantic ocean that was the day of Janmashtami. Srila Prabhupada celebrated Janmashtami in the ship itself. He invited captain Pandya, captain of the ship and his crew for the celebrations there in the boat itself. Iskcon’s first Janmashtami in 1965 was in the ship. And now after 50 years of the incident, around 150 countries are celebrating this Janmashtami festival. I went to China and there too in Beijing celebrations were in progress. I had been there in this month only. Its August right? So Janmashtami is getting celebrated in China.

“karti katha gati gane gudiya torane”
Sant Tukaram Maharaja of Maharashtra sang this song. It was Janmashtami festival during that time. Do you know what is “torana”? In marathi its torana. They tie mango leaves and flowers on the rope and hang it to the doors. Such decorations are going on. The whole Gokula was decorated. And,
anandalya nara nari

All the men and women were happy and joyfully singing the glories of the Lord. They were experiencing bliss. They were singing glories of Lord and dancing. A few minutes before, I saw that it was time for katha/ class but all of you were doing kirtana, singing and dancing and playing some musical instruments. 5242 years ago, I don’t want to go into calculations of how the grand total came. But from 5242 years onwards this festival of Sri Krishna Janmashtami is being celebrated. Till the moon and the stars are in the sky, this festival will be celebrated. From one generation to the other the Lord is giving an opportunity for the living entities to celebrate this festival. This objective also we will talk about. The reason why the Lord appears? So now when everything is getting ready for the celebrations then we will also make up our mind, getting ready mentally by hearing to some Hari katha , Krishna katha, janma katha. Then our mind will be “changa”. It’s a Punjabi word. So when Bhagavan appears on Janmashtami day then we will be ready mentally. The ground of our heart should be kept neat and clean. Then we will be eligible to hold the Lord in our hearts. Lord should take birth in our minds and in the courtyard of our hearts.

Before taking birth from the womb of Devaki, Lord had appeared in the mind of Vasudeva. Then from the mind of Vasudev He appeared into the heart of Devaki. Vasudeva’s mind and Devaki’s heart were the suitable pure places, vessel for the Lord to appear. And He appeared on the night of ashtami day. The Lord is not the product or combination of men and women. Krishna doesn’t take birth like us, like our body takes birth. Bhagavan does not take a birth, He doesn’t have a material body because He is not the product or the combination of man and woman. We don’t hear this in the lila, do we? Vasudeva is a man and Devaki is a woman. But when Lord was born how? He was very wonderful child. So we can understand that the birth is not common. The child was laughing. Did we ever come across any child in this material world taking birth laughing? No. That means this birth is unlike the material birth that we know of. The births that take place in this samsar, material world it is definitely not like the birth of Lord Krsna, that’s why Bhagavan is called Ajanma. The one who has no relation with the birth but still we celebrate Krishna Janmashtami. That’s why Bhagavan is saying,

janma karma ca me divyam evam yo vetti tattvatah

My birth is divya, transcendental. One who knows My transcendental birth and activities will also get benefitted by this when we understand this principle of transcendental birth and activities of the Lord. The tattva of the Lord’s birth or the reason of His Birth, etc. We want to discuss about such topics and this we will start from the prayers of Kunti Maharani. She knew the Lord. Amongst the knowers of the Lord, Kunti Maharani was the Lord’s parshada/ parikar. She was not a conditioned soul. She was not a common wordly women. When the Lord appears in this material world he appears along with His associates. For example when a King is going somewhere he doesn’t go alone. He is followed by his body gaurds, His ministers , associates , His priests, etc. King doesn’t come alone. Similarly when Bhagavan is coming He doesn’t come alone. In some of His avatars Lord doesn’t come alone or didn’t come. For example when He came as Lord Rama, He didn’t come alone. Sri Krishna, when He appeared, sometimes like Rama sometimes like Shyam , He didn’t come alone. He came as Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, He didn’t come alone but when He came as Narsimha Deva then He came alone. Similarly He came in so many other avatars alone like araha bhagavan. So in many such avatars He comes alone but dharma sya glanir bhavati – when there is decline in the dharma- religious principles abhyutthanam adharmasya tadatmanam srjamy aham.

When the irreligiousness is spreading everywhere and religious principles are declining, not taken care, at that time Bhagavan says I appear tadatmanam srjamyaham. So during such times or circumstances the Lord appears. So at that time only one lila will be played and then the Lord disappears after that lila is over. But in some lila’s the Lord appeared and stayed for 125 years right from His birth, then balavastha –childhood, pauganda avastha then Kaishor avastha, navayavannam ca – yuva avastha –youth. Lord Rama also stayed long around 11000 years on this planet earth, Sri Krishna stayed for 125years and Sri Krishna Chaitanya Mahaprabhu for 48 years. So these 3 avatars are little special. Lord stayed on this planet earth for 1000’s of years displaying His pastimes.

Sri Radhashtami Katha
26th August, 2020

Radhastami Mahotsav ki jai !!!

Today is the day, our Radha Pandharinath appeared on Radhastami, 16 years ago. So there is another occasion, the 16th anniversary of Radha Pandharinath Temple, Pandharpur opening. Also Radhastami is a day in New Delhi in 1976, Srila Prabhupada gave me a, I would call it a special benediction, instruction to start padayatra. So that was 1976’s Radhastami, if I remember correctly, it was 1st of September, Lajpat Nagar 21, Firoz Shah Gandhi Road.

So it’s a very special day for me, as a special mercy of Radha Rani for me, I consider as Srila Prabhupada instructions for me to travel in a bullock cart. Which then gradually became a padayatra with the bullock cart or sometimes the horse cart , for sometime no carts, just to go to as many villages, as many towns. So that was the 1976 Radhastami instruction I received, for which I am very grateful to Srila Prabhupada for such instructions.

I consider Radharani appeared to Srila Prabhupada in his heart and in his mind and then he gave me these very special instructions, padayatra, Bullock cart Sankirtan party program. Then in 1984, we did padayatra on Radhastami, 8000 km padayatra from Dwarka to Mayapur via Kanyakumari. It took us 18 months. So it is the grace of Radharani again that we were able to regain and it never finished. We did arrive with padayatra in Mayapur and then we couldn’t just stop, Radharani was pushing us, Gauranga was inspiring us to carry on, so we went on and on and on and on. So today we are completing 36 years of the padayatra in India. Hari Bol !!!

This is the 36th anniversary of all India padayatra. And that same Padayatra was here, 11 years ago, when we had the Silver Jubilee Celebration of Padayatra, all India Padayatra here in Pandharpur on Radhastami day and then they started their journey from Pandharpur. We appointed Acarya Prabhu president of Padayatra or incharge of Padayatra and you would be glad to know that they have successfully travelled to thousands of villages and towns in the last 11 years, since their departure from Pandharpur.

So we congratulate those all India padyatri’s also for this accomplishment and of course all the padayatris from all over the world. We congratulate them and we are thankful for carrying forward Srila Prabhupada’s instructions or mission which is ultimately of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s. Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu ki Jay !!!

Chaitanya Mahaprabhu mission of spreading the holy name to every town and village. And making Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s prediction come true, that is to spread the names of Radha and Krishna all over the world. Right!
Chaitanya Mahaprabhu said,

Prithvite ache yata nagaradi grama
sarvatra prachara haibe mora nama [Chaitanya Bhagavat]
Translation:
In as many towns and villages as there are on the surface of the earth, My holy name will be preached.

My name will spread all over the world. So Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s name is Radha Krishna, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is Radha, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is Krishna. So when he said my name will spread means Radha Krishna’s name will spread and this mahamantra is nothing but Radha Krishna’s name

Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare
Hare Ram Hare Ram Ram Ram Hare Hare

The padayatras around the world are spreading the name of Radha, the name of Krishna. My name will reach every town, every village, Radha’s name will reach, Krishna’s name will reach. You see the connection – Radha that appears today, some 5200+ years ago, that her name is now been spread all over the world by the members of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness, and amongst them some members are going out on padayatra and bringing Radha’s name to the heart of all. And anyone who hears Radha’s name, Krishna’s name,

Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare
Hare Ram Hare Ram Ram Ram Hare Hare

So, RadhaRani who appeared today on Radhastami day, She is now appearing in so many towns and villages. Yes! Do you understand this?

tatra tisthami narada
yatra gayanti mad-bhaktah

Oh Narada, where My devotees get together and chant My names, My glories, I am very much there. So if Hare is chanted, Krishna is chanted, Radha Krishna make their appearance in those villages and towns. So She doesn’t remain in Ravalgaon. Ravalgaon wali ki jai jai jai !!!

No one says that. They do say, Barsane wali ki jai jai jai !!!
That Radha Rani of Barsana She is not remaining limited to Barsana anymore. She is becoming, Delhi wali ki jai or Moscow wali ki jai. In fact, one time Srila Prabhupada installed Radha Pariseshwar and Radha Londoneshwar. Then he installed Radha Pariseshwar, that Radha of Pariseshwar. Prabhupada was talking, how the ladies, women of France, Paris were beautiful and he said, “Look at our Radharani, She is the most beautiful”. So he was making some connection with the women of Paris, in the form of deities also.

So Radha is rare and Radha’s appearance is rare, Her personality is rare, She is rare to be obtained. But by the grace of Sri Krishna Chaitanya Mahaprabhu now Radharani is becoming known to all over the world.

yadi gaura na hoito, tabe ki hoito,
kemane dharita de?

It is written by Narottam Das Thakur. So he said, you cannot even imagine if Gauranga has not appeared then how could we have survived and revived our love for Radha and Krishna. And how could we have thrived also. Not just survive but revive and thrive. We are thriving, the members of Krishna Consciousness movements are thriving. Because of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu he appeared.

radhara mahima, prema-rasa-sima,
jagate janata ke

If Gauranga Mahaprabhu had not appeared, then radhara mahima, the greatness of Radha Rani, which is because of the ras and rasa, the mellow and the devotion and Her emotions for which She is known. Rasa sima, that the rasa, that the mellow, that she possesses are unlimited, aseem, no seema, no limits. So that kind of Radha Rani, how could we have come to realise or know Radharani, if Gauranga Mahaprabhu had not appeared. How the world could have come to know? Many people of Radhakund, they could have found out. Or people, residents of Jagannath Puri or maybe of Navadvipa, Mayapur, just a few places here and there, but jagat, the whole world, how could the world have found ? Radhara mahima and Premras, sima, unlimited rasa. Rupa Goswami’s song, if anybody knows Radha Rani, Rupa Goswami is the one who knows, among those who knows Radharani, Rupa Goswami is the one. How come he knows Radharani? He is always with Radharani as a manjiri, Rupa manjiri in Golok. He is always around Radharani. So that Rupa manjari appears as Rupa Goswami and we could also say that,

yadi gaura na hoito, tabe ki hoito,
kemane dharita de?
radhara mahima, prema-rasa-sima,
jagate janata ke

So we have also come to know the glories of Radharani because of Rupa Goswami. So it’s not only Chaitanya Mahaprabhu or infact to introduce Radharani to the whole world, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu had come with a very major strategy and lots of manpower. He was not going alone to spread the glories of Radharani and make Radharani known to the world but he had appeared with a big team of those Golokvasis. So they all put together, headed by Gauranga. The goal was to grace the world, bless towns and villages with the mercy of Radha and Krishna. Especially Radha, because if you don’t get mercy of Radharani, then no mercy of Krishna. So Rupa Goswami has compiled so many songs and ashtakas glorifying Radharani and this is one of his very popular song,

Radhe jaya jay madhava dayite

So it’s a very great day as we did say earlier. It’s Radharani’s day. This ashtami has become known as Radhashtami. A lot of people even do not know that Radha exists. A lot of people doubt about Her existence and they also keep wondering “Oh! Radharani is not mentioned in Bhagavatam” and we know most of the people in the world do not know today is Radharani’s day and how many in, Chandrabhaga ke par, the other side of Chandrabhaga river in Pandharpur, how many are aware that today is Radhashtami. I wonder whether even the temple authorities of Rukmini Vitthal mandir, I think we had been reminding them and they had been doing something in the past, abhishek of Radharani and special dress for Radharani but there was a time they did not even know that Radhashtami is something or Radhashtami exists or this day is known as the appearance day. So that is the state of affair.
In south India Radharani practically, they go for Rukmini, Bhudevi, Sridevi that’s it. Radha? forget it.

Gaurang Mahaprabhu, appeared, 500 years ago and kind of started a campaign. He wanted the world to know Radharani and knowing Radharani is the way to get the mercy of Radharani. So, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu wanted the whole world to be benedicted by the mercy of Radharani. Jai Radhe! Since the foundation of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness and since Srila Prabhupada started travelling and preaching all over the world, and he started spreading,

Hare Krsna, Hare Krsna, Krsna Krsna, Hare Hare,
Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare,

People started to know Radharani. O this Hara, hara is hare, when you address Hara, this Hara is Radha and when your address Hara, Hara is Radha becomes Hare while explaining the maha mantra also. Then they were explaining Radharani otherwise, that Srila Prabhupada was preaching on the footpath of New York roadside and chanting Hare Krsna Hare Krsna. Then in the middle he would stop and people gathered around him and he would say, you show them a photograph of Radha and Krishna and say this is Krishna, the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Just by hearing that they were like “Ah! Then what is that girl doing there, next to your God?”. These westerns ignorant and fools, well easterners also could be and are ignorant and fools, there are plenty of them around. So they did not know Radha.

In 1965-66 Srila Prabhupada was only one who knew Radha and then we could see by now how many persons in America, in Canada, in South America, in Africa, in Australia, in Russia, in New Zealand, like that around the world, how many have come to know who is Radharani and not only they have come to know but I am confident that today, the whole world is celebrating Radhastami festival. Over 100 countries are celebrating Radha’s appearance day today. The world has come to know Radharani along with Krishna. This is because of Shri Krishna Chaitanya Mahaprabhu.

Having said that Radharani is rare and it’s not easy to understand Radharani. You may understand women, you may understand Durga or you may even understand Laxmi, you may understand Sita also. But, Radharani is very difficult to understand because of her exalted nature and purity of Radharani and emotions of Radharani, Radha bhav.

radha-bhava-dyuti-suvalitam naumi krishna-svarupam [CC Adi 1.5]

To understand Radha’s emotions, Radha’s thoughts, simple living and high thinking. Radharani’s thinking is highest. No one thinks the way Radha thinks. Her thoughts are the highest thoughts, what She thinks is the highest thinking. So to understand Radha’s emotions, Radha’s bhava, Radha’s thoughts, what is on Radha’s mind, it is so very difficult that even Krishna doesn’t know. Rukmini has said to Dwarkadhish, “There is something my Lord, maybe I know something and Radharani knows more, so there is something that only Radharani knows and you do not know. What Radharani goes through when she is in vipralambha bhava, feelings of separation and emotions of those times are so intense and so deep and so pure that you don’t know what I go through”. This is Rukmini talking, “Radharani knows what Radharani experiences, you don’t know”. So when Krishna heard that, he must have been like “What you are talking about. You did not read the bhagavatam? Open the first verse of bhagavatam and there it says abhigya, svarat. I am supposed to be abhigya, a knower of everything. I am known for knowing everything and you say there is something that I do not know”. Rukmani says, “Yes, yes, there is something you do not know only Radharani knows, my dear Lord”. And so that was the time Lord made up his mind, that next time I appear, my homework is going to be to know Radharani. I would know Radharani, I would want to know, this will be my pastimes, activities, endeavours to know Radharani.

And thinking like that, he was thinking 5000 years ago like this, he made up his mind, he took sankalpa, he took vow, next time I am going to be. And in order to know Radharani I will become Radharani, I will become Radharani. That’s why we sing; Narottamdas Thakur has sung, “Yadi Gaur na hoite tabe ki hoite”. Gauranga Mahaprabhu had not appeared. To begin with Krishna he could not have found or known Radha rani fully well and then he also could not have shared his understanding, Krishna’s understanding with the world.

Radhar mahima prema rasa sima jagate janate ke

So, Lord did go ahead. He appeared as Gauranga and so this is mentioned that Lord’s confidential reason for his advent. General reason everyone knows, the routine reason everyone knows, what is that?

paritranaya sadhunam
vinasaya ca duskrtam
dharma-samsthapanarthaya
sambhavami yuge yuge [BG 4.8]

Translation
In order to deliver the pious and to annihilate the miscreants, as well as to reestablish the principles of religion, I advent Myself millennium after millennium.

But this time as he has appeared as Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, he has one additional homework. He has one additional agenda as they say and that is to know Radharani. He is going to be acting like Radharani also, not only knowing but acting like Radharani. So, Lord had to take one whole avatar just to know Radharani. We can hardly imagine how difficult it is to know Radharani that even Krishna did not know some things and then he appeared as Gauranga and then he had spent the last 18 years studying Radha’s life and teachings, Radha-bhava. Of course he has assumed the Gaura varna – golden complexion so he is Gauranga.

antah krsnam bahir gauram [CC Adi 3.81]

Inside he is hiding as Krishna and outside he is Radharani, complexion like Radharani and his emotions are Radha-bhava

radha-bhava-dyuti-suvalitam naumi krsna-svarupam [CC Adi 1.5]

He has become Gauranga. In the beginning of Chaitanya Charitamrit Krishnadas Kaviraj Goswami he has explained or shared a beautiful and confidential verse,

samajani saci-garbha-sindhau harinduh [CC Adi 1.6]

That Lord has appeared as Ajani – Gauranga Mahaprabhu appeared. Saci-garbha-sindhau – from the womb of saci-garbha, womb of Saci-mata is like an ocean.

vrsabhanudadhi-n ava-sasi-lekhe

Vrsabhanudadhi- Vrishabhanu is like a ocean dadhi is a ocean, nava-sasi-lekhe – and from that ocean normally it is kind of understood that when the moon rises if you are on a bank of some ocean, you experience that as if the moon has risen right out of the ocean. Moon has risen out of the ocean. So, vrsabhanudadhi-nava-sasi-lekhe, Vrishabhanu is ocean and sasi is moon, and Radharani has appeared. Vrishabhanu is also ocean and kirtida is also ocean so put together – ocean, so from that ocean Radharani has appeared. So, here, in this verse he says, saci-garbha-sindhau – from the womb of Saci mata whose womb is like sindhu – ocean. Harinduh – hari is hari, indu is chandrama – moon, moon appeared, Gaurachandra appeared. So, having appeared now what is His mission which He is going to accomplish while He is in Jagannath Puri for 18 years. So, Lord has a agenda and that’s what Krishnadas Kaviraj has mentioned

sri-radhayah pranaya-mahima kidrso [CC Adi 1.6]

kidrso – of what kind? radhayah pranaya-mahima – the greatness of Radha’s love, what kind of love it is? Radha’s love – I want to understand. So, there are three items mentioned here. One is the greatness of Radha’s love, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu who is Krishna, he wants to know the greatness of Radha’s love. Special experience; She is experiencing me, my sweetness. So, if she relishes my sweetness, what is that sweetness like? What is that experience of Radharani is like? That I don’t know, that only she knows that is her experience. In other words, I want to understand even myself through the eyes of Radharani or Radharani point of view. Who am I? Am I supposed to be wonderful? Am I supposed to be sweet? Oh, sweet Lord. So, these are the three questions that Sri Krishna Chaitanya Mahaprabhu has or three agenda items. So it’s kind of getting to know each other. I want to know Radharani but I also want to know myself, the way she understands me, her satshaktkar – her anubhava,

mad-anubhavatah kidrsas
veti lobhat tad-bhavadhyah [CC Adi 1.6]

So Krishna has become greedy and eager to know these things and then he is hi bhava, his emotions have become more flourished or more solidified. He is determined to understand Radha and understand Krishna also through Radha.

sri krishna chaitanya radha krishna nahe anya [Chaitanya Bhagavat]

Translation
Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is none other than the combined form of Sri Sri Radha and Krishna.

Gauranga Mahaprabhu has appeared to first realise Radha Krishna, realise Radha and then he is gonna share that Radharani, glories of Radha, glories of Krishna with rest of the world. So all we could say, as Sri Krishna Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is realising, realising the realisations of Radha, having access to Radha’ mind and heart and to know Radha as she is. So all that experience of Sri Krishna Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, he has invested that in the mahamantra. He did not give big discourse, 700 verses Bhagavad Gita as he did as Krishna. He just condensed everything, all that you need to know in fact is all in it.

namnam akari bahudha nija-sarva-saktis
tatrarpita niyamita smarane na kalah [Siksastakam Verse 2]

All the energies, even Radharani. Radharani is the energy of the Lord, Hladini shakti of the Lord. Shaktiman, Sri Krishna is there and Shakti, hladini shakti, Radharani is there, are there in these names. He said okay, take this mantra and spread it, go everywhere, let the world know Radha and Krishna. Just introduce them to the holy name and then he also says harer namaiva kevalam, this is all that you need. Just chant, chant and chant and as you attain matra-siddhi then you will have realisation, you will have darshan of Radha and Krishna, just by chanting the holy names of the Lord. As you chant and chant, as sadhaka you are going to be attempting to become further purified, become free from anarthas. While chanting you are going to be praying & crying,

ayi nanda-tanuja kinkarama
patitam mam visame bhavambhudhua
krpya tava pada-pankaja
sthita- duli- sadrsham vichintya [Siksastakam Verse 5]

Translation
O son of Maharaja Nanda (Krsna), I am Your eternal servitor, yet somehow or other I have fallen into the ocean of birth and death. Please pick me up from this ocean of death and place me as one of the atoms at Your lotus feet.

This is the prayer, while chanting Hare Krsna, you are praying like this with all humility at your command. Of course, Lord has already said this-

trinad api sunichena
trorar api sahishnuna
amanina mandena
kirtaniyah sada harih [Siksastakam Verse 3]

Translation
One should chant the holy name of the Lord in a humble state of mind, thinking oneself lower than the straw in the street; one should be more tolerant than a tree, devoid of all sense of false prestige, and should be ready to offer all respect to others. In such a state of mind one can chant the holy name of the Lord constantly.

If you did this, you’re humble. Humbler than the straw in the street. Mahaprabhu has just given these 8 verses (mantras). All these teachings, he has condensed them into this Hare Krsna maha mantra. Go ahead and unpack it, open up this maha mantra, and then maha mantra will reveal unto you and eventually will reveal the darshan of Radha Pandrinath ki jai, Radha Shyamsundar ki jai, Radha Madhav ki jai, Radha Ras Bihari ki jai.

You will have darshan of the Lord, you will have Radha bhava, little sampling of Radha bhava. So you will have Radha bhava and you will have Gopi bhava. Bhaktas, devotees in order to do their services. Bhakti is done with bhakti bhava, Bhakti is done with emotions, feelings, what kind of feelings, we are asked to cultivate feelings, what kind of feelings we have to cultivate.

ramya kascid upasana vraja vadhu varga virya kalpita

Vraj vadhu varga, this Gopi’s emotions like them, so for us also the bhava that we have, whenever we have, whenever we get that bhava, that is Radha’s bhava, Bhakti’s bhava and Gopi’s bhava. Bhava is bhava, everyone doesn’t have a different bhava, once you are in bhakti, life of devotion and devotional service is nothing like Mauritius bhakti bhava orthis bhava is Chinese bhava, there may be Chinese bazaar bhava, there are different business techniques and thoughts while doing the business and making money, they may differ, but once, we are in the field of devotional service then all that bhava is same bhava. They are the same thing like oos donga pari rase nohe donga, that is also there just because of some sugarcane sticks, some sticks of sugarcane are straight and some are bent, but the juice inside, rasa nohe donga, the juice inside is the same in all of them. No one says ” Give me juice of only straight sticks, not this bent stick, there is no sugar inside, no, no, we know the sugar is the same, same sweetness. So it doesn’t matter, there is no different bhava, as we talk on bhava, emotions, it’s universal, univerally the same. So whether it is practiced in Goloka, practiced in Gokul, of course, that is another thing, sakhya bhava, dasya bhava, vatsalya bhava, these are varieties. Variety is there, but basically they are similar in nature of character as part of our constitutional nature,

hitvanyatha rupam
sva- rupena vyavasthitih [SB 2.10.6]

Sva- rupean, as we are situated in our own svarup, then that bhava, those emotions, those thoughts are the same as Radha’s bhava or Gopi’s bhava. So that is what Sri Krishna Chaitnya Mahaprabhu, he practiced, he was cultivating that bhava, try to realise that Radha’s bhava, Gopi’s bhava in Jagannath puri. Then Chaitanya Mahaprabhu with the help of Lalita and Vishakha. SwarupaDamodar is Lalita’s and Ramanand is Vishakha and Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, sri krishna chaitanya, radha krishna nahe anya, he is both Radha and Krishna. But in Jagannatha puri Krishna kind of takes a back seat and in the forefront is Radharani. He did act as Krishna, dharma- samsthapanarthaya sambhavami yuge yuge, he takes sanyas. He travels all over the world

radha rabhave gaura avatar, hare krishna nama gaura karila prachar

He has propagated the holy name, so while spreading the holy name around, here and there, South India, he comes to Pandharpur, spreading the holy names. He goes through Jharkhand forest spreading the holy name amongst the animals and other preachers in Jharkhand, he is Krishna. He is Krishna there, Krishna is in the forefront and Radharani is waiting to act like Radharani or play her role. So Lord does that as he finally returns form Vrindavan, now he is Jagannath puri and Chaitnya Mahaprabhu is simply Radha there. He also sent Balaram, Balrama what are you doing here? Go preach, preach in Bengal. So, he is giving a small team, take this dwadash gopas and others and you go. You go away, so that I could be now Radharani. You can not be around me while I’m in the mood of Radharani or I‘m with Radharani. Brother, now it’s time for you to give me some social distancing, leave me alone, this is personal, private life. So don’t meddle in the middle.

So, Chaitnya mahaprabhu has planned that, sending Balarama away as preaching is going on and he has already done the dharma- samsthapanarthaya, he has already travelled for 6 years. He has done that duty and now he is free from obligations and he is going to be more renounced. He is going to do his nirjana bhajan in a secluded place, so he has selected gambhira and he has very selected group of devotees, his associates, just the right ones, appropriate ones who would nourish his emotions, his feelings, increase his bhakti bhava. In Jagannath Ratha yatra is he there as Krishna or Radha? He is there only as Radha, Krishna is in the chariot and Radharani is in front of the chariot on the ground.

While He is dancing in front of Jagannath’s cart, He is Radharani, His thoughts are like Radharani, He is thinking like Radharani or even having the dialogues with Jagannath in the chariot. Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s ecstatic dance in front of Jagannath’s chariot that chapter has so many verses, all Radharani’s thoughts, feelings and emotions.

Vrindavan Dhaam ki jai! Sri Krishna Chaitanya Mahaprabhu ki jai!

It’s so common, I always say this but then sometime this thing just slips and what a great misfortune. Yeah I got it. Chaitanya Mahaprabhu says, mora man vrindavan, we are all pulling your chariot, bringing you to Vrindavan and we know you are anxious to return to Vrindavan but O Lord! Now Radharani is speaking to Krishna that mora man vrindavan, we are bringing to back to Vrindavan, you love to be in Vrindavan but please take a note mora man vrindavan, please enter my mind, please reside in my heart. So these are Radharani’s emotions.

So Mahaprabhu is lying down, He is Radharani, from inside He is only Radharani. He is thinking like Radharani. Talking of these siksastakam prayers,

ashlishya va pada-ratam pinashtu mam
adarshanan marma-hatam karotu va
yatha tatha va vidadhatu lampato
mat-prana-nathas tu sa eva naparah [Siksastakam 8]

Translation
I know no one but Krsna as my Lord, and He shall remain so even if He handles me roughly by His embrace or makes me brokenhearted by not being present before me. He is completely free to do anything and everything, for He is always my worshipful Lord, unconditionally.

So, this is said by Radharani, of course Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is compiler and Chaitanya Mahaprabhu saying it, this is how we read here but here Radharani is speaking. This is even the earlier bhava that one moment is like years or more longe.

Many passages, sections in Chaitanya Charitamrita where all these Radha’s emotions, Radha’s thoughts are expressed. It is written there in black and white by Krishnadas Kaviraj Gowswami. Study of Bhagavatam is graduation, graduate course textbook syllabus is Bhagavatam and if you want to do post graduation, your masters degree then you have to study Chaitanya Charitamrita.

Radharani is mentioned, Her talks are included in Chaitanya Charitamrita, Her thoughts and Her feelings and this is because of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. Sri krsna chaitanya radha krsna nahi anya. The whole purpose of his advent is to know Radharani as we presented in the beginning, sri-radhayah pranaya-mahima kidrso.

Chaitanya Mahaprabhu appeared and he has made Radharani known to the world. So we can not imagine what could have happened, how could the world have found out about Radharani if Chaitnya Mahaprabhu had not appeared. Hence, our acharyas sing the song,

yadi gaura na hoito, tabe ki hoito,
kemane dharita de?
radhara mahima, prema-rasa-sima,
jagate janata ke

How could the world have found out Radharani and her love for Krishna, her understanding Krishna or her Krishna. This is my Krishna, Radharani says, this is my Krishna, like we have written, My Prabhupada, he is everybody’s Prabhupada, he is Keshav Prabhu’s Prabhupada also, he could also say my Prabhupada, right?. But then there could be a difference between Lokanath Swami’s Prabhupad and Keshav Prabhu’s Prabhupad, it is expected right? Like that, one thing is my Krishna, myself saying my Krishna or Keshav saying or Maharaj saying or everybody saying my Krishna and then if Radharani could say this is my Krishna. I think there is going to be a word of difference, same Krishna but how much you understand Krishna and you call him my Krishna and how much Radharani understands Krishna and then she proudly says, this is my Krishna, my Krishna.

So as Lord had appeared as Chaitanya Mahaprabhu and then Chaitnaya Mahaprabhu is Radha and Krishna combined. In that, Radharani finally becomes motivated and activated, going through the whole experience of Krishna realisation and then Radharani has realised Krishna. Those are the three questions. As Radharani understands me, so as Radharani in Chaitanya Mahaprabhu understands Krishna and then if Radharani would say this is my Krishna that understanding is going to be the complete understanding of Krishna. Krishna was not understanding Radharani before and then he appears as Gauranga Mahaprabhu and makes his mission, mission of life, goal of his life. Goal of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s life is to know Radharani, realise Radharani. So Krishna becomes Radharani realised and Radharani has also become Krishna realised. So this is full manifestation, they are realising each other and there love for each other is also anandambudhi-vardhanam, is expanding and increasing.

So by the grace of Gauranga that world has, to begin with he has given the holy names and by chanting this holy names you are introduced to Radha and Krishna. The mode of worship, the way we worship Radha and Krishna in this age of kali is chanting Hare Krsna and this is how,

Yajnaih sankirtana-prayair yajanti hi su-medhasah [SB 11.5.32]

By the performance of this sankirtana yajna you are worshipping Radha and Krishna. So one may ask how do I worship Radha and Krishna? Or today is Radharani’s appearance day, how do I worship Radharani? Our answer is chant Hare Krsna, Radharani will be happy by this.

So Radharani is about to appear, very soon. So she is going to be very very happy or to make us happy in fact. Happy birthday to Radharani!! We are grateful to our parampara acharyas, beginning with 6 goswamis of Vrindavan, archayas like Narottam Thakur and others acharyas, Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur, Srila Bhakti Siddhant Saraswati Thakur and Srila Prabhupada. Srila Prabhupada ki jai!!

We are linked to Radha and Krsihna through this parampara. They have kept all the knowledge intact and live and they have landed that down to their disciples and followers. So we have reached all the way from the day Radharani has appeared 5000 years ago to this day 2020. All the glories of Radharani, all the beauty of Radharani, all the pastimes of Radharani, everything about Radharani we get to know, we get to sit and hear, we get to open scriptures and read and understand through the pages of different scriptures. So we are grateful to all those involved for bring Radha’s mercy, Radha’s knowledge from that day Radhashtami day to today. It also becomes our duty, we have received so we should be happy and do nothing? Should we be doing something? We should distribute, share Radharani. be generous. Chaitanya Mahaprabhu became generous with us by spreading the holy name and he asked each one of us to,

yare dekha, tare kaha ‘krsna’-upadesa
amara ajnaya guru haaa tara’ ei desa [CC Madhya 7.128]

Translation
Instruct everyone to follow the orders of Lord Sri Krsna as they are given in the Bhagavad-gita and Srimad-Bhagavatam. In this way become a spiritual master and try to liberate everyone in this land.

You all become gurus and hand down the form of holy name, form of all these scriptures, all these books which Srila Prabhupada has given us, Radharani and prasadam of Radharani. Radharani was the best cook, share that prasad and that happens everyday, we feed her everyday. Distribute Radha prasad, Krishna prasad, so that Radharani’s mercy could reach souls in form of remnants or prasad.

Today is the 16th anniversary of Radha Pandarinath temple opening. So it was 16 years ago, 2004, we had this hall but not this big, Prahlad Prabhu had expanded it further. There were many Maharaj, Prabhus, devotees from many places, I am sure many demigods might be there. It was quite a wonderful event, deity installation, special abhishek and special kirtans, they were long, I also was doing kirtans that day. And we have prasadam also in front of that old stone house. Memorable event, so we remember it and we are grateful for all those devotees’ attendance and participation in our grand opening of Radha Pandharinath temple. But this temple is not the final temple, for pleasure of Radha Pandharinath we would like to build much much bigger temple, palace. Maybe we should take that sankalp on their appearance day that we want to build a monument that will become a big landmark in Pandharpur, centre of attraction in Pandharpur. So that the whole world could come and take darshan of Radha Pandharinath and Sri Sri Rukmani Vitthal. So let us not be satisfied with what we have, so lets work towards that goal of building that grand temple for Radha Pandhrinath.

Radha Pandharinath ki jai!!

Grihasta asrama – Practical tips

Date: 31st July, 2020

Practical tips start from here,

“Grihe thako, vane thako, sada ‘hari’ bole’ dako,
sukhe duhkhe bhulo na’ko, vadane hari-nam koro re”

Whether you are a grihasta or brahmacari or sannyasi like me, one dharma is common and
same and that is chanting of hare Krishna.

grihe thako, vane thako, sada hari bole dako

We all are spirit souls, grihasta has soul, Sanyasi also has a soul, there is no difference on
spiritual level, zero difference. We have our sanatan, eternal dharma which is also called bhagavat dharma, vaishnava dharma or jaiva dharma which was said by Bhakti Vinod Thakura, so they are same for all, for all the varnas and all the asramas. Some principles, some rules and regulations are same like chanting of the hare krishna. Then from the vision of varna and asrama dharma is called varnasrama dharma. Varna and asrama includes brahmacari, grihasta,

vanaprastha and sannyasa. In these everyone has their own dharma, brahmacaris have their
dharma, grihastas have their dharma, vanaprasthas have their dharma and sannyasis have their
own dharma. Also varna includes brahmin, ksatriya, vaishya and sudra. Brahmin has their
dharma, ksatriya has their dharma, if vaishya then protection of cows. Prabhupada has said
and written many times that for grihastas vaishya dharma is nice. Sudra also have their

dharma, to serve all the three varnas. There are some people who are called chandal or mleccha, they don’t have a dharma. They are separate from varnasrama dharma, they have their own separate world, they are not even human beings they are just two legged animals.

ahara nidra bhaya maithuna? cha
samanam etat pashubhir naranam
dharmo hi teshamadhiko vishesho
dharmena hina pasunhir naranam

The thing which is common between animal and man is food, sleep, defence and mating.
The tendency of eating, sleeping, mating are common in both humans and animals. But it is
expected from humans to become religious, dharmo hi tesham adhiko vishesho. Who is a
human being? If someone says I am a human being, then prove. When you accept dharma
then you can be called human. When you follow the dharma then you’re a human being. A
person who doesn’t follow dharma is like an animal only. So first of all we have to accept
dharma or understand dharma. Human birth is very rare. Sankaracarya says three stages
of life kaumaram yauvanam jara.

When we are a child then we waste our time in playing, in
youth we get attached and attracted to each other, one third life gets wasted in this way and at last in old age we are in total anxiety. So Sankaracarya says where do you have time to become dharmic? In childhood you are busy playing, in youth you are busy with lusty affairs and in oldage you are engrossed in anxiety. So human life is very rare.

durlabham manusam janma
tad apy adhruvam arthadam [SB 7.6.1]

Transaltion: The human body is most rarely achieved, and although temporary like other bodies, it is meaningful because in human life one can perform devotional service. Even a slight amount of sincere devotional service can give one complete perfection.
Prahlad Maharaja says, life is temporary and it can get wasted, but we should not do this.

Human life is very meaningful and very useful.

durlabha manava-janama sat-sa?ge tara e bhava-sindhu re

We should engage this rare form of human life in satsang. Satsang and devotee association is the a very important need for every human being. We can be part of any varna or asrama but specially for grihasta without satsang and sadhu sanga life is useless, then its equivalent to death. If there is no satsanga then we will not serve Radha and Krsna in grihasta life.

manushya-janama paiya, radha-krishna na bhajiya, janiya suniya visha khainu

Translation: 0 Lord Hari, I have spent my life uselessly. Having obtained a human birth and having not worshiped Radha and Krishna, I have knowingly drunk poison.

We will drink poison and then we will die. But if we do satsang in this life,

urlabha manava-janama sat-sange tara e bhava-sindhu re

Then in this human life only we can cross the ocean of material existence.

krishna-prapti hoy jaha ha’te

Those grihastas who can understand this and those who are living life with the aim of krsna prapti by taking advice form saints, diksha guru and siksha then their life will be successful. In shastras two types of grihastas are mentioned:
1. One who is in grihasta asrama, who is following all the rules and regulations of
householder life as stated in the scriptures.
2. Grihamedhi
Prahlad Maharaja says,

Yan maithunadi-grihamedhi-sukham hi tuccham [ SB 7. 9.45]

What are grihamedhis doing? They make their house maithunagar and thus waste and destroy their lives. They are called grihamedhi. We need to understand who are grihamedhi. Sukhdev Goswami talk about grihamedhi,

diva carthehaya rajan ku?umba-bharanena va [SB 2.1.3]

Translation: Householder in the daytime they are busy either in making money or maintaining family members.
These householders who are now days in majority in this world and in this modern civiliazation. Infact majority of people of this modern world are uncivilized. Such people are not grihasta asrami but grihamedhi. Highly so called education but they are not cultured. Their slogan is, ‘If you feel good just do it, do not even think.’ The civilized householders they think then they act. But uncivilized householders their formula is ‘Just do it.’

nidraya hriyate naktam
vyavayena ca va vayah [SB 2.1.3]

Translation: The lifetime of such an envious householder is passed at night either in sleeping or in sex indulgence.
When they get up they are busy in making money, money for what? ku?umba-bharanena va.

Once when I was China, it was written on a shopping mall, ‘After your work hours spend time with us.’ The hidden meaning behind it was, when you work hard and then at the weekend waste that money shopping on our mall. What to talk about these grihamedhis?

In brief Sukhdev Goswami said,
kaler dosa-nidhe rajann. asti hy eko mahan gunah [SB 12.3.51]

5000 years back Sukhdev Goswami has said, that the lives of followers of Kali will be filled with faults in their lifestyle. Then starts Kali-Puran. So we need to understand the difference between grihasta and grihamedhi. There are some do’s and dnt’s, favorable and unfavorable. We need to understand both in spiritual field. Grihasta householders should understand what should be done and what should not be done. We should not follow the grihamedhis.

There is vivaha yajna, actually the whole life of grihastas should be a yajna, sacrifice. Human should do all activities for the pleasure of God. When there is marriage ceremony going on

otherwise shubhmangal savadhan, marriage is auspicious, mangal but be careful, savadhan.

yajnarthat karmano anyatra loko yam karma bandhanah [ BG 3.9]

Translation: Work done as a sacrifice for Visnu has to be performed, otherwise work binds one to this material world.
Otherwise it will bound you, you will be entangled in attachment and karma fully. In Iskcon when there is marraige in the grihasta circle that time we hear that, we should make Krsna our marriage partner. It should not be that only partnership between husband and wife but Krsna out of the picture. No Krishna should be the center of the grihasta life. As we are talking about grihastas, the grihasta should also stay in asrama, those grihastas who do not stay in asrama then they are grahamedhi.

Your house where you spend your most of the time, housewives practically spend 24 hours in the house, your home is where your heart is. So make that home a temple or make your asrama as temple not just make home theater. We have to become grihasta asrami not grihamedhi. It is said in sastras grihastas make and stay in house to serve the Lord and the guests. And which type of guests? Those who are parivrajakacharya and devotees. So make your house a temple or asrama. You can have deities at home or also a picture of the Lord to make it simple. If God is in your home then make Krishna as the center of the house and let everything revolve around Krishna. If there is a Lord then there should be kitchen also and our movement is also known as kitchen religion. Krishna has a very close connection with the kitchen. Make different dishes or bhogas for the Lord. And of course when you do this then you can fulfill Lord’s instructions,

patram puspam phalam toyam,
yo me bhaktya prayacchati [Bg 9.26]

You will be saved from sins, sins like meat eating, egg, fish. People say, eat eggs any day Sunday or Monday then Yamraja will give you dande or punishment. Offer bhoga to Krishna and then don’t sleep but sing the glories of Radha Krishna. So make your house a temple when the Lord comes and also devotees come as guests, keep it very clean as it’s a temple.

King Kulshekhar was an ideal grihasta. Now-a-days people talk about swacha bharat abhiyan, it’s nice but cleanliness should not only be external. First thing which should be cleansed is our mind and thoughts, ceto darpana marjanam. This kind of deep cleanliness we need. Grimedhis may look clean early morning, they say good morning but we can also say suprabhatam in place of good morning. They say good morning but hear and read all bad news and fill the mind and heart with bad news. Mind and thoughts both become dirty. You should not only keep deities and pictures of Lord but also keep sastra in the house. Put fire to all the stock of newspapers, and decorate your house with sastras, Gita, Bhagavatam, Chaitanya Charitamrita. Keep all Prabhupada’s books at home. Tulasi Maharani should be there and if you can keep a cow it will be very good. And if you have a dog then it should be kept outside. You can keep a cock not to eat but so that they wake us up early morning like in Dwaraka there were cock to wake up. Dwarkadhish Krishna used to get up with the help of them. This is all Lord’s arrangement how cocks assist us. The Lord wakes up early, so if you want to have Krishna prema and also want to go back home back to Godhead then we have to practice waking up early. Early to bed and early to rise, makes men healthy, wealthy and wise. Getting up early is not hard but sleeping early is difficult.

asat sanga tyagat yei vaishnava acar

If you want to become vaishnava grihasta then you have to stay away from bad association. Late night parties and all this affairs stop all this. So stop all this, the whole family gets into bed early and gets up early. Because to say, to Krishna, uthi uthi gopala, Yasoda maiya wakes up Gopal early in the early morning, brahma muhurta. So if we have Bal gopal at home you could play the role of Yasoda maiya and wake Krishna up and short mangal aarti. Or on the walls you can have paintings of Vrindavan, Mayapur, Jagannath Puri, acaryas instead of politicians, actors,etc. Throw them out, you don’t need them, there should be spiritual decoration so that wherever you see that will inspire you to stay high forever, jiva jago.

Leave hi hello, it’s practical why say hello hello just say Hare Krishna you don’t have to
invest time separately in that, it’s practical just say haribol. When you are making money,
keep life simple, simple living high thinking. People say just do it, do not even think, they
have high living, low thinking. Not only low thinking, they do not think, don’t even think just
do it. Householder is also a money holder or property holder and the other three asrama don’t hold money. Whatever you have acquired should be acquired by fair means, do not go for meat

eating, gambling, illicit sex and intoxication. Don’t do any job in which these activities are
done, stay away from all this. And you make money, you have the right to acquire or collect money. We brahmachari or sannyasi collect or acquire knowledge and give it to you and you should share half of your collected money for spreading Krishna consciousness or building temple, food for life, printing books, you could spend on pilgrimages, buy books. If you have a Krishna centered lifestyle then all your investments will be in Krishna consciousness. A grihasta should be selfless, parupkaraya idam sariram, this body is given for being selfless.

Rupa Goswami says that a Grishatha should share 50% of his wealth for Krishna Consciousness and keep 25% for emergency purposes. The important duty of every Grishatha is to raise Children in Krishna Consciousness and if this duty is not followed then you are irresponsible. It is said in Bhagavatam,

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 ya? samupeta-m?tyum [SB 5.5.18]

Translation: One who cannot deliver his dependents from the path of repeated birth and death should never become a spiritual master, a father, a husband, a mother or a worshipable demigod.

Don’t become parents if you cannot send your children back home back to Godhead. It’s your duty to make your children devotee. Providing only mundane education and providing basic necessities to children is not sufficient, then they will just have higher education and earn money and use money in wrong ways. They are also spirit souls, the need of children’s souls should be fulfilled that is to make them Krishna Conscious. For this there are various seminars in ISKCON centres on parenting. In today’s world it is challenging to make children Krishna Conscious. For that we can learn parenting tips from Iskcon, sadhu sanga is important or sunday schools of ISKCON, send children to Bhakta Prahlad schools, there are so many things you can do. If you have made your home asram all the members should be Krishna Conscious and especially children should be raised in Krishna Consciousness.

Question 1: What is the right way to manage or balance material education as well as the
spiritual culture? As they spend most of the time in school, we send them to sunday classes,
read bhagavatam but what is the right kind of balance?

Answer : Like I said we should make our home a temple or asrama, by staying in this environment your children will get all the samskaras and impressions automatically. Make such an environment at home, parents are the first guru of their children, you get an example
for them. I was thinking when Srila Prabhupada was a child, he would be sleeping, and father would be doing arati, ding ding ding, he would hear the bell and wake up and see their father bowing down before Krishna. This provides balance, prasadam at home and arati all have influence. Inspire children to chant rounds everyday.

Question 2: How can a devotee wife grow in bhakti and raise her kids to become devotee if the husband is not much spiritually inclined?

Answer: You do your duty, it is best if both husband and wife inspire children to become
devotees, both wife and husband both are gurus. Maybe later he will change his mind in future but for now you do. Spiritual education can begin from mother or wife also. It is said if you bring change in your wife’s or husband’s life then you change that person but if you bring change in housewife’s or a mother’s life then she will work on the whole family, then she makes everyone a devotee, she makes it her personal project. Make children Krishna conscious and use your
intelligence how to make your husband also Krishna conscious.
Hare Krishna.