Bhagvata Katha 2017: Day Seven

Venue: Ganesh Kala Krida Manch, Swargate, Pune.

Date: 31 December 2017

Topic:  The principles of Vaishnavism (Vaishnavata ka pratik).

jaya radha-madhava  jaya kunja-bihari
jaya gopi-jana-vallabha, jaya giri-vara-dhari
jaya yashoda-nandana, jaya vraja-jana-ranjana….

Hare Krsna Hare Krsna Krsna Krsna Hare Hare, Hare Ram Hare Ram Ram Ram Hare Hare

om namo bhagvate vasudevaya

My obeisances to Vasudev. May Lord Vasudev accept our humble obeisances. Also namsakar to all of you who are dear devotees of Lord Vasudev. Jivatam is always dear to the Lord. How dear He is to us is different, but we are always dear to the Lord and our relationship  with the  Lord is always there. The Lord has brought us here which  is also due to His love for us. It’s His mercy that we are coming here for six days and today the strength is more.  I welcome all those who have come today for the first time.

It’s said that when we become devotees of the Lord’s devotee, then we become His devotee. We are servants of His servants and that is what He likes. I am also serving you all by reciting this katha. Somethings are yet to be shared, and actually there no end to the lila and katha of the Lord.

Whatever I said was related to Sri Krsna Caitanya Mahaprabhu. We have a very close relationship  with Sri Krsna Caitanya Mahaprabhu who appeared just 532 years ago. He is the latest avatar and Lord Himself.  Every day we say, sri krsna caitanya radha krsna nahi anya. There is no one equal to the Lord, as He said in Gita

mattah parataram nanyat kincid asti dhananjaya (BG 7.7)

There is no Truth superior or equal to the Lord. There are lots of avatars of the Lord, but Sri Krsna is Lord Himself.

Lord Krsna and Caitanya Mahaprabhu both reside in Golok. Caitanya Mahaprabhu came to establish the dharma of Kaliyuga for all of us and that’s Harinama. ISKCON is Sri Krsna Caitanya Mahaprabhu’s mission and  it’s established to fulfil the HIs desire. It’s spreading all over the world and many people are coming together through this mission. When the devotees come together they……

mac-citta mad-gata-prana bodhayantah parasparam
kathayantas ca mam nityam tusyanti ca ramanti ca (BG 10.9)

….. discuss the lila and katha of the Lord. When we go back to our temples we will talk about it to others, that’s also bodhayantah parasparam. Prabhupada was ordered by his spiritual master, to preach in English in the West and translate the books in English. Then Prabhupada told his disciples to print books. That is all an expansion of the mission. Now preaching is continuing in more than one hundred  languages.

Printed books are not just kept in godowns(storerooms) but they are distributed all over. In the month of December ISKCON devotees distribute the books on a large scale and that’s called the book marathon. In 1976 Prabhupad’s disciples distributed 7 million books. That’s 40 years ago, but now more and more books are being distributed. In the national capital region (NCR) more than 5 lakh Bhagavad-gitas have been distributed. In 1966 with the help of some English boys Prabhupada established ISKCON and it’s spreading all over. This is also expansion (vistar).

In the period of 500 BC, animals were killed in the name of Vedas. So karma kanda was going on. Then Lord Buddha appeared and established,

ahimsa paramo dharmah

If animal killing is recommended in the Vedas then we reject the Vedas. He established voidism (sunyavad). This siddhanta is not accepted by the Vedas. He wanted to stop karma kanda. Prabhupada said this siddhanta was meant only for that time. It was an emergency siddhanta. However, this siddhanta is still being followed and accepted and its expansion is going on. When Jesus came animal killing was also going on, yet one of the ten commandments in Bible states  “thou shall not kill.”

Adi Sankaracarya came 1200 years back he preached jnana kanda called advaitvad. a-no, davit-two. That means that the jiva and Lord is one. That is  also called nirakarvad or nirgunavad. This siddhanta ofnirakarvad is also called mayavada. In the Padma Purana, there is a famous verse wherein Siva tells Parvati that he will appear in the age of Kali as a brahmana to preach asat-sastra.

mayavadam asat-sastrampracchanam-baudham ucyate mayaiva kalpitam devim kalau brahmana rupinah.

Caitanya Mahaprabhu strictly warned all of us,  mayavadi-bhasya sunile haya sarva-nasa

“Anyone who follows the principles of Mayavada philosophy is certainly doomed. He said Lord is there and we all should worship Him.”

man-mana bhava mad-bhakto  mad-yaji mam namaskuru

Always think of the Lord and become His devotee. Worship Lord  and offer homage unto Lord.

But the mayavada philosophy says,  brahma satyam jagan-mithya jivo brahmaiva naparah Brahman alone is real and this jagat is mithya, and the jiva is non-different from Brahman.’the Advaita philosophy,

Preaching of sunyavad was going on, then  Sankaracarya came and he preached about advaitvad. Then came the acarayas of the 4 sampradayas, one after the other. All four acarayas appeared in the South and all  the avatars of the Lord appeared in the North.  These four sampradayas are Vaisnava sampradayas as they all serve and accept Lord Krsna, Vishnu, Ram. It is important to note that they take shelter of the Vishnu tattva and not of the demigods

1.The Sri Brahma Sampradaya whose Sampradaya Acarya is Sri Madhvacarya.

2.The Sri Laksmi Sampradaya whose Sampradaya Acarya is Sri Ramanujacarya.

3.The Sri Kumara Sampradaya whose Sampradaya Acarya is Sri Nimbarkacarya.

4. The Sri Rudra (Siva) Sampradaya whose Sampradaya Acarya is Sri Visnu Swami.

They all emphasised dvaitvad. There is a need understand all these siddhantas.

mamaivamso jiva-loke  jiva-bhutah sanatanah

The living entities in this conditioned world are My eternal, fragmental parts. We are not Lord, we are two not one.

Lord Krsna has 64 qualities and we living entities have 50 qualities. We are qualitatively same as the Lord, but quantitatively we are very small. advaitvad and dvaitvada are together. Out of the four acaryas, Madhavacarya emphasised on the two – dvaitvad, not one. He had defeated advaitvad. He preached vishista dvaita siddhanta.

Then Vishnu Swami who belongs to Kumar Sampradaya preached about dvaitadvaita siddhanta. They preached about Lord being ‘sakaar’-that means having form.

Srila Baladev Vidyabhusan wrote commentary on the Vedanta sutra which called Govind bhaiya and his siddhanta was called ‘acintyabhedabheda siddhanta’.  There is a difference in the Lord and jiva . That isbhed and then there is no difference between Lord and jiva, that’s abheda.

If we get two buckets of sea water – one small and one big. They will be the same qualitatively but quantitatively different.   So our relationship with the Lord is eternal.

Navadvipa jabe ami pragat hoibo tava sampradaya svikar karibo

Bhatki Vinod Thakur in his book Navadvipa parikrama khanda writes,  

Sri Krishna Caitanya Mahaprabhu took two special qualities of each sampradaya and then the Brahma Madhava Guadaya sampradaya was complete.

Krsna murti nitya jani tahar sevan sei ta dvitya sar jaan mahajana

These four acaryas also appeared  in Gaur lila as, Sri Ramanujacarya – Ananta, Sri Visnuswami –Vallabha Bhatta, Sri Nimbarka – Keshava Kashmiri. Caitanya Mahaprabhu said,

aishwarya bhava has a lot of fear and reverence, but less love. In this bhava the devotee does not love the Lord very much. It is like a relationship between a servant and a boss.

There are two types of sadhana . 1. Vaidhi and 2. Raganuga. In raganuga bhakti there is reciprocation of love between bhakti and the Lord. Lord wanted to relish this bhava so Sri Krsna Caitanya Mahaprabhu appeared.

bhagavan more putra mora mitra mora prananath

Vatsalya. Sakhya and Madhurya are the main rasas and there is a lot of reciprocation of love between bhakta and the Lord or Lord becomes a bhakta.

panca-tattvatmakam krsnam bhakta-rupa-svarupakam
bhaktavataram bhaktakhyam namami bhakta-saktikam (CC Adi 1.14)

Sri Krsna Caitanya Mahaprabhu has five features. He comes with all those five features  to preach His message. Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu is the form of a devotee, Nityananda appears in the form of a devotee’s spiritual master, Advaitacarya is the form of a bhakta (devotee) incarnation, Gadadhara Pandit is the energy of a bhakta, and Srivasa is a pure devotee.

anyadharman tiraskritya puraskritya mahotsavan 

Narada muni said to Bhakti Devi,  “I will establish you in every house, in everybody or every society. Mahotsavan – I will organise festivals. And with the festival as the forum, I will propagate you, establish you everywhere.

When Srila Prabhupada established ISKCON, he started many festivals like Sunday festival, first ratha yatra festival in San Francisco in 1966 in which 10,000 people participated. In a recent survey is was found that 600 Jagannatha Ratha yatras were organized.

What do the devotees do? They take up the mrdanga and sing and dance. Such festivals are going on everywhere all over the world. No festival is complete without sankirtana.  Aindra Prabhu started akhanda sankirtana and now it’s going on. It was predicted that people over the world will come to Mayapur and chant Jai Sacinandan Gaur Hari.

We always say in Prabhupada’s pranam mantra  gaurvani pracharini. He preached the message of Sri Krsna Caitanya Mahaprabhu all over the world protected and saved those who were affected by mayavadand sunyavad. We were also saved. Gaurvani closed the mouth of mayavad, sunyavad and advaitvada. We did not talk about Charvak siddhanta

“yavat jivet sukham jivet rinam kritvã dhritam pibet” 

“As long as you live, live happily. Incur debt but drink ghee.

Take loans car loan, this loan that loan. Beg, borrow, steal but make sure that you live happily.

“bhasmi- bhutasya dehasya punaragamanam kutah.” 

Once you die your body is destroyed, who comes again so just enjoy. There are so many follower of Charvak, mayavad, sunyavad, advaitvad. Sri Krsna Caitanya Mahaprabhu rejected all this siddhanta and gave us complete knowledge.  His message is for each and every person all over the world.

”This is my own and that is a stranger’ – is the calculation of the narrow-minded. For the magnanimous-hearts however, the entire earth is but a family’.

He is merciful and beyond the dualities of poor-rich, man-woman. Those who follow these dualities are narrow minded, laghucetasam. Laghu means small and Guru means heavy.

There is a Marathi  phrase , he vishwachi maze ghar , which means that this world is my house and that’s also the world view of Lord.  Sri Krsna Caitanya Mahaprabhu made a plan so that His message reaches all over the world.

Prabhupada registered ISKCON and with its 7 objectives.

1. Propagate spiritual knowledge all over.

Material knowledge is going all over.  “Why are you calling us sudra? We are not Indian.  Being sudra is also not bad.’ samsidhi hari tosanam’. The best secret is to please the Lord.

1. Propagate Krsna Consciousness

Make Krsna the centre of our lives. As a mother sees her son’s toy and thinks of her son, our Krsna consciousness should be like that.

1. Encourage the sankirtana movement
2. Erect holy places of the pastimes of Lord Krsna

Prabhupada had established so many temples, gurukuls, goshala, farm houses and named them. Krsna loves cows so Prabhupada started goshala in foreign countries. Where people were gobhaksak, he made them goraksak.

1. Teach a simpler and natural way of life.

However all the opposites are going on. There is high living and no thinking or low thinking. The mantra is – just do it. The effect of high living and no thinking is that mental diseases are increasing. India is also becoming number one. The President said in Delhi yesterday that 1 in 10, that’s 10% of the population is affected by mental diseases. He also warned us to be careful of the epidemic of mental diseases. It is going to come, so we need to do something.

At the malls we see the word ‘life style’ .I don’t understand what it means, I have no idea. But I say its ‘death style’. We all are suffering from diseases and from five star hotels to we are going to five star hospitals. Krsna Consciousness is the only way. There is no other way, no other way, no other way. Turn towards Krsna. Honor Krsna Prasad. Your mind also will become pure. wWe become hatever we eat. The mind does thinking, feeling and willing. So whatever we think ,like that we become. We use our senses for gratification and thus we get mentally diseased. We always have to keep our senses engaged in Krsna consciousness.

andha yathandhair upaniyamanas

Prahalad Maharaja says that blind men guided by another blind man miss the right path and fall into a ditch. Our leaders are blind and we follow them without thinking. Like sheep we follow each other and fall in a ditch.

na te viduh svartha-gatim hi visnum

The goal of life is to return home, back to Godhead, and engage in the service of Lord Visnu. 

The leader is the one who takes us to our goal, but today’s leaders don’t know about the goal. During Prabhupada’s time, the leaders were engaged in freedom work. Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur said that it was not needed. Here in katha we are distributing books. Harinama preaching is going all over and when we hear the harinama, our mind becomes pure and high thoughts come to our mind. And we just fulfil our basic needs. In China it was written – after you work spend time with us – which means earn full day and then spend money in our malls. Cheating is going on all over. Maya is cheating, Kaliyuga is cheating us. We are become follower of Kali-kalirchela.

All these members  and even others addicted to sinful acts can be purified by taking shelter of the devotees of the Lord, due to His being the supreme power.

These are the names of different countries all over,  Kirat-Bihar, Huna-germany, Yavan means turkey like that. People there will accept Krsna consciousness and become pure. Prabhupada did that.  He circled the globe fourteen times. So the world is becoming pure. The 4 regulative principles. where

dyutam panam striyah suna  yatradharmas catur-vidhah

The personality of Kali was given permission to live in four places –  the place of gambling, the place of prostitution, the place of drinking and the place of animal slaughter.

Meat eating destroys daya (compassion). daya dharma ka mula hai. Somebody said that we are making our stomach a graveyard, eating all sort of animals and then we ask for peace or santi. Fighting is going on everywhere and that’s also due to eating meat. Gambling and mental speculation destroys Satya (Truthfulness). Intoxication destroys Tapa (Austerity)

Lord Rsabhadeva told His sons: One should engage in penance and austerity to attain the divine position of devotional service. By such activity, one’s heart is purified, and when one attains this position, he attains eternal, blissful life, which is transcendental to material happiness and which continues forever.

Illicit Sex destroys saucha (Purity). In 1966 Prabhupada asked his followers if they were  ready to follow the 4 regulative principles and to our surprise, all the boys and girls said, “Yes Swamiji, we are ready.”

One who follows these 4 rules, all the 4 pillars of dharma becomes strong and dharma gets established.

Todays is a special day. Everyone is waiting for the new year, parties going on all in Pune. This is also our party. We have gathered here today to chant and dance and welcome the new year. We  are hearing katha and lila of the Lord.

Do you all want to be happy in the new year. Happy new year to all of you! How can we be happy? Chant Hare Krsna and be happy.

Hare Krsna Hare Krsna Krsna Krsna Hare Hare, Hare Ram Hare Ram Ram Ram Hare Hare

Everyday chant the holy name, those who are not chanting can make sankalpa today that we will chant the holy name every day in the New Year. Thank you.

Nitai Gaura Premanande…..Hari Hari Haribol.