19820502 Vyāsa-pūjā lecture

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The following is a vyāsa-pūjā lecture given by His Holiness Jayapatākā Swami Mahārāja on May 2, 1982 – in Atlanta, USA.

Nirvi Se Namo Mahbadanaya Kṛṣṇa Prema Praday Kṛṣṇaya Kṛṣṇa Taptakanchanagorangi Ravonity Śrīvasadi God Śrī Gurung Dina Tari Nam Whenever these Vyas Pūjā appearance day birthday observances are held, I am reminded of the statement of his divine grace, Bhakti Siddhānta Saraswati Thakur, who is the spiritual master of our founder Acharya and my beloved spiritual master, Bhakti Vedānta Swami Prabhupda His Guru day Bhakti Siddhānta Thakur said in a big public assembly so many people were glorifying, he was being offered the garlands and the. And I can’t express exactly in the language that he used. But basically he said that to the people that you must be thinking, well, here this person is completely vain, proud, sitting up there like a stuffed, getting offerings and getting praise and seeming to enjoy the praise also without any shame.

Then he explained that actually the spiritual master, he has to do this because he’s representing Vyasadeva. As was explained so eloquently so many times tonight he’s representing the previous spiritual masters. So on behalf, and to maintain the honor, the prestige, the spiritual glory of the previous masters, the spiritual master has to, as an ambassador accepts praise on behalf of the king or as a mailman takes the letters to deliver to their ultimate destination, the spiritual master has to accept these offerings. So of course it is a peculiar situation. I don’t think it has much parallel with anything that I have ever experienced or that I think any of us have experienced before. Especially moving is the expression when a devotee appreciates the service or the association of another devotee, especially one spiritual master.

Today here, of course, there are mainly my beloved Godbrothers and God sisters and disciples of my beloved Godbrother and fellow Acharya Crya Devine grace Rla Hridayananda Goswami. Actually, I see him as the representative of my spiritual master, Rla Prabhupāda. And I don’t know what was the purpose. But when Śrīla Acharya Dev asked me whether I would come here, then of course I consulted with other Acharyae God brothers whether they thought that this would be not overextending myself to carry out the instructions to the Prabhupāda or that this would be an instrumental. And they, surprisingly enough, I thought they would all chastise me and say, no, you shouldn’t do it. You should just stay india and do the work that Prabhupāda gave you there.

But just as a Charya Dave had advised, they also said, no, you should come to the west sometimes and should go there. Then a cryadev had already asked me to go to South America. And then I experienced that I wasn’t getting that much association with him. I have to admit that I am always anxious for association with Vaishnavas. And I also always appreciate the association with my godbrothers and God sisters. Now I am appreciating the association with my disciples as well as the great Vaishnavas who are my nephews and nieces in this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement. Sometimes I would be so eager to associate with my godbrothers that I would not take as much advantage of Rla Prabhupāda’s association as was there to take that.

Of course I regret in some instances, but apart from those Rare instances, in 99% of the situations, actually I achieved RLA Prabhupda’s association and the association of Kṛṣṇa through the association of the Vaivas. And one of the hardest things is actually to appreciate other people. Philosophically, we all tend to become little impersonal and to feel embarrassed to actually appreciate other people. I mean, especially Vaiavas, just due to some type of conditioning. And this obstacle is there, I am sure, in varying degrees, depending one’s particular mental situation. And whenever one overcomes that, it’s especially moving and especially impressive that actually how deep the relationship between spiritual godbrothers and God sisters and godfathers and goddaughters and sons, spiritual master and disciple. How intimate the actual relationship is. Sometimes that association comes personally, sometimes it comes in dreams, sometimes it comes just even by thought.

Jayade promised me he would come and we would have so many joint preaching. But unfortunately I don’t get that much association with him. But I can’t complain, because when I read the 11th Canto and I see the work he’s doing, I feel very indebted to one of my spiritual godbrothers who’s dedicated his life in finishing the work that Rla Prabhupda had taken up as his life work. And I remember when I visited Brazil, somehow he had just left. Most of my pastimes are just missing Acharya day. But I just remember that I heard from someone one time. The Prabhupāda said he had a smile which could conquer. So then I was bowing down before his picture, which was just in front of the deities in Sao Paulo. When I looked up And I saw his smiling face on the picture.

Suddenly an uncontrollable laugh, a type of a joy came out from within me just by seeing that smiling face. And then I had the realization of Prabhupāda’s words. And just like when I have seen the. Just like there’s some disciples of my mother, women who distribute books and men who distribute books in South America on these buses, the micro boost, Chico libro grande, big and small books. And when I hear this fantastic stuff they do 100 books or 200 books, and how they’re in a day and how they’re struggling and going on the bus and requesting everyone to become happy, to know who they are, to know their spiritual life. My heart reaches out to them and I know how Rla Prabhupāda’s mercy is coming down because they’re distributing his books.

When I see the distributors in the Atlanta airport, when I see how they’re trying to give people transcendental sound vibration, trying to give them transcendental literature, then I appreciate that how the devotees are so sincerely dedicating themselves to the order of our previous acharyas coming down in this Kṛṣṇa conscious movement. And in spite of so many difficulties, when a Brahmacharya goes out and preaches or begs, so to speak, previously would beg. Now, if we just beg, people would consider us to be parasites or something. Yet they consider so many things anyway. But from our own point of vision, we want to give them spiritual knowledge in return for anything they may give us. So we give them something spiritual in return for whatever donation they give.

So naturally, when one is in this position, he has to hear so many criticisms, so many insults, and people are generally very miserly. Somehow or another they are able tolerate that, to become humble and to go on preaching. I know that india there’s a story about when Brahmachari was going door to door begging, and everyone was refusing. No, we have nothing. We have nothing. We have nothing. No. Come back later and say was getting very frustrated that he was supposed to beg something for his spiritual master. But no one was giving anything. So one day, and finally he came to one house and then the wife called back to the husband. Is there anything we can give? A Brahmachari is here. And then the husband was eating his meal. He said, well, here’s some ashes in the cold stove.

Why don’t you offer him the ashes? And so he says, well, we have some ashes, if you like Brahmacharya. This time so many people had not offered anything. So I said, well, just stop talking and give something at least that. It’s so rare if anyone gives anything that at that point, if you could get, if you actually give the ashes of talking, go to the actual effort of giving something, it would better than nothing. So people are generally hesitant to give anything. And understandably, someone to put himself in that position to be a preacher and have to hear so many things is definitely a great tapasya. I appreciate the devotees who are taking that tapasya. When I see the deities, of course, tonight the deities are already wearing their pajamas, spiritual nightdress.

When we see how they’re beautifully decorated and cared for and how the deity room is so clean, then we appreciate the devotees work. Who is cleaning the temple? When I think how difficult it is in spite of so many obstacles in preaching in the west and how the temple president has to always be preaching to the devotees, just like here in Atlanta. Gokul Ranjana Prabhu, how he has a very heavy responsibility for serving Nitāi Gor. And now also to see that the Marari Sevak project and so many projects are connected with this temple are going on, can’t help but appreciate that these devotees are working so hard to please the spiritual master, to please Rla Prabhupāda.

And when I see how my senior godbrother, Rupanuga Prabhu is dedicating himself to try to bring Kṛṣṇa consciousness to the American people, one can’t help but appreciate because in the whole world, who’s giving anything? Even if they give ashes, you see, they won’t even. Some people won’t stop. Even if you ask them to please give me your cigarette ash. They would probably give you the lit cigarette in the face, maybe, but they wouldn’t even give you that. Generally, they won’t even stop. I have seen so many people go by. It’s one thing is india, in South America, if you ask someone to stop, I don’t know anybody to walk by. But in America, people, they walk right by.

And I see that the distributors, they have to suffer so much sometimes they’re considered a little bit aggressive just to get a person to stop for a second to hear what they might have something worthwhile to say. So of course you may have to think of other ways to attract the people to stop, since they don’t stop ordinarily on the street like that. We may have to consider other ways of bringing them to our temples and bringing them to our festivals where they can hear. But nonetheless, we can stop our effort to preach. So this is a very great sacrifice everyone is performing. And I am trying to appreciate the service of all the different devotees Because I know that if I can see the qualities that they’re giving so much to Kṛṣṇa, they’re giving to the spiritual master.

And then if I can encourage them in any place, how to give more because they already have that sincere desire, or if I can help them in some way in their service, or if I can bring a person who could give his energy to Kṛṣṇa and thus get out of the material bondage of birth and death. I want to just learn how to appreciate those good qualities. And I learn best when I see the good qualities and all the other devotees. This is not something unusual, actually. The Vedas say that the spiritual master comes to a spiritual master in the form of his disciples. Just as a teacher sometimes says, well, I learned from my students.

As we’re teaching, as we’re training our disciples, this also helps us to know how we have to also, on a higher level or on a different level, we have to surrender to our spiritual master. Or we can remember times in our spiritual life when we received certain instructions from our spiritual master and when we followed or didn’t perfectly follow those instructions. And this way, in the process of preaching, one is continuously refining the devotional service. And so we can remember that in this movement, that this unique relationship of surrendering to a spiritual master, being friends with the devotees, giving mercy to the innocent people, avoiding the very envious people is a basic principle. And if we can bring people into that friendship, if we can bring people into that family, then no one will regret it.

No one will regret having been brought into the spiritual circle of friends of Lord Kṛṣṇa, his devotees. Rather, they will gain something which they won’t lose. So I want to thank everyone for their service to this Kṛṣṇa Consciousness movement, Accept any offerings that were made on behalf of our previous behalf of the pure devotees in our line.

And I am confident that here at the Npanihati temple, under the shelter of Nitāi Gaur, under the shelter of Jaga Mohana Jagannath, who’s known to attract the whole world, he’s known as Jaga Mohan, one who can attract the mind of all the people, that if every devotee concentrates on getting the mercy of Nitāi Gaur and Lord Jagannath with his companions Subhadrā and Balaram and their pure devotees, that the people of Georgia and of the Southeast, even though it appears to be a difficult task, gradually the intelligent and the truth seekers. They will be attracted and they will be able to benefit unlimitedly by the transcendental shelter and mercy of the most merciful Lord and of the all attractive Lord. So it’s late and I am sure everyone’s hungry, so I don’t want to delay the program any longer. Already everyone is so patiently head through everything.

What’s the next program? If you’d like to. So we’d like to request everyone to come up and we’re going to.