19820515 Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 2.7.43-45

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The following is a lecture given by His Holiness Jayapatākā Swami Mahārāja on May 15, 1982 – in Honolulu, USA. The lecture begins with a reading from Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 2.7.43-45.

Although the potencies of the Lord are unknowable and immeasurable, still because we are all surrendered souls, we know how he acts through yoga, Māyā potencies and similarly the potencies of the Lord are also known as the all powerful Shiva, the great king of the atheist family, namely Prahlad Mahārāja Swayam Bhugamanu, his wife Satarupa, his sons and daughters like Priya Vratha, Uttanapada, Akuti Devahuti and Prasuti Prachina Barhi Ribu Anga, the father of Venu Maharaj Dhruva, Ikshwaku Ayla Muchukunda Maharaj Janaka Gadhi Raghu, Ambarisha, Sagara Gaya, Nahusha Mandhata, Alarka Satadhanve, Anu, Rantideva, Bhishma, Bhali, Amuraya, Dilipa, Sobari, Utanka, Sivi Devala, Pipalada, Saraswatta, Uddava, Parasura Bhurishena, Viveshana, Hanuman, Sukhadev, Goswami, Arjuna, Arshti, Sena, Vidura, Sutadeva and many others, etc. Purport by His Divine Grace R.L.A.

Prabhupda all the great devotees of the Lord, as mentioned above, who flourished in the past or present, and all of the devotees of the Lord who will come in the future are aware of the different potencies of the Lord along with the potency of his name, quality, pastimes, entourage, personality, etc. And how do they know? Certainly it is not by mental speculation, nor by any attempt to dint excuse me, by dint of limited instruments of knowledge. By the limited instruments of knowledge, either the senses or the material instruments like microscopes and telescopes, one cannot even fully know the Lord’s material potencies which are manifested before our eyes. For example, there are millions and billions of planets far beyond the scientist calculation. But these are only the manifestation of the Lord’s material energy.

What can the scientist hope to know of the spiritual potency of the Lord by such material efforts? Mental speculations, by adding some dozens of ifs and maybes, cannot aid the advancement of knowledge. On the contrary, such mental speculations will only end in despair by dismissing the case abruptly and declaring the non existence of God. The same person therefore ceases to speculate on subjects beyond the jurisdiction of his tiny brain. And as a matter of course he tries to learn to surrender unto the Supreme Lord who alone can lead one to the platform of real knowledge. In the Upanishads, it is clearly said that the supreme personality of Godhead can never be known simply by working very hard and taxing the good brain. Nor can he be known simply by mental speculation and jugglery of words.

The Lord is known only by one who is surrendered here. Brahma Ji, the greatest of all material living entities of all material living beings acknowledges this truth. Therefore the spotless spoiling of energy by pursuing the path of experimental knowledge must be given up. One should gain knowledge by surrendering unto the Lord and by acknowledging the authority of persons mentioned herein. The Lord is unlimited and by the grace of Yoga Māyā helps the surrendered soul to know him proportionately with the advance of one’s surrender. Thus, in the purport of verses 43 through 45 of the seventh chapter, second Canto Seema Bhāgavatam translated with purport by his divine grace Rlaesi Bhakti Vedānta Swami Prabhupāda. So. How the Lord is acting through his Yoga Māyā potencies, how the unseen hand of the Lord is acting can only be understood by the devotees.

So many great devotees are mentioned here. Men and women who are able to understand the potency of the Lord, how His mystic powers are working. But no one can know the Lord completely. But even how the Lord acts that we can understand something about it if we are a devotee. For the non devotees, they may be great philosophers, they may be great in any material field. It doesn’t make any difference. That is not the qualification for knowing about Kṛṣṇa. Just like the material scientists, they’re coming up with so many theories every few years. The old theory is cashed in and a new theory is established. And then they know a little more. They say, well that theory also doesn’t stand. Darwin’s theory was given. Now people, they don’t accept that Darwin’s theory is exactly substantiated. Many are questioning it like that.

There are so many big theories. First there was the primordial soup theory, now then there’s the big Bang theory. And now they have, you know, so many other theories about one big going back kind of this way and that way. They have so many different theories, all on the basis of the buzzing that they hear on their radios coming from outer space. They think that’s the echo of the bang or that’s the sound of the soup. And they are speculating on how the world was created 40 million billion years ago. And these things are very good for getting government grants and for impressing the PTAs but don’t actually give us a real clue as to what is the material world, how did it come about?

And they always have the soup camp and the band camp and other camps who are somewhere in some other portion of the left field trying to establish their theories without a real clue as to what is happening. Even if there is a big bang, or even if there was originally a soup that who stirs the soup and makes things happen and who lights the fuse to make the bang go? They all come to the ultimate conclusion that there’s no God because they can’t figure out how he works. And here the answer is given because only his surrendered souls can know how he works. You see, if you are cleared with security and you’re a high ranking government service, then you can also know how the secret Service works, how the CIA works, how all these things work.

We don’t actually know just the common citizens. We may be citizens, we may have some relationship with the government, but we don’t know exactly how those governments, government institutions are working. We can only get access if we are given a security check and if we have some intimate connection with that level of government. But why do we think that Kṛṣṇa is going to reveal the mysteries about how he works to someone who is not having faith in him, to someone who is not reciprocating with him in a level of love, in a level of devotion in relation to God, we say devotion. In relation to the country, they say patriotism, it’s the difference. To whom do you owe your allegiance?

So when we think that we’re the body, then we are very attached to family, nation, country, to the way we dress, the way we look, to who we associate with. We’re very attached to these bodily relations. In the previous verse, it very strongly advises us about being attached to this body, that it’s very dangerous. But anyone who is specifically favored by the Supreme Lord, the personality of Godhead, due to unalloyed surrender unto the service of the Lord, can overcome the insurmountable ocean of illusion and can understand the Lord. But those who are attached to this body, which is meant to be eaten at the end by dogs and jackals, cannot do so. If we are overly attached to this body, then we will not be able to cross over this insurmountable illusion before us. We won’t understand why people suffer in the world.

We won’t understand where we come from, where we’re going to. We won’t at all be able to understand that who is the ultimate truth, ultimate cause behind everything, or whether it’s a who or an it or whatever. We won’t be able to come to that type of a conclusion unless we actually render devotional service. So Chaitanya Mahapu, he used to take his devotees around Navadvik, the sacred pastime place of Lord Caitanya. And it describes here in the song that we sang this morning how just as the sun starts to become. Starts to show a light in the sky. I mean, it hasn’t risen yet, but still the sky has already become illuminated. At that time, Lord Caitanya would take his devotees and journey through all the towns and villages of Nadia district. Nadia is considered to be really sacred place of Caitanya’s pastimes.

And how Lord Caitanya would dance, how the madrangas were making the noise. Tatai, tatai. The judges, these big. Wampas, as you call them, they’re called jajs. How they roll, it’s called in Bengali, roll. Just like rolling the drum, rolling the cartels playing jajas, rolling madrangas tataing teotanag deh dit d. There’s so many bowls. When you play madranga, you learn bowls. Each madranga sound has a name in Sanskrit or in Madranga bo language. So you know that ta Tiny. Some people, we have a devotee in Māyāpur. He can make the Madranga speak. He can say, nitāi goranga going to the well to take water. Nitāi goranga going to the well take water. It’s a special art to learn how to play these drums. I don’t know if you get that much of a da on these fiberglass imitation. Well, that’s.

We find that, you know, whoop. That part of it’s very hard to get. So with that they make the drums actually speak. Just like when Naratam Das Thakur, he was called upon at the first Māyāpur, at the first Gor Pūrṇimā festival was held at Keterigram. He was called upon by, I believe, by Birchandra, the son of Nithyananda, to lead a kīrtana. Or was the Chutananda Dwighta Sandovich, I forget. Someone asked him and he took permission from Janava Devī, the widow of Nityānanda Prabhu, after Nithyananda had left the world. And then he started his kīrtana, when his kīrtana is something very special. He had a trained kīrtana group with many mitrangas and many kartel players. And as he was paying his. As he was playing, these madranga players would be complaining completely in unison, exactly in unison. And sometimes he would Let them.

You know, while he was doing the kīrtana, they would sometimes spin around, jump in the air, down on the ground on their knees, all the time not losing one beat while they’re dancing and spinning and jumping in this way. Everyone was completely raptured by the sankirtan. And they were absorbed completely in this meditation. Sometimes, even today, you see the madranga players, while they’re playing, they’re saying the bowls. And you hear them going. And they’re saying all the. And exactly. The drums, they’re going, watt. Making those sounds. And they’re just completely. While the kīrtana is going on, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa. They’re bowling it. It’s an amazing thing to see. So in this way, if one absorbs himself somehow or another in the sankirta, see, that immediately takes one’s consciousness off the body. It’s so beautiful.

And of course, it’s a vibration like any other vibration. Of course, we would think. But no, it’s a transcendental vibration. The madranga playing, the jazas, the kartals, the cymbals and all the other quan shells and everything creating that transcendental vibration. That vibration is not a creation of this material world. That is also going on in the spiritual sky. You won’t hear there in the spiritual sky the sound of factories making. Making, you know, motorized toothbrushes. You won’t hear the sound of atomic reactors. You won’t have to hear any type of sound of the type that we hear in this world. But you will be able to hear the chanting in kīrtana and the beautiful natural glorification of the Lord and other type of musical sound with transcendental vibration.

Since originally, the music vibration coming from the spiritual world is meant for glorifying the Lord, for elevating our consciousness. Of course, nowadays, some vibrations, they try to elevate the consciousness. And some vibrations, they’re just trying to express how miserable their consciousness is. I believe they call that the punk rock. How angry and how miserable they are, you see? But the point is that Kṛṣṇa consciousness is giving a positive alternative. It’s one stage to realize that we’re miserable in the material world. And it’s another stage to do something about it, to just be angry and want to destroy. That’s not a solution that just further gets you into the entanglement of this material world. So this was a positive alternative.

That Lord Caitanya, he was going around and telling all the people that while you are spending your nights, this is the sleep and then the Whole day you simply decorate your body. Simply. Now you should fill your mouths with the holy names. Makunda, Madhuba, Jada, Bahari. Chanting without any offense, Vadana Bhuti. Fill your mouths with this chanting. The whole day we spend decorating our body, we can’t help it. The body requires so much maintenance anyway. We have to feed it, clothe it, clean it, evacuate it. We have to do so many things just to keep this machine on the road, right? So. But to take that maintenance work and just add a little bit to it, a little bit of sense gratification and think that now I am going to be satisfied, or this is actually the purpose of life that is completely illusion.

You see. Caitanya Mahāprabhu movement because the consciousness becomes elevated above the material, mental and physical platform. Therefore, they’re not afraid of the maintenance works of the body. Rather, they simply dovetail those maintenance works and spiritualize them. Caitanya Mahāprabhu, just in one of his days, and now that one can understand how everything perfectly fits in, how he would go when he was a teacher and he had so many students, he would go through the town and people would call him over the garland. Flower man would see him, come by and invite him into his ashram, into his house, give a seat to Lord Caitanya. Lord Caitanya would say, what do you have for me today? He’d offer him a garland and Lord Chaitanya, I don’t have any money for this. He said, I am a poor Brahman. No, no, you take it. It’s all right.

And he’d go down the street and then he’d go into the cloth men, the hand weavers, and they give him a seat, wash his lotus feet, perform aarti, or greet him with sweet words. And then he’d say, oh, you have anything for me today? Any new weaves? So they come out with the cloth. And then he say, but of course, you know, I am a poor Brahmin. And they’d give him, as he was the greatest pandit in the whole Naviglip, in the whole India. They were very pleased and they were attracted by his features like this. He would. He would be going around the town with his hundreds of followers and everyone would be receiving him. And there would be this wonderful reciprocation even before he started his Sankirtan movement.

Then he’d go down to the Ganges with his followers and they would have jalakriya or water sports for. Some hours. And then he would go back home after Taking his bath in the Ganges. And he would do his worship of his Shaligram Sila which he would worship in the mood of Kṛṣṇa. And after finishing his worship and his chanting, then he would offer the Prashad, the boga that was prepared by his mother and his wife. Then his wife would take the prashad and serve it to Caitanya Mahāprabhu. Mother Satchi would supervise, be very happy that how Caitanya Mahprabhu is being served by his faithful wife. In Kṛṣṇa consciousness he’d take a little bit of half hour rest after Prashad, sometimes take a massage at his lotus feet and then he’d go out.

And later of course, when he’d go out in later times, then he would go out and do the Sankirtan with the devotees around the town. And in the evening then he would chant in this way he his day was filled with different activities. And somehow the maintenance activities, they never predominated. But they were all just part of the whole sequence which did not do anything to reduce one’s consciousness. Especially bathing in the Ganges or in the ocean. The ocean is considered sanctified by Haridas Thakur and by many sacred rivers that flow into it. It’s one called the Sindhu, this Mahatirt holy place. So the Ganges is the sacred river flowing from the Toa of Vishnu. Jamuna is sacred because Kṛṣṇa bathed in it. This way. There are so many sacred places sacred.

So one can engage in activities which are serving to maintain the body. At the same time, those should not be the goal of life. They should just be the supportive part of the life. And they should be dovetailed in such a way that while we are doing all the activities, we can always remain in meditation on Kṛṣṇa. And that some considerable time should be devoted every day for chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa Hare Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Hare Hare Hare Ram Ram Ram Hare Ram Hare. And for serving Kṛṣṇa, that should be the maximum. So in this regard, Bhaktavinod Thakur, he’s praying what Lord Caitanya is saying that you got this human birth, it’s so rare.

But now that you have it, why you’re not thinking that what is the purpose of this human life that you’re not worshipping Yaśodā Sutta in this human life, in this way your whole life is simply becoming useless. At the time of death, everything will be finished. All the work we do to maintain the body. Just like you maintain your car when you finally total it out and it’s all wasted. So this body is a guaranteed total destructive. The guaranteed dev is total destruction. The body cannot remain even. We have very nice young body now, very beautiful. We can have so many different types of relations with this body. We can try to enjoy so many things with this body. But day by day, the time of the body is winding out. And before we know it, we will have an old body.

And before we know it, the body will be finished. But we are not finished. Why should we live just 60, 70 years, 50 years, 20 years. We can’t say how long we’re going to live. Even the babies died. We can’t say how long we’re going to live. Why should we live just for this short spotlight when we should be living on the transcendental platform and realizing our real eternal life? So the human being has the ability to achieve that. If they don’t, then it’s a great failure. It’s considered to be a great waste. In this way, Lord Caitani is telling all the people that every rising and setting of the sun, a day passes and again it’s lost. In other words, we’re not 20 years old. 30 years old, 40 years old, 50 years old, 60 years old. We’re 20 years dead.

30 years dead. 40 years dead. 50 years dead. 60 years dead. Sunrise meant that one more day has begun. It means that the day before is finished. We never get that day again. There’s a saying that you can buy almost anything, but you cannot buy the spoken word. Once you speak something out, you can’t buy it back. And once time is gone, you cannot buy it back. There was a famous cinema star in Bengal. He’s like the John Wayne or Regan or something of Bengal. He was a big hero. So he was on his deathbed, he was very sick. He grabbed a doctor hand and he told him, Save me. Save me, doctor. I want to live. Save me. He died just then. So the newspaperman asked the doctor that, don’t you? And what do you have to say about this?

Your patient was grabbing your hand, begging you to save him. But he died. The doctor said, well, this happened several times before. And every time I did save him, it was only this one time that I failed. So this is a materialist idea, you know. Well, so many times I was saved from death, you see. Just one time I may miss. The point is that then it’s over, you know? Then you have to go on to the next body you don’t get to take. He can be the big hero in this life, but next life he can be, you see, Anything. There’s no guarantee whether dog or whether human being or demigod. So Lord Chaitanya is saying, you should understand this essential fact. Life is temporary and filled with various kinds of miseries.

Therefore, carefully taking shelter of the Holy Name and remain always engaged in his service as your eternal occupation. We should understand that the Lord has come down as the Holy Name. Incarnation is the Holy Name. Just to give us Jīva Kalana, to give us our good fortune. Without this Holy Name coming down. How in this material world of so many activities and so many distractions and so many situations, how could we be Kṛṣṇa conscious? But by the Holy Name, while we’re riding in the bus, while we’re swimming in the waves, while we’re chanting, while we’re eating, while we’re sleeping, while we’re doing our work. Anytime a person can chant and gradually bring up his copy consciousness to the spiritual platform.

And when one achieves that spiritual platform and he becomes situated as a devotee of God, as a devotee of Kṛṣṇa, that is a liberated state. Not just I believe in God, that’s another thing. A devotee of the Lord means someone who has realized his spiritual relationship. That he is connected with the Lord on the Spiritual platform. Not just the material conception. See, that is very third class type of devotee. But here the devotees mentioned knew their spiritual link was with Kṛṣṇa, with the supreme personality of Godhead. And therefore they knew how his energies were working. They knew because they had all accepted each other spiritual master in the line. See, just like Rla Prabhupāda Śrīla Ramaswara Swami, they accepted a bona fide spiritual master. They served in the process of Bhakti Yoga or devotional service. And thus they could know these mysteries, you see.

Otherwise, without this chanting, how would it be possible in this disturbed age? So the Lord’s coming down is simply for our benediction, you see. To take away all the ignorance and to create great light in the heart. To destroy all the ignorance and darkness. So Bhakti did not. Here he says if you take this pure chanting of the Holy Name, you drink it. Drinking, you see, Just like when one drinks. If you take, there has to be that complete connection. Otherwise it will spill all over. You take green coconut. In Bengal, they say you should take it one drink at one time. If you take it one time, you can take the whole thing if you just break it once. Because there’s somehow there’s some living energy there in the. In the green coconut. If you break it, then it’s very hard.

You can’t again just finish it off in one draught. Then usually you have to end up sipping it. There’s some mystery about that. Maybe someone knows how to do it. But generally speaking, it’s a very tricky thing. So when we take supan to drink something, that means we take it in one draught. We don’t take it and let it spill. Here we take completely one draught. That’s the way we should take the holy name, full consciousness. We don’t. We’re not just when we’re drinking, we’re completely drinking the nectar of that holy name. We’re not allowing it to be broken or to be distracted in any way. And as a result of that, we become completely ecstatic. We become completely transcendentally situated. And that will give the most happiness to bhaktived.

This is the special wonder that these great devotees of the Lord, these great cryas or spiritual masters, they desire to see everyone happy. And when you become happy, they are happy when you become happy in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, because they know that happiness you won’t lose. To see a person happy because he won the lottery ticket. Just recently in Illinois, a man won a million dollar lottery ticket. Actually he won it about four years ago, 50,000 a year for 20 years. He was 68 years old. He’s 72 now. He just, you know, kicked the bucket. So they couldn’t find any after he left his body, they couldn’t find any heirs. So trying to figure out who to give the money to. But here’s the person, he was so happy he’d won a million dollars, but he couldn’t live to spend it. And it’s like that.

Even if we get something, we can’t stick around to enjoy it. Man builds his Ford millions, or Walt Disney builds his millions, and then he has to leave it. So that type of happiness, the devotees are not really don’t consider it very important, but when they see that someone is happy chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa, happy serving the Lord, then they become happy because they know that happiness they will never lose. Therefore, they can understand that in these 14 worlds, in the whole universe, the only real thing is chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa. Thank you very much. I believe it’s time for the alright then. Yeah. Dukirtan questions those who are intelligent, you see, they can understand the difference between the body, the mind and the self. Ordinary people, they don’t think about these things. They’re just mechanically acting as a body.

They’re just a little bit more sophisticated than animals. But in a real sense, they haven’t understood what’s beyond the body. They haven’t really gone beyond the animalistic side of being a human being to the more sensitive spiritual side. So those who are intelligent, who know what is life, who want to achieve truth and help people to also get out of their miserable condition, those type of broad minded souls, very intelligent soul, they know the purpose of life. They will never be understood by the massive people very well. They are the pioneers. You can say now we have come so far west here to Hawaii. The only way you can go further west is you go way east. Go west, young man. So now we have to go to the Vedic philosophy. That is the last pioneer stage you see in this great American go west.

They have gone all the way west to Hawaii. Now the only way you can go beyond this, you have to go over the daytime, what do you call that? The day date line. Not to China, but to India, to Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Are there any questions? Yes. I was wondering if I should work in society. I have an opportunity to take some training in cleaning things, cleaning up buildings. Well, that every person, whether he should continue working in society or whether he should move in the temple or what he should do that way. There’s no hard and fast rule like that. One should always keep association, divorce. And each case is individual. That’s where having a spiritual master or having at least instructing spiritual master of senior vaiavas to guide one is necessary to consider each person’s individual situation.

Some people will be able to according to the particular frame of mind. They have to be advised in a particular way. Because abruptly we cannot just change our whole lifestyle or we cannot suddenly change things in every case because it may be too much for us to accommodate. So how a person has to be step by step led up. Of course, the ideal thing is whatever we do, it should be without desire for our own personal material advancement, but rather for maintaining a simple life and for devoting our maximum energy to the high thinking of Kṛṣṇa consciousness and helping others. That should be the goal. And we should try to keep the association of devotees as far as individual case whether you should work in whatever you’re suggesting.

That should really be left up to a personal interview with some senior devotee who can advise you individually in that regard as to whether that’s the best thing for you to do with your time. Because time is limited. So we have to make the best use of time to achieve the unlimited. If we can trade in limited time, we get unlimited time for that. I feel it would be a waste of time. It sounds like a waste of time but Prabhupāda said generally we shouldn’t use I don’t know who you are, if you initiated devotee or not, but generally the Prabhupāda said that to become Kṛṣṇa conscious, whatever we have, we should use that because it’s not dependent upon any material ability to be Kṛṣṇa conscious.

So whatever you already know, you could just dovetail that in the service of Kṛṣṇa and that would be enough to be Kṛṣṇa consciousness. You don’t have to learn, you don’t have to get a PhD to be Kṛṣṇa conscious. You don’t have to learn how to do something. Kṛṣṇa Consciousness is already there in our heart. It’s a matter of uncovering it. It’s covered by dirts of material misconception and those are not cleansed away by further material education. The risk is you put some more dirt, some more misconceptions there. If someone already has a material education or is just about to finish it, then you can use that in the service of Kṛṣṇa. There’s no problem. But since time is limited, we don’t know how long we’re here, we shouldn’t waste any time. It. Yeah. Sam. Sa.