19920627 Caitanya-caritāmṛta Madhya-līlā.7.87-101 - Nāmahaṭṭa

Lecture Code: 19920627

Chaitanya Charitamritha

Verse: Madhya Lla 7.87 – 101 Lecture by

His Holiness Jayapatākā Swami Mahārāja

In Namahatta Romford, England

 

 

vande 'ham sri-guroh sri-yuta-pada-kamalam sri-gurun vaisnavams ca

sri-rupam sagrajatam saha-gana-raghunathanvitam tam sa-jivam

sadvaitam savadhutam parijana-sahitam krsna-caitanya-devam

sri-radha-krsna-padan saha-gana-lalita-sri-visakhanvitams ca

 

 

His Holiness Jayapataka Swami: 

And they are going to be without his association so one day Lord Nityananda and Lord Chaitanya were both present at Jagannatha Puri and so prasad was brought for the two Lords to eat and the remnants of the prasad was distributed to all the devotees present. 

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami recites Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.87)

śuni’ śuni’ loka-saba āsi’ bahir-dvāre

‘hari’ ‘hari’ bali’ loka kolāhala kare

“Hearing about this, everyone there came to the outside door and began chanting the holy name, “Hari! Hari!” What were they chanting? Devotees: Hari! Hari!, His Holiness Jayapataka Swami: Hari! Hari! Devotees: Hari! Hari!, His Holiness Jayapataka Swami: Hari! Hari! Devotees: Hari! Hari! “Thus there was a tumultuous sound”.

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami recites Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.88)

tabe mahāprabhu dvāra karāila mocana

ānande āsiyā loka pāila daraśana

“After lunch, Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu made them open the door. In this way everyone received His audience with great pleasure”.

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami recites Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.89)

ei-mata sandhyā paryanta loka āse, yāya

‘vaiṣṇava’ ha-ila loka, sabe nāce, gāya

“The people came and went until evening, and all of them became Vaiṣṇava devotees and began to chant and dance”.

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami recites Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.90)

ei-rūpe sei ṭhāñi bhakta-gaṇa-saṅge

sei rātri goṅāilā kṛṣṇa-kathā-raṅge

"Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu then passed the night there and discussed the pastimes of Lord Kṛṣṇa with His devotees with great pleasure."

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami recites Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.91)

prātaḥ-kāle snāna kari’ karilā gamana

bhakta-gaṇe vidāya dilā kari’ āliṅgana

"The next morning, after taking His bath, Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu started on His South Indian tour. He bade farewell to the devotees by embracing them."

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami recites Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.92)

mūrcchita hañā sabe bhūmite paḍilā

tāṅhā-sabā pāne prabhu phiri’ nā cāhilā

"Although they all fell to the ground unconscious, the Lord did not turn to see them but proceeded onward."

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami recites Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.93)

vicchede vyākula prabhu calilā duḥkhī hañā

pāche kṛṣṇadāsa yāya jala-pātra lañā

"In separation, the Lord became very much perturbed and walked on unhappily. His servant, Kṛṣṇadāsa, who was carrying His water pot, followed behind."

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami recites Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.94)

bhakta-gaṇa upavāsī tāhāṅi rahilā

āra dine duḥkhī hañā nīlācale āilā

"All the devotees remained there and fasted, and the next day they all unhappily returned to Jagannātha Purī."

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami recites Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.95)

matta-siṁha-prāya prabhu karilā gamana

premāveśe yāya kari’ nāma-saṅkīrtana

"Almost like a mad lion, Lord Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu went on His tour filled with ecstatic love and performing saṅkīrtana, chanting Kṛṣṇa’s names as follows."

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami sings Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.96)

kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! he

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami asks the devotees to repeat and he also joins in)

 kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! he

(devotees repeat)

kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! rakṣa mām

(devotees repeat)

kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! kṛṣṇa! pāhi mām

(devotees repeat)

rāma! rāghava! rāma! rāghava! rāma! rāghava! rakṣa mām

(devotees repeat)

kṛṣṇa! keśava! kṛṣṇa! keśava! kṛṣṇa! keśava! pāhi mām

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami continues reading):

Synonyms: kṛṣṇa — O Lord Kṛṣṇa; he — O; rakṣa — please protect; mām — Me; pāhi — please maintain; rāma — Lord Rāma; rāghava — descendant of King Raghu; keśava — killer of the Keśī demon.

Translations: That is, O Lord Kṛṣṇa, please protect Me and maintain Me. That is, “O Lord Rāma, descendant of King Raghu, please protect Me. O Kṛṣṇa, O Keśava, killer of the Keśī demon, please maintain Me.

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami sings Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.97)

“Chanting this verse, Lord Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu, known as Gaurahari, went on His way. As soon as He saw someone, He would request him to chant “Hari! Hari!” (devotees repeat Hari! Hari!)

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami sings Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.98)

sei loka prema-matta hañā bale ‘hari’ ‘kṛṣṇa’

prabhura pāche saṅge yāya darśana-satṛṣṇa

Whoever heard Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu chant “Hari! Hari!” (devotees repeat Hari! Hari!) also chanted the holy name of Lord Hari and Kṛṣṇa. In this way they all followed the Lord, very eager to see Him.

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami recites Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.99

kata-kṣaṇe rahi’ prabhu tāre āliṅgiyā

vidāya karila tāre śakti sañcāriyā

"After some time the Lord would embrace these people and bid them return home, having invested each of them with spiritual potency."

 

Purport "In his Amṛta-pravāha-bhāṣya, Śrīla Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura explains that this spiritual potency is the essence of the pleasure potency and the knowledge potency. By these two potencies, one is empowered with devotional service. Lord Kṛṣṇa Himself or His representative, the unalloyed devotee, can mercifully bestow these combined potencies upon any man. Being thus endowed with such potencies, one can become an unalloyed devotee of the Lord. Anyone favored by Lord Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu was empowered with this bhakti-śakti. Thus the Lord’s followers were able to preach Kṛṣṇa consciousness by divine grace."

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami recites Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.100

sei-jana nija-grāme kariyā gamana

‘kṛṣṇa’ bali’ hāse, kānde, nāce anukṣaṇa

"Each of these empowered persons would return to his own village, always chanting the holy name of Kṛṣṇa and sometimes laughing, crying and dancing".

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami recites Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.101

yāre dekhe, tāre kahe, — kaha kṛṣṇa-nāma

ei-mata ‘vaiṣṇava’ kaila saba nija-grāma

"Such an empowered person would request everyone and anyone — whomever he saw — to chant the holy name of Kṛṣṇa. In this way all the villagers would also become devotees of the Supreme Personality of Godhead".

 

Purport "In order to become an empowered preacher, one must be favored by Lord Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu or His devotee, the spiritual master. One must also request everyone to chant the mahā-mantra. In this way, such a person can convert others to Vaiṣṇavism, showing them how to become pure devotees of the Supreme Personality of Godhead".

 

So this is how the movement of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu spread. In the beginning it was congregational movement. Lord Chaitanya didn’t personally build any temples, He just requested people to chant Hari! Hari! Devotees: Hari! Hari! Hare Krishna! Devotees: Hare Krishna!

 

Those people will become filled with ecstatic love of Krishna and then they would go back and get their family and their friends and their neighbors to also chant. Their whole village used to chant. And in this way Sankirtana movement spread. It’s very interesting in South India there was one village and this village they were chanting:

 

sri krishna chaitanya

prabhu nityananda

sri advaita, gadadhara

srivasadi-gaura-bhakta-vrinda

 

(Devotees also join in the recitation of the Maha Mantra) 

Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna

Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare 

Hare Rama, Hare Rama

Rama Rama, Hare Hare!

 

They were chanting for as long as they could remember, more than one hundreds of years. And when they were asked where they learned it from, they couldn’t remember. Someone had taught their forefathers and since that time they have been saying this Mantra and they never stopped. So like that, there were some remote villages that Lord Chaitanya’s message reached and the people  went on chanting, and they are still chanting today! Maybe they don’t have any roads or there’s no communication, nobody knows, we could found some village and they’re still chanting Hare Krishna for five hundred years. And some of them still had a temple of Lord Chaitanya. Although Lord Chaitanya is not normally worshipped in the South of India but He was only there six years but He had a big impact. So this is the basic system; how to spread Krishna Consciousness. We need the mercy of Lord Chaitanya to get the eternity shakti and the pleasure shakti or potency. If we have transcendental bliss, if we have eternal realization then we can spread Krishna Conscious also by the mercy of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. So just like you’re all chanting today at the Romford festival, so this has a tremendous impact spiritual benefit to all of the people watching. And in this way people somehow or other chant Hare Krishna then. Even in the beginning people may sometimes laugh or criticise or think otherwise but once they actually chant Hare Krishna they see how nice it really is, how nice the devotees are, and then their idea changes. There’s a verse in the Caitanya Caritamrita that says people used to criticise and complain. Later on they changed their mantra and said “Ballo Ballo!” or “very good very good!”. Sometimes people are too covered to take up the chanting but by gradually getting some prasadam, hearing. After some time they become more fortunate to be able to take up the chanting of Hare Krishna. So in this way Lord Chaitanya He was traveling alone, He was continuously traveling. Prabhupada is explaining how the Sankirtana movement was spreading. 

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami recites Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.102)

grāmāntara haite dekhite āila yata jana

tāṅra darśana-kṛpāya haya tāṅra sama

"People from different villages who came to see such an empowered individual would become like him simply by seeing him and receiving the mercy of his glance".

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami recites Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.103)

sei yāi’ grāmera loka vaiṣṇava karaya

anya-grāmī āsi’ tāṅre dekhi’ vaiṣṇava haya

"When each of these newly empowered individuals returned to his own village, he also converted the villagers into devotees. And when others came from different villages to see him, they were also converted".

 

It’s like a domino situation here. Someone saw Lord Chaitanya, he became mad after Krishna and was chanting Hare Krishna and laughing and dancing and crying and singing. Then someone else saw then he went back and got his village people, his townspeople to chant. And then the neighbouring town and village people saw them and they learnt from them and they started to chant. Then somebody went to their place, they started to chant. In this way it gradually started to spread.

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami recites Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.104)

sei yāi’ āra grāme kare upadeśa

ei-mata ‘vaiṣṇava’ haila saba dakṣiṇa-deśa

"In this way, as empowered men went from one village to another, all the people of South India became devotees".

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami recites Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.105)

ei-mata pathe yāite śata jana

‘vaiṣṇava’ karena tāṅre kari’ āliṅgana

“Thus many hundreds of people became Vaiṣṇavas when they passed the Lord on the way and were embraced by Him”.

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami recites Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.106)

yei grāme rahi’ bhikṣā karena yāṅra ghare

sei grāmera yata loka āise dekhibāre

"In whatever village Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu stayed to accept alms, many people came to see Him."

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami recites Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.107)

prabhura kṛpāya haya mahābhāgavata

sei saba ācārya hañā tārila jagat

"By the mercy of the Supreme Lord, Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu, everyone became a first-class devotee. Later they became teachers or spiritual masters and liberated the entire world."

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami recites Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.108)

ei-mata kailā yāvat gelā setubandhe

sarva-deśa ‘vaiṣṇava’ haila prabhura sambandhe

"In this way the Lord went to the extreme southern part of India, and He converted all the provinces to Vaiṣṇavism."

 

(His Holiness Jayapataka Swami recites Caitanya Caritamrita Madhya Lila 7.109)

navadvīpe yei śakti nā kailā prakāśe

se śakti prakāśi’ nistārila dakṣiṇa-deśe

"Lord Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu did not manifest His spiritual potencies at Navadvīpa, but He did manifest them in South India and liberated all the people there."

 

Purport “At that time there were many smārtas (nondevotee followers of Vedic rituals) at the holy place of Navadvīpa, which was also the birthplace of Lord Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu. Followers of the smṛti-śāstra are called smārtas. Most of them are nondevotees, and their main business is following the brahminical principles strictly. However, they are not enlightened in devotional service. In Navadvīpa all the learned scholars are followers of the smṛti-śāstra, and Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu did not attempt to convert them. Therefore the author has remarked that the spiritual potency Lord Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu did not manifest at Navadvīpa was by His grace manifested in South India. Thus everyone there became a Vaiṣṇava. By this it is to be understood that people are really interested in preaching in a favorable situation. If the candidates for conversion are too disturbing, a preacher may not attempt to spread Kṛṣṇa consciousness amongst them. It is better to go where the situation is more favorable. This Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement was first attempted in India, but the people of India, being absorbed in political thoughts, did not take to it. They were entranced by the political leaders. We preferred, therefore, to come to the West, following the order of our spiritual master, and by the grace of Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu this movement is becoming successful.” There’s a little comment by Srila Prabhupada. He’s using the example that Chaitanya Mahaprabhu went out of Navadvīpa preaching Krishna Consciousness. And because it was very favorable. So similarly when Prabhupada tried to preach in India that was just after twenty years after the Independence of India. So the Indian people were too preoccupied in political thoughts. So  therefore they were not taking up Krishna Consciousness very seriously. So Prabhupada came to the West and he found that here people needed Krishna Consciousness and they took it up very seriously. So preachers can go wherever the customers are more willing to buy their product. Of course to understand these pastimes of the Lord someone who is devotee can appreciate how the Lord can empower someone. For instance somebody got a book of Prabhupada’s in the Soviet Union and he lives in a village a town very close to Japan. And this was during the Communist rule, Bolsheviks and then it was Soviet Union. So that time it was Communist rule he got one Bhagavatam, one Bhagavad Gita at the Moscow book fair. Took it to that island, on the west coast of Korea and he just had the Bhagavad Gita, never met a devotee. Read the Bhagavad Gita and became convinced about preaching and he got sixty people in his place to start chanting sixteen rounds of Hare Krishna, regular programmes, everything – just from the Bhagavad Gita! And when the movement became legalised in Russia  and devotees were publicly starting to distribute in person, he met a devotee and then explained “Oh, you’re the first devotee I’ve met! I’ve been following for so many years, I got the Bhagavad Gita and then, I wanted to know one thing. Can you say the Hare Krishna Maha Mantra, one time so I can hear it? Can you hear me to see if I’m saying it right or not? Because I’ve never heard a devotee say it.”  And then they went there, Vishnu Swami Maharaj went there and found, you know, a big, sixty devotees chanting, fired up. So how, just by getting Prabhupada’s  books he became empowered. Of course, they didn’t know the detail, how to put on tilak, or so many other things, you know, you learn from devotees personally. But the basics of chanting and reading, those things they were following. And now Indradyumna Maharaj  just came from the different Soviet Union countries and he said that even though there is no formal temple, every city he went to, every place he went to there was somewhere between 300-600 devotees waiting for him at the airport. It’s like people they saw the Movement had been spread by these different devotees and all of this, you know, only one. It started off with one or two Prabhupada disciples in the entire country step. So if somebody gets empowered by Prabhupada. Prabhupada would send different preachers to different places to set up the preaching and they were able to perform wonderful preaching, and still are performing these wonderful preaching. So one needs to get the mercy of Lord Chaitanya, the mercy of Guru and then that mercy you can get very easily by following their instructions. Like somebody got the book. He accepted the instructions and started to practice as it is. And then people started to change, their hearts began to change. This is the important thing of course, that when people’s hearts actually change. It’s not just a fashionable thing but it’s actually that people are getting a higher realisation, devotional service. We can see it, it's something very wonderful. Someone, if they get empowered, if they get, learn how to do it properly then they can easily get to spread Krishna Consciousness. They can practice. But sometimes people from other disciplic successions or other yoga’s. Like Hatha-yoga, Astanga-yoga, Jnana-yoga or karma-kanda; the fruitive activities. They don’t see the difference what the devotees are doing. But actually the devotees practice is something very special. There’s an art to it, that we have to learn from the scriptures and the guru and the devotees. Like this there was an example, that one time there was a potter and he had a friend who was a blacksmith so they made an appointment to have a picnic together, to go out with the families and have an outing. But the potter had to finish up an order of clay pots and then he could go out. So he had his pottery wheel spinning and he was making the pots and. What the potter’s use is they use a wooden hammer and they pretty carefully they tap at one point the clay and they mould it to the shape they need it. So when the blacksmith saw that he said “well I work with a hammer all the time and I can also help you, no problem, we could get out quicker.” So he sat down also and took his hammer then you know (HH Jayapataka Swami makes a breaking noise) he broke a pot. “what’s happening here? I’ll take another one” and then know (HH Jayapataka Swami makes a breaking noise) he broke another and then “wait hold it, it's ok, I’ll take care of it!.” Because the use of the hammer by the potter and the use by the blacksmith. The blacksmith was you know taking and smashing steel and the potter is just you know tapping to just to flatten the clay. It’s a very gentle artistic kind of application of the hammer. Whilst the blacksmith’s application of the hammer was very crude and harsh. So devotional service looks like anything else to un-inform the observer that might look like something ordinary, but it may not be, fully figure it out but looks something ordinary. They don’t understand that the devotees, when they are doing their devotional service they’re actually thinking about Krishna, they are thinking about pleasing their Guru, pleasing their spiritual master. They’re doing the activities  with a particular purpose, a particular manner. There are little details, like they take Krishna prasadam. They don’t eat bhoga. They chant Hare Krishna. There’s many details to it that may not be visible to just another even a spiritual person. They won’t be able to see, you know all these little intricacies. How the devotee is maintaining his Krishna consciousness. And they just think it’s like you know, the blacksmith just thought “well I’ll just use, take the hammer and use it.” It’s just like anything else. There’s another example, you probably heard about it, the carpenter and the tiger? So the play is an Indian story told by our previous Acharya’s. One time there was a carpenter from Bengal, I think (aside) a Bengali lady left she had to go home?. And he went to the Sundarban forest. It’s a jungle in southern part of Bengal, Bangladesh. It goes to both. It’s called the Sundarban. ‘Sunder’ means beautiful and ‘ban’ means this jungle or forest. So Sundarban means a beautiful forest. Apparently it’s very beautiful. It has many big trees, many rivers. It’s connected to the ocean so the low and high tide comes in. and there’s also many tigers. It’s the only place in the world where the royal Bengal tigers are present. The largest cat in the world, larger than a lion. I don’t know, I was just there, we had a Namahatta programme. In the last village, the last civilisation before the National Forest begins and we took about fifteen devotees from all over the world. Declan was there I think? He’s not here but he was there (devotees laugh)

 

Devotee:  People are not following the Vedas at all they are not following Krishna.

 

HH Jayapataka Swami: (aside) what you read the purport?

 

Devotee: Yes! I read the purport and I still can’t understand. Talks about people following the sacrifices.

 

 HH Jayapataka Swami: (aside) Must of stepped out. And another different devotees from all over. (aside) you were there right? Yeah, so I knew there was some British representative (devotees laugh). Of course the devotees all got down from the bus and then all the locals start telling them about the tiger story and then everybody start getting nervous (devotees laugh).  Be sure to have their flashlight ready when they went back from the festival to the house. But the tigers said, there’s a river and the tigers are on the other side of the river but you can’t, sometimes hear them call out.  And they were going to take us in a boat and show us the deep jungle. Because just by the sight you don’t see too much. But there wasn’t enough time, it was a very tight programme. So, this time I couldn’t take them into the jungle by boat. He was telling us how that night we had thirty thousand people gather for our Pandal programme. A big tent and the people wondering here from the programme from morning from sunset to sunrise. So the devotees they’d journeyed quite a few hours and then took lunch, took dinner and then they went onto the stage and we had Gaura-Arti  and we had bhajans, short Bhagavad-Gita class by a new devotee, like a ten minute invocation class. Reading of the Bhagavad-Gita. Then a welcoming address, some local political, the mayor or someone.  Not mayor, as it’s not a city it’s a village so some union leader I think they call them village union for ten villages. “upa-jilah”; sub-district leader. He came and gave a welcoming speech. Because it that area although Bangladesh is an Islamic republic, it’s got twenty percent Hindu’s, and that particular area there’s about forty percent Hindus and sixty percent Muslims. So the Hindu voting block is crucial for the politicians. So they always come to our programmes, it’s the biggest gathering. And they give their swagatam speech to welcome us, put a few political plugs in like “don’t forgot to vote for me!” or something. They’re a little subtle. And like this we have lectures, two devotees will speak about, one after the other, two devotees will speak for ten fifteen minutes how they became devotees, how Krishna Consciousness is progressing and wherever they came from. (aside to devotee) what did you speak about? Everyone! We have every devotee preach that comes there. (aside to devotee) how does it feel to preach to such a big crowd? People, they want to hear, they’re just like completely focused. Then we’ll have some bhajan, some kirtan and then again two will speak. Then Bhakti Tirtha Maharaj some days. I went for some days.  So this particular village was right on the edge of the jungle. Just on the other side of the river, jungle where all the, this side. And the householders telling us “now is the dry season nothing to worry about. But in the rainy season sometimes the crocodile’s come out from the jungle and come over into our little pond where we go swimming here. But don’t worry there’s none here” (devotees laugh) just to spice it up a little bit. It was quite peaceful at night. But I remember that day, the next day someone told us that, because I had told them the story about the pond lake and the tiger. You’ve properly heard about that story! (devotees laugh) actually I’ll come back to that later if I, too many stories at the same time I lose a chain (devotees laugh). So I told that story (aside) you’ve never heard the pond lake and tiger? (devotees laugh). About the grammarian brahmana and the Sanskrit grammarian, he knew all kinds of Sanskrit. (aside) no. this was a, he was a just graduated from the Sanskrit University and he was going back to his village and he wanted to take a shortcut in the evening through the jungle. And one of the villagers told him “please don’t take the shortcut!” and he said “why not? I want to get home quick.” Because a tiger was seen in the jungle. And he said “tiger?” – “you don’t know tiger, this is a Sanskrit word which means “bagrah”. “bagrah” in Sanskrit you know “bagrah” is composed of so many letters – “Ba-ah-rah.” He divided up each letter, what each letter meant, how it was you know power, and this and that, giving all lectures to the person. It was a simple villager who was like this is very nice but I don’t know much Sanskrit, but anyway it’s better not to go in the forest because you see, tigers will eat you. “You don’t find it here, the different definition about eating?” (devotees laugh). I don’t know if it’s in the definition sir but it’s a known fact they do eat people” (devotees laugh). So then the Sanskrit scholar said “well anyway I’m a Brahmana. And Bramanas’ are meant to serve others, so if the tiger eats me up, I’ll be serving the tiger isn’t it?” “Sir I didn’t know Bramanas’ were meant to be tiger food. I think it’s better go through the village path and you take a little longer but you’ll get home safely because that jungle is dangerous at the moment. You know we need your help as a Bramana to guide us, you know. We don’t want to see you eaten by the tiger but you know, of course it’s up to you. You’re the Pandit – whatever you want to do, you can do” so that Pandit said “no no it’s alright” and he went into the forest, you know, thinking about all his Sanskrit sloka’s and the grammar and, you see. Then as he got into the jungle, all of a sudden, there was, you know little eyes, he looked, and then (HH Jayapataka Swami makes a roaring noise) (devotees laugh). The tiger leapt out and jumped on him! And started chewing on his leg. And he was in excruciating pain but then suddenly he remembered “oh I remember not that there was another meaning to the word tiger in Sanskrit. ‘One who lives by eating others’ why didn’t I remember that meaning!” (devotees laugh) and then he was finished. So the idea was that sometimes people they get a little learned, a little scripture, but they get puffed up and think “I don’t need advice from anyone. I don’t need the shelter.” Just like that villager he was very practical, he was giving practical advice how to avoid obstacles in his spiritual life, or material life in this sense. Or someone, the Guru, a Vaishnava may give someone guidance how to avoid some obstacles. But if someone may help some book learning but not practical experience. They may think “no I don’t have to follow.” And this way they get put into difficulty. So that’s why we need not only to study the books but we need practical guidance also from some senior devotees, some Guru to help us. And if we are very proud and don’t take that advise then we’re put into difficulty. So I was explaining that there’s a big crowd in a village by the side of the Sundarban by the side of the Bangladesh. The next morning the place where we were staying, that place had no electricity. For the programme we had generators but where we stayed there was no electricity. So we just had candles, grass huts. It was pretty original. And another thing is, any difference to what it is now and five hundred years ago or five thousand years ago except there was a couple of tin sheets they had on the side. But generally all the houses were just grass root, bamboo. Very nice, very clean. They cooked a big feast for the devotees, about eight different vegetables, rice and dhal. Chutney’s. you go on, you know, the middle of, you travel for four hours straight from the nearest city and went straight South. We left the paved road, went onto brick road for about an hour. Left the brick road for another hour went on dirt road. Then we came to the last stop for the jungle, that’s where the programme was. So there the next morning the man told us “that remember last night you told the story about the tiger? Well in the forest last night there was one man he knew that everybody was going to your programme so he thought to go into the forest where there was no competition and get honey.” In the wild there grew this big honey hives in the forest. So just 4 kilometers from our programme place. This man had skipped the programme and gone in to get honey and he was eaten by a tiger. So it was like a shock, usually they are faraway, it was only 4 kilometers away. So because after that no-one should miss the Hare Krishna programme (devotees laugh). I remember a helicopter service to that village and everybody was surprised. Helicopter in a poor country like Bangladesh, how can you get helicopter service? So the roads are so bad that they have people that ride bicycles and they carry in the front of their seat, they have a little wooden seat and in the back they have two. So they carry three people on their bicycles and ride with it and call it “helicopter service” (HH Jayapataka Swami and devotees laugh). So back to the original story, which was about the carpenter who was going into the forest. When I think of the forest, I mean I have a picture of the Sundarban, we been there to site, I want to go deeper into it to see one time. And they say it’s very beautiful but what preaching opportunity do you get because there’s no people living there. So this carpenter he was going to get the wood and somehow or another this older carpenter told him that “this Sundarban is a beautiful place, very big trees, you can get a lot of wood there. But one thing, there’s a lot of wild animals and you should take a weapon with you otherwise you could get attacked” and he said “what are these old guys talking about, what do they know! I mean look, if you are in the forest, the whole forest is filled with trees! What are trees made out of? Wood! So why do I have to bring a wood weapon into the forest? If I see a tiger I’ll just cut a branch off the tree and use it to defend myself. Ill swing that branch around my head and tiger’s will stay miles away from me! They won’t come near me! So why should I take a weapon? Anytime I can just take a branch off the tree, I’m a carpenter right?” So this was his idea. So he went into the forest. Of course, one thing he didn’t think of, you know, that when a tiger’s jumping on you, there’s not a lot of time for chopping off branches off the trees (devotees laugh). The tigers don’t give you a lot of time to think about it (devotees laugh). The villagers were telling us so many tiger stories, I can take up the rest of the night with tiger stories (devotees laugh) but they say that with these tigers they say they’re so big, they say that they’re like fifteen feet long and their tails grow another, you know, I don’t know, I have to see, sometimes you know, it’s like a village story, I don’t know how big they really are. But the way they said, they said “gigantic!” (devotees laugh). And I think that they’re quite big, from what I remember that tigers  are very very big. These wild Bengal tigers are supposed to be at least ten feet from my understanding, but they said even bigger. But they say that these tigers, they’re able to make themselves very small like a cat, you know how they sit, kinda just sit there in the bush and all the bushes there look striped you know, leaves and that you know (devotees laughs)

,so they just sit there. So somebody, and they, all the people go on the canoes and walk through these jungles, and go on little canoes looking for the bees, looking out where the bees are, where’s the wood that they want. And the tigers they’re pretty smart, they know that there’s only one way they can go so they just wait upstream in one bush until they come right to where, and then they (HH Jayapataka Swami makes a swooshing noise) and then they leap out. And when they leap out they become so huge that you know it’s unbelievable, they’re so big but they don’t make any sound they can move completely silently. So here’s you know this foolish carpenter, doesn’t listen to anybody’s advice. He goes into the forest without any weapons and then when we sees a little tiger, not a big one just a little one, you know eight foot long tiger, baby (devotees laugh) starts running towards him, he quickly jumps up and tries to cut a branch off arrgh! (devotees laugh). Finished! He could never get it. Meanwhile a little later, a devotee came to that village and he was chanting and was getting everyone to chant Hare Krishna and then before he could ask anybody this, went into the forest and started chanting. So the villagers thought “this devotees going there, the tigers could attack him, we should protect!” so they ran after him with the weapons and they followed him. Just to see if anything happens they will be there to protect him. But they saw that, because he didn’t have any envy in his heart, he was completely pure devotee and he was chanting Hare Krishna in the forest. The forest animals became peaceful. Even when he saw some animals he told the animal “Haribol!” “Chant Hare Krishna!”. And the animals themselves started to go “Haribol! Haribol!” and were dancing and some were rolling on the ground in ecstasy on whole, they could believe it “what’s going on?” the whole forest is becoming filed with the chanting and the animals themselves were behaving, you know, very unusually, chanting and dancing also. So in this way, so what’s the moral to that story? Can anyone say? (devotees say “chant Hare Krishna!”) That’s one of the main pearls that we have to learn. The other one is, who’s the carpenter, who are the villagers with the weapons and who’s the pure devotee? Who are they compared with? Anyone can say? The carpenter is like a mystic yogi, believe it or not (devotees laugh). See the mystic yogis they think that “I’m going to protect myself by my own power, I’ll do my mystic yoga, I’ll do my pranayama, I’ll do my Hata yoga, and if ever I get attacked by some kind of spiritual obstacle, well in that time I’ll quickly go to meditation or something to protect myself. When that happens I’ll be able to do pranayama or something. I’ll be able to somehow protect myself in due course by my own efforts.” So, but actually these yogi’s if they’re attacked by even a little tiger, a little lust, anger, greed, madness or illusion, they can get devoured. They’re not very well protected. Because until they’re completely perfect, they’re vulnerable. They don’t have the weapon and they won’t have time to get one. Now the villagers who came after the devotee with their weapons they’re like the karmi’s. they’re like the regular material people, their weapon is ok. Just to be happy they have some sense gratification and if they’re regulated and all and all then that’s how they survive, by their, material happiness. Somehow or another if they get happiness they feel alright. Somehow or relatively speaking. So they have to live in fear, they’re always a little bit fearful and they’re not very secure. They’re afraid of the tigers. But the devotee, is a devotee, and he’s chanting and completely depending on Krishna. So by depending on Krishna, Krishna protects him and he can control the vices or control the different urges coming from the six vices simply by fully depending on Krishna. We can’t control these vices simply by some material effort very nicely, but if we fully engage our self in Krishna’s service, use our mind, our intelligence, our body in Krishna’s service, weather in the house grhe thako, vane thako, sada 'hari' bole' dako, . Bhaktivinoda Thakura said “weather in the home or weather in the ashram, in the temple, in the forest, wherever you maybe, everyone should chant Hare Krishna” so by engaging our self in devotional service then we’re protected from these attacks of Maya. We need that protection. And we get that protection when we fully depend on Krishna, not by yoga, or not even by even karma. Even the other people with weapon, sometimes the tiger outsmarts them. They’re not in a very safe position. They try to defend themselves. The devotee, rather he won over all those wild animals. It’s said a devotee is able to  win over the vices because the devotee uses all the vices in Krishna’s service. How do we use lust for Krishna? So lust means very strong desire, so someone may have very strong desire to serve Krishna, a strong desire to bring someone to Krishna Consciousness, offer something to Krishna, lusty to wanting to give something to Krishna. For example, “oh, what a wonderful house, how nice it’ll be to have it for Krishna.” “what a wonderful person, how wonderful would it be if he was a devotee for Krishna”. Whatever we could lust for our self we can lust it for Krishna, then it’s pure. Lust, anger, greed. Lust, greed. Well greed is like lust multiplied right. Like you want to hold it, just like how to make the whole city devotees. How to make many people devotees, many more and more nice things to give to Krishna. So normally people, why aren’t you satisfied with what you get? Well that’s reasonable, for Krishna we’re greedy, we want more for Krishna. Better place, better facilities, more devotees, more prasad to give out, and so on. So this is for Krishna it’s good! What’s wrong to feed more people, to make more people happy, Krishna Consciousness. So that kind of greed is not an obstacle. But if, really it’s a purified greed. We’re greedy, but it’s for a good cause, there’s nothing wrong with it. But in anger - if somebody wanted to come and destroy the temple or harm a devotee, you get angry and defend Krishna. So that anger in defense is also not bad. So like this, madness. Devotees in chanting Hare Krishna, sometimes they become mad in ecstasy. That type of madness isn’t mad. Illusion -  sometimes in ecstasy, they forget the time or they forget something and they get a little bit. So that’s also not a serious problem. It’s not a big obstacle in devotional service. And envy – the devotee’s  are trying to give everyone mercy, they want to see everyone uplifted, so there’s no question of any envy. They don’t feel envy for anyone. So that, none of the vices can get devotee’s because the devotees are purifying all of them except for envy which he doesn’t have anything to do with anyway. So in this way we can become completely purified by Lord Chaitanya’s mercy. So to get to be like that sadhu, to get the animals to chant, Prabhupada said it might be difficult to be so empowered that Lord Chaitanya and some devotee’s could get even the animals to chant, it was historically recognised. So Prabhupada said at least if you could get the human beings to chant, we can try for that. We may not be able to get the animals to chant but at least the human-beings. So, Lord Chaitanya empowered many people in South India to do this type of preaching. So also, here in the West, Prabhupada empowered many devotees and those devotees are getting empowered, and like this it’s spreading. So here we see so many devotees are empowered by Lord Chaitanya and they’re empowering other devotees, and we hope in this way, the Nama Hatta movement will spread all throughout the UK and  every town and village very fast, very quickly. Many people will get the nectar of chanting Hare Krishna. Thank you very much – any questions? 

 

Devotee: we can be greedy for Krishna or lusty for Krishna, say you’re angry, it’s very simply a difficult one to engage because we have to look for something to protect (devotees laugh) – how’d you cope? The other one’s are very easy to (inaudible from 47:10)

 

HH Jayapataka Swami: well it’s Kali-yuga, there’s usually enough opportunity. Well anger’s not the kind of thing, you know, it’s not like Hiranyaksha, he was in a angry mood looking for someone to fight all the time. He couldn’t find anyone to fight with so he would go and smash mountains for practice, you know. And if you’re a person like that, it’s a little bit tough to get him to keep on smashing mountains till some danger comes up (devotees laugh), hopefully most people are not that angry all the time, I mean they have a little tendency for anger and occasionally when there’s need for protecting the temple or something comes up they can let their anger out at that moment and then that should hold them over until the next opportunity (devotees laugh). Now if we get a situation where the whole world is so peaceful and there’s no envious people, then there’s no way to get their anger out, we’ll have to, you know, we’ll make wrestling matches or something like that, better work it off (devotees and HH Jayapataka Swami laugh). Apart from physical, I mean, it’s not only physical but, many times a person will come up and say something offensive or foolish, you can also defend Krishna through argument (inaudible 48:42), you can defend Krishna by discussion also. Use that protective nature, not necessarily mean violence, but you can, that will only be an answer if someone else was violent. Usually people are not too violent, just to extend verbally, some kind of verbal attack. You can be angry also, for instance, there’s a lot of ways that people are being deprived of getting Krishna’s mercy due to ignorance. And this way they’re suffering. The person maybe angry to see that these people are suffering, and they’re being misled, and cheated, and so on and then you want to save those people from that problem. So then, although one might have to be quite tactful to do it but then, it’s a kind of anger, seeing people suffering and wanting to. It’s a mixture of anger and at the same time compassion. But in a way there’s also some anger there, you know that they’re being misled and you want to protect them. Anger is not blind in Krishna Consciousness, not a destructive thing, but it’s funneled, that energy is funneled, focused in a way that will be construct, which will save people from danger. So there’s no lack of danger is there? of being in illusion, of people dying not being in Krishna Consciousness. Is there any lack of it? Definitely people are being misled and being cheated out of their eternal life due to ignorance so one could approach it from different angles. If you have a lot of anger you could even approach it slightly from an angry point of view, but then, mix it with a little mercy and then try to, save the people. Prabhupada definitely, sometimes he was a little forceful preaching, almost touching on anger you could say. How then, you know, different moods. Sometimes very compassionate, sometimes very forceful. But how the modern society. Sometimes he would go heavy,  modern world was, modern education, different focuses, he would say strong things. When he saw that the people were being misled by and he wanted to save them.  It wasn’t a constant, sometimes heavy, sometimes he was more mellow. 

Transcribed By: Fiona Tailor

Transcribed On: 21-Jun-2020

Proof Reading By: Amrita Padma Devi Dasi

On 21/9/2020