20030214 Bhagavad Gītā 4.9

The following is a Bhagavad-gītā class given by His Holiness Jayapatākā Swami Mahārāja on 14^th February, 2003 at Dāmodaradeśa. The class begins with a reading from the Bhagavad-gītā, chapter 4, text 9.

Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare
Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare 

Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare
Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare 

Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare
Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare 

Jaya Prabhupāda!

tapta-kāñcana-gaurāṅgi rādhe vṛndāvaneśvari
vṛṣabhānu-sute devī praṇamāmi hari-priye

vāñchā-kalpatarubhyaś ca kṛpā-sindhubhya eva ca 
patitānāṁ pāvanebhyo vaiṣṇavebhyo namo namaḥ

śrī-kṛṣṇa-caitanya-prabhu-nityānanda
śrī-advaita gadādhara śrīvāsādi-gaura-bhakta-vṛnda

Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare 
Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare

mūkaṁ karoti vācālaṁ paṅguṁ laṅghayate girim 
yat-kṛpā tam ahaṁ vande śrī-gurum dīna-tāranam 
paramānanda mādhavam śrī caitanya īśvaram

oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevaya!

Text 4.9

janma karma ca me divyam
evaṁ yo vetti tattvataḥ 
tyaktvā dehaṁ punar janma 
naiti mām eti so ’rjuna 

Translation: One who knows the transcendental nature of My appearance and activities does not, upon leaving the body, take his birth again in this material world, but attains My eternal abode, O Arjuna.

Purport: The Lord’s descent from His transcendental abode is already explained in the sixth verse. One who can understand the truth of the appearance of the Personality of Godhead is already liberated from material bondage, and therefore he returns to the kingdom of God immediately after quitting this present material body. Such liberation of the living entity from material bondage is not at all easy. The impersonalists and the yogīs attain liberation only after much trouble and many, many births. Even then, the liberation they achieve – merging into the impersonal brahma-jyoti of the Lord – is only partial, and there is the risk of returning to this material world. But the devotee, simply by understanding the transcendental nature of the body and activities of the Lord, attains the abode of the Lord after ending this body and does not run the risk of returning to this material world. In the Brahma-saṁhitā (5.33) it is stated that the Lord has many, many forms and incarnations: advaitam acyutam anādim ananta-rūpam. Although there are many transcendental forms of the Lord, they are still one and the same Supreme Personality of Godhead. One has to understand this fact with conviction, although it is incomprehensible to mundane scholars and empiric philosophers. As stated in the Vedas (Puruṣa-bodhinī Upaniṣad):

eko devo nitya-līlānurakto 
bhakta-vyāpī hṛdy antar-ātmā

“The one Supreme Personality of Godhead is eternally engaged in many, many transcendental forms in relationships with His unalloyed devotees.” This Vedic version is confirmed in this verse of the Gītā personally by the Lord. He who accepts this truth on the strength of the authority of the Vedas and of the Supreme Personality of Godhead and who does not waste time in philosophical speculations attains the highest perfectional stage of liberation. Simply by accepting this truth on faith, one can, without a doubt, attain liberation. The Vedic version tat tvam asi is actually applied in this case. Anyone who understands Lord Kṛṣṇa to be the Supreme, or who says unto the Lord, “You are the same Supreme Brahman, the Personality of Godhead,” is certainly liberated instantly, and consequently his entrance into the transcendental association of the Lord is guaranteed. In other words, such a faithful devotee of the Lord attains perfection, and this is confirmed by the following Vedic assertion:

tam eva viditvāti mṛtyum eti 
nānyaḥ panthā vidyate ’yanāya

“One can attain the perfect stage of liberation from birth and death simply by knowing the Lord, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, and there is no other way to achieve this perfection.” (Śvetāśvatara Upaniṣad 3.8) That there is no alternative means that anyone who does not understand Lord Kṛṣṇa as the Supreme Personality of Godhead is surely in the mode of ignorance and consequently he will not attain salvation simply, so to speak, by licking the outer surface of the bottle of honey, or by interpreting the Bhagavad-gītā according to mundane scholarship. Such empiric philosophers may assume very important roles in the material world, but they are not necessarily eligible for liberation. Such puffed-up mundane scholars have to wait for the causeless mercy of the devotee of the Lord. One should therefore cultivate Kṛṣṇa consciousness with faith and knowledge, and in this way attain perfection.

Translation again.

One who knows the transcendental nature of My appearance and activities does not, upon leaving the body, take his birth again in this material world, but attains My eternal abode, O Arjuna.

Jayapatākā Swami: So this is a very important verse, janma karma ca me divyam. Kṛṣṇa is explaining my appearance and my activities are transcendental. Very important to understand this. Sometimes you may meet some kind of challenging person, and they ask or make statements which are improper in relation to Lord Kṛṣṇa. Very offensive. Why do you worship Kṛṣṇa? He steals butter. You are worshipping God who’s a thief. Sometimes someone may challenge something like this. Then as a devotee, what are you going to say? How are you going to consider this? So the first thing we can do is remember this verse. Janma karma ca me divyam. “My dear sir, you don’t understand. All of Kṛṣṇa’s activities are transcendental.”

If a father gives his children some gifts, and then playing with them he takes it away, then gives it back, is it stealing? Kṛṣṇa is the supreme proprietor. How he can be a thief? He owns everything. But just to create some happy pastimes, he has instituted His childhood pastimes in Vṛndāvana. So the devotees who are visited by Kṛṣṇa‘s lotus feet, and he’s taking butter from their store, they are not the loser. They are very happy actually that Kṛṣṇa has visited. How many of you would like Kṛṣṇa to visit your house and take some butter?

(everybody raises hands)

So like that some devotees have been doing tapasyā for a long time to be able to be born in Vraja, when Kṛṣṇa pastimes are going on. It was their keen desire to have Kṛṣṇa come and steal their butter. Kṛṣṇa is doing that just to give them transcendental happiness. To be able to plan how to catch Kṛṣṇa. It’s like a transcendental game of chess. He’s the most clever. You know that pastime, how the gopīs laid a trap to catch Kṛṣṇa in Varsāṇā? Don’t know? Forgot?

In Varṣāṇā. In a place called… Citra devī’s place. Citra Devī’s village. One of the eight sakhīs. There is Lalitā, Viśākhā… so Lalitā, Caṁpakalatā, Citradevī and Tuṅgavidyā on the left side. So Citradevī has got her own village. So in that village there was a house with a big store of butter. So the ladies decided we can never catch Kṛṣṇa. So what they do is they put bells around the doorway. So when Kṛṣṇa opens the door, then he’ll set off the alarm. They put bells on the stone mortar. He’d have to move to reach the butter. They know his technique. He’s too short to reach, so he brings the stone mortar over there that they keep in the same place. So they put bells around the pot of butter. So when he pulls the pot of butter to take out the butter, it will also go ding ding. So this way the gopīs, when they hear the bells, the elderly gopīs, they’ll know that Kṛṣṇa is there. They can go and capture him. So this was their plan. So then Kṛṣṇa went with all the coward boys and he sees all the bells on the doormat and, “What do they think I am? Ordinary coward boy?” Then he made his plan. “All right bells! I order you, don’t ring!”. So when he opened the door, the bells, out of fear of the Supreme Lord, didn’t ring. He told the bells and the mortar “Don’t ring.” He told the belts and the butter pot, “Don’t ring.” So nobody rang. They took out the butter. Now it says that the monkeys in Vṛndāvana, they were great ṛṣīs and munīs who had done lot of tapasyās in order to be born as a monkey to get butter from the hand of Kṛṣṇa. How many of you like butter from hand of Kṛṣṇa?

(everyone raises hand) Hari bol! So they are not ordinary souls, not ordinary monkeys. They are special birth, to serve Kṛṣṇa. To get kṛṣṇa-prasāda. The cowherd boys, they are taking the butter, feeding their monkeys. We went to this village… (and there are many monkeys still there) … and they brought us some buttermilk, because they had churned the butter and the buttermilk was left. This was the fresh buttermilk. So we were taking the buttermilk prasādam and the monkeys were sitting there looking, saying “We don’t get?” So then we had to also give some of the monkeys. They are lining up one after another to take.

So, one of the cowherd boys, he wanted to feed Kṛṣṇa the butter. So he went and put some butter in Kṛṣṇa’s mouth. Soon as he offered the butter in Kṛṣṇa’s mouth, all the bells started to ring. Ding ding ding ding ding ding!

“What are you doing?? Why are you ringing!? Now I’m going to get caught.”

And the bell said, “Lord, he was making offering to you. (laughter) Whenever an offering is made to you, we have to ring!” (laughter)

How many of you ring bells when you make an offering to Kṛṣṇa? (everybody raises hands) The bells know their duty. Kṛṣṇa is taking prasādam, bhoga, they have to ring. So the gopīs heard the bell singing, they came running. “Aha! Kṛṣṇa’s inside!” and they (mimics closing door) latched the door so he’d be captured. Panic inside! “What to do? You heard that?”

“Yes they locked us in.”

The elderly gopīs went running to get reinforcements. This was the first time they’d ever caught Kṛṣṇa red-handed, so they wanted to get the other elderly ladies to be able to prove, see Kṛṣṇa [25:10 incomprehensible]. Whenever Kṛṣṇa would take the butter, he would get away and there’d be no proof. So when they go and complain that, “Mother Yaśoda, your son is stealing our butter.” She’d say “What do you think? My son eats your butter? He’s the King of Vraja. He’s got so much butter in my house. We got enough butter. What do we need your butter for? Must be someone else. What is the proof that my son took your butter?” So they didn’t have any proof. So this time they got proof. There he was inside, captured!

But meanwhile one of the cowherd boys found that inside there was a door. There was a window in the back. We can escape through the window. All the cowherd boys are very skinny. One by one they escaped through the little window and got out. One of Kṛṣṇa’s friends is not a cowherd boy. He’s brāhmaṇa, Madhumaṅgala. So he tried to get to the window. But he was a little fatter, so he didn’t fit. He got stuck! So the gopīs came in. They couldn’t find anyone. But in the back they saw Madhumaṅgala was stuck in the window, his legs kicking. (laughter) So they kept him as hostage. (laughter) “Your Kṛṣṇa must have been here. Now we got you. We are not releasing you until Kṛṣṇa comes.” They are harassing him and chastising him.

So Kṛṣṇa heard that his devotee was captured. He always promised to protect his devotee. So he made this priority. Then he came back and he told all the coward ladies, “Shame on you. Shame on you! What you are doing to this poor brāhmaṇa boy? We are cowherd boys. You can do anything to us. But he’s a brāhmaṇa. You are insulting him. Torturing a brāhmaṇa. You know what your future is going to be? You’re going to suffer a lot of bad karma. You should all beg him forgiveness. And you must do prāyaścitta. You must do atonement. Because they are all very simple-hearted ladies, Kṛṣṇa’s words were very enchanting. So they said “What should we do?”

“Well Madhumaṅgala, he likes sweets. (laughter) You give him lot of sweets, prasādam, then he’ll forgive you for your offense.”

So they put Madhumaṅgala on a stone seat, and they tile piled kinds of barfi, sandeśa, rabrī, lāḍḍus and different kinds of sweets. What other sweets they have in Vrṇdāvana?

Devotee: Rasamalāi?

Rasamalāi. I don’t know if they have that in Vṛndāvana. But you go bengali sweets then sandeśa, rasamalāi, chum-chum, miṣṭī-dahī, mysore-pāk. I don’t know whether they have mysore-pāk in Vṛndāvana. Vṛndāvana-pāk. (laughter) So… gulab jamun, that could be there.

Devotee: Perā?

Perā. Jalebīs. So they put a big mound of sweets in front of Madhumaṅgala and begged him forgiving if they committed any offense. He blessed all of them and took some sweets. There was a big festival. So that seat, called Madhumaṅgala-baiṭhak, is still there. You can see at the backside of Varṣāṇā, in the village of Chiksauli, at the side of the Kṛṣṇa-kuṇḍa, at the entrance of… What’s that forest? There is a very special forest there. So there you can see this house is still standing. The house where Kṛṣṇa was caught. Almost caught!

So like that, you know the whole background, the whole thing, then for the devotees Kṛṣṇa’s pastime as Mākhanacora are very sweet. But for the materialists, atheists, people covered by the mode of ignorance, they don’t understand all these things. They may say very challenging things. Sometimes people are just testing. You should know all the answers. We should be very clear that Kṛṣṇa’s activities are transcendental. His appearance is also transcendental. Kṛṣṇa, where does he come from? Where does Kṛṣṇa live?

Devotees: Goloka Vṛndāvana.

So when he comes to this material world, he comes from Goloka Vṛndāvana. He descends. He comes in his own form.

īśvaraḥ paramaḥ kṛṣṇaḥ sac-cid-ānanda-vigrahaḥ 
anādir ādir govindaḥ sarva-kāraṇa-kāraṇam
(Bs. 5.1)

He is sac-cid-ānanda-vigrahaḥ. Eternal blissful knowledge is what He is made out of. He doesn’t have to take material body, with the skin… and bones… and blood… and intestines, all the mechanisms which make this body run and the byproducts it produces. Kṛṣṇa’s form looks like a human form but his form is transcendental. That’s why Kṛṣṇa never grew old. When Kṛṣṇa was giving the Bhagavad-gītā lecture to Arjuna, he was 120 years old. But he was still young looking just like a 20-year-old boy. We cannot look like that at 120. We will be wrinkled and white hair, usually. Kṛṣṇa doesn’t grow old. He just changes his body according to what role he has to play in the drama, in the līlā.

So he has many different forms, ananta-rūpa. So when he comes in the material world, it’s also by his own decision. Prabhupāda said, “If the president or governor of a country wants to see the prison house, who can stop him?” And head of state has also the legal right to pardon a prisoner. Sometimes someone has got death penalty and the pardon comes from the president or the governor or the ruler. So this is how Kṛṣṇa is visiting this material world. He’s coming here to show all of us how beautiful His pastimes are. So if we can be attracted by His beautiful pastimes, so then we can also desire to join him and return back to his spiritual abode at end of his life. If you understand Kṛṣṇa’s nature, if you desire to serve him, then you can also achieve his eternal abode. We make so many plans for this material world but we forget that life in the material world is also temporary. We need to side by side have our material plan and our spiritual plan. At any time we have to be able to revert to our totally spiritual plan.

Prabhupāda was in his gṛhastha life working as a pharmacist. He had his own pharmacy. So he one time went to visit a friend who was sick. He was industrialist. And the doctor told them you only have a short time to live. Your life is coming to an end. So then the doctor, that patient, the businessman, he grabbed that doctor’s hand and he said, “Doctor! Please give me one more year! I just invested one and a half lakhs of rupees in my factory and it’s going to double the profit next year.” The doctor said, “I don’t have. It’s not in my hands to give you how much time you have.” Prabhupāda was noticing. He was quite amazed how the businessman is being told his life is coming to an end, but he only is thinking, “I need to have one more year to double my profit.” He’s simply thinking how to get the more profit. But he’s not thinking that I have to leave this body and what is my next destination going to be?

It’s like somebody here… if you’re having a rented flat, does it make any sense to spend all of your salary to decorate it up, take loans and fix it up? Then when you leave it all behind and go back to India with nothing, will that be a good investment? So once we realize that we are all expatriates in this material world; we are not here eternally. Of course, if we want to be here, we can get visa extension life after life. But if we surrender to Kṛṣṇa, we can go back home, back to Godhead. So that time, whatever chanting you’ve done of Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare, Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare, that’s in your fixed deposit. Your TFD. Transcendental fixed deposit which you can take back with you to the spiritual world. The word gives you that ticket.

Mostly people are investing in this world and they are not thinking about their future. But we should go on depositing for our future. Whatever we do for Kṛṣṇa, whatever service we do that goes into our permanent transcendental fixed deposit, whatever we’re just spending here for the temporary sense gratification that goes in our current account,that expenditures… some expenditures we have to do, that’s expected.

So what we need for our survival, there’s no problem. But if we are very wasteful and use all our energy just to try to enjoy the temporary life here in this material world, we only get stuck up here. So why Kṛṣṇa comes down is to show us there’s an alternative. If He didn’t come and show this, if he didn’t tell us these things through Bhagavad-gītā, we might think that this world is all there is, there’s nothing more. And that would be a very big mistake. Therefore, Kṛṣṇa is saying you should understand me. Human form of life is meant to know Kṛṣṇa. And if you know Kṛṣṇa, it’s not a small thing. Because if you know Kṛṣṇa, he’s saying, evaṁ yo vetti tattvataḥ tyaktvā dehaṁ punar janma naiti mām eti so ’rjuna. That when you leave your body, you’ll come back to me. So in this lifetime, we want to establish relationship with Kṛṣṇa, reestablish our lost relationship, so we can go back home, back to Kṛṣṇa.

Caitanya Mahāprabhu made it very easy for us, giving us the Holy Name. He also told us we have to be very careful to avoid offenses. Offenses to the Vaiṣṇavas is the most serious offense. Lord Caitanya said yadi vaiṣṇava-aparādha uṭhe hātī mātā upāḍe vā chiṇḍe, tāra śukhi' yāya pātā (Cc. Madhya 19.156) That our spiritual life is like a creeper and if we commit Vaiṣṇava offense, then that means that… the elephant, if it goes in the garden and pulls out the trees, the trees are going to die. It’s such a serious mistake that the roots can be pulled out from our devotional creeper. And then śukhi' yāya pātā means all the leaves will dry out. Maybe immediately the person won’t just be burned to a crisp. But what happens is gradually they dry out. They stop to taste the nectar of Kṛṣṇa’s chanting, their material desires start to increase.

In the beginning we’re trying to get rid of our material desires by developing a transcendental taste. So we chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, we dance, we hear the classes, we do service. We get absorbed in all our spare time when we’re not working or doing our routine work. And this way we start to develop a taste for chanting, taste for serving. That taste is something very special. It’s described like a jewel. The bhakti-ratna. So if you have a jewel, how will you protect it? Do you leave it lying on the street? So you have a diamond. What will you do with your diamond? Where will you keep your diamond? Any suggestion where will you keep your diamond?

Devotee: Locker.

They keep it in a locker. They keep it around your neck. They keep it locked up very carefully? So we keep our bhakti jewel locked in our heart. We have to be careful of the thieves. We have to be careful of misplacing. So that bhakti jewel can get easily stolen from us, just like a tiger ripping it out of our heart, by Vaiṣṇava offenses. We can also gradually lose our bhakti-jewel by gossiping like materialistic people, which leads to offenses. By breaking regulative principles. Like a prostitute entices a man and then sometimes, feeds the man drugs and steals all the man’s money. Like that, sometimes we are tricked to go for sense gratification and then we find that we lose our devotional taste because we went to sinful activities. So getting the bhakti-jewel is not so hard with Lord Caitanya’s mercy. Lord Caitanya giving it to us quite easily by chanting and good association. But losing it. Then you have to be very expert to guard it once you get it. Because māyā will be sending all kinds of agents to steal your jewel. Pickpockets, thieves in the form of, prostitutes, tigers, wild animals, so many kinds of creatures. So you must be very careful. That’s why advising always stay in good association. Lord Caitanya advised that you should stay in satsaṅga. We should hear also from bona fide people, from Vaiṣṇavas. If we hear from the non-Vaiṣṇavas, we hear from the impersonalists, then their interpretations of Gītā and Bhāgavata may be very interesting to hear. But what happens is it steals away our devotion. Because they try to tell everyone that you are God yourself. So we think we’re God, where is the bhakti? Devotion is there between devotee and Lord. Devotee thinks no, I am lord. Then loses bhakti. That’s why Lord Caitanya, he advised that once someone has taken up seriously their devotional service, maybe in the beginning someone goes under so many groups. Once you take up your spiritual life very seriously and you want to do bhakti-yoga then you should just hear from the devotees. That will be the most conducive for your spiritual progress.

Mukunda Datta, he was lead singer for Caitanya Mahāprabhu’s kīrtana. But he didn’t follow this order of Lord Caitanya. He used to go and listen to many lectures, visit many groups. Anyway, it’s all one. When you go for higher studies in spiritual life, you need to focus on a particular path and become a specialist. So bhakti path has its own philosophy, its own deep understanding. And if you hear from the jñānī or the yogīs or the karma-kāṇḍīs, then you get bewildered easily. Possible to get bewildered if you don’t have a very strong philosophical understanding. Also, what is the use of listening to those lectures if They are not going to help our devotion? We are depending on the mercy of Kṛṣṇa. He’ll deliver us. But we have to have a clear understanding about Kṛṣṇa. We get a distorted understanding, then we won’t get the same result. Sometimes the Māyāvādīs say Kṛṣṇa is actually coming in sattva-guṇa. That Kṛṣṇa is impersonal Brahman and taken the form of sattva-guṇa. But this is nowhere confirmed anywhere in the Vedas. So this is speculation. Kṛṣṇa is sat-cit-ānanda. He is Param-brahma. So he is not in the mode of goodness, passion or ignorance. He’s transcendental. He’s saying janma karma ca me divyaṁ. He doesn’t say janma karma ca me sattvaṁ. He didn’t say sattva. He said divya. Divya means transcendental. Transcendental to the three modes. But this Māyāvādīs they say, “No Kṛṣṇa is sattva-guṇa. Because the Brahman is nirākara, but it’s not great. Brahman is both nirākara and sākāra. Bhagavān is sākāra Brahman and brahma-jyoti is nirākāra-brahman. So these brahmavādīs, they don’t know about the personality of Gohead. So they make offenses against Kṛṣṇa. So Lord Caitanya advises follower, don’t go listening to Māyāvādi. They’ll destroy your bhakti. Mayāvādī kathā śravaṇa korile bhakti haya sarva nāśa.

But Mukunda Datta, he didn’t listen. And he went anyway, to so many different groups. So then one time Lord Caitanya, he just got fed up. If his senior devotee is a bad example, then everyone is going to get affected. Possibly. Maybe he’s not being affected. But anyway, he’s not following the rule. So it can affect others. And maybe he’ll be affected, who knows? Anyway, he didn’t follow. So then Lord Caitanya says, “He’s not following so I don’t want to see him anymore. He wants to do his own thing? Don’t come and see me.” So when he came, every day he’s seeing Lord Caitanya. He’s like a close friend. But he became too familiar. So he didn’t follow. Then he came and he wasn’t allowed to go in. “He won’t speak with you. He won’t talk with you.”

He said, “What do you mean!?”

“It’s like that. He doesn’t want to see you. You keep going to other groups. He’s told you so many times! You don’t follow. So now he doesn’t want to see you anymore.”

Never realized that Lord Caitanya would also be so serious about the matter. He pleaded with Nityānanda. Nityānanda Prabhu and other Vaiṣṇavas went. “Okay. He promises he’ll never go again to listen to the other Māyāvādī groups.” Lord Caitanya said, “No, I’m sorry, you can go with him. But I don’t want to see him. He does not listen. Why should I?”

So Mukunda Datta, he was so much in shock. He never knew that it would come out like this. He couldn’t eat, he couldn’t sleep. He was like a madman. And he’s running after the devotees. They said, “What can we do? Lord Caitanya is independent. If he wants to give you mercy, he can give. If he doesn’t want to, nobody can change his mind.” Kṛṣṇa is independent. What he wants to do, he’ll do it. He gives us some independence. But if we don’t use it properly, in bhakti-yoga… everyone is given some levy to act. We have to act responsibly. We have to act very carefully. Kṛṣṇa sees everything we’re doing. If we act responsibly, then we try to do the right thing under guidance of guru and sādhu and śāstra, then Kṛṣṇa will be very grateful and he’ll give all the blessings to you. But if we don’t act properly, then why he’ll give us blessings?

So for so many months, Mukunda Datta… he was like a madman. He can’t see Lord Caitanya, he can’t eat. He’s hopeless. Lord Caitanya said, “No I don’t want to see him anymore.” Then one time he approached the secretary and begged him, “Please, just ask him.”

“Listen Mukunda Datta, I feel for you but what can I do? Don’t press me.”

He talks about Caitanya. “When I mention your name, He gets angry.”

“Just ask him when I can see him again. That much. How long is this period of banishment? Because he said I’ll never see you again.”

So he asked Lord Caitanya, the secretary. When he mentioned him, “No! Why are you bringing his name?”

“No. He just wants to know when can he see you again?”

“So tell him he can see me after one crore births.”

Imagine, 10 million births. Very depressing. But, Mukunda Datta was so hopeless. He heard never again. “Never. Never. I made such a mistake. I’m never going to see Lord Caitanya” When the secretary came out and told him you can’t see him for 10 million births, he became very happy. “Haribol! Haribol! Haribol! I am going to see Lord Caitanya again after 10 million births. I got to see him again!! Haribol!!”

Lord Caitanya said, “Whats this noise going on outside?” 

“You see, that’s Mukunda Datta.”

“Why he’s shouting Haribol Haribol, rejoicing?

“He was hopeless that he’ll never see you again. When he heard that he can see you after ten million births, he became happy that at least he’ll see you eventually. So he is jumping in joy.”

That was how hopeless he was. “I’ll never him see again.” And then, “Finally, I can see.” Haribol!

Lord Caitanya was moved by that. And in his own independence he said, “All right, let him come.” HARI BOL.

We have to be very careful. Whatever vows we take, whatever commitments we take, whatever we do, we should try to be very honest with Kṛṣṇa. Because we can’t cheat Kṛṣṇa. He knows everything. He’s Antaryāmi, He’s the Supersoul, Paramātmā. So in bhakti-yoga, one has to be very sincere. Insincerity doesn’t work with Kṛṣṇa. In other processes, one might not be so sincere. That’s why bhakti-yoga is tough. It’s easy to do. Nothing hard. As a gṛhastha you can do it. As a student, you can do it. Nothing physically hard. Nothing very rigorous. Very easy things to do. Sing, dance, feast on prasādam, hear a little philosophy, do some devotional service. Not very difficult, very easy. But only difficulty is with our false ego, with our sincerity. Will we be honest to ourself? That’s why to help us to be sincere, having good association is very important. If we’re with other sincere devotees, it’s very easy to do devotional service.

But if we’re with friends who are pulling us, “Let’s go to cinema, let’s go drinking, let’s go party, let’s go this and that…”, it’s more difficult to be a serious devotee and we can easily get misled. So our close friends, we should try to pick out devotees. If we want to advance in our spiritual life. If you can make your friends only devotees, that’s best, no doubt. But otherwise, at least have devotee friends to associate with and support you in your spiritual quest then you’ll find it much easier. We want that after leaving this body, you will not have to take birth again in the material world. This is our goal. And while you’re in this life, we want you to be peaceful, be happy and be booking your… developing your relationship, your understanding, your knowledge of Kṛṣṇa side by side.

In this way, sometimes even if we’re given a test, we take it also as a special opportunity to become more Kṛṣṇa conscious. So I want to thank you all for your participation in these satsaṅga. For your chanting. How many are chanting here Hare Kṛṣṇa? How many do daily japa? Those who are doing daily japa, it’s a very good practice. Kṛṣṇa said yajñānāṁ japa-yajño ’smi (Bg. 10.25), that of all the sacrifices, I am the practice of japa. Chanting the holy names of Kṛṣṇa is a wonderful way of purifying our consciousness and establishing our relationship with Kṛṣṇa. Just as Kṛṣṇa appeared in this material world 5000 years ago and spoke Bhagavad-gītā, he’s also coming to the material world now in Kali-yuga. How has Kṛṣṇa come here in Kali-yuga?

Devotee: Lord Caitanya?

No, right now he’s here.

Devotee: In His name form.

Harināma! Golokera prema-dhana, hari-nāma-saṅkīrtana.

kali-kālera dharma—kṛṣṇa-nāma-saṅkīrtana
kṛṣṇa-śakti vinā nahe tāra pravartana
(Cc. Antya 7.11)

Kali-kāle nāma rūpe kṛṣnera avatāra, Kṛṣṇa comes as the holy name. This is another form of Kṛṣṇa. So we can directly contact with Kṛṣṇa by chanting

Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare,
Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare

Every day you chant some minimum number of times. That means a guaranteed connection with Kṛṣṇa. Here if you have a tree in the Gulf which is not being irrigated, simply waiting for the rain, how will it grow? And if you have another one which is having the drop irrigation every day, it is getting some minimum number of drops. So which tree will grow better?

Devotees: The second tree.

So that’s what this japa is. Drop irrigation. Every day we’re giving certain number of drops.

Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare,
Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare

If you want to give one mālā of drops, or two mālās or three mālās, or four or five or six or seven, eight, twelve… or 16! We recommend trying to come up to 16. That amount of irrigation means a very luscious growth of your spiritual life. But if you can’t do 16, then do eight or four or two or one something.

♦ ♦ ♦ ♦

Verified by:
Bhakta A. (JPS Archives Team)
Śrī Māyāpur