20200826 Zoom Visit to Different temples on Rādhāṣtamī

The following is a Zoom Visit to Different temples on Radhastami with His Holiness Jayapatākā Swami Mahārāja on August 26th,2020 in Śrī Dhāma Māyāpur, India.

mūkaṁ karoti vācālaṁ paṅguṁ laṅghayate girim
yat-kṛpā tam ahaṁ vande śrī-guruṁ dīna-tāraṇam
paramānandaṁ mādhavaṁ śrī caitanya iśvaram

Hariḥ oṁ tat sat!

Jayapatākā Swami: So, we are not yet at the point in the reading of the Kṛṣṇa Caitanya līlā where the Lord is taking sannyāsa. So, I will jump ahead just to tell you a version of the ceremony. It seems that in this class we are having side by side translation. Normally, we would have the simultaneous translation on the different Facebook pages. Apparently today it will be different.

The father of Śrīnivāsa Ācārya before Śrīnivāsa was born, he was going to Navadvīpa to see Lord Caitanya. He was known as Gaurahari, Gaurāṅga, Nimāi Paṇḍita. So when He got to Katwa he saw there was a huge crowd of people. He asked why they are here? You don’t know, Gaurahari is here, they said. He is taking sannyāsa. He is in the āśrama of Keśava Bhārati. So this devotee, he went to the āśrama of Keśava Bhārati but there a huge kīrtana was going on. So everybody was jumping up and down! Haribol! Haribol! Haribol! But somehow he got to the front row. Then Lord Caitanya stopped the kīrtana. He told the barber to shave His head. When the barber put the blade by His hair, no, no, no! a big crowd, they objected. The barber took away his blade and said, I cannot do it! I cannot do it! I will do aparādha if I did. Lord Caitanya said, listen, you are a barber. I need My hair cut. If you don’t do it, I take all the responsibility, you should do it. When He said like that, then the barber, he started to cut the hair of Lord Caitanya. When he was cutting the hair, he was holding the hair and he started to feel the ecstasy. Tears were flowing from his eyes. His hands and body were trembling. How would you like to have your hair cut by a barber whose hand is trembling? But Lord Caitanya was insisting that he do the service. Somehow or another he cut the hair of Lord Caitanya. The hair fell by the side, there is still a picture in Katwa of this barber cutting His hair. After he cut the hair he fell down on top of the hair, just sobbing and crying. Lord Caitanya went and took His bath in the holy Ganges. Then He got the sannyāsa cloth from Keśava Bhārati. Meanwhile the hair was put in samādhi. Then He came back and He asked Keśava Bhārati, is this the mantra that you want to give Me? And He pulled him over and told the mantra in his ear. So, Lord Caitanya gave the Vaiṣṇava sannyāsa-mantra to Keśava Bhārati and Keśava Bhārati gave it back to Lord Gaurāṅga. In the Bhārati sampradāya, Bhārati tradition, the brahmacārīs are called by the name Caitanya. So Keśava Bhārati gave the name to Lord Gaurāṅga, Your name is Kṛṣṇa Caitanya. When the father of Śrīnivāsa Ācārya heard that, for months and months, he was just chanting Kṛṣṇa Caitanya, Kṛṣṇa Caitanya, Kṛṣṇa Caitanya! Then he was called by the name Caitanya-dāsa.

I was thinking today that Lord Caitanya’s hair samādhi is the only remnant we have of Lord Caitanya on the planet. Because when He disappeared He was seen simultaneously going into the ocean, He went into the temple room of Lord Jagannātha, and He went into the temple room of Toṭa Gopinātha. So, they show the knee of Toṭa Gopinātha and they say Lord Caitanya entered here. But they change the Jagannātha Deity every twelve years. So, that Lord Jagannātha 500 years ago, we don’t have any more. And anyway He ended in the ocean, there is no record of that, nothing. So the hair samādhi in Katwa is the only thing we have of the Lord.

Anyway, we will gradually come up to this pastime but on this day of my 50th anniversary of sannyāsa, I thought to tell this pastime. Lord Caitanya doesn’t need to do any austerities of sannyāsa. He is the Supreme Personality of Godhead and He has everything already. But as a sannyāsī He could travel from country to country. At that time, He went by walking. And He would stay in a different village, in a different house, every night. Any way, He was giving out His mercy that way. He told in the Rāma-līlā, Rāma said that in this pastime I will banish Sītā to the forest. In Kali-yuga I will come as Gaurahari and I will banish Myself to the forest. So in one sense He was reciprocating with Sītā. So some people complain why did Rāma banish Sītā, but as Lord Caitanya, He banished Himself to the forest.

I am just an ordinary jīva. Taṭasthā-śakti. And Śrīla Prabhupāda asked me in 1970 in Calcutta, if I wanted to take sannyāsa. So it sounded like a very glorious thing! So I thought it is very nice! In 1968 in Montreal, the wife of the temple president had told me that I should get married otherwise I cannot go back to Godhead! I went to Śrīla Prabhupāda and asked him what to do? He said, anyway, wait till you are 25 and then the guru will discuss with you and tell you what to do. So I told the wife of the president, I have to wait and talk to Śrīla Prabhupāda. But Śrīla Prabhupāda asked me when I was 21 whether I wanted to take sannyāsa. And I said, yes! We had heard that Śrīla Prabhupāda had given 9 sannyāsas in Los Angeles. Acyutānanda was my older Godbrother and he was also going to take sannyāsa. On Rādhāstami day we had the yajña, we wore the sannyāsa robes, we had the daṇḍa, and the daṇḍa is still here. And Śrīla Prabhupāda gave Acyutānanda first and he said you are number 10 and he gave me the daṇḍa and said, you are number 11. So at that time he taught me a verse from the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, 11.23.57:

tāṁ sa āsthāya parātma-niṣṭhām
adhyāsitāṁ pūrvatamair maharṣibhiḥ
ahaṁ tariṣyāmi duranta-pāraṁ
tamo mukundāṅghri-niṣevayaiva

Basically, you will follow in the path of the previous ācāryas and great souls and by serving Mukunda you can cross over this ocean of birth and death.

So he said that in the daṇḍa there are three daṇḍas – body, mind and word. At the top of the daṇḍa there is a curved thing, that is intelligence. Use the intelligence to engage the body, mind and word in the service of Kṛṣṇa. Śrīla Prabhupāda said you should always stay busy in the service of Kṛṣṇa. And I was very fortunate because I was in India, I was in Māyāpur. After about a year and a half, Śrīla Prabhupāda sent me to Māyāpur. And he came every year to Māyāpur twice a year. So he was writing to me regularly, he would come here and he would train me, and in India the ladies stay away from sannyāsīs! They are very respectful. ! So I think in the West it is much more difficult But I was trained up for the first nine ten years in India in the association of Śrīla Prabhupāda. And Śrīla Prabhupāda said, as a sannyāsī, you should travel and preach. The husband and wife, they may have some difficulty, you should not counsel the gṛhasthas on the family affairs. You should let the senior Godbrothers do that. And Śrīla Prabhupāda although he was a gṛhastha before, he never entered into this counseling of gṛhasthas in their marriage problems. I remember that when I was driving from LA to Chicago, we had a car accident. The car rolled over seven times and the driver told me that he heard me chanting, Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa! But at that time he was a gṛhastha, he was thinking about his wife, his child. So he was appreciating that as a brahmacārī, I was only thinking about Kṛṣṇa.

So that is the advantage, but I learnt to appreciate that being a gṛhastha there may be a slight license for enjoyment, but they have lots of responsibilities, it is very responsible. So in this way if a gṛhastha couple they really take it seriously to be Kṛṣṇa conscious, at the same time being a brahmacārī is you are free from all these responsibilities. You can also give all your energy to preaching.

So whichever situation is more suitable for each individual, one should do that. But since Śrīla Prabhupāda had given me the sannyāsa order, I tried to serve him. I became an Indian citizen and I had to give up my American citizenship. But I was asked to by the GBC to help Śrīla Prabhupāda in South America. At first I went to Chile, Bolivia and Peru. Then they added on Ecuador. I was travelling from India to South America. Then I crossed over North America. Then they asked me to be part of southeast North America. So I was GBC also in southeast USA. About 20 years or so. So I did a lot of travelling. Maybe around the world, five times or six times a year! I travelled over a million miles on United Air. Also, a large number of times on British Airway. I got lifetime Gold for both United and British Airway.

So, I did not begin to talk about my sannyāsa much! But they are telling me, time up! Time up! So if I have been able to do anything, it is only by the mercy of Śrīla Prabhupāda and Lord Caitanya! And Śrīla Prabhupāda kept me very busy. He said sannyāsa meant, mind, body and word, use it in Kṛṣṇa’s service. Mana, kāyā, vākya. So, I have a lot of service to do and if you stay busy with service then māyā has no chance to come! And Śrīla Prabhupāda always said that we could leave our body at any time. So, after having a stroke, and learning that I had Hepatitis C, I thought I could leave any time, I should do as much service as I can! And I should do as much service as I could while Kṛṣṇa is giving me a chance. Then I got the Hepatitis C cured but afterwards the kidney and liver failed. Then I had a liver and kidney transplant. Then I got cancer. The cancer was cured. Now as I have all this going on, I am trying to expand the preaching, please help me! Please, please, help me! I heard this morning that in Trivandrum they are doing a saṅkalpa that new people who were not doing any preaching, they are taking a saṅkalpa to preach. Like this, the disciples should be very careful to chant their 16 rounds and following the four regulative principles, and then also all the ISKCON members if they can unite to distribute books. I am very pleased that 38,000 books were dedicated on my behalf on this Rādhāstami. Śrīla Prabhupāda asked me to organize distribution of 10,000 mahā-big-books and 100,000 small books every month. So many temples around the world are inspired by this request and they are distributing books. I am very thankful that devotees, Ambarīṣa prabhu, Vrajavilāsa and all the other devotees, are contributing and helping to build the TOVP. In the TOVP Exhibits and Planetarium section, many senior devotees are helping. So, on this sacred Rādhāṣṭamī day, I am thankful that Śrīla Prabhupāda has allowed me to live for these 50 years of sannyāsa! And I will try to fulfill the many other instructions he gave me. So I should end here.