20260131 Śrī Nityānanda Troyodaśī Special Class

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

Oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya
Oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya
Oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya

Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta, Ādi 1.7

saṅkarṣaṇaḥ kāraṇa-toya-śāyī
garbhoda-śāyī ca payo ’bdhi-śāyī
śeṣaś ca yasyāṁśa-kalāḥ sa nityā-
nandākhya-rāmaḥ śaraṇaṁ mamāstu

Translation: May Śrī Nityānanda Rāma be the object of my constant remembrance. Saṅkarṣaṇa, Śeṣa Nāga and the Viṣṇus who lie on the Kāraṇa Ocean, Garbha Ocean and ocean of milk are His plenary portions and the portions of His plenary portions.

Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta, Ādi 1.8

māyātīte vyāpi-vaikuṇṭha-loke
pūrṇaiśvarye śrī-catur-vyūha-madhye
rūpaṁ yasyodbhāti saṅkarṣaṇākhyaṁ
taṁ śrī-nityānanda-rāmaṁ prapadye

Translation: I surrender unto the lotus feet of Śrī Nityānanda Rāma, who is known as Saṅkarṣaṇa in the midst of the catur-vyūha [consisting of Vāsudeva, Saṅkarṣaṇa, Pradyumna and Aniruddha]. He possesses full opulences and resides in Vaikuṇṭhaloka, far beyond the material creation.

Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta, Ādi 1.9

māyā-bhartājāṇḍa-saṅghāśrayāṅgaḥ
śete sākṣāt kāraṇāmbhodhi-madhye
yasyaikāṁśaḥ śrī-pumān ādi-devas
taṁ śrī-nityānanda-rāmaṁ prapadye

Translation: I offer my full obeisances unto the feet of Śrī Nityānanda Rāma, whose partial representation called Kāraṇodakaśāyī Viṣṇu, lying on the Kāraṇa Ocean, is the original puruṣa, the master of the illusory energy, and the shelter of all the universes.

Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta, Ādi 1.10

yasyāṁśāṁśaḥ śrīla-garbhoda-śāyī
yan-nābhy-abjaṁ loka-saṅghāta-nālam
loka-sraṣṭuḥ sūtikā-dhāma dhātus
taṁ śrī-nityānanda-rāmaṁ prapadye

Translation: I offer my full obeisances unto the feet of Śrī Nityānanda Rāma, a partial part of whom is Garbhodakaśāyī Viṣṇu. From the navel of Garbhodakaśāyī Viṣṇu sprouts the lotus that is the birthplace of Brahmā, the engineer of the universe. The stem of that lotus is the resting place of the multitude of planets.

Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta, Ādi 1.11

yasyāṁśāṁśāṁśaḥ parātmākhilānāṁ
poṣṭā viṣṇur bhāti dugdhābdhi-śāyī
kṣauṇī-bhartā yat-kalā so ’py anantas
taṁ śrī-nityānanda-rāmaṁ prapadye

Translation: I offer my respectful obeisances unto the feet of Śrī Nityānanda Rāma, whose secondary part is the Viṣṇu lying in the ocean of milk. That Kṣīrodakaśāyī Viṣṇu is the Supersoul of all living entities and the maintainer of all the universes. Śeṣa Nāga is His further subpart.

* * *

Jayapatākā Swami: So we can realize how great Lord Nityānanda is! That He is the first expansion of Lord Caitanya. He is Lord Balarāma who has come as Lord Nityānanda. He came and He desires that all the conditioned souls get delivered. He has unlimited potencies. So, Lord Caitanya wanted to spread the saṅkīrtana movement and Lord Nityānanda took that up. We cannot begin to understand how great Lord Nityānanda is! He is the source of Mahā-Viṣṇu. And He as Mahā-Viṣṇu emanates innumerable universes from the pores of His skin. That he wants to deliver the conditioned souls in this manner is His special mercy! By Lord Nityānanda’s mercy, Jagāi and Mādhāi were delivered! He would take the most difficult cases and deliver them. We may try, but He actually delivers the conditioned souls. As a result, we need to get the mercy of Lord Nityānanda. Here, He was staying in Navadvīpa, He was staying right here where we are! Haribol! Jaya Nitāi!

He is the source of the Supersoul, so He knows what everyone of you is thinking! And therefore we need to be completely sincere. We cannot hide anything from Him. But if we hear about His pastimes, He is very, very merciful, He is very kind! He wants to deliver all of us! Do you want to be delivered by Lord Nityānanda?

So, at one point, He decided to wear ornaments. And He was covered with gold jewels, pearls and things. But He was in the ecstasy of vraja-līlā! When Lord Caitanya told Lord Nityānanda to go back to Bengal and preach there, He went to Pānihāṭi and various other places like Kharadaha, Ādi-saptagrāma and then to Navadvīpa. So when He was in Pānihāṭi, He said to Rāghava Paṇḍita, give Me a kadamba garland. But Rāghava Paṇḍita said now is not the season for kadamba flowers. But Nitāi said, you go and see in your garden, what flowers are there! Then he noticed that there were kadamba flowers flowering on a lime tree. Haribol! Haribol! Nitāi ki jaya! So he took the kadamba flowers from the lime tree. He made a garland and offered it to Lord Nityānanda! Of course you know about the Cīḍa-dadhi festival. So I won’t mention about that.

One day, all the devotees smelled some fragrance of some South Indian flower. So, everyone smelled it, it was all-pervasive! Lord Nityānanda Prabhu asked, do you all know why this fragrance is there? He informed them that here Lord Caitanya had come and He was wearing the garland of the fragrant flowers. Therefore, the smell is everywhere. So all the main avatāras of Kṛṣṇa and even Lord Rāma, always, with Him comes Balarāma as Lord Nityānanda, Lakṣmaṇa.

So, when Lord Nityānanda Prabhu was in Navadvīpa there was a smārta dacoit who was the son of a brāhmaṇa, but he was not a brāhmaṇa, he was a sinful person. So, he called all the other dacoits. He told them Mother Caṇḍī has given us a great boon. All the priceless jewels of gold, silver on Lord Nityānanda are all in one place, worth hundreds of thousands of dollars! This way, he encouraged his group that we will try to steal everything from Lord Nityānanda and we will become very rich! We can see from the above verses that Lord Nityānanda’s partial expansion is the Supersoul, so He can know what everyone is thinking. So, we can understand that Lord Nityānanda knows everything! So, these dacoits they came with their weapons – triśūlas, swords, everything. Their plan was they will loot everything from Lord Nityānanda and be very profitable. They were confident every moment that very soon we will get very rich! But, they sent one person as a spy to check out what was happening. So he went and he saw Lord Nityānanda taking prasāda. All the other devotees were dancing in ecstasy. Some of the devotees are like cowherd friends of Kṛṣṇa from the Vraja dhāma. So he went back and reported to the dacoit leader, he said let them take prasāda and sleep, we will wait under the tree. They were in some way meditating on Lord Nityānanda in this way, and each dacoit was thinking, I will steal this ornament from Him and that ornament from Him. Then Lord Nityānanda put His sleeping energy over them! They fell deep asleep. So then they were so much asleep that even when the sun rose, they still did not get up! When the crows started to caw, then they woke up. Then they started arguing with one another, you are sleeping! What are you doing? You were sleeping also! The dacoit leader said, let us worship Mother Caṇḍī, let us give her nice wine, meat, and so on. I mean, these were very bad people. Anyway, they were afraid, so they hid all their weapons in the forest and went home and did the pūjā of Mother Caṇḍī. Next day they came ready to rob Lord Nityānanda! But, the spy went and saw that many armed soldiers surrounded Lord Nityānanda. So He came to see the house where Lord Nityānanda was staying, and he saw these armed soldiers. Each soldier was very strong, well-built, had tilaka, neck beads and was chanting the names of Kṛṣṇa. Looked like each man, soldier, could defeat a hundred people. So the dacoits were afraid to attack Lord Nityānanda. They thought that perhaps some king or royalty had come along with their soldiers, to meet with Lord Nityānanda and that they would leave after an hour or so.  They went back again. The third time there was storm, rain, hail, etc. So it was so dark, they fell in the ditches, bitten by insects. Some people broke their bones. The situation was they could not see anything as hailstones were falling on them. Then, the dacoit leader, he started to think that all these things are happening! So he went and surrendered to Lord Nityānanda and he said, I surrender to You! But then the other devotees with Lord Nityānanda said, You cannot believe him, he is a thief, a dacoit! Maybe he has come in this way to steal Your ornaments. Lord Nityānanda asked him, “So what do you have to say?” He said, “I realize You are the Supreme Personality of Godhead! And we wanted to harm You, we wanted to steal everything from You. We are great sinners and our sins are so much that we should drown in the Gaṅgā and commit suicide!” Normally a thief never admits that he is a thief. But he told everything to Lord Nityānanda. So Lord Nityānanda said, “You don’t have to kill yourself, but you have to chant Hare Kṛṣṇa and follow these rules.” And He told him bring all the other dacoits here and have them take shelter also. So in this way, Lord Nityānanda even converted and delivered a gang of dacoits!

So you should all pray to Lord Nityānanda to have His mercy on you!

Today is the appearance day of Lord Nityānanda, so we should all celebrate! He is the original Guru. Taking shelter of His lotus feet, it is said that koṭi-candra suśītala, millions of moons soothing light! Now it is Nityānanda Trayodaśī, so the moon is almost full! Now, thinking of million of full moons, it is unimaginable! So, we need the shelter of Lord Nityānanda! So, we should always think about Nitāi Gaura, we should always engage in Their service! If we miss this chance, then we will be very unfortunate!

There are many things that I could say about Lord Nityānanda, but time is also limited! Here we have Mādhāi ghaṭa, Lord Nityānanda said that just like a mother holding the child, the child kicks the mother, but the mother just takes it. Then Mādhāi said that I have committed offences to the dhāma-vāsīs. So then Lord Nityānanda said, in the low season Mādhāi should build a ghāṭa and people by taking bath at the Mādhāi-ghāṭa, he would get forgiven for his offences. Now, His Grace Jananivāsa Prabhu is trying to build a temple of Prauḍhā-Māyā near the Mādhāi-ghāṭa. So there, Mādhāi personally built the ghāṭa when the Ganges was low in the month of May. When it was very sunny, people would go to bathe. So he was sweating, perspiring, very hard when he was building the ghāṭa.

So there are many līlās of Lord Nityānanda. Today is the sacred appearance day of Lord Nityānanda and if all the devotees can take shelter of Lord Nityānanda, they can surely be delivered. Just by His glance people can get ecstatic love for Kṛṣṇa!

Anyway, now I would like to mention that the Gaura-Pūrṇimā festival is coming up. Some of the leaders have already come. Soon we will have so many leaders and thousands of devotees and so as the world spiritual headquarters of ISKCON, we should welcome, serve, be very positive to all the devotees visiting! I am very grateful for the devotees who are willing to help the visiting leaders and devotees. Just like atithi, some visitor comes to your house, you welcome him! So, we are the residents of Māyāpur, we should see that all the visitors feel welcome! Atithi devo-bhava! So, I just wanted to remind everybody that we should be in this type of sevā-bhāva! So we should welcome and serve all these leaders and devotees who have come to our world spiritual headquarters! Now, I am just saying this on Lord Nityānanda’s appearance day because He is the epitome of Vaiṣṇava behavior!

Any questions or comments?

Question: We saw Bṛghu Muni offended Lord Viṣṇu by kicking Him on the chest. Also, how Lord Nityānanda was offended but He forgave. But we, sometimes people offend us but we cannot forgive them. What is the reason why we are not able to forgive others?

Jayapatākā Swami: In the Śikṣāṣṭaka, the third verse, it is mentioned:

tṛṇād api su-nīcena
taror iva sahiṣṇunā
amāninā māna-dena
kīrtanīyaḥ sadā hariḥ

Translation: “One who thinks himself lower than the grass, who is more tolerant than a tree, and who does not expect personal honor yet is always prepared to give all respect to others can very easily always chant the holy name of the Lord.”

So, this idea of revenge or resentment is tamo-guṇa. So, we want to be free from all the guṇas. So, like this cow and the bull were beaten by Kali, but they just took it as their karma or something. If someone causes us suffering, then instead of wanting revenge, we take it that this is some bad karma. This idea of taking revenge is something that we should try to give up. If someone gets abused, we report it. But when we want to think about Kṛṣṇa, we do not think about the abuser. Then when Cāpāla Gopāla offended Śrīvāsa Ṭhākura, some of the devotees approached Śrīvāsa and told him, he should forgive Cāpāla Gopāla, because Lord Caitanya would only pardon him if Śrīvāsa forgave him.

This is the first time I could come to the temple, once I came when everyone was gone in the past two weeks. They said my immune system is almost non-existent. So I should keep a certain distance from people and should be careful. So we have to observe that.

I will end here.

After Gaura-Pūrṇimā in the yearly Spiritual Safari, His Holiness Jayapatākā Swami will establish two lotus foot prints of Lord Caitanya in Ādi-saptagrāma and another in Baḍagacchi.