Gossip: Tolerate and Avoid

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
Speaking online to San Jose
14 June 2015

Question: You were saying we must not listen to gossiping. One of the types of saintly association is confiding in devotees. Sometimes devotees want to confide in us, for example tell us about something they are going through with another devotee, how do we know if it is gossiping or it is our duty to listen to them?

Always avoid it. Who is fighting, they can fight, but you should always avoid it. Gurudev's words are, "Ignore it."

When I just joined the temple, there was an opposition group and many were against Gurudev. I actually did not see anyone who was favourable to Gurudev except only one person. At that time, Gurudev did everything—he went collecting, preaching, etc. So, they would take Gurudev's food and in front of Gurudev would pay him full dandavat, full obeisance, but behind his back they would tell me, "Why do you want to take initiation from him? You are a very educated person, why do you want to stay in the temple?" Do you think everyone was in favour of Gurudev at that time? No one was. I just tolerated. Sometimes I would tell Gurudev about it, but he said, "Do not tell me about it. You must tolerate and avoid that." You must do both—tolerate and avoid. One time when I told Gurudev there were so many people against him, he said, "It is OK. If you have faith in me, if you have tolerance, and you can ignore it, then you can stay in the temple."

Actually, if you make yourself busy with service, you will have no time to listen to gossips...

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