All Glory to Sri Sri Guru Gauranga

GUIDANCE

Issue #22

Lectures of His Divine Grace

Om Vishnupad Jagad Guru Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

published at SCSMathInternational.com during January-March 2020

CONTENT

How Affection Develops

Frustrated Journey

Harmonising the Ego

Useless Independence

Unconditional Service

Chaste Journey

Main Teaching

Danda-Bhangi Pastime

Fighting Material Desires

Do Not Delay

Golden Opportunity

Joy of Sankirtan

Beacon Light for Lost Souls

Our Dear and Near

Uncompromising Chastity

On Dawdling and Patience

Hijacked Souls

Main Goal

Keep Sankirtan Fire Ablaze

Sacrifice Your Life

Now Is the Time

Leave Maya's Service

Before Too Late

Sincere Service Mood

"Come with Us"

"I Am Saranga's Murari!"

Not Just Words

Purity of Heart

Run After Devotion, Not Visaya

Surrendered Service

Seva Opportunity

"My Last Word"

Courtyard of Vrindavan

Entering Higher Study

Outdoors Preaching Campaign

Facing Austerity

Distinction of Sri Rupanuga Line

Treacherous Desires

Inconceivable Mercy

Victory over Visaya

Power of Sukriti

Atma-Buddhi

Buddhi-Suddhi

Zest for Service

Grand Festival

"My Gratitude"

Guard Your Service Life

Do Not Fear Sacrifice

Hidden Service

Spiritual Promotion

Puja with Love

Our Mistake

Spiritual Diet

"Does It Cross Your Mind?"

Unload Yourself

Universal Remedy

Test of Attachment

Wrong Employment

Step Forward

Value of Faith

My Question to You

Sri Nabadwip Dham Pracharani Sobha

Prime Festival

Importance of Sri Nabadwip Dham

Watch Your Step

Material Greed

Undaunted Devotion

Complete Engagement

Our Target

Loving Service

Selfless and Unconditional Service

Double Lock Your Mouth

Concentrate On Your Life

Hanuman's Service Drive

Plane of Faith

Parikrama Plan

Parikrama: More Than Pilgrimage (1)

Parikrama: More Than Pilgrimage (2)

Parikrama: More Than Pilgrimage (3)

Parikrama: More Than Pilgrimage (4)

Parikrama: More Than Pilgrimage (5)

World Pandemic: Use This Time Wisely

World Pandemic: The Only Relief

Nurture Faith and Faithfulness

How Affection Develops

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

3 July 2013, Sri Nabadwip Dham, part 1

Jay Srila Guru Maharaj ki jay

Jay Om Vishnupad Jagad-Guru rila Bhakti Sundar Govinda Dev-Goswami Maharaj ki jay

Question: In the Vaishnav world, there is some love and affection in the dealings between devotees, between the guru and a disciple. How we can develop more affection to our Gurudev?

Actually, some things come from sukriti, some things come from association, and some things like love and affection come through seeing others' example. It is similar to how love and affection comes within a family. You should think that we are all one family—sometimes there is love and affection, sometimes there is chastisement, but if we cannot think that we are all one family, that we are the same family, that we are Gurudev's family, then love and affection will not come. If you think that our relation is based only on giving or taking initiation, and after that this relation finishes—it is not like that.

Even if you consider parents' love and affection for their children. When the parents are alive, when the children are alive, then there is so much love and affection, but after that family members slowly, slowly grow apart and that love and affection also becomes distant. For example, it happens in some families where a daughter gets married and does not visit her parents regularly—then the parents stop thinking about her so much, and she also does not think about her parents so much.

Here it is also like this. When we stay together, there is more love and affection among us, but if some distance comes, then not everybody will feel love and affection. Just as every animal's love and affection is not the same, so is the love and affection of every human being.

I have told many times that some people take initiation to get something, some take initiation to give something up, and some take initiation to serve their Gurudev. When parents take care of their children, some parents think, "My children will become very big, and when I am old, they will take care of me." Their love and affection can be like that. Some parents take care of their children thinking, "Because I have produced my children it is my duty to take care of them." This is another type of love and affection. Love and affection can be of many types. Mostly, love and affection comes and grows stronger by seeing others—from association—when you understand, "Oh, he does so much for Gurudev, why cannot I do also something? I must try to do something too." Some strong feeling comes in this way.

I have seen many families. In one family, there are eight-nine brothers, all are married, and all live together. Their wives come together and there are maybe one-two bad ones among them who say things like, "We must live separately! Why must we all stay together? They have many children, and I have only one baby, then why must I take care of so many things?" Some jealous person can come from another family, but if somebody sees that others do so many good things, others take care of the brothers very nicely, that others have love and affection, then one day they too will think, "Why cannot I do that?" They live together and learn from others. That family lives together and there is not fighting, no jealousy in their family. Gradually, all bad feelings go away. If there is one bad person in the family, they become good through the association with others.

If somebody has a strong lack of love and affection, if somebody has never got any proper love and affection in their life, when they come to stay with devotees and live with devotees, they gradually become good too, but if somebody lives alone or stays far away, then they will not be able to understand these things. When you live with devotees and see their behaviour and practice, then love and affection come properly.

* * *

Frustrated Journey

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

3 July 2013, Sri Nabadwip Dham, part 2

Question: Why did Sanatan Goswami send Ishan back to his home? What can we learn from that?

I remember Gurudev's discourse about it. Gurudev explained it very nicely. Talking about Krishna consciousness, Gurudev said that the world we come from and that we have left and this world are very different because this world is material and that world is transcendental. If you have some kind of attachment to this world, then it is very difficult to reach that world. Success in getting to the transcendental world depends on your attachment to this world—even if you have some little attachment to this world, you will not be able to leave it. That is why we must always have disinterested nature towards material things and we must always have a strong common sense.

Sanatan Goswami told Ishan that he could not go with him because it would hamper Sanatan Goswami's spiritual life. Sanatan Goswami thought, "I too am going to get the association of Mahaprabhu, but if I take such kind of people with me, then it is not only bad for me, it will also give some bad feelings to Mahaprabhu, it will disturb Mahaprabhu. He told me a lie, he did wrong one time, and I can forgive his offence—I can tell him it was wrong and it would be not a problem; but he told me a lie twice, then I cannot go with him."

When Sanatan Goswami left his village, left his job and anyhow, by hook or by crook, left everything, so many problems came on his way to the spiritual life. There were so many obstacles, so much bondage in his spiritual life when he was going to come to Mahaprabhu.

At first, his relatives gave him some affection. Gurudev says that relatives' affection (their protection, care, samraksan) is very bad and very difficult. When Sanatan Goswami's relative showed affection to him, they told him, "Wait here for two days." He refused. Then, his sister said, "Brother, stay with us. You are going so far, give me your clothes, I can wash it. Stay, you can go later." Sanatan Goswami did not listen to them. He only accepted one blanket from his sister because he was going to cold places and she was giving it with so much affection.

After that, when he continued his way, he was attacked by some dacoits. Those dacoits had an astrologer who could predict whether a traveller had property, money, gold, etc. When Sanatan Goswami was coming their way, the astrologer said to his boss, "Do you see those two men over there? One of them has some gold coins." The dacoits immediately stopped Sanatan Goswami and Ishan and gave them so much false love and affection, gave them so much nourishment. Now, Sanatan Goswami had much sukriti, very good intelligence and strong common sense, so he immediately suspected something wrong, "They do not know us, they have just seen us on the road—why are they giving us so much affection?" Then, Sanatan asked Ishan, "Ishan, do you have anything with you?" Ishan said, "Yes, Prabhu... I have seven gold coins..." Sanantan Goswami told Ishan to give him those coins. Taking the coins from Ishan, Sanatan came to the dacoits and gave the gold coins to them. The dacoits were surprised, "Why is he giving it to me?!" They were going to kill Sanatan Goswami and Ishan at night when they would be asleep, throw the dead bodies into the Ganges and take their money. This was their initial plan, but when they saw and spoke to Sanatan Goswami, their minds softened up and changed a little. So, when Sanatan Goswami handed the gold coins to them, they said, "Prabhu, we do not want it." Sanatan Goswami insisted, "You please take it." The dacoits then told the truth, "We wanted to kill you for this money, but now we understand that it is a great sin. We do not want your money." Sanatan Goswami replied, "No, no, no, this money bring visaya (material bondage), it is vis (poison). If I keep material things with me, they will always give me many problems. If you do not take it, then on my way to Mahaprabhu some other dacoits can catch and kill me. It is very dangerous for me, you please take it." Then, he gave the seven gold coins to the dacoits and asked them for help, "Can you do me a favour? This area here is very dangerous, this is a Muslim area. Please help me cross the river in a boat." The dacoits helped them. Later on the way, Sanatan saw that Ishan was upset because they had to give that money to the dacoits—he asked Ishan, "Ishan, do you have anything else with you?" Ishan told the truth, "Yes, Prabhu, I do... I have kept one coin because you were going to give everything to those people and we are travelling, we would not have anything." Hearing this, Sanatan felt disturbed. He said, "Take this coin. I will not take it from you. Take it and go back to your home. I cannot take you with me."

From this pastime we can understand that Gurudev wants to take everybody with him, but those who are unfortunate, who have a bad luck, who do not have sukriti will not be able to reach their destination—they can go back to their previous life in the middle of the way. We can see that Ishan was half way there—he was with Sanatan Goswami, but although he had got this good association of a great Vaishnav, he had some material desire inside. Even though he had a good guru, even though he had good association, he could not go because of his own problem, because of his own disturbance and mistake. We must understand that we too may practise and practise, but we too may not reach our destination. So many servants fell—Ishan also had done so much service for Sanatan Goswami, but Sanatan Goswami told him that he could not reach his goal because of his own mistake and problem, and Ishan left. Sanatan left him behind and Ishan went back to his home. We must learn through this. We must understand the lesson through what had happened between Sanatan and Ishan. We must understand what is our main conception and what is our real goal because we too may fall down on the way. We must be careful and we must try to remove any material attachment to this world as soon as it comes otherwise some attachment can come and we will not be able to follow our heart...

* * *

Harmonising the Ego

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

3 July 2013, Sri Nabadwip Dham, part 3

Question: To chant the Holy Name, we must have humility, tolerance, not want respect for ourselves and give respect to others, and it is said that the only thing that prevents us from that is our pride. How can we remove that pride?

Mahaprabhu, Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur, Srila Sanatan Goswami, Srila Rupa Goswami and other goswamis have already told how to remove the ego. Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakur also explained it. He also explained,

krsna-seva kamarpane, krodha bhakta-dvesi-jane,

lobha sadhu-sange hari-katha

moha ista-labha bine, mada krsna guna-gane,

niyukta kariba yatha tatha

"I will engage lust by offering it in Krishna's service. Anger I will direct towards those who are envious of the devotees. I will be greedy to hear the topics of Hari in the association of devotees. I will feel illusioned without achieving my worshipable Lord. I will be maddened while singing the glories of Krishna. In this way I will engage these enemies in their proper places."

(Srila Narottam Das Thakur, Sri Prema-bhakti-chandrika, 22)

It says here where you must keep all kinds of bad things—where you must keep lust (kama), anger (krodha), greed (lobha), attachment (moha), ego (ahankar), etc. We have an ego, but we must think, "I am a servant of the Lord." That should be our ego. As for, trinad api sunichena (humility, tolerance, giving honour to others),

dainya, daya anye mana, pratistha-varjana

chari gune guni hai karaha kirtana

Humility, compassion, honouring others, and giving up prestige—become qualified with these four qualities and chant the Name.

(Sri Siksastakam Giti)

If you have these qualities and if you chant the Holy Name (engage in sankirtan), then all kinds of bad elements, all kinds of problems will be removed. It is necessary to chant properly—not alone with your mala, the result does not come like this; it comes through service and chanting. You should attend daily programmes, do parikrama in sadhu-sanga, in bhaka-sanga (circumambulate the holy dham, visit the holy places together with devotees, in devotees' association)—then ego can be removed. It is also removed through small service—if you follow Gurudev's instruction, that is very nice.

For example, before I came to Gurudev, I used to work as a teacher—I was a college teacher, then a college principal and had many security guards and other workers under me. But when I joined the mission and Gurudev gave me service, he told me first to guard the goshala and then to be the night guard of the temple. If I have ego, I will think, "Oh, what for will I be the guard? This is not my position! I am a college teacher! What for have I come here? To be a security guard?" But I did not think like that—whatever service Gurudev gave me, I accepted it. At first I may have thought, "What am I doing? I? A night guard?" but then I told myself, "No, Gurudev gave me this service, it is his service—being a night guard here means being a security guard in Goloka Vrindavan." Then I thought that it was a very great, a very high position—it is nothing like any college security guard. When I understood this, I harmonised with myself.

* * *

Useless Independence

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

4 July 2013, Sri Nabadwip Dham, part 2

"Marabi rakhabi, yo ichchha tohara: whether you keep me or kill me, it is up to You."

We always say, "Krishna is the palan-korta (protector)," "Krishna takes care of me." We say, "Avasya raksibe Krsna visvasa palana —we must keep faith that Krishna will certainly protect us." We say that Krishna must protect me, but at the same time we always live independent—we always think that we can protect ourselves. That is not so, it is false. We must understand and believe that only Krishna can protect us.

One day, I went to the crops field. I had just come there and had only spoken to my workers for one minute when suddenly my mobile phone rang. It was many years ago when the mobile network was not so good in this area. The tower was in Krishna-nagar, so the signal was not good here. My phone rang only once, and when I answered it, I heard that it was Gurudev. He told me, "Come here quickly!" And the line was cut after that. I immediately left everything and ran back to Nabadwip thinking that perhaps something had happened there, maybe there was some problem there, but it turned out that nothing had happened in Nabadwip. When Gurudev told me to go back, I immediately went back to Srila Sridhar Maharaj's Ambassador car that I had come by and as soon as I put one leg into the car, some people who wanted to kill me blasted a bomb—there was an explosion. Two men died on the spot, and one man was injured—he lost his hand. Those who wanted to kill me killed themselves.

That is why—"marabi rakhabi, yo ichchha tohara: whether you keep me or kill me, it is up to You." Only Krishna can kill us, and only He can protect us. We must understand this...

* * *

Unconditional Service

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

4 July 2013, Sri Nabadwip Dham, part 3

Question: Why is Raghunath Das Goswami considered the prayojana-tattva acharya?

There is sambandha, abhidheya, prayojan. Sambandha-tattva is the relation. Abhidheya-tattva (the means to the end) is sravan and kirtan. And prayojana-tattva is the goal. There are also three Deities in Vrindavan—Madan Mohan, Govinda, and Gopinath. Gopinath is the prayojana-tattva Deity, and the other two Deities is sambandha and abhidheya. "Tina thakura gaudiyake kariyachena atmasat—these three Deities of Vrndavan have absorbed the heart and soul of the Gaudiya Vaisnavs." (Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, 1.1.19)

Govinda is served by Srila Rupa Goswami, Madan Mohan is served by Srila Sanatan Goswami, and Gopinath is served by Sri Madhu Pandit. Radha-Gopinath is prayojana-tattva because Svarup Damodar is actually an exclusive servitor of Gopinath service, and Raghunath Das Goswanmi got that service directly from Mahaprabhu—Mahaprabhu gave him a gunja-mala and a Govardhan sila. He got the service to Srimati Radahrani directly from Sriman Mahaprabhu—nobody can get that service, but he did. The gunja mala means Srimati Radharani, and the Govardhan means Krishna. Therefore, who got the exclusive (antaranga-lila) service to Radha-Krishna? Srila Raghunath Das Goswami. That is why we can accept him as the prayojan-tattva acharya.

Question: You spoke about conditional surrender and unconditional surrender. How one can increase their surrender?

I have told many times about conditional surrender. It means having some sarta (condition). Gurudev gave the example of a grocery shop. Suppose you go to a grocery shop to buy something—you will give the shopkeeper some money and he will give you something (sugar, potato, oil, rice, or garam masala) in return. If you do not give him money, he will not give you anything. This is what conditional dealing means. Suppose you go to a shop to buy a sari—when you come in, the shopkeeper treats you with so much love, he gives you a bottle of thumbsup, 7up, or sprite, gives you a tea, maybe a bottle of coca-cola; and you start thinking that he loves you not only for your money. The truth is you are going to buy something from him, so the shopkeeper is happy that he will tell you a high price and can cheat you properly! He is not giving you tea, coffee or coca-cola using his money—he is actually using your money because he knows can cheat you properly after that. This is the relationship between a shopkeeper and a customer. This happens every day.

As for Gurudev, a proper guru does not behave like this. Gurudev thinks about the disciple, "How can I increase his spiritual life?", "How can I increase his spiritual activities?" Guru will not think that he will get more money or something else from the disciple—a guru who thinks like this is a bogus guru, not a bona fide guru. A proper disciple will only think, "How can I serve my guru?" If the disciple thinks, "If I serve the guru, I can get something from him," "I take initiation from him and in lieu of that I will get something"—this is conditional surrender. Unconditional service means I understand that I had made a promise (bhajibo boli esechhile) when I was in my mother's womb, but I had forgotten about it—Gurudev came and gave me the consciousness that I must serve the Lord; that is why I came to him, took initiation from him, and he will not engage me in the service of the Lord. That is called unconditional service. I promised to the Lord to serve Him, but I had forgotten about it because of the illusory environment, but my guru has come to me, he reminded me of it—I must surrender to him and he will engage me in the service of the Lord.

* * *

Chaste Journey

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

4 July 2013, Sri Nabadwip Dham, part 4

Question: Is there any message for all the Gurudev's disciples and your disciples all over the world?

Yes, everybody knows what that message is, everybody knows what I want from them. I want everyone to protect Gurudev's mission, to help protect Gurudev's mission—I want everyone not to go their own way but stay in Sri Chaitanya Saraswat Math's boat. Gurudev is still the captain of the boat. You may see some boat going zigzag way, some boat has much opulence, some boat is decorated elaborately, but you can also see that those boats may sink on the way—they may not reach Goloka Vrindavan. We must stay in Sri Chaitanya Saraswat Math's boat, this boat will slowly, slowly take you to your destination. Even if it is slow, but it is sure. Slow and steady wins the race.

Sometimes, we think, "That boat is going fast, let me jump into that boat!" but that boat sinks on the way. It is like the story of the hare and the tortoise. Once, a hare and a tortoise decided to have a running competition. The hare thought it was nothing—it could just jump and win the race. So, when the race began, the tortoise started walking very slowly, and the hare started jumping very far and fast. After a few jumps, the hare saw a banyan tree and thought, "Let me take some rest under this tree, I feel tired." So, the hare lay under the tree taking a nap, thinking that by the time the tortoise came slowly, it would wake up, make a few more jumps and easily win the race. In the meantime, the tortoise kept walking slowly and when the hare woke up and jumped to the finish line, it saw that the tortoise was already there.

We must not make the same mistake. We need quality, not quantity. We sometimes look at quantity thinking, "Oh, there is so much opulence there. I will join that consciousness, I will go there." There are so many "consciousnesses"—Rama Krishna mission has so many disciples, Bharat Seva Ashram has so many followers, but what do they do? They only want liberation, they want exploitation, etc. but Gaudiya Math, Chaitanya Saraswat Math can give the real devotion, pure consciousness. We must only follow Gurudev's instruction.

I have told it many times,

"gorara ami, gorara ami" mukhe balile nahi chale

gorara achara, gorara vichara la-ile phala phale

Just saying, "I am Gora's! I am Gora's!" does not do. Only when you follow Gora's practices and Gora's conception will you get the proper result.

(Sri Sri Prema-vivarta, 8.6)

We always say, "We are devotees of Mahaprabhu," but we do not follow Mahaprabhu's conception, Mahaprabhu's instruction. We say we are all disciples of Gurudev, Srila Bhakti Sundar Govinda Dev-Goswami Maharaj, but we do not follow Srila Bhakti Sundar Govinda Dev-Goswami Maharaj's instruction because we want some name and fame, we want pratistha. Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur said that pratistha means 'sukarer vista'—it is the stool of a pig. It is very easy to fall down because of pratistha—when you get much pratistha, you become very heavy and your boat sinks. We must be always careful—we must follow the proper line, Gurudev's line and we must be happy with whatever Gurudev gives us; we do not want more than that. Prayascha (thinking, "I want more," "I want more," "I want more!", "I am not happy with this, I want more!") is very bad for us; it causes a fall down from Krishna consciousness.

So, Gurudev is the captain of our ship, and we must stay in that ship. The ship may be sometimes crowded, it may be sometimes not so good, there may be no good rooms, but anyhow we must stay on board—we must try to stay on that ship. Even if this ship may be broken, we must still stay and go slowly, slowly and we will reach our destination.

* * *

Main Teaching

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

20 July 2013, part 1

Jay Om Vishnupad Jagad-Guru Srila Bhakti Sundar Govinda Dev-Goswami Maharaj ki jay

Visva-varenya Srila Guru Maharaj ki jay

Question: From so many slokas, why did Srila Gurudev make so much emphasis on 'trnad api sunichena'?

This is Mahaprabhu's teaching.

trnad api sunichena taror api sahisnuna

amanina manadena kirtaniyah sada harih

One who is humbler than a blade of grass, more forbearing than a tree, who gives due honour to others without desiring it for himself, is qualified to always chant the Holy Name of Krishna.

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Antya-lila, 6.239)

It is Mahaprabhu's teaching that we must be humble, tolerant and give honour to others. If you are humble, tolerant and give honour to others, then you can easily conquer devotees' hearts. In this age of Kali, people will not easily take to Krishna consciousness—sometimes they will criticise you, but if you are humble and you have tolerance, it is good for you.

In this age of Kali, everybody has an ego. Somebody says, "I am very beautiful," somebody says, "I am very rich," somebody says, "I am very wise"—everybody has some ego. In Dvapar-yuga, Krishna met with Kubja—she is an ugly-looking lady and because everybody teased her she was not happy; but when Krishna told her, "Oh, you are so beautiful!" she was very happy. Krishna used politics, but Mahaprabhu did not take to politics—Mahaprabhu wants to give it as it is. Mahaprabhu shows audarya-lila. Audar, or udar, means an open heart (lit. magnanimous). So, Mahaprabhu's conception is that we must be humble, tolerant and give honour to others—then you can easily convert people. For example, when somebody's heart goes to mix with bad people, bad association, you can say something to them humbly and they will listen to it otherwise if you want to say something forcefully, people will not listen to you.

Therefore, Mahaprabhu advised us to be humble, tolerant, and to give honour to others.

dainya, atma-nivedana, goptrtve varana

'avasya raksibe krsna'—visvasa palana

Humility, self-submission, embracing the Lord's guardianship, maintaining the faith that 'Krishna will certainly protect me.'

(Saranagati, 1, by Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur)

dainya, daya, anye mana, pratistha-varjana

chari gune guni hai karaha kirtana

Humility, compassion, honouring others, and giving up prestige—become qualified with these four qualities and chant the Name.

(Sri Siksastakam Giti)

In this age of Kali, "dinere adhika daya kare Bhagavan"—Krishna will give mercy first to those who have humility. It is the humble who will get mercy first.

Therefore, dainya, daya, anye-man—be humble, kind, give honour to others, and pratistha-varjan—you have some name and fame, but you must reject it. If you follow this, if you have these qualities, then you can chant the Holy Name, otherwise you will chant the Holy Name but it will not work. That is why one of the eight teachings of Mahaprabhu is

trnad api sunichena taror api sahisnuna

amanina manadena kirtaniyah sada harih

One who is humbler than a blade of grass, more forbearing than a tree, who gives due honour to others without desiring it for himself, is qualified to always chant the Holy Name of Krishna.

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Antya-lila, 6.239)

Because Mahaprabhu taught this, our Guru-varga, our Gurudev mainly taught these things as well. These are the main things. If you learn it, then you can teach others. First you must be humble yourself, then you can tell others to be humble. Simply speaking also, suppose there are two people fighting, and both are equal in their fighting—if one of them is humble, he will give in, then the fighting will stop.

* * *

Danda-Bhangi Pastime

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

20 July 2013, part 2

Question: You were talking about Nityananda Prabhu breaking Mahaprabhu's danda yesterday. Can you tell us why He did that?

I have told it many times. Gurudev said there were two reasons. I spoke about it yesterday also.

First reason is this. The danda is actually Nityananda Prabhu Himself. Whatever the Lord uses, it is Balaram. Balaram serves Krishna with His ten bodies, or hands (dasa-dehe)—He serves the Lord as His pillow (balis), shoes (paduka), peacock fan (mayur pakha), bed (sayana), carrier (avahana), house (grha), umbrella (chhatra), garments (vastra), ornaments (bhusana), sitting place (asana). Even the temple of the Lord, the temple of Mahaprabhu is Nityananda Prabhu Himself. That is the reason why we do not pay dandavat inside the temple—we always pay obeisance outside the temple. Even the pujari who does the puja does not pay obeisance inside—he comes outside and pays his obeisance from outside. Everything is Nityananda Prabhu Himself. Therefore, the danda is Nityananda Prabhu Himself too. So, Nityananda Prabhu thought, "I will carry Mahaprabhu! Why will Mahaprabhu carry Me?" And He broke His danda.

In another way, Nityananda Prabhu knows who Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is—He knows that He is Krishna Himself who has come as an acharya.

[kali-yuge] sadhu paoya kasta bada jivera janiya

sadhu-bhakta-rupe krsna aila nadiya

"Understanding that [in this Kali-yuga] it is very difficult for a soul to find a sadhu, Krishna came to Nadia in the form of a pure devotee."

(Sri Sri Prema-vivarta, 7.8)

It is very rare and very difficult to find a real sadhu in this age of Kali. Krishna knows it, therefore He Himself comes as a guru, as an acharya, or as a teacher. Mahaprabhu is Krishna Himself, and Nityananda Prabhu says, "If Mahaprabhu takes sannyas, why must He take the eka-danda sannyas? He can take tridanda-sannyas! If He has to teach others, He must give full teaching. Why will He take eka-danda sannyas?"

Tridanda means three (tri) aspects—kaya (body), mana (mind), vakya (speech). It means one promises, "I will serve the Lord with the strongest faith, and with kaya, mana, vakya." That is why Nityananda Prabhu decided to break the danda. He broke it and threw it into the Bhargi River.

We once went to that place when we were returning from the temple of Nil-madhav. We stopped the bus and the car there for five minutes and saw this river and the danda-bhanga place. Mahaprabhu sat at that place and gave His danda to Nityananda Prabhu. After that, He forgot about it—He walked on and on. Later, when Mahaprabhu and the devotees came near Jagannath Temple, when they were at the Atharnala bridge, Mahaprabhu remembered about it and asked Nityananda Prabhu, "Where is My danda? Give it to Me!" Nityananda Prabhu lied, "When You were doing kirtan, You fell down and Your danda broke." Mahaprabhu understood it was a lie—He said to Nityananda Prabhu, "You know what for I have taken the danda. You know what for I have come. You know everything, and You did that?! I will not go with You!" Mahaprabhu was very angry—He said to the devotees, "I will not go with you! Either you all go first, or I will go first." Nityananda Prabhu said, "All right, You go first, we will follow You." And they did that...

* * *

Fighting Material Desires

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

20 July 2013, part 2

Question: You mentioned that it is important to remove material desires from the root—how can we do that?

Yes, it is necessary to remove material desires. If you understand what is favourable to devotion and what is unfavourable to devotion, then when you do something that is not favourable to devotion, when you make some mistake, you must nip it in the bud—you must remove any material desires. Gurudev told also that this world and the other world are very different; if you have even a little bit of desire for this world, it will be very difficult for you to get to the transcendental world.

If you still have some material desire, you must remove it. But the question is how you can do it. If you gradually engage yourself in more service, if you engage yourself more and more in practising life, in Krishna consciousness life, if you keep yourself busy with service, then material desires will automatically be removed from your life. And Gurudev is always merciful—he always tries to help us, he is always at our back, he always gives us shelter, so if you have a good desire, a strong, great desire to serve the Lord, to serve your guru, then gradually all bad desires will leave your heart.

It happened in devotees' lives. For example, in Mahaprabhu's time Srila Sanatan Goswami had some desire—he wanted to kill himself. Some other devotees also had some desires for something, but finally they succeeded through their service—they finally could follow the proper line. Sometimes devotees are seen to make some mistakes, but after that they understand their mistake and correct themselves—they engage in real activities and finally get to their destination.

The problem here is the ego. If somebody tells you something, gives you some advice and you think, "I know more than you! I understand more than you!"—then this is ego and pride. Pride comes before a fall. That is the problem.

Matsaryata (jealousy, jealous mood) is also very bad. You have everything—anger, greed, etc.—but you must use it properly.

krsna-seva kamarpane, krodha bhakta-dvesi-jane,

lobha sadhu-sange hari-katha

moha ista-labha bine, mada krsna guna-gane,

niyukta kariba yatha tatha

"I will engage lust by offering it in Krishna's service. Anger I will direct towards those who are envious of the devotees. I will be greedy to hear the topics of Hari in the association of devotees. I will feel illusioned without achieving my worshippable Lord. I will be maddened while singing the glories of Krishna. In this way I will engage these enemies in their proper places."

(Sri Prema-bhakti-chandrika, 22)

For example, you have anger, but you must use that anger in the way that the Lord Himself indicates. How should you use anger? If you can use anger for the service of the Lord, then it is good. For example, if somebody criticises your guru or some devotees do something bad, you can become angry at that time. In the same way, you must use greed, attachment, etc. "I could not practise properly! I could not do my service properly! I have not been able to do anything for my guru, for the Lord." This kind of attachment should come. If you think, "Oh, I am doing everything! I am doing this, I am doing that"—this is very bad. "I have given so many things for the service to my guru and the mission!", "I have done so many things"—such feeling can come through service actually, but it is very bad to think like this. "I have not been able to do anything for my guru!"—such mentality should come. Therefore, if you have this kind of desire, this kind of feeling, then whatever material desires you may have will be removed from you gradually. The only thing that is very difficult to remove is matsaryata (jealousy)—it is very bad and very harmful for your activities, harmful for your practising life. You think grudgingly, "Oh, he (she) does it and I cannot!"—but you must realise why you cannot do it. If somebody can do something and you cannot, do not become jealous. You must practise properly, and actually Gurudev told that wherever you are you must maintain your spiritual life properly every day. You must maintain your spiritual life properly, that will be good for you, that will be beneficial for you.

* * *

Do Not Delay

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh

3 January 2020, morning, part 1

Jay Om Vishnupad Jagad-Guru Srila Bhakti Sundar Govinda Dev-Goswami Maharaj ki jay

Om Vishnupad Srila Bhakti Raksak Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj ki jay

Jay saparikara Sri Sri Guru Gauranga Gandharva Govinda Sundarjiu ki jay

Om Vishnupad Bhagavan Sri Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Goswami Thakur Prabhupad ki jay

Rupanuga-guru-varga ki jay

Namacharya Haridas Thakur ki jay

Sri Chaitanya Saraswat Math ki jay

Sri Gaura bhakta-vrinda ki jay!

All the Vijayawada devotees ki jay

Harinam sankirtan ki jay

Nitai Gaura premanande Hari bol

By the mercy of Gurudev, we have again come to preach in Vijayawada this year, all the devotees here are engaging me in service. I saw that Vijayawada devotees did a lot of service during the Vrindavan parikrama—their service enthusiasm encouraged me to come here again.

Actually, our duty is to always distribute the message of Srila Gurudev, the message of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu—we must distribute the religion of Kali-yuga everywhere, door to door.

In this age of Kali, people struggle all day from morning until night for the sake of their bodies, for themselves, and we do not realise that one day, when we close our eyes, we will have to leave everything here—all our houses, cars, etc. We will have to leave everything and go to the cremation ghat.

We always say that now is not the time to practise Krishna consciousness or come to religion—we say that when we retire, then we will join religion; but we must understand that when we become old enter retired life, after sixty or seventy years old, our health will go down and so many diseases will attack us, so many problems will come to us, and whatever previous karma we did will also give pressure to us (sometimes we will even need to use somebody's help to move us from one place to another)—at that time our mind will not be able to concentrate on chanting the Holy Name, at that time our mind will always disturb us because there will always be some pain in legs, bones, etc.

That is why Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur says that those who say that they will practise Krishna consciousness when they retire are actually cheating Lord Krishna. Therefore, when a representative of Krishna, a representative of the Lord comes to you, you should not lose time—do not wait for a long time. Take initiation, surrender and take shelter of the Lord through the guru.

* * *

Golden Opportunity

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh

3 January 2020, morning, part 2

Krishna has given us this opportunity, we must not wait for a long time. The Lord's representative has come to us to tell us what is necessary for our spiritual life, to tell us what we have got this human body for, etc. We had got this human body many times before, but you do not know if this time is the last time or not—you may not get this opportunity again next life, you may not get this human body again. If you do not get a human body next life, you will not be able to serve, to chant the Holy Name. That is why you should not wait for the next life.

Sometimes, we offer bhog to the Deities, to Radha-Krishna or Gauranga Mahaprabhu, but we do not know whether Krishna takes it or not—we cannot see whether Krishna receives our offering or not. However, we can always talk to the representative of the Lord (the guru), we can always tell our problem to him, we can always consult with him, offer food to him, and we can easily understand what he likes—in this way we can serve the representative of the Lord properly.

We must understand that the guru comes through a guru-parampara—through Srila Rupa Goswami's line, Srila Sanatan Goswami's line. Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu gave everything to Srila Rupa Goswami, therefore we must take initiation from the person who is carrying the flag of Rupa Goswami's line. That is the main thing. Also, taking initiation does not mean only taking the mantra—taking initiation means we must follow Gurudev's instruction, we must listen to what Gurudev tells and obey his instruction. If we give a letter directly to Lord Krishna, we will not get any answer from Him, but we can convey our message to our Lord through our Gurudev—Gurudev will tell everything, he will tell about our problem to the Lord. The guru is the Lord's medium, and he can convey our message to the Lord. In this way we can understand everything and can serve the Lord.

Therefore, we should not wait to take initiation. Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur said that in this world you will get so many gurus but you will not get a proper disciple. It is necessary to be a proper disciple. Before becoming a guru, one must first be a proper disciple. A proper disciple means serving and following Gurudev's instruction without any condition—a proper disciple follows what Gurudev tells.

The Lord is the visaya-vigraha (worshippable), and Gurudev is the asraya-vigraha (shelter-giver). Therefore, we must take shelter of Gurudev and follow his instruction. We must serve our Guru and Vaishnavs—in this way we can please the Lord, we can make the Lord happy.

Actually, Gurudev is the centre of the disciple's heart. If you follow Gurudev's instruction properly, you can become the proprietor of Gurudev's property. Gurudev's property is not his building, his temple, his construction—these are not his property; his property is his love and affection, his heart, etc. If you want to get this property—this love and affection—from your Gurudev, then you must follow Gurudev's instruction with chastity.

* * *

Joy of Sankirtan

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh

3 January 2020, evening, part 1

Brahma, Siva, Narad, everybody chants the Holy Name. Siva chants the Holy Name with his five mouths, Brahma chants with his four mouths, Narad plays his vina and always chants the Holy Name—they all chant the Holy Name and feel happiness through that. Everybody becomes happy when they chant the Holy Name—all the demigods also chant the Holy Name and become happy. Through chanting the Holy Name we can get the highest service of the Lord and the Lord's associate.

sadhu-sange krsna-nama—ei matra chai

samsara jinite ara kona vastu nai

I desire only to chant the Name of Krishna in the association of the sadhus. There is no other way to conquer samsara.

(Sri Sri Prema-vivarta, 6.13)

Chanting the Holy Name in good association is the highest attainment in this age of Kali. Just as you have all chanted today the Holy Name in the street—this is the highest attainment, the highest practice in this age of Kali.

You must think and you must realise one thing perfectly. How many days of this life do you have left? How many more days will you be alive in this world? For how many days have you got this human body and how many days can you stay in this human body? We do not know it—we can leave our body, we can die at any time. It is necessary to think. Pariksit Maharaj is a very fortunate soul—he knew that he would leave his body after seven days. Khatvanga Maharaj also knew that he would leave his body in forty-eight minutes. However, we do not know in how many seconds we will leave our body. You know that you have got this human body many times before, but you must realise that it is not sure whether you will again get a human body next life or not. You cannot say. You have got a human body now, but the type of body you get next life depends on what you do in this human body. That is why you must utilise this body in the proper way.

We suffer in so many ways—adhibhautik, adhidaivik, adhyatmik—we suffer from the miseries caused by our body, by the nature, and other souls. We suffer from all this because we forget the Lord. How have we come to this world? How have we got this human body? We think we have got this human body from our parents, but it is actually not true. We have got life only from the Lord. Everything depends upon the Lord. You have got this body from the Lord and for the Lord, but because you have forgotten it you are now suffering. When you understand this, when you know this by the mercy of the guru (the Lord's associate), then your suffering will stop.

We are fortunate that Krishna Himself has come in the form of the Name and He also has sent His associate, His very own man to this world in the form of a guru. This guru gives us the message about the Lord. We are fortunate that we can listen to him. Yet, even though we listen to that message our proper consciousness does not awaken, we do not get proper sense—that is why sometimes we wait and wait , we delay too much. That is why we suffer...

* * *

Beacon Light for Lost Souls

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh

3 January 2020, evening, part 2

From time to time, some sannyasis (Gaudiya Vaishnavs) come to you. They do not come for themselves—they come for you. They go door to door for your benefit. Suppose you buy a mobile phone. If you do not charge it properly, you will not be able to talk on that phone, you will not be able to use it. In the same way, sometimes Vaishnavs come to us and they charge our 'batteries' so that we may not forget and practise properly. You all get their association, you are inspired by them. That is your great fortune. They come to you once or twice a year, they invite you to come for the dham parikrama—Vrindavan Dham parikrama, Puri Dham parikrama, Nabadwip Dham parikrama. When you join them, when you get their association and visit so many holy places, you always remember Krishna. Through their association you do not forget Krishna.

I told you in the morning also that when you offer bhog to the Lord or Gurudev on the altar, you do not know whether the Lord takes it or not, but the guru is the Lord's associate—he is saksat Hari (the Lord Himself). So, when he comes to you, you can personally serve him, you can give prasadam to him, you can talk with him, tell him about your problem, consult with him, etc. Through the guru you can get spiritual benefit and you can get the message of the Lord. If you follow the instruction and guidance of great souls, great Vaishnavs, that is what is called being a real disciple. Only taking the mantra and not following the guru's instruction is not the duty of a disciple. A disciple only follows his/her Gurudev's instruction. That is the duty of a disciple. A real guru always thinks about your spiritual life, about your spiritual benefit—he does not think about your material benefit. Gurudev always thinks what is necessary for your real benefit, "How will I take my disciple to his real home? I want to send him to his real home so that he may not again get birth and death." This is what a real guru always thinks about.

You think that you have no money, that you do not have anything, but even a crorepati (a millionaire) who has crores of rupees also thinks that he wants more and more and more—he is also not happy with what he is getting. That is why, you must remember that a devotee always thinks about the service of the Lord, about the happiness of the Lord. A devotee always thinks how to make the Lord happy. Vraja gopis do not think about themselves—they think, "If we give our footdust, we may go to hell, but that is not a problem for us—as long as our Lord Krishna's headache is cured. That is our real happiness."

Therefore, I am telling to everybody—in this age of Kali you must take shelter of a bona fide guru. In this age of Kali, there are so many conceptions, there are so many gurus, but actually Sri Sukadev Goswami and Srila Vyasadev have told what is the real conception, they told everything in Srimad Bhagavatam. If you read Srimad Bhagavad-gita, Srimad Bhagavatam and if you read our temple's scriptures—Srila Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj's books, our Guru Maharaj's books, you will see what is the real benefit and what is the real conception. It is "loving search for the lost servant"—Krishna searches for us! We are all lost servants, we are searching for Him, and He is also searching for us—He always thinks how to take us to our real home and how we can get eternal service.

* * *

Our Dear and Near

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh

3 January 2020, evening, part 3

Almost all people in this world, almost 100% of people, always pray to demigods and ask for something for themselves—"Dhanam dehi, vidyam dehi, rupam dehi, varyam dehi, kavitam dehi" (make me rich, make me clever, make me beautiful, give me a good wife, make me a poet, etc.). We want wealth, we want gold, we want money, we want property, we want women, etc. We think about all these things, but Sriman Chaitanya Mahaprabhu told

na dhanam na janam na sundarim kavitam va jagadisa kamaye

mama janmani janmanisvare bhavatad bhaktir ahaituki tvayi

"I do not want wealth, I do not want knowledge, I do not want beauty, I do not want to be a poet. I only want causeless devotion to Your lotus feet. Give me that kind of devotion to Your lotus feet so that I could do Your service life after life."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Antya-lila, 20.29)

We only pray for devotion: Prabhu, we only want some mercy from You, we want to serve You; please please give us some service, please give us some opportunity to serve You. We do not want wealth, we do not want property, we do not want liberation, we do not want anything—if we can only get only ahaituki bhakti (unconditional devotion) to You, that is sufficient for us.

Actually, we think that our mother is our relative, our father is our relative, our son is our relative, our husband is our relative, our wife is our relative, and so; but Mahaprabhu and Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur say that if they are your relatives, then why do they leave you? When you die, they all leave you—they drop you at the cremation ghat and return home...

Just the day before yesterday I saw an article in the newspaper saying that one lady's husband died and when the family was going to the cremation ghat, they saw a gold ring on the man's body and wanted to take it off—the ring did not come out, so the family cut his finger for that gold ring. Then you can understand how much love and affection a wife has for her husband. That is an example for you all. So many court cases also are filed in Bengal and everywhere else—some little fight happens and the wife puts her husband into jail! This is case number 498 [domestic violence]. Any woman can go to the court and file a false case saying, "My husband tortures me!"

So many things are happening in this life... You can understand then how much happiness you get in family life. You must understand who your real relative is. Krishna is your real relative, and Krishna will not leave you. If you chant His Holy Name, if you remember Him, He will always help you, He will always support you. You must have faith. It is necessary to have the strongest faith in your spiritual life.

* * *

Uncompromising Chastity

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh

3 January 2020, evening, part 4

Sriman Mahaprabhu called Sripad Mukunda Prabhu khad-jathiya—He said, "You go everywhere, you mix with everyone! You have no chastity! You are khad-jathiya!" [lit. khada, straw, jathi, stick—i.e. sometimes humble, sometimes opposing]. Srila Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj also told that it is like sometimes you go to the snakes' camp and sometimes you go to the frogs' camp. You must understand this.

When you were in Vrindavan, you went to Radha Kunda and saw the bhajan kutir of Srila Raghunath Das Goswami. I heard from my Gurudev how much chastity Srila Raghunath Das Goswami has for Srimati Radharani.

In Vridnavan, Radharani's kunja is near the kunja of Chandravali who is a competitor of Srimati Radharani. Our line is the line of Rupanuga and Raghunath Goswami, so we always go to the line of Srimati Radharani—we will never go to Chandravali's line.

You know that when Srila Raghunath Das Goswami lived in Puri Dham, he always lived with and served Srila Svarup Damodar. When Srila Svarup Damodar left, Srila Raghunath Das Goswami, feeling deep sadness and separation, stopped taking rice. So, first he left rice—he would sometimes take some fruit. Then, when Mahaprabhu left, he stopped taking fruit as well. He thought, "I will go to Vrindavan! I will climb Govardhan and jump from it! I will commit suicide." At that time he only drank some water. When Srila Raghunath Das Goswami came to Govardhan, he met with Srila Sanatan Goswami and Srila Rupa Goswami there—they taught him good lessons and explained everything to him saying, "You are going to commit suicide? This is very offensive and sinful. You cannot follow your mind. Mahaprabhu and Svarup Damodar taught you so much—you must now distribute in Vrindavan Dham the teaching that they have given you!" This is how Srila Raghunath Das Goswami changed his mind and started living in Radha Kunda.

At Radha Kunda, Srila Raghunath Das Goswami would take only some buttermilk (mata) that a Vraja basi brought him every day, and he did not use any steel pot—he would take his mata in a pot made of a lotus leaf. The Vraja basi would every day bring the mata in the lotus leaf from Radha Kunda, but one day he went to another place (Chandravali's Surya Kunda) and brought the leaf from there. When he gave Srila Raghunath Das Goswami the buttermilk in that leaf, Srila Raghunath Das Goswami immediately recognised that the leaf was not from Radha Kunda. He asked the Vraja basi, "The leaf looks different today. Tell me, where have you brought it from?" The Vraja basi explained, "Prabhu, I did not get time today to get the leaf from Radha Kunda. I was in a hurry, so I brought this leaf from Chandravali's kunda." As soon as Srila Raghunath Das Goswami heard this, he threw that buttermilk along with the leaf pot.

From this pastime you can understand how much chastity Srila Raghunath Das Goswami has for Srimati Radharani. Moreover, he fasted that day—he said, "I will not take anything today." This is an example for you all. This is a lesson for you all. You must have chastity for your Guru. Chastity is the main thing. Everybody has a guru, but not everybody has proper chastity to their guru.

* * *

On Dawdling and Patience

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh

3 January 2020, evening, part 5

You do not have to wait, "I will chant later. First let me live my whole life. I take to chanting the Holy Name when I am old." It is not so. In your old age, you will not be able to chant because so many diseases will come, so many problems will come at that time. The young age is the proper time to chant the Holy Name, to serve the Lord, to serve the guru and Vaishnavs. You have got actual time now, so do not wait.

asraya la-iya bhaje, tare krsna nahi tyaje

ara saba mare akarana

"Krishna never leaves those who take shelter in Him and serve Him—all others die in vain."

Take shelter of a real guru and you will get real benefit in your spiritual life. You can stay in your house and from there you can be a member of this family, that will be good for you. Those who are not initiated are members of a mundane family, but when you take initiation, you become a member of Krishna's family. When you understand these things, you will feel that it is not necessary to wait. Take shelter of a real guru—try to understand what is necessary for that. You must not delay. What is necessary to take shelter? You do not have to leave your family, job, etc.—you only need to follow the instruction that you get from your guru and leave some small things. That is the main thing in your spiritual life.

Actually, what you need is to get service. You know, when you look for a job, you keep on applying to different places, sometimes you can send ten applications and not get the job. Still, do not become tired or disheartened—do not lose patience. It is necessary to have patience and one day you must get the real benefit. We often think, "How will I get service? How will I chant? How many years will it take?" We have no patience. But the truth is that it is necessary to have patience—no matter how long it may take, we must have tolerance and we must give honour to others. This what Mahaprabhu teaches us. You must wait for an instruction to come from your guru, and when an instruction comes, you must immediately take that instruction and start to do that service.

There are so many employment opportunities in this family of Krishna. In your mundane family, the number of 'employees' is always sufficient, but in Krishna's family the number of employees is always insufficient—always more employees are needed. The vacancies are unlimited here. If you can join this family and this unlimited service, then one day you will get some service. There is no doubt about that.

* * *

Hijacked Souls

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh

3 January 2020, evening, part 6

You can see there are many of our friends among us here. Jagannath Vallabha Prabhu and Kamalendu Prabhu came from Colombia, Sripad Sajjan Maharaj came from Venezuela. There are so many other foreign devotees in Kolkata, Nabadwip, Mayapur, etc. They come from thousands and thousands of miles away to join you. They get the message and take to chanting of the Holy Name, they play the mridanga, etc. This is your culture, this is Indian culture, but by the influence of bad association you forget your own culture. They, on the other hand, receive good association of great souls and come wearing tilaks, kanthi-mala, playing the mridanga, chanting the Holy Name. Then you can understand—we think we are Indian, but we forget our Indian culture.

We are very fortunate because we were born in India and we can freely chant the Holy Name, we can come out in the street and chant, there is no problem in this country. In many countries like Turkey, China, Japan, Iran, etc. there are government restrictions against chanting the Hare Krishna maha-mantra, against chanting and following the religion of this culture, but they still secretly practise Krishna consciousness properly—they hidingly chant the Holy Name. In this age of science you can see through the Internet, through facebook, and other media that people chant the Holy Name everywhere all over the world.

prthivite yata achhe nagaradi grama

sarvatra prachara haibe mora nama

"My Name will be spread in every town and village of the world."

Mahaprabhu's message is now spreading everywhere, all over the world.

There are many devotees who want to take initiation but who do not want to leave bad habits—they cannot control their tongues. We always follow our tongue and mind. I was telling one devotee today also that a lion or a tiger cannot give up eating deer, chicken, goat, etc. but you have intelligence, you can avoid killing animals and other jiva souls. Krishna is present in every jiva soul—sarva-jive Krishna-adhisthan. You have a human body, so you have a good brain—if you try to avoid bad things, if you try to avoid killing other souls, you can easily do it; unlike animals, you can easily control your tongue.

Jay Srila Guru Maharaj ki jay.

[His Divine Grace then chants kirtans.]

gurudev!

krpa-bindu diya kara' ei dase

trnapeksa ati dina

sakala-sahane bala diya kara

nija-mane sprha-hina [1]

O Gurudev! Give this servant a drop of your mercy, and make me more humble than a blade of grass. Give me the strength to tolerate everything, and make me free from any desire for personal honour.

sakale sammana karite sakati

deha natha! yatha yatha

tabe ta' gaiba hari-nama sukhe

aparadha habe hata [2]

O master! Give me the ability to befittingly honour everyone. Then I will sing the Lord's Name happily, and all my offences will be eradicated.

kabe hena krpa labhiya e jana

krtartha ha-ibe, natha!

sakti-buddhi-hina ami ati dina

kara more atma-satha [3]

When will this soul attain such mercy and become fulfilled? O master! I am devoid of ability and intelligence, and greatly distressed. Please accept me.

We pray to Gurudev, "Sakala sahane bala diya kara. O Gurudev! Please give me the power to tolerate everything! Sakale samman karite sakati. Please give me such power that I can give honour to others. Ami sakti-buddhi-hina. I have no intelligence, I have no power, you please hijack me!" What does it mean when we tell Gurudev, "Please hijack me"? It means we have been suffering for so long having become servants of maya (illusion), following her orders, but she has never helped us. Now we have come to Gurudev and pray, "I am helpless, I am surrendering to you. Please hijack me from this kind of situation! Please give me service to your lotus feet." What does Gurudev do? Gurudev takes us out of maya, gives us shelter at his lotus feet and gives us service to the higher plane, to the lotus feet of Sri Sri Radha-Govinda.

sakti-buddhi-hina ami ati dina

kara more atma-satha [3]

When will this soul attain such mercy and become fulfilled? O master! I am devoid of ability and intelligence, and greatly distressed. Please accept me.

yogyata-vichare kichhu nahi pai

tomara karuna-sara

karuna na ha-ile kandiya kandiya

prana na rakhiba ara [4]

When I examine myself for qualifications, I find none. Your mercy is everything. If you are not merciful to me, then, crying, I will no longer maintain my life.

* * *

Main Goal

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh (Sita Thakurani's house)

4 January 2020, part 1

Jay Om Vishnupad Jagad-Guru Srila Bhakti Sundar Govinda Dev-Goswami Maharaj ki jay

Visva-varenya Srila Guru Maharaj ki jay

Om Vishnupad Paramahamsa-kula-churamani Jagad-Guru Srila Bhakti Raksak Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj ki jay

Jay saparikara Sri Sri Guru Gauranga Gandharva Govinda Sundarjiu ki jay

Om Vishnupad Bhagavan Sri Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Goswami Thakur Prabhupad ki jay

Rupanuga-guru-varga ki jay

Namacharya Haridas Thakur ki jay

Vrinda Devi Tulasi Devi Sri Bhakti Devi ki jay

Sri Shyama Kunda Radha Kunda Sri Giri Govardhan ki jay

Sri Mayapur Dham Sri Nabadwip Dham Sri Vrindavan Mathura ki jay

Sri Purusottam Ksetra ki jay

Baladev Subhadra Jagannathjiu ki jay

Akar Math-raj Sri Chaitanya Math ki jay

Mayapur Yogapith ki jay

Sri Chaitanya Saraswat Math ki jay

Tandiya sakha Math samuha ki jay

Sri Mather sevak vrinda bhakta-vrinda ananta-koti Vaishnav vrinda ki jay

All the sannyasi vrinda ki jay

All the brahmachari vrinda ki jay

Jay Sri Vijayawara bhakta-vrinda ki jay

All the devotees of Sri Vijayawara ki jay

Harinam sankirtan ki jay

Vijayawara preaching programme ki jay

Samagata Sri Gaura bhakta-vrinda ki jay!

Nitai Gaura premanande Hari bol

Devotee: Jay Om Vishnupad Paramahamsa Jagad Guru Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj ki jay. Nitai Gaura premanande Hari bol

By the mercy of Gurudev, we are present here today at this programme at Sita Thakurani's house.

Actually, in previous time, Sri Sita Thakurani is Advaita Prabhu's wife (patni). Advaita Prabhu had two wifes, Sri and Sita. Sita Devi cooked rice for Mahaprabhu, and when Mahaprabhu took sannyas, she went with Advaita Prabhu across the Ganges to their house in Shantipur. There, Sita Thakurani cooked thirty-two items for Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. After taking sannyas, Mahaprabhu took prasadam at Srivas Acharya's house on the day He took sannyas; after that, He walked for three days and two nights before coming to Shantipur. When He was given prasadam, He said, "Oh, I have got such nice prasadam after three days! I am very happy."

Remembering Mahaprabhu's pastimes, remembering His activities gives us enthusiasm.

Actually, there are many people who do not know anything about the true conception, who do not believe in Mahaprabhu, they say so many nonsense things about Mahaprabhu, but Mahaprabhu is actually Lord Krishna Himself. The Lord Himself comes in this age of Kali as Gauranga Mahaprabhu, Radha-Krishna's combined form.

Srimad Bhagavatam tells the symptoms of all incarnations (avatari) of Lord Krishna, and it mentions also the symptoms of the avatari for the age of Kali. So, before even the Kali-yuga avatari (Mahaprabhu) came, it was already written in Srimad Bhagavatam.

Indeed, who else could ever do this? What Mahaprabhu gave to us and what He spread all over the world—who else can give that to us? Mahaprabhu is param doyal, param vadanya (extremely merciful, extremely magnanimous). He is the greatest donor. Nobody else is capable of giving what He has given.

Before Mahaprabhu's coming, Srila Advaita Acharya and Srila Haridas Thakur would every day worship a salagram sila with Ganges water and Tulasi leaves to bring the Lord from the Goloka to this Bhu-loka (earth)—they brought the Lord to this world to rescue all fallen souls like us who do not know anything about Krishna, about Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, who do not know anything about Krishna consciousness. Therefore, we are fortunate that we are still continuing that line of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu.

We are fallen souls, but on the other hand we are also very fortunate because we have come in this age of Kali, we are born in a human body and we have got connection with Mahaprabhu's line, Srila Rupa Goswami's line, Sri Sri Rupa-Raghunath line, Sri Rupanuga-dhara conception—we got a bona fide guru, we have taken shelter of a bona fide guru, and we are trying to follow his order, we are trying to serve our Gurudev and to make him happy. That is our main goal.

* * *

Keep Sankirtan Fire Ablaze

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh (Sita Thakurani's house)

4 January 2020, part 2

Sometimes you think that there are only very few of you devotees here in Vijayawada, but Srila Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj said, "Agun jvalo vatas emnite-i asbe. Start the fire, the wind will come on its own." Srila A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Maharaj Prabhupad also started preaching in America alone, but you know what a big society (ISKCON) he created with his preaching and, with his power. WhenSrila Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj established Sri Chaitanya Saraswat Math, he had only one thatched house, but you can see that now Sri Chaitanya Saraswat Math preaches all over the world.

You have taken initiation in this Chaitanya Saraswat Math, and you should also preach about Gurudev, about Guru Maharaj. Preach one by one, try, try, and try. Sometimes people will not listen to you because people are too much attached to family life in this age of Kali. Still, you must try to preach, try to detach them from this family life and take souls to the family of Krishna. That will be good for everybody.

The most important thing is that you must follow Gurudev's instruction. If you preach to people one by one in this area, then there will be more and more devotees. You can invite people to the programmes, you can take them to Nabadwip for Nabadwip Dham parikrama, or for Vrindavan Dham parikrama, Puri Dham parikrama.

Sometimes you become tired, but you must not become restless—do not lose your patience. Be tolerant. Try and try in this way, and you must be successful one day. Also, you must chant five kirtans every morning and five kirtans every evening. You know that you are going to work this day, but before you go to work, you must start the day with kirtans in the morning and chant another five kirtans in the evening. If you engage yourself in sankirtan-yajna, you can make Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu and Sriman Nityananda Prabhu happy through that.

kirtana-prabhave, smarana haibe,

ta kale nirjjan bhajana sambhav

"Chanting of the Holy Name (kirtan) arouses remembrance (smarana), and at that time it becomes possible to practise nirjan-bhajan."

Vaishnav Ke? 19

You can remember the Lord, you can remember your Gurudev through kirtan. When you chant guru-vandana, you can remember Gurudev's lotus face—through the kirtan of Nityananda Prabhu, through the kirtan of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, you can remember Their lotus faces (Their Name, form, pastimes, abode, associates, etc.). Kirtana-prabhave smarana haibe—chanting makes it possible to practise remembrance. It is necessary to practise this.

Also, you can make programmes every week at different places. You do not have a centre here yet, but you can make a programme once a week—one week in one house, another week in another house, and so on. Devotees can come together for istha-gosthi (candid talk), they can ask questions and those who know some conception can answer. There are devotees here who always associate with me, who understand my language and your language—you can ask them any question also. Always keep contact with devotees, and it is always necessary to keep connection with your guru.

* * *

Sacrifice Your Life

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh (Sita Thakurani's house)

4 January 2020, part 3

We will not waste our time on prajalpa.

gramya-katha na sunibe, gramya-varta na kahibe

bhala na khaibe ara bhala na paribe

amani manada hana krsna-nama sada la'be

vraje radha-krsna seva manase karibe

"Do not listen to the mundane talks, do not listen to the mundane news. Do not eat fancy food, do not wear fancy clothes. Do not expect honour to yourself, but offer all respect to others. Always chant the Holy Name of Krsna, and in your mind serve Radha-Krsna."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Antya-lila, 6.236-237)

This is Sriman Chaitanya Mahaprabhu's advice to us, and you must follow this instruction. Always avoid prajalpa (gossiping, idle talks), para-ninda (abusing others), para-charcha (criticising others).

bhakti-anukula matra karyera svikara

bhakti-pratikula bhava—varjanangikara

"Engage only in activities that are favourable to devotion, reject everything unfavourable to devotion."

(Saranagati 1, by Srila Bhakti Vinod Thakur)

You must do what is favourable to devotion, but if you in the meantime also do what is unfavourable to devotion, then you will not get any result. You must do what is favourable to devotion and at the same time you must also reject what is unfavourable to devotion. Always avoid unfavourable things.

Srila Visvanath Chakravarti Thakur writes,

saksad-dharitvena samasta-sastrair

uktas tatha bhavyata eva sadbhih

kintu prabhor yah priya eva tasya

vande guroh sri-charanaravindam

"I offer my obeisance unto the lotus feet of Sri Guru, who is said by all the scriptures to be the Lord Himself, and considered to be so by the sadhus, yet is also the Lord's beloved devotee."

yasya prasadad bhagavat-prasado

yasyaprasadat na gatih kuto 'pi

dhyayam stuvams tasya yasas tri-sandhyam

vande guroh sri-charanaravindam

"I offer my obeisance unto the lotus feet of Sri Guru, praising and meditating upon his glory at the three junctions of the day. By his grace, one gains the Lord's grace. Without his grace, one has no shelter anywhere."

(Sri Sri Gurvastakam, 7-8)

You can have everything, but if you have no mercy of Gurudev, if you have no good connection with Gurudev, if you have no proper attitude to your Gurudev, then you have nothing. You can be doing everything, but actually you are doing nothing. On the other hand, you may not be doing anything, but if you have a good relationship with your guru, if you have a good connection with your guru—that is sufficient for your spiritual life.

So, you must try to maintain your spiritual life. Practise every day, maintain your practising life. This is the main thing. People will not listen to what you tell them because they have too much attachment to family life and to materialist life—this is why they cannot sacrifice anything. But you must sacrifice your life for your guru. This is the main thing—that is called saranagati (surrender). You must sacrifice your life for your guru, for Vaishnavs and Bhagavan.

* * *

Now Is the Time

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh (Nama-hatta)

4 January 2020, part 1

First, I am giving my full obeisance at the lotus feet of my beloved Divine Master Om Vishnupad Jagad-Guru Srila Bhakti Sundar Govinda Dev-Goswami Maharaj, as well as to all the assembled devotees, all the sannyasis, all the matri-mandali (mother-like lady-devotees). I am giving my full obeisance to you all.

vaisnavera guna-gana karile jivera trana

suniyachhi sadhu-guru-mukhe

"Singing the glories of the Vaishnavs rescues and protects the jiva soul. I heard this from the mouth of sadhus and my Guru."

('Jayare jayare jaya paramahamsa mahasaya')

"If we glorify our Gurudev, if we glorify beloved Vaishnavs and all the devotees, they can rescue us and help us overcome all kinds of obstacles in our devotional life."

You are very fortunate to be living in Vijayawada, near Pana-Nrisingha, near Laksmi-Nrisingha. There are so many pastimes of Lord Nrisingha and Prahlad Maharaj, pastimes of Hiranyakasipu performing his meditation in Satya-yuga, etc. You are fortunate to live in this area. You can all read about the pastimes of Nrisinghadev and Prahlad Maharaj and you can see how much devotion Prahlad Maharaj has. Even the Vraja gopis, who are the highest devotees, also say with so much humility, "We do not have anything of the kind of devotion that Prahlad Maharaj has for the Lord."

Millions of millions, crores of crores years are passing, and during all this time we get so many births and deaths, but you should think—how many days have we got this human body for? This life is very short.

dina yaya michha kaje nisa nidra-base

nahi bhavi marana nikate achhe base

My days are passed in useless work and nights are wasted on sleeping. It never occurs to me that there is death sitting next to me.

('Durlabha manava janma labhiya', by Srila Bhakti Vinod Thakur)

We pass so many days talking, telling so many things, working so hard, doing everything only for our bodies, and it never occurs to us that we can leave our body at any time, at any moment. Therefore, we must think what kind of body will we get after leaving this body? Do not think that you will again get a human body—it is not certain, it is not clear. Do you think that you can chant the Holy Name and serve Deities or the Lord in any birth? This lifetime is a great opportunity, the best opportunity—you have got a human body now, and now is the perfect time to serve devotees and Vaishnavs.

It is first necessary to have faith (sraddha). There are four types of sraddha—kamala sraddha (soft faith), taranga sraddha (fickle faith), drdha sraddha (strong faith), sudrdha sraddha (strongest faith). The devotion that comes depends upon your faith—the more faith you have, the more devotion you get. When we have sraddha (faith), the next step is that we get good association. Through the good association we clean our hearts. How will Krishna reveal Himself in your heart? It is first necessary to clean your heart. Just as when we have many diseases in our body, we cannot get taste from food, in the same way when we suffer from so many material things (when you have so many material things existing in your body—kanak, kamini, pratistha, kama, krodha, lobha, maha, mada, matsarya—desire for money, women, fame, lust, anger, greed, illusion, maddness, envy), we also do not like to chant the Holy Name or serve the Lord.

To cure a material disease you got to a doctor, and Gurudev is the real doctor, the spiritual doctor. If you open your heart to him and tell him what your problem is—not your material problem, but your spiritual problem, why you cannot come to the spiritual line, what obstacles you have in your spiritual life—if you openly discuss it with your guru, the guru will give you a solution for that. Sometimes you may make some kind of mistake, but if you tell your Gurudev, "Gurudev, I have made this mistake," Gurudev will not hate you for that, Gurudev will not reject you. If you openly tell the truth and speak clearly, Gurudev will not chastise you—rather, he will accept you and rectify you, he will purify you.

* * *

Leave Maya's Service

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh (Nama-hatta)

4 January 2020, part 2

mahanta-svabhava ei tarite pamara

nija karya nahi tabu yana tara ghara

"It is the general practice of all saintly people to deliver the fallen. Therefore they go to people's houses, although they have no personal business there."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Madhya-lila, 8.39)

All the sadhus, gurus, Vaishnavs, all the Gaudiya Vaishnavs, go door to door, they come to beg for our own good—they come to help us, to rescue us from the material world; but we are such great materialists, we have so much attachment with with maya (illusory environment), with our family life that we cannot leave it. Your husband, wife, son, daughter, etc. take your blood—they will take your blood to the last drop—but you cannot understand it. And yet, Gurudev comes to call you to serve Deities, but you cannot understand it because maya is very strong.

Sometimes we give some flower, we offer incense to the photo of our Gurudev and we think that this is sufficient for our spiritual life. No! This is not sufficient. We must follow what Gurudev tells us. This is our best opportunity. You have come and joined Gurudev's family, then you can come and do some service there. This is our main opportunity, but we still worry about our material life.

Maya Devi is so strong—you have so much material attachment. This is why you cannot join, you cannot come to service plane—you are not taking advantage of this greatest, highest service opportunity. Instead, we are always following the worst orders of Maya—we serve Maya, yet Maya is very cruel, she has no compassion on us. She takes us away from the service of the Lord uses us for her own service.

You cannot understand it at this moment, but when you leave this body and get another body, then you will realise how much you are suffering. Next life you can get a dog, a cat, a snake, a frog, a fly or a mosquito's body. You may not want it, but if you do not utilise this human body in the proper way, you will end up in one of such lower species.

* * *

Before Too Late

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh (Nama-hatta)

4 January 2020, part 3

Your son, daughter, husband, wife, everybody is always disturbing you—they do not follow the proper way, they do not listen to you. Instead, they only give so much trouble to you. Even if you give much love and affection to your children, to your family, but how much do they love you? They will still leave you, they will reject you.

You have got this human body from the Lord. The Lord gives everything to you—you eat fruit, you eat dal, subji, rice, chutney, you drink water, you breathe air, etc. Whatever you take or use, everything comes from the Lord, but the problem is that we only know to take His things, and we never give anything to Him. We are always increasing our debt. Each and every day we live in this world we kill millions and millions of jiva souls—you can imagine how much sin we do every day. Even when you drink some water, there are so many bacteria inside, and you kill all that bacteria. We kill so many insects, so many bacteria, and we do not think how much sin we do every day. But you have joined Krishna's family, you have become a member of Krishna's family, then whatever you cook, whatever you do, you must offer everything to the Lord, then all that sin will be removed. Everybody should do this.

When you have teeth, you have to brush your teeth, you have to protect and take care of your teeth; and what your teeth are gone, you will have a big problem—you will not be able to eat properly. In a similar way, when you have a guru, the guru gives everything to you, but when you reject him, when you do not follow his instruction, then when your teeth finish you will understand, "Oh, why did I not take care of my teeth earlier?" When the opportunity runs away from you, then you will repent and think, "What have I done?"

You must understand these things in this life very clearly.

* * *

Sincere Service Mood

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh (Nama-hatta)

4 January 2020, part 4

When Sriman Mahaprabhu saw His guru, Sri Iswar Puri, He said,

"samsara-samudra haite uddharaha more

ei ami deha samarpilana tomare"

"Please rescue Me from this ocean of material existence! I am surrendering Myself to you."

(Sri Chaitanya-bhagavat, Adi-khanda, 17.54)

He is the Lord Himself, but He shows that He is not the Lord but a servant of a servant of the Lord. Yet, we do not become proper disciples, we do not become proper devotees. How can we serve devotees? If you are not a proper devotee yourself, you cannot serve devotees. Those who are not devotee always come to the Lord and ask, "Give me this," "This," "This," "This," "Dhanam dehi (give me money)," "Vidyam dehi (give me knowledge)," "Rupam dehi (make me beautiful)," "Bharyam dehi (give me a good wife)"—they always come to the Lord and tell Him about their own problems.

bhakter jinish prabhu lutiputi khay

abhakter jinish prabhu ulti nahi khay

"The Lord eats anything and everything when a devotee offers it, but He does not take anything from a non-devotee."

Krishna Himself says, "I do not take anything from a non-devotee's hand. I take from those who serve Me—if someone gives Me something with devotion, that is sufficient for Me." Krishna Himself took flat rice from Sudama Vipra, He took banana skin from Vidura's wife, etc., but Krishna never took raj-bhog (opulent preparations) from Duryodhan. The main thing is to give with heart and soul—if you give your heart for the service, that is sufficient. At the same time, you can be doing something external, but it may not be service—you must serve with heart. That is the main thing.

tad viddhi pranipatena, pariprasnena sevaya

upadeksyanti te jnanam, jnaninas tattva-darsinah

You will be able to attain knowledge by satisfying the divine master with submission, relevant inquiry, and sincere service. The enlightened souls who are learned in scriptural knowledge and endowed with direct realisation of the Supreme Absolute Truth will impart divine knowledge to you.

(Srimad Bhagavad-gita, 4.34)

It is necessary to have full surrender (tad viddhi pranipatena), to make honest enquiry (sat-jijnasa) and to have service temper (seva-pravritti). We have come to this world in this human body only for the service of the Lord. Try to understand and remember this.

suddha-bhakata-charana-renu

bhajana-anukula

bhakata-seva parama-siddhi

prema-latikara mula

"The dust of pure devotees' feet is favourable to devotion. Serving the devotees is the supreme fulfilment and the root of the creeper of divine love."

We put tilaks, wear a mala and say that we have become great devotees, but this is not good—this is ego, and this ego will bring you down, it will bring you problem.

'krsna-nitya-dasa'—jiva taha bhuli' gela

ei dose maya tara galaya bandhila

"When the jiva soul makes the mistake of forgetting that it is an eternal servant of Krishna, Maya captures the soul by its neck."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Madhya-lila, 22.24)

We are eternal servants of the Lord, but we forget it, that is why maya attacks us. People always think they are enjoying, that they become great, etc., but they cannot understand what is what.

It is very nice when we do service, kirtan, sankirtan-yajna all together. Even Hari-katha is also kirtan—giving a lecture is also Hari-kirtan. Srila Prabhupad Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur says that even taking prasadam is also service (seva); but when somebody is distributing prasadam and you think, "Oh, he is giving dosa to him, but he did not give it to me"—then you are not taking prasadam, you are taking dosa.

Sometimes, in the temple life also somebody thinks, "Oh, I do not want to go for collection, I do not want to go begging door to door. Somebody will throw me out, somebody will swear me. I do not want to do this service, I want to do that service." This is not right. What Gurudev told you, that is your service.

Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur also says that sometimes somebody thinks, "Oh, I give such good lectures! I go to so many places! I have been living in the temple for so many years, but Prabhupad is not giving me sannyas! I want to take sannyas!" Srila Prabhupad says that when somebody takes sannyas from their guru forcefully, their sannyas danda eventually becomes a stick (danda) for fighting...

Jay Srila Guru Maharaj ki jay

Jay saparikara Sri Sri Guru Gauranga Gandharva Govinda Sundarjiu ki jay

* * *

"Come with Us"

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh (evening Nama-hatta)

4 January 2020, part 1

By the mercy of Gurudev, we have all assembled here today. First, I am paying obeisance to my beloved Gurudev, my Divine Master Om Vishnupad Jagad-Guru Srila Bhakti Sundar Govinda Dev-Goswami Maharaj, as well as to all the assembled sannyasi-vrinda, all the brahmachari-vrinda, all the matri-mandala. I am paying my obeisance to you all.

A cloudy day is not a bad day for us—a bad day for us is the day when we cannot chant the Holy Name, when we cannot serve the Lord and Vaishnavs. Therefore, we are very fortunate that we have got some time today to hear some Hari-katha, Krishna-katha, Bhagavat-katha. That is a great fortune for us today. Actually, I am not saying anything—my Gurudev and Krishna say everything, and I am only an instrument; what comes to my tongue comes by the mercy of Guru-varga, by the mercy of Gurudev.

I will tell you today something about the chanting of the Holy Name, about the glorification of the Holy Name.

The Harinam (the Holy Name) is extremely powerful in this age of Kali—chanting the Holy Name is the only way we can get to our real home: back to God, back to home. Jive daya, Name ruchi, Vaishnava-seva—only through getting taste for chanting the Holy Name and only through Vaishnav-seva can we get back to our real home.

Bhagavan Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur says that those who are simple-hearted, who have kamala-sraddha, who have little devotion, who have only recently joined Krishna consciousness, should do Gaura-mandala parikrama (Sri Nabadwip Dham parikrama). Those who are on another level, those whose devotion has increased, should do Puri Dham, or Purushottam Ksetra, parikrama. Those who have even more devotion, those who remember the pastimes of the Lord, who can serve their Guru and Vaishnavs properly, and who want to increase their service, they can go for the Vraja-mandal parikrama. Our Sri Chaitanya Saraswat Math makes the parikrama of Nabadwip Dham every year, and many hundreds and thousands of people join this parikrama. This parikrama will take place this year too, and I am inviting you all to come for this parikrama.

Sri Nabadwip Dham is nine islands—Sri Dham Mayapur is Antardwip, then there is also Simantadwip, Rudradwip, Koladwip, Godrumdwip, Madhyadwip, Ritudwip, Jahnudwip, and Modadrumdwip. There are these nine islands, and nine kinds of devotion exist in each of these nine islands (Antardwip—atma-nivedanam, Simantadwip—sravanam, Rudradwip—sakhyam, Godrumdwip—kirtanam, Madhyadwip—smaranam, Koladwip—pada-sevanam, Ritudwip—archanam, Jahnudwip—vandanam, Modadrumdwip—dasyam).

sadhu-sange krsna-nama—ei matra chai

samsara jinite ara kona vastu nai

"I desire only to chant the Name of Krishna in the association of the sadhus. There is no other way to conquer samsara."

(Sri Sri Prema-vivarta, 6.13)

Those who can do this parikrama in good association of devotees and chanting the Holy Name are very fortunate souls. Everyone goes everywhere on this dham parikrama, but Srila Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj says that when you go on a parikrama, you must hear from great Vaishnavs about the glorification of the Dham, about the pastimes of Sriman Mahaprabhu, of Guru-varga in each place, etc.—otherwise if you go on a parikrama and only walk, that is called 'eye exercise'.

tirtha-yatra parisrama kevala manera bhrama

sarva-siddhi govinda-charana

"The trouble of visiting holy places is simply a mental delusion—all possible perfection is the feet of Govinda."

(Srila Narottam Das Thakur, "Anya-abhilasa chhadi...")

tirtha-phala sadhu-sanga, sadhu-sange antaranga,

sri-krsna-bhajana manohara

yatha sadhu, tatha tirtha, sthira kari' nija-chitta,

sadhu-sanga kara nirantara

"The result of visiting a place of pilgrimage is sadhu-sanga (pure devotees' association) and being drawn to the exclusive service of Sri Krishna. A place of pilgrimage is where a sadhu (pure devotee) is. Always keep the association of pure devotees and firmly fix your mind by such association."

(Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur, Kalyan-kalpataru)

ye dina grhe bhajana dekhi

grhete goloka bhaya

"On the days when I see devotional service taking place in my home, I feel that Goloka has manifested there."

('Suddha-bhakata-charana-renu' by Srila Bhakti Vinod

Wherever the worship of the Lord and chanting of the Holy Name take place, that is Goloka Vrindavan...

* * *

"I Am Saranga's Murari!"

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh (evening Nama-hatta)

4 January 2020, part 2

I am remembering now the last day of Nabadwip Dham parikrama, and I want to tell you some very important thing. We always glorify Mamgachhi, that is Modadrumdwip, and speak about the birthplace of Srila Vrindavan Das Thakur there, but there is also one small temple beside it called Saranga Murari's temple. Radha-Gopinath Deities were installed in this temple a few hundred years ago, and some devotees serve those Deities to this day. What I am about to speak is the glorification of the Holy Name and the power of suddha-vaishnav's chanting of the Holy Name—the reaction that comes through great Vaishnavs' chanting of the Holy Name.

There was an old Vaishnav, an associate of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, named Saranga Thakur. He served the Deities of Radha-Gopinath in that temple. Eventually, he became very old. One night he cried to Radha-Gopinath, "Prabhu, please send someone. I have gone so old now that I cannot do Your service properly. Please send someone to take over the service." When he left the temple room and went to bed that night, suddenly he got a dream. Gopinath came to him and said, "Do not worry about that. Give the Harinam maha-mantra to whoever you see first tomorrow—he will be your servitor."

Actually, Saranga Thakur walked a few kilometres every day early in the morning to bathe in the Ganges, after that he did the mangal arati, etc. So, that night, after Gopinath told him that, he suddenly woke up. Excited, he thought, "Oh, Gopinath has given me a dream and told me to give Harinam to someone—that person will be the servitor of Radha-Gopinath!" He started walking to the Ganges to take bath.

In the early days, it often happened that somebody was bitten by a snake, and people did not go to doctors (there were not so many doctors in those days), instead they would go to some ojha (healer) to take the poison out. So, that day a small boy was bitten by a snake, but the ojha could not save him, so, according to the tradition, his parents wrapped his body into banana leaves and put it into the Ganges with some incense and a flower garland.

So, when Saranga Thakur went bathing, he saw a child's body floating in the Ganges, coming his way. He saw the boy was dead, but he remembered what Gopinath had advised him; so when the body floated to the bank of the Ganges, he chanted the Holy Name into the boy's ears—Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare / Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare. Suddenly, the boy opened his eyes—he sat up and looked around.

Then, Saranga Thakur took him to his ashram (the temple in Mamgachhi, near Srila Vrindavan Das Thakur's birthplace). He gave him initiation and the brahman thread. The boy's name was Murari. Having received the mantra, Murari started serving Radha-Gopinath. After some time, the news reached his parents that he was alive, and they came there to take him home, but when they came Murari said, "I will not go with you! You have already thrown me into the Ganges, so I am not your son any more, I am now the son of my Guru. I am not your Murari, I am Saranga's Murari!"

* * *

Not Just Words

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh (evening Nama-hatta)

4 January 2020, part 3

I will tell you another pastime of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu and about the glorification of the Holy Name, about what happened when Mahaprabhu chanted the Holy Name. You know that Chaitanya Mahaprabhu appeared five hundred years ago and He started the chanting of the Holy Name. After taking initiation from Ishwar Puri, He gave His full energy to chanting and distributing the Holy Name.

Before that, one day Durvasa Muni was sleeping in a forest when a deva-putra (a son of a demigod), a small boy who did not know anything, came to him and cut his jata (dreadlock, or sikha). Durvasa Muni became very upset, he said, "As you have cut my sikha, I am cursing you—you will be born as a crocodile and you will live in water for four ages!" The boy began to cry, "What will I do? Please forgive my offence!" Durvasa Muni said, "You ask for forgiveness, all right, but I have already said that you would get this punishment, so you must get a crocodile body, but I can give you a boon. When Krishna Himself comes in the form of Name and Chaitanya Mahaprabhu in the age of Kali, He will chant the Holy Name and by hearing the Holy Name you can get your previous body again."

So, one time, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu was walking with some devotees from Mayapur (Antardwip) to Madhyadwip, and on the way He met one ghosh named Bhim, a cowherd boy who had many cows. Their house was full of milk products—Bhim's mother made paneer, yoghurt, curd, etc. Her name is not mentioned in the scriptures, but Jagadananda Pandit writes that she actually called Mother Sachi (the mother of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu) "mother". So, when Bhim saw Mahaprabhu, he quickly came to Him and said, "Uncle, please come to my house! Mother is waiting for you, she wants to feed You. You have not come to our house for so many days, please come." Mahaprabhu agreed, and He went to Bhim's house with all the devotees who were with Him.

Bhim's mother quickly gave an asan for Mahaprabhu to sit. Then she asked,

"Brother, how is mother?"

Mahaprabhu said, "She is good, everything is all right."

"OK, I am arranging for everybody to sit and will give you all prasadam."

So, Nimai and all the devotees sat there and took prasadam. Everybody was happy. After that, Nimai told everybody, "Let us go to that lake and chant the Holy Name there!" Bhim said, "No, no, no! Do not go there! There is a crocodile living in that lake! Even our cows do not go there, they are afraid to drink the water from that lake." But Mahaprabhu said, "It is OK, I am not afraid." So, Mahaprabhu started chanting and after some time a small boy came out of the lake. He came to Mahaprabhu and clasped His feet.

Mahaprabhu asked him, "Who are you? Where did you come from?"

The boy told his previous story, what offence he did (that he had cut Durvasa Muni's jata) and how Durvasa Muni gave him a curse, how he became a crocodile, and how Durvasa Muni told him, "When Krishna Himself comes in the form of Name and is chanting the Holy Name, by hearing that chanting of Harinam, Krishna-nam, you will get back your previous body." In the end, the boy said, "Yes, I know You are Lord Krishna Himself! O Lord! I have not seen my parents for so long, please give me permission to go back to them now."

Such is the glorification of the Holy Name. The Holy Name is not only some letters. This Hare Krishna maha-mantra is pure, and this pastime is the evidence of that.

* * *

Purity of Heart

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh (evening Nama-hatta)

4 January 2020, part 4

Through chanting the Holy Name you can get real service from the Guru and Vaishnavs, who can show you the real way how to go to your real home. That is why, only a only bona fide guru, who descends from Goloka Vrindavan, who is an associate of the Lord, can distribute this Holy Name in this world—if you take initiation from such guru, you can get real benefit in your spiritual life.

At the same time, it is necessary to be pure—you must only not pretend to be a devotee—you must be a devotee. It is necessary to be a real devotee. Only putting tilaks, wearing kanthi-mala, etc. are external things. Sometimes people ask me, "Maharaj, what is the mantra to do this? We do not know anything." I tell them, "That is the mantra—'I do not know anything.'"

We have to be humble,

trnadhika hina, dina, akinchana chhara

apane manabi sada chhadi' ahankara

vrksa-sama ksama-guna karabi sadhana

pratihimsa tyaji' anye karabi palana

Give up your false ego, and always consider yourself lower than grass, poor, needy, and mean. Practise tolerance like a tree. Give up vengeance and nurture others.

If somebody gives me some problem, it is my duty to tolerate it and not to make any problem for them in return. They can give me a problem, but I will show them patience and tolerance.

Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur writes in his song "Kabe habe bolo se dina amar":

trnadhika hina kabe nije mani

sahisnuta-guna hrdayete ani'

"When will I feel that I am lower than a blade of grass, when will I bring the quality of tolerance into my heart?"

kabe habe bala se dina amara

aparadha ghuchi suddha name ruchi

krpa-bale ha'be hrdaye sanchara

"Please tell me, when will that day be mine? When will my offences be removed? When will the taste for the pure Name arise in my heart by the power of mercy?"

When will these qualities necessary for chanting the Holy Name come to me? It is necessary to have these qualities—you must be humble, tolerant and give honour to others.

jivana-nirvahe ane udvega na dibe

para-upakare nija-sukha pasaribe

Do not trouble others for your own upkeep, and forget your own happiness in the course of helping others.

You must not give any anxiety to others for the sake of your enjoyment; and for others' benefit, you must give up your own happiness. Just as sannyasis leave their parents, their families and go door to door begging, "Please chant the Holy Name!"

prabhura ajnaya bhai, magi ei bhiksa

bala krsna, bhaja krsna, kara krsna-siksa

"O brothers, on the order of Sriman Mahaprabhu, I beg from you this favour: chant 'Krishna', serve Krishna, and learn about Krishna.

We always pray to devotees, we always beg from people, "Please chant this Holy Name! Please take this book." Distribute books, take prasadam, etc.—there are many kinds of devotional activities, and we come to tell everyone, "Please engage in devotional activities."

* * *

Run After Devotion, Not Visaya

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh (evening Nama-hatta)

4 January 2020, part 5

You struggle your whole life earning money, saving money, etc. You always run behind money, but when you die, you will leave everything and go to the cremation ghat...

Question: When I chant, my mind goes here and there, how can I chant then?

It is the mind's duty to go here, there, everywhere, but if you chant the Holy Name loudly, then your mind will not go outside so much.

Mahaprabhu told,

krsna yadi chhute bhakte bhukti mukti diya

kabhu prema-bhakti na dena rakhena lukaiya

"If you ask Krishna for anything except devotion, He can give you those things—bhukti, mukti, liberation, and so on—but He will hide devotion from you. You will not get devotion."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Adi-lila, 8.18)

We say we want devotion, but at the same time we want this, that, we want a house, we want opulence, etc.—Krishna will give you that and Krishna will remove devotion from you.

Gurudev told one example. Suppose there is one college teacher who has a two-year old son. One morning, he is going to college to teach, and his son suddenly starts crying so much, "Oh, I want to go with my father! I want to go with my father1" The father thinks, "What am I going to do now? I have to go to the college"—and he gives him a chocolate or a toy, and the boy forgets about going with his father. In the same way, we worship the Lord, but if in lieu of that we ask for a house, a car, etc., Krishna will give everything to you, "Here, take it!" but you will not get pure devotion.

* * *

Surrendered Service

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh

5 January 2020, part 1

Jay Om Vishnupad Jagad-Guru Srila Bhakti Sundar Govinda Dev-Goswami Maharaj ki jay.

I am very happy to meet with all the devotees—

vaisnava sangete mana anandita anuksana

sada haya bhakta para-sanga

"In the association of Vaishnavs, my mind is always joyful—in their association I always get the association of devotees."

We are very happy to take the association of devotees, sannyasis—Sripad Shanta Maharaj, Sripad Muni Maharaj, Sripad Sajjan Maharaj, Jagannath Brahmachari is also here—all the matajis, all the devotees from Vijayawada and many devotees from other places. We are meeting after a few months, and actually I am very happy to see your service mood, your service attitude. You know that I do not know your language, and you also do not understand my language (Bengali), but we have a heart to heart connection, and that is sufficient. Sripad Shanta Maharaj, Sripad Muni Maharaj coming to you all the time to give you all their holy association, and it gives me and you all also much happiness. They come here from time to time, they keep connection with you by phone, whatsapp or other media—I do not call you because I do not understand your language (Telugu) and you also cannot understand my language...

Even though I cannot understand your language, you are always in my heart because I am getting energy to see your service mood. You may not be rich, but Srila Vrindavan Das Thakur writes in Sri Chaitanya-bhagavata that Chaitanya Mahaprabhu told,

dinere adhika daya kare bhagavan

kulina, pandita, dhanira bada abhimana

Those who have a high birth, knowledge and wealth are so proud of themselves, but the Lord is so merciful to those who are poor and needy.

Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Antya-lila, 4.68

Mahaprabhu, Srila Prabhupad Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur, Gurudev, Guru Maharaj—they will see what is your service, what you are doing and how much you are trying to please Guru and Vaishnavs. They only see these thing, they do not see your colour, what caste you come from, whether you are a householder, a brahmachari, or a sannyasi. The Lord, Krsihna, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, Prabhupad, Gurudev, Guru Maharaj do not see that—they do not see whether you are black or white, whether you are a Christian or a Buddhist. They always see your seva-manobhav—how much service temper you have.

I see that how much Srinivas Prabhu, Krishna Prasad Prabhu, Vamsi Prabhu and other devotees, all the ladies whom I see as my mothers, try to make me happy. They are giving everything they have—man, buddhi, anankar (mind, intelligence, ego)—to the Lord, to their guru. That is called surrender mood. They give everything they have for the service of the Lord.

I have been coming here for many years now because Sripad Shanta Maharaj comes here and he is very eager to preach here. My Gurudev also tried to make a center here in South India. He once sent some sannyasi to Secunderabad, to Krishnananda Prabhu's house—he gave him some money also to spend on preaching, but he could not succeed. It is Gurudev's desire to have preaching here in South India—he wanted that so that there would be preaching about our Chaitanya Saraswat Math's message, Rupa Goswami's message, Srila Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj's message, preaching about the main line (rupanuga-dhara) in this area.

I see that your devotion is increasing day by day, that you are preaching in whatever capacity you have. I have seen that your capacity is little, you are all family men, you have to give your time to your wife, husband, children, etc. But in the meantime you also have to give time to the service of the devotees. When devotees come or I come, I see that you always stop your job, leave everything and come. It is actually good that you are self-employed (like Srinivas Prabhu, who is an auto-driver) because if you have a government or a contract job, it is very difficult to get time off on any other day except for Sunday. Anyhow, you are all trying to serve and you give love and affection to each other, you help each other. With your help, Gurudev's desire will be fulfilled. I can see that.

* * *

Seva Opportunity

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh

5 January 2020, part 2

You do your job or some other work, you take care of your family—you think (I told about it yesterday also) that your sons, brothers, etc. are your relatives but actually they are svajanakya-dasyu—they are "dacoits in disguise of relatives." This is the title Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur gives them. You think your husband, your wife, sons, brothers, etc. are your relatives, but they are not—for as long as you are alive they will be taking your blood till the last drop, and when you die they will throw you away at the cremation ghat.

I saw one devotee last year, Sripad Muni Maharaj and Sripad Paramarthik Maharaj stayed at his house. He is a retired man, but even though he gave everything to his wife, still she was not happy. She always bound her husband with a rope. I was reading today also one scripture written by Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur—he says a devotee's family (his parents, son, daughter, wife, etc.) complain, "You are giving everything to the Lord, but you are not keeping anything for us! You are not even keeping anything for yourself! What are you doing?!" They live for enjoyment—those who are enjoyers do not know what is service and what our human body is meant for. They do not know anything, they have no Krishna-srti-jnan ("Maya-mugdha jivera nahi krsna-srti-jnana: charmed by maya, the conditioned soul has no knowledge or remembrance of Krishna")—because they do not have any remembrance of Krishna, maya always attacks them.

Gurudev and Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur give one example. Suppose you have a job—you work and get a salary every month, for example 5000 rupees; six-seven years later you become sick and cannot work any more, but you have got that previous salary, so you can manage with that. In this life also, you do some service for two, three, four, five-six years, you get some sukriti from that, and you will get the result based on that. Therefore, you must practise properly. I am also inviting you all to our temple. I have told you—I am giving you an opportunity to serve.

There is one lady who always gives much fruit to us. You can see how strong maya is. That lady has given everything to her son, family, relatives, but what is the result? They kicked her out! I told her that she could come and stay at the temple where she could serve, get some seva opportunity—even when you are sick and stay in the room, but in the nat mandir they do kirtan, bhajans, you can listen to it from the room. Somebody told me yesterday, "Oh, if you can make a temple here, we can stay there." This is pradesi katha (provincialism)! It is like you are saying, "Oh, you can make a temple near my house and I can go there all the time"—but you do not know where you will be born after death; you may not be born in this Andhra Pradesh, you may be born in China, the Netherland, or any other place. They do not understand this. How many days will you be alive? 40 years? Gurudev says if you are alive for twenty years, it means you sleep for ten years and you spend the rest ten years working—then how many hours do you give to the Lord? Those who have some sukriti and can understand these things clearly can join. Actually, you know that it is very hard to get there—you cannot serve big things with little sukriti.

That is why I tell you—if you make a programme once a week, it is good. Sometimes you get holidays, like 26 January holidays are coming [Republic Day], then you can make additional programmes during holiday time. That will be good. Make programmes on Sunday—there are many Sundays in a year. Try to give more time to the service—increase the time you spend on service to the Deities and devotees. Do sadhu-sanga together, try to sing kirtans, read books. There are so many books here, I am very happy that you have printed books in Telugu language, it is very good—everybody can read it in their langage and practice kirtan.

* * *

"My Last Word"

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh

5 January 2020, part 3

You must practise kirtan. Actually, Srila Prabhupad Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur said that kirtan is not a song. A song is different—a song is what all the cinema actors sing, it is 'gan'. Gan and kirtan is not the same. Mahaprabhu becomes happy through your kirtan. The kirtans we do are devotional songs. Everything is bhajan—every single thing you may be doing can be service. For example, you cook, you do as much as you can, and you make the Deities happy. The pujari only offers bhog, but those who cook take care of what is cooked, etc.—cooking service is more important than even the pujari's service.

We sometimes give service, serve prasadam to others, for example, and some think, "I do not like this person, so I will not take care of him; I like that person, and I will take care only of them." This is not good, this is not service. You must always take care of your service.

Always chant the kirtans—Guru-vandana, Vaishnav-vandana, and so on. When you do kirtans, you can practise rememberance. If you do it, I will be very happy. These are the main things for our spiritual life.

Srila Prahlad Maharaj taught about nava-vidha bhakti (nine types of devotion),

sravanam, kirtanam, smaranam, vandanam,

dasyam, sakhyam, atma-nivedanam

"Hearing, chanting, remembering, offering obeisance, rendering service as a servitor, as a friend, and self-submission..."

What is atma-nivedanam? Atma-nivedanam is surrender. Surrender means you must give everything you have. You must stop thinking about other things, you must not think about your family, your brother, your wife, etc. To be surrendered means, "All I know is my Lord—I only know my Guru, I do not know anybody else. This is my last word."

* * *

Courtyard of Vrindavan

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh

5 January 2020, part 4

sadhu-sanga, nama-kirtana, bhagavata-sravana

mathura-vasa, sri-murtira sraddhaya sevana

"One should associate with devotees, chant the Holy Name of the Lord, hear Srimad-Bhagavatam, reside at Mathura and worship the Deity with faith."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Madhya-lila, 22.124)

"Sraddhaya sri-murtira sevan" is archan, or archcha of Svayambhu-vigraha (serving and worshipping the original, self-born Supreme Lord). A Deity of the Lord can be made of eight elements—stone, wood, metal, earth, paint, sand, the mind or jewels. On the one hand, any of these types of Deities are non-different from Svaymabhu-vigraha (the image of the original Supreme Lord), even a picture of the Lord (alekya-mayi) is also a vigraha, but it is also different in the sense that it is very difficult to serve Svayambhu... Anyway, you keep some altar and serve, make offering, etc. This is an important service for you. We must understand and clarify how to make our Gurudev happy. If you think, "I like this," "I do not like that"—this is maho-dharma (concocted religion).

When you chant kirtan, there are so many kirtans, but it is necessary to have adhikar (right)—the kind of kirtan you chant depends upon adhikar, and the quality of your kirtan depends upon devotion. Srila Narottam Das Thakur sings, "Vrndavane chabutara tahe mora mano-ghera—My entire mind dwells within the courtyard of Vrindavan." But we all know where our mind goes. [His Divine Grace laughs.]

Therefore, we must practise constantly and practise perfectly. This is how you must do your service, this is how you must make yourself a devotee. Always preach, engage in sankirtan (congregational chanting), prachar (preaching), etc. Do what is necessary. Continue in this way. Also, everyone must keep in touch with each other, this is the main thing. Devotees' good association gives energy to devotees, be they householders, brahmacharis, sannyasis or vanaprasthas. It is all about bhakta-bhav, the mood of the devotion. Krishna always sees how much devotion you have. Bhakta-bhav (mood of devotion) is the main thing.

yei bhaje sei bada, abhakta—hina, chhara

krsna-bhajane nahi jati-kuladi-vichara

"Only a nondevotee can be considered as worthless and abominable: anyone who takes to devotional service is great—there is no consideration of class, caste or any other status for those who have taken up service to Krishna."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Antya-lila, 4.67)

It is necessary to have the mood of devotion. Yesterday, one devotee asked me a very nice question, "I chant the Holy Name, but my mind is always chanchal (fickle, restless), my mind goes everywhere. What can I do?" I told him the same answer that Srila Prabhupad Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur gave—"if you chant sankirtan loudly, then your mind will be controlled."

"If you loudly chant the prescribed number of rounds of the Holy Name of Krishna, unwanted habits and qualities will go away, and all materialism, etc. will run away—even those who are averse to the Lord, the outside people will not be able to avert it then."

~Guidance 3

* * *

Entering Higher Study

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh

5 January 2020, part 5

[His Divine Grace reads from Questions and Answers chapter from Guidance, Volume 3:]

Sometimes we think, "Why do the teachings of Sri Rupa-Raghunath not enter our ears?"

Answer: When our material desires stop completely, then the teachings and pastimes of Sri Rupa-Raghunath will enter our ears—not before that.

Question: What is the purpose of this body?

Answer: Srila Prabhupad said, “We will not stay in this world for long. If you use your body for chanting the glories of the Lord until its demise, this is the purpose of this body.”

Question: What is the highest religion of the jiva soul?

Answer: Srila Prabhupad said, “Our highest religion is to serve the Vraja-vasis afflicted by the pain of separation from Krishna when He left for Mathura.”

Question: How can one live in Mathura?

Answer: If you want to enjoy and imitate living in Mathura, this is not living in Mathura.

Question: What is the only duty of the man?

Answer: Mahaprabhu teaches:

trnad api sunichena taror api sahisnuna

amanina manadena kirtaniyah sada harih

One who is humbler than a blade of grass, more forbearing than a tree, who gives due honour to others without desiring it for himself, is qualified to always chant the Holy Name of Krishna.

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Antya-lila, 6.239)

Hari-kirtan is the only duty. If you always, constantly chant the Holy Name, then all other works (enjoyment, etc.) will stop. If you do not stay always on the path of remembrance of the Lord, then you will be enjoying your material life. If you do not know how every single thing is related to the Lord, then there will be no need for divine love. Foolish people pray to get some material religion, things, money, lust, liberation. In the words of Sri Gaurasundar, these are basic things taught to children—He taught higher and the highest things. Upanisads, Gita are taught in the infant class, if one wants to enter higher study, then they must discuss Srimad Bhagavatam.

Question: What is the result of sincere service?

Answer: When someone preaches Krsna consciousness without deceit or worships the Lord of all four directions Sri Gaurasundar in the form of His Deity and His instructions (vani), the devotees of Gaura become affectionate to such person and the environment percolated with their affection and mercy makes others’ service successful too.

Question: How can we protect the seed of devotional creeper?

Answer: We can see in Sri Chaitanya-charitamrta that if you do not water it, the seed of the devotional creeper (bhakti-lata bij) will dry and be destroyed. In general, if you plant some seeds and do not water them after that, they will dry up, and if you water them too much, the seeds will rot. It is the same here too—sravan and kirtan (hearing and chanting) is the way to protect the seed of the devotional creeper, but if unqualified people listen to or discuss the highest topics found in the works by Chandi Das, Vidyapati, chapters about rasa-lila, etc. on pretext of sravan, then the tiny seed of their devotional creeper will not sprout, it will die very quickly.

Question: What is the reason of our suffering?

Answer: If we do not discuss the answer to the question ‘Who am I?’, then we experience difficulties in life. Various temptations of material life try to drown us. The moment we drop our guard, Witch Maya grabs us by the throat. Unless we do perpetually listen to discussions about Krishna consciousness, there is no way for us to escape the bondage of Maya.

Question: What is devotion?

Answer: When will the industrious materialists get their promised reward? Who will get it? Where will they get it? We debate about this among ourselves, but almost everyone is going down the wrong path without realising this. Those who have even a little realisation of the spiritual world exclusively worship Chaitanya’s feet dust—Brahma, Brihaspati, Indra and other demigod in charge of various duties—reject such trifle knowledge like stool and urine. Devotion is objection against enjoyment and liberation.

* * *

Outdoors Preaching Campaign

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh

5 January 2020, part 6

"Common people will criticise you saying that they are donors and you are beggars, i.e. they hold a higher position than you, that you are the recipients of their mercy; some will be ready to chastise you—as a result, your tolerance can grow, you will have an opportunity to be humble and give honour to others. Just by seeing your qualities of being humbler than a blade of grass, more tolerant than a tree and respect to others, common jiva souls will be benefited."

Bhagavan Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur told "You must take a loan to preach Mahaprabhu's teachings, then to pay back that loan you will have to engage yourself in service even more. When you have a pending payment for this loan, you will have to engage yourself in even more collection. At the same time, if your practice is not proper and character is not pure, pious grhasthas will not donate anything to you—then you will have to try hard to lead a pure life of a practitioner. I will not leave you even one cent so that in future you do not become lax and leave sankirtan, service to the Lord, and your proper practice of Krishna consciousness."

Do you have any questions?

Question: You were speaking about the relation between the guru and the disciple. Is it correct that a disciple will not offer any defence?

Yes, a disciple will never try to defend himself—one must always have a humble mood. Actually, it is very rare to find a proper disciple. I have told it many times. We take initiation, but actually we pretend to be disciples—instead of becoming proper disciples we become guru-bhogi (we enjoy the guru); or we become guru-tyagi (we reject the guru). It is very rare to see a guru-sevi (a servant of the guru).

You can take some books, for example Gurudev's book Original Source—you can translate it into Telugu and distribute it here, it will be good. It is a small book, a brochure, but it is a very nice book.

Question: What should we do if we do not feel energy to go outside for preaching?

It is necessary to try. Try and try, and you will be successful. Buy a motorcycle and go with your wife door to door—give people leaflets, brochures, etc., beg them. You do not have to leave your work for this. You can go on Saturday and Sunday, or every day. Try to give more time to service, then you will be successful. I have told you how to do it. Somebody will tell, "Oh you are poor, you are coming to beg!" Say, "Yes, thank you. No problem. Please take this leaflet, come to our programme." If you do in this way, you will be successful.

Do not be shy or anything. Srimati Radharani and all the Vraja gopis left everything—even shame, shyness, etc. They have rejected everything.

You can see also what I do. I have been doing collection for many years. This year too, after Gangasagar programme I will go house to house for potato and rice collection. Some people give one kilogramme, two kilogrammes, I do not have any problem with that. Every year I collect 700 kg. I go to 100-120 houses, walking every day in the hot sun—we drive three-four hours by car, then leave the car and start going house to house, sometimes walking in the fields, etc.

Actually, what does collection mean? We do not go door to door for rice or potato! We do not come to hijack anyone's potato, rice, or money. We want to hijack people! I invite people, they give us some potato, they know our address and can come to our programme—there, they will hear Hari-katha, I will 'wash their brain,' and then give them kanthi-mala and chanting beads. That is it. Hijacking is finished.

I started doing this in my brahmachari days in 1992, and I am still doing it. still go to the market, I buy everything, arrange everything. Sometimes, I hear, "Oh, you are an acharya, you are a big world guru and you are going yourself." People can say many things, it does not matter to me. Our temple also has many paddy (cultivation) fields—I would go there myself and oversee the planting of rice, etc...

* * *

Facing Austerity

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Sri Ekachakra Dham, late morning class

5 February 2020, part 1

Actually, the problem is to have a strong desire. Mainly, when will Hari-katha or Krishna-katha enter our ears? When we have a great strong desire. If we have such strong desire, then everything will be proper. Therefore, whatever you want to do, you must have the strongest desire, "I must do it! I will do that!"

I have seen it myself also—I will try and try, and not become discouraged, I will try three times times, four times, five times, a hundred times, more than a million times, it is not a problem—I can and I will keep on trying and trying until I have succeeded, until I have reached my goal. I will not stop trying, that is the main thing.

You said you have missed your flight, but if you have a strong desire, "I must come!", Krishna will anyhow fulfil your desire. You can see that all the kings, all the big personalities who have got the blessing from the Lord have been doing so much austerity. We are afraid of austerity, but it is those who have a very strong desire that succeed. This is true about anything. Whatever you do, it is necessary to have a strong desire. This is true in the case of Dhruva Maharaj, Pariksit Maharaj.

Whereas those who want liberation (mukti-kami loka) do not want austerity—they say, "Oh, I do not want problems!" What is service? Even in the material life, does anything come without austerity? No. Whatever you want to achieve, it is necessary to have some austerity. We must not be afraid of austerity, and we will not run away from austerity.

"I want austerity! I want problems! If more problems come, it is OK, let them come! Let more and more problems come. I am asking for more problems, I want to see how many problems you can give me, Prabhu. I do not mind it at all. I want problems, I will never run away from problems. In fact, I want more and more problems."

When more problems come, it is mercy. Those who want liberation seek some quiet hiding place, want to go to the forest, etc. They go to some hill, stay alone, thinking, "I do not want any austerity." This is not our service mood. Service mood means always welcoming austerity. There will always be so many problems. This is the main thing. Problem and problem, and this is not a problem!

tomara sevaya, duhkha haya yata,

seo ta' parama sukha

"All the distress I encounter in Your service is also my greatest happiness."

(Saranagati 16.4)

That is happiness.

* * *

Distinction of Sri Rupanuga Line

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Sri Ekachakra Dham, late morning class

5 February 2020, part 2

Actually, Sripad Bhakti Chandan Parvat Maharaj used to do collection. Sripad Bhakti Hriday Mahayogi Maharaj and Sripad Bhakti Vaibhav Parivrajak Maharaj did it last year. This year when one man said, "No, no, get out, get out," the person who was collecting thought, "Oh, that man does not want to see us, we will not go there again." I said no—it is not correct. The day before yesterday we went to some mill in the evening, the person in charge shouted at us, "Hey, what you are coming so late at night for?!" The next day I told Ashok Prabhu, "Prabhu, we will go to that mill again today!" When we came to that mill the next day, that same man gave us 100 kg rice—and the day before that, they shouted at us and everybody ran away. Do you see? Who is collecting? Nityananda Prabhu is doing everything.

Actually, we have no shyness, we have no shame, nothing—we have given everything to our guru, to the Lord, so we do not mind anything.

What is the behaviour of a sadhu? If somebody swears me, if somebody treats me bad, what is my problem? It is their problem. If somebody chastises me, if somebody uses bad language or misbehaves with me, this is their problem—it is not my problem. That is why, I do not care for such things. It is service.

Vraja gopis left all their fear, shame, etc.—they do not care about anything. They only think, "One way or another, but we will meet with Prabhu."

And service must always be done with love. In this world, people serve the Lord in three ways. First, somebody worships the Lord because they are afraid. Second, people worship the Lord because have some material desire. You can say this is karma-misra bhakti (devotion mixed with pursuit of material benefit). Third, somebody worships the Lord out of sense of duty. This is called kartavya-bodh. It means people think, "Oh, because we are servants of the Lord and Krishna is the Supreme Personality of Godhead, then we must serve Krishna." This is not right—you must serve Krishna out of love, affection (sneha), out of attachment and love for Krishna.

All Vraja gopis and all Gaudiya sampradaya serve the Lord out of love (bhalobhasa). That is the distinction of Srila Rupa Goswami's line—Sri Rupanuga Sampradaya. Followers of Sri Rupanuga Sampradaya serve Krishna out of love (Krishna-prema).

* * *

Treacherous Desires

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Sri Ekachakra Dham, late morning class

5 February 2020, part 3

Dhruva Maharaj was a king, but when he was five years old, he went to meditate in the jungle. How much yoga, meditation (dhyan) he did during this time—it was too much austerity for a five-year old boy. He did not eat, drink, take bath or anything for five years—he had only been meditating for five years. We sit for half an hour in one place, and our legs start paining; we stand on one place for half an hour, and our legs start paining. But Dhruva Maharaj had practised austerities for five years.

Finally, Krishna was pleased and sent His disciple Narad Goswami to give Dhruva Maharaj initiation. Narad gave him initiation, and Dhruva Maharaj started practising. In the end, Krishna Himself came in front of him. Krishna said to Dhruva Maharaj, "Here, take your kingdom. How much kingdom do you want? Tell Me." Dhruva Maharaj became shy, "O Prabhu! Please do not embarrass me. I do not want any kingdom. I have been foolish. Now that You have come to me, I do not want anything else. You have come, that is sufficient for me. If I get You, what do I need a kingdom for? A kingdom is a simple matter, I want to forget it all." This is what he said in the end.

There are also two points. On the one hand, it is said,

krsna yadi chhute bhakte bhukti mukti diya

kabhu prema-bhakti na dena rakhena lukaiya

"If you ask Krishna for anything except devotion, He can give you those things—bhukti, mukti, liberation, and so on—but He will hide devotion from you. You will not get devotion."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Adi-lila, 8.18)

If you have some material desire and want it to be fulfilled, Krishna will give that to you happily. Suppose you keep a baby on the ground—he will start eating soil, and his mother will come running and crying, "Oh, why are you eating soil?" But the baby does not know that he is eating soil! His mother comes and takes it out of his mouth. We are also foolish—just like babies we want a car, we want a house, a home, a wife, etc. Krishna thinks, "Oh, this is a baby's character! What sort of things do they want?!" If you take soil, mother comes and chastises you; some time later, somebody gives the baby a sweet, and the baby rejects soil thinking, "No, no, no. Soil is not good; now I want something sweet." One fancy replaces another one.

So, if we think we want a car, a house, some opulence, etc., we are being foolish. We think these things are necessary for our life, but if you get the sweetness, the love and affection of Krishna, then you will realise that those things are nothing.

On the other hand, it is also said,

krsna kahe,—ama bhaje, mage visaya-sukha

amrta chhadi' visa mage,—ei bada murkha

ami—vijna, ei murkhe 'visaya' kene diba?

sva-charanamrta diya 'visaya' bhulaiba

"Krishna says, 'They worship Me, desiring material happiness—leaving aside nectar, they ask for poison. They are great fools. I am very intelligent though. Why will I give these fools material things? Instead, I will give them the nectar of My lotus feet and make them forget the material world."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Madhya-lila, 22.38-39)

Krishna says, "I am not a fool—why will I give them visaya (material things)? Instead, I will give them My lotus feet and make them forget visaya! Those who ask Me for fulfilment of their material desires are foolish, but I am intelligent—why will I give material things to them? I will give them Myself instead, and they will forget about those material things!"

We see these two points in Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita written by Srila Krishna Das Kaviraj Goswami.

* * *

Inconceivable Mercy

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Sri Ekachakra Dham, late morning class

5 February 2020, part 4

We can understand Krishna consciousness if we have a desire to serve the Lord—if we have utsaha (enthusiasm), if you want to serve the Lord, if you want to serve Nityananda Prabhu. You can see how merciful Lord Krishna is, but Mahaprabhu is more merciful than Krishna, and Nityananda Prabhu is even more merciful than Gauranga.

Krishna gave mercy to Putana who had come to kill Him. It is inconceivable. He gave mercy to those who came to kill Him, and not only kill—if one kills a baby, there is even more offence in that. So, Krishna gave mercy to a baby-killer. Krishna rescued her.

By the influence of bad association of Kamsa, Purtana became very bad. One day, she wore a gopi-dress and came to Krishna when He was only a few days old. Seeing her gopi-dress, Krishna became pleased (you can understand how dear gopis are to Him). Because Krishna became pleased to see her gopi-dress, Krishna gave her the right to show motherhood. When Krishna took Putana's breast and started sucking it, He took her life. When Putana felt it, she cried, "Leave me! Leave me!" but Krishna says, "I do not easily catch anybody, but if I do catch anybody, I will not leave them so easily."

Putana ran out of the house—she had time to run a little far and then fell down dead. Everybody could see then the demoniac body of Putana—it was so big that it could not be cremated. So, the Vraja basis cut her body into many pieces and burnt them. When they were burning her body, the whole of Vrindavan was full of the smell of sandalwood, camphor, etc. This is the proof that Krishna gave her His mercy. Does everyone's body emanate sandalwood smell when it is burned? No. But when Putana's body was being burnt, the smell of aguru (fragrant water distilled from a herb), chandan (sandalwood), etc. was coming. Everybody was surprised, "What is happening?" And somebody told, "Oh, they are burning Putana."

* * *

Victory over Visaya

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Sri Ekachakra Dham, late morning class

5 February 2020, part 5

We say,

prasada-seva karite haya,

sakala prapancha-jaya

"By honouring the Lord's prasad I conquer all worldly illusions."

(Saranagati, 31.5, by Srila Bhakti Vinod Thakur)

If we take prasad, all kinds of bad elements, bad diseases will be removed; if we chant the Holy Name, all Nama-aparadhas will go away; if we do service, all seva-aparadhas will go away—we do it, but why are we not getting the result? Because we cannot do it properly, it is our fault. It means that there is some fault in what we are doing, that is why we are not getting the result properly. That is the main thing. If you want to do something, if you have a strong desire, then you will succeed, there is no doubt.

visaya chhadiya kabe suddha habe mana,

kabe hama heraba sri-vrindavan

"When will my mind, leaving the material world, become clean? When will I see Sri Vrindavan?"

When will all these material desires, all these nonsense things be removed? It is necessary to live a detached life, like that of Srila Raghunath Das Goswami. The problem is that we cannot do atma-nivedanam (we cannot surrender) properly. We say we surrender, but actually we do not surrender properly. If you can surrender 100%, you will get everything. That is our main conception.

Mainly, the problem is Vaishnav aparadh, doing what is not favourable (what is unfavourable) to devotion. If we do some service but in the meantime use time to do something that is not related to service, then that is not appropriate. Even if you are tired, you can take rest and sleep, that is good, but talking, talking, talking, prajalpa, telling lie, etc. is not good. When prajalpa is going on, then lie, nonsense talks, so many things are there. You must always be reserved, you must always talk less, not so much. When you talk, it should be Krishna-katha. This is the main thing.

Accept only what is necessary for your life, minimum necessity—it is not necessary to have so many things; whatever is required for your life, a little bit, you can use that, otherwise do not accumulate or desire so many things. If you think, "I want this, this, this,"—then you will spend your whole life on that, desires will never stop.

If you have some other desires, some material desires, you think you need something, you will get it, but you will not be happy—you will want something else, you will get that too, and you will again not be happy. For example, you like rasagullas (sweet balls) a lot—you take one piece, OK, two pieces, OK, then ten pieces, then twenty pieces, then another twenty pieces, and when they want to give you more, you will say, "No, I do not want more, I do not like it any more." But when Krishna-prema starts, when it comes, comes, and comes, then you will be happier and happier. You will not feel, "Oh, I have had twenty rasagullas, now I do not like it"—when more and more Krishna-prema comes, you will like it. But when material desires come, you will not be happy with that—you will never be happy, you will never be ananda with that.

* * *

Power of Sukriti

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Sri Ekachakra Dham, late morning class

5 February 2020, part 6

Sanda and Amarka taught Prahlad Maharaj nonsense things, but Prahlad Maharaj did not take that association—he did not accept their teaching. Prahlad Maharaj had some previous sukriti (actions related with the Lord), and through that sukriti he could follow the proper teaching that he had got from Narad Goswami. You know that Lord Nrisinghadev actually appeared for Prahlad Maharaj, but even before that, in Prahlad Maharaj's previous life, there was also Lord Nrisingha. You may wonder how it can be possible. It is possible. Valmiki also wrote Ramayan long before Rama-lila happened—he wrote the whole story sixty thousand years before it happened.

Before Prahlad Maharaj's time, Nrisinghadev was also there. In his previous life, Prahlad Maharaj was born in a village as a boy named Vasudev. He grew up and became a young boy, and you know what character young boys have—he liked one girl and after talking and talking with her, he wanted to engage in some material things with her, some wrong things came to his mind. So, one day Vasudev and that girl went to look for some secluded place. Where were they to find it? At that time, there were not so many houses in the village, but there was one abandoned temple covered by jungle, forest. The bush had not been cut for many years, and the temple was very dirty. Sometimes, once a week, a lady would bring and offer some fruit to the Deity, but other than that nobody went there. The place was very secluded, so Vasudev told the girl, "We will go there!"

Both went into the temple, and when the girl saw that the place was very dirty, she said, "Ugh, this is such a dirty place, we will not do anything here!" But Vasudev said, "No, no, no, do not worry. I will clean it!" He cleaned some part of the temple, and through that he got sukriti—by the power of that sukriti he got a devotee's body next life.

* * *

Atma-Buddhi

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Sri Ekachakra Dham, late morning class

5 February 2020, part 7

The problem is ego.

kabe sri chaitanya more karibena daya

kabe ami paiba vaisnava-pada-chhaya

"When will Sri Chaitanya be merciful to me? When will I reach the shade of the Vaishnavs' feet?"

kabe ami chhadiba e visayabhimana

kabe visnu-jane ami kariba sammana

"When will I give up this mundane ego? When will I honour the Lord's devotees?"

Always chant this. Chant, chant, chant, always think about it. Everybody has ego, I also say that I have ego.

gala-vastra krtanjali vaisnava-nikate

dante trna kari' dandaiba niskapate

"With a cloth around my neck, joined palms, and straw between my teeth, I will sincerely submit myself at the Vaishnav's feet."

If we pay obeisance to Vaishnavs, if we give respect to Vaishnavs, then ego will go away. Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur says that among one thousand Vaishnavs you will get one Krishna's devotee. We do not consider ourselves a Vaishnav, what to speak of a devotee of Krishna. We are even farther away from being Krishna's devotee. You may get one devotee of Krishna out of one thousand Vaishnavs.

kabe ami chhadiba e visayabhimana

kabe visnu-jane ami kariba sammana

"When will I give up this mundane ego? When will I honour the Lord's devotees?"

If you have fifty kilogrammes of rice on your head, you feel so much pain, so much pressure—even if you come into an A/C room, you will not get any comfort there because you have heavy things on your head. We still have ego, we still cannot even understand what we are—we cannot even understand that we are eternal servants of the Lord. We still think I am a man, I am a woman, I am Indian, I am Russian, I am English—we still do not understand this, then how will we get the relationship with the Lord? Your body has no relation with the Lord. Only your real self (atma, soul) has relation with the Lord—only atma knows what is necessary and what is not necessary for the Lord, what is essential for the Lord, etc. Only atma knows it. But we still cannot think, "I am not this body, I am the soul." We cannot understand it—such intelligence, such buddhi has not come to us. That is why we think, "I am Russian," "I am Brazilian," "I am English," "I am American," "I am Colombian."

Srimad Bhagavatam and so many scriptures say,

naham vipro na cha nara-patir napi vaisyo na sudro

naham varni na cha grha-patir no vanastho yatir va

kintu prodyan-nikhila-paramananda-purnamrtabdher

gopi-bhartuh pada-kamalayor dasa-dasanudasah

"I am not a brahman, I am not a ksatriya, I am not a vaisya or a sudra. Nor am I a brahmachari, a householder, a vanaprastha or a sannyasi. I identify Myself only as the servant of the servant of the servant of the lotus feet of Lord Sri Krishna, the maintainer of the gopis. He is like an ocean of nectar, and He is the cause of universal transcendental bliss. He is always existing with brilliance."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Madhya-lila, 13.80; Padyavali)

* * *

Buddhi-Suddhi

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Sri Ekachakra Dham, late morning class

5 February 2020, part 8

Srila Bhakti Raksak Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj composed the Archan-kan book, and there he wrote a sloka called buddhi-suddhi. Buddhi-suddhi means when you are going to do archan—you recite mantras for the archan, you chant that the cloth is clean, the chamara is clean, the peacock fan is clean, the pancha-pradip is clean, etc. Everything is clean, and you think, "OK, it is clean," but you must also think, "Is my mind clean?" Do you ever think about it?

That is why Srila B.R. Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj gave that sloka there. I am now priting the Archan-kan book, and that buddhi-suddhi sloka is there. We put tilaks on twelve parts of our body, that is OK, but you can read there that lastly it says, "Please, I am sitting at Your lotus feet, I am taking shelter at Your lotus feet—I clean my mind and then start the archan. That is called buddhi-suddhi. It means your mind becomes pure.

divyam sri-hari-mandiradhya-tilakam kantham sumalanvitam

vaksah sri-hari-nama-varna-subhagam sri-khanda-liptam punah

putam suksma-navambaram vimalatam nityam vahantim tanum

dhyayech chhri-guru-pada-padma-nikate sevotsukas chatmanah

"Meditate that the Lord's Temple (your body) is decorated with shining tilak, your neck bears a beautiful tulasi-mala, your chest is adorned with the Names of Sri Hari and sandalwood paste, you are wearing fine, new, clean cloth, and in your pure, eternal form, you are at the lotus feet of Sri Guru, eager for service."

[A devotee notices some insects in the flowers placed at the feet of His Divine Grace and takes the flowers away.]

She saw an insect in the flower, that is OK, it is correct to remove it, but we have many insects in our mind also...

* * *

Zest for Service

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Sri Ekachakra Dham, late morning class

5 February 2020, part 9

In Gurudev's time, from my brahmachari life, I have been going house to house, from one rice mill to another, I have been collecting rice, potato, etc. Now I am teaching Sripad Niriha Maharaj, he is also going house to house—somebody gives him one kilo, two kilos, five hundred grams even, but we collect minimum twenty-five kilos, not less than that (our target is twenty-five, fifty or one hundred kilo per mill). This year everybody told me, "Oh, our business is bad this year," "This is bad," "That is bad," but I have already collected the amount of rice that was collected last year—that amount is already finished and we still have two more days to go after the festival. Ashok Prabhu also told me that this year there may be less collection, but I have already crossed the limit of the last year.

When I went for an operation in 2005, some devotee told Gurudev not to send me that year for collection because of the operation, but Gurudev said, "Maybe he is sick, but he is going door to door, and somebody gives 500 grams, somebody gives 200 grams or 100 grams, but they give their energy for service at Gaura Purnima, for service to the Lord. You cannot destroy that energy!" Later Gurudev told me, "You must remember that I will never buy rice for Gaura Purnima. I can spend so much money and make Gaura Purnima festival, but I cannot buy rice for Gaura Purnima." Then I understood what Gurudev wanted. He wants to give benefit to others, and he wants us to go for collection for that reason.

For that, I think that the Lord arranges everything that is necessary for His service—only our desire, wish, will is necessary. You have heard many times about Mother Yasoda trying to bind Gopal. When Mother Yasoda wanted to tie Gopal, Lord Krishna, she succeeded. Who can tie Gopal? He is all over the universe, and He shows that—no matter how much rope Mother Yasoda tried to tie Him with (there were thousands and thousands of cows, so much rope was there), it was always two fingers too short. Still, Mother Yasoda tried and tried, and she succeeded. What do those two fingers mean? One finger is desire and the other finger is mercy. If you have desire ("I will do it!"), you will succeed. It is necessary to have desire, otherwise sitting idle, laziness will not take you far. You think, "I have already taken initiation from my guru, he has a big temple. Now my job is finished. I am a disciple of a big guru. I have got everything" No, this is laziness. Those who think like this cannot reach their goal.

* * *

When I made the temple in Bankura, I installed there the Deities of Radha Raman. This is Gurudev's favourite name of Deities, these Deities were installed in Kaikhali (Sri Sri Guru Gauranga Radha Raman). Sripad Bhakti Kanan Giri Maharaj lived in Bankura, he made a temple there. One of his followers later took initiation from me and gave me their house—I demolished that mud house and made the temple there....

* * *

....There are different kinds of culture, different kinds of people. I saw yesterday in the newspapper that an aeroplane evacuated people from China—400-430 people were rescued from there. There is some virus, bacteria in China now, so many people are suffering, and five cities have collapsed. Scientists say they are discovering so many medicines, but Lord Yamaraj says, "You can invent five hundred medicines a year, but I can give you five million diseases a year!" They do not know anything about this virus, they do not know how to cure it, they do not have any medicine for it, and people are dying. This is Kali-yuga—everything is slowly, slowly finishing.

* * *

Grand Festival

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Sri Ekachakra Dham, evening class

8 February 2020, part 1

Jay Om Vishnupad Jagad-Guru Srila Bhakti Sundar Govinda Dev-Goswami Maharaj ki jay

Om Vishnupad Jagad-Guru Srila Bhakti Raksak Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj ki jay

Jay saparikara Sri Sri Guru Gauranga Gandharva Govinda Sundarjiu ki jay

Om Vishnupad Bhagavan Sri Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Goswami Thakur Prabhupad ki jay

Rupanuga-guru-varga ki jay

Namacharya Haridas Thakur ki jay

Vrinda Devi Tulasi Devi Sri Bhakti Devi ki jay

Sri Shyama Kunda Radha Kunda Sri Giri Govardhan ki jay

Sri Mayapur Dham Sri Nabadwip Dham Sri Vrindavan Mathura ki jay

Sri Purusottam Ksetra ki jay

Baladev Subhadra Jagannathjiu ki jay

Akar Math-raj Sri Chaitanya Math ki jay

Mayapur Yogapith ki jay

Sri Chaitanya Saraswat Math ki jay

Tandiya sakha Math samuha ki jay

Sri Mather sevak vrinda bhakta-vrinda ananta-koti Vaishnav vrinda ki jay

Sri Gaudiya Acharya vrinda ki jay

Tridandi-pad-gan ki jay

Saparsada Sriman Nityananda Prabhu ki jay

Saparsada Sriman Mahaprabhu ki jay

Bhakta-raj Prahlad Maharaj ki jay

Suddha-bhakti-vighna-vinasankari Bhagavan Nrisinghadev ki jay

Sri Sada-Siva Gangadhar Giriraj Govardhan ki jay

Ekachakra Dham ki jay

Dham-vasi bhakta-vrinda ki jay

All the worldwide devotees ki jay

Harinam sankirtan ki jay

Nitai Gaura premanande Hari bol

Devotee: Jay Om Vishnupad Paramahamsa Jagad Guru Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj ki jay. Gaura premanande Hari bol

By the mercy of Gurudev, by the mercy of Sri Nityananda Prabhu, we have already finished our Nityananda-trayodasi festival. We feel very grateful, we feel much happiness that such a big festival has taken place without any problems. We are trying to fulfil the desire of Gurudev and Guru Maharaj. We think that without Nityananda Prabhu's mercy, without Gurudev's mercy, we are not able to do it, we have no capacity—everything happens by the mercy of Lord Nityananda Prabhu and Gurudev.

We do not know for how many days in this life we can do this service like this, but we are always enthusiastic, we are always trying to serve Gurudev or Nityananda Prabhu, and it is Their matter whether they will accept our service or not, we do not know this. Our duty is to always try to do our best. Without service to the guru and Vaishnavs, if we cannot make our guru and Vaishnavs happy, then our spiritual life is going in a wrong way. You must be always alert, you must be always careful not to make any offence to the guru and Vaishnavs.

Once, Mahaprabhu decided to test Srivas Pandit. Mahaprabhu told him, "Srivas, you always give shelter to Nityananda Prabhu at your house, but you do not know His caste, you do not know what His religion is, who He is, etc. You should kick him out of your house." Srivas Pandit laughed, "Prabhu, You are coming to test me! You are coming to joke with me! I know that your body and Nityananda's body is the same. Even is Nityananda Prabhu does bad things, even if He brings a prostitute, my mind and my heart will not change about Nityananda Prabhu." When Mahaprabhu heard this from the mouth of Srivas Pandit, He said, "Hari bol! Hari bol!" and embraced Srivas Pandit. Srivas Pandit said then, "Prabhu, You please give me Your mercy that I may carry on this kind of mentality, this kind of thinking about Nityananda Prabhu my whole life."

That is Nityananda Prabhu. His mercy is inconceivable. Therefore, only very fortunate souls can join this kind of festival and enjoy with it. Actually, I am thinking now that there is always a grand festival in Nabadwip at Gaura Purnima time, but this festival is becoming more and more grand—more and more thousands of people come to take prasadam, to join this festival. It is all only mercy of Gurudev, it is Guru Maharaj's will.

* * *

"My Gratitude"

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Sri Ekachakra Dham, evening class

8 February 2020, part 2

When we want to do some service, our mind always takes us in the opposite direction:

nidralasya hata sukarya

virata akarya udyogi ami

"I am ruined by laziness and sleep. I do not like to do what is good, I like to do what is bad."

Our lifestyle is always laziness, sleep, etc. We do not get the energy to serve Vaishnavs, we do not get the energy to chant the Holy Name, we do not get any enthusiasm to serve the guru and Vaishnavs because we still have some bad things in our hearts.

visaya chhadiya kabe suddha habe mana,

kabe hama heraba sri-vrindavan

"When will my mind, leaving the material world, become clean? When will I see Sri Vrindavan?"

When will I be able to leave my material attachment? When will my mind be pure? When will I always think about Sriman Nityananda Prabhu's pastimes, Mahaprabhu's pastimes, Gurudev's and Guru Maharaj's pastimes, the pastimes of Radha-Krishna? When will we be always able to remember this? Everybody should always think about it.

So many devotees are helping us with this festival—somebody cannot help physically, but they are helping through their mind, through their funds, money, etc. I am not only thanking them, I am very grateful to them because they are doing so much for Gurudev. One time, Gurudev told me, "Do not worry, when some door closes, another door will open." Therefore, I am thinking that it is all happening automatically, on it own accord.

I started construction in nine places last year (in 2019), and almost all construction is finished, The construction in Ekachakra finished, in Nrisingha Palli finished, in Bankura finished, in Midnapore finished, in Tarakeshwar finished, in Ganga Sagar finished, only there is still some construction due in Mayapur, Bangladesh, and Uluberia—in these three places, the construction is not finished yet, it is still going on...

* * *

Guard Your Service Life

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Sri Ekachakra Dham, evening class

8 February 2020, part 3

Whatever problem comes, we will not run away from our service. Problems will always come—we are in the battlefield, and we will fight against maya until our death. That is our conception. We will not fight against men, but we will fight against ourselves. We are always attacked by kama, krodha, etc., and we will always fight against that.

We must understand clearly what Gurudev wanted and how we can fulfil Gurudev's desire. Actually, I have never wanted to be a guru, I have always wanted and still want to be a proper disciple of my guru. Never do I think that I am a guru. At most, you can say I am the guardian of servitors. I never consider myself big—you saw yourself also that I go door to door collecting rice, collecting vegetables. This is what Sriman Mahaprabhu instructed, and my Gurudev also did it. I only want to be a proper servitor of my guru. To be a devotee of Krishna is a very high plane, it is very far away—if I can simply get the foot dust of Krishna's devotees, the foot dust of Vraja gopis, that is sufficient for me.

You must serve, you must try to serve the mission of Sri Chaitanya Saraswat Math. I have told you before—we are Krishna's soldiers, fighting against maya. Maya is created by Lord Krishna, and we want to fight against her. We are always reluctant to fight, we always fight among ourselves because of our ego, that is our problem. Service always runs away from a servitor through offences or through ego. False ego always eats our devotional activities, our devotional life.

Everybody must be serious in their devotional life. If we have no desire to serve the Lord, then automatically laziness, ahara, nidra, bhaya, maithunam cha (eating, sleeping, fearing, lust) will keep increasing day by day. If we are afraid of service and we keep away from service, then maya will search out a hole just like an ant that is always searching a hole. As soon as you keep a little distance from your service, maya will automatically attack you and you will become busy with nonsense things. However, if you make yourself busy with service, then your mind will not be disturbed and will not be engaged with nonsense things.

Therefore, serve according to your capacity—always remember Krishna, remember Gurudev, remember Lord Nityananda. Always think about service. Even if somebody is bodily sick, they can always think, "Oh, I cannot do service," "I cannot do it"—he or she will also maintain their service mood, they will also always remember service. Somebody is an expert at computers, somebody translates books, somebody can do other service, whatever service you can do, always engage yourself in the activities of the service of the Lord. That is the main thing.

People often wonder about me, "How can he do that?" I am telling you that in fact when I do some service, I get happiness. If any problem comes to me, I happily accept it. I am not the kind of person who will run away from the battlefield. I always fight with myself.

Kama, krodha, lobha, mada, moha, matsarya—lust, anger, greed, attachment to material things, illusion, jealousy—these are the bad elements that we have within ourselves. We can be our friends, and we can be our enemies... That is why, everybody must be careful about committing a Vaishnav aparadh. If you scoop milk from a pot with a glass that has a hole, all milk will fall down. So, if you do service and also talk nonsense, do prajalpa, waste time, gossip about others, criticise others, speak about others, always think about others' nonsense things, etc. you will not get any result. You must close the holes first. Do not think about anybody's bad qualities, it is very harmful for your practising life.

Also, we must always follow rules and regulations. Viddhi-marga is always necessary. Following rules and regulations properly and do not follow what your mind tells you.

* * *

Do Not Fear Sacrifice

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Sri Ekachakra Dham, evening class

8 February 2020, part 4

What the guru and Vaishnavs tell, that is service. Sometimes we do something, but it becomes karma. Karma means karma bandhan (bondage), and the result of karma bandhan is going to hell. You become bound by karma. Therefore, you must practise your Krishna consciousness life out of love and affection. You must serve Krishna with love—not only fear, not only in the hope that you will get some benefit, etc. Not like this. Do you understand? You must serve with love.

I heard the other day that the toilets outside the temple are very dirty, and today I heard that some devotees cleaned them. I am very happy with that. I have heard also today that someone took all the thrown away prasadam plates and cleaned that place—they put all the plates in the truck and threw them away. They are cleaning the temple, I am very happy with that. I have seen today some devotees cleaning—they are doing service properly, and I am very happy with that. Cleaning is the most most important service. Mahaprabhu showed it in Puri when He cleaned the Gundicha Temple.

A few days ago I got very angry because when I came from Nabadwip and the collection for Gaura Purnima, I saw that the temple was very dirty. I chastised the devotee who cleans, "You are a cleaning person, but what is happening here? Everything is dirty! The whole temple is dirty!" But when I came back from rice collection a few days later, I saw that the temple was cleaned in a very perfect way.

Life should be for service. You must sacrifice in your life. Those who can make sacrifice in their life, they get the real benefit.

Once, Gurudev told me (I had not taken sannyas at that time, I was a brahmachari), "Vinod, some guest is coming at Gaura Purnima time, but there are no rooms. Where will they stay?" I told Gurudev, "I have my room, they can sleep there, and I will sleep in the corridor. It is not a problem." That year, Risabdev Prabhu came from America. There were no rooms left, there were no rooms in the foreign section—where will he sleep? At that time, Govinda Kunda did not manifest properly, there were no buildings there; some rooms were given to the foreign devotees in the Centenary building, but more devotees came that year and we did not know where to put them. I remembered what Gurudev had told me—he said, "When I went to Risabdev Prabhu's house, he gave his room to me and slept in the corridor." That is why when Gurudev asked me where he would sleep, I said he could sleep in my room, and I would sleep in the corridor.

You must show sacrifice in your life. It is necessary.

* * *

Hidden Service

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Sri Ekachakra Dham, evening class

8 February 2020, part 5

You must think this is your home. You see that I started building the floor above the nat mandir less than a year ago (I started after Gaura Purnima) and I have finished it. There are now nineteen rooms and ten bathrooms. Otherwise, every year they take so much money for the pandal and everybody fights because the pandal is not good quality, nobody goes to stay in the pandal—everybody slept in the corridor in the nat mandir. It was very difficult. That is why I prayed to Nityananda Prabhu [to arrange rooms for the devotees], and some devotees helped to build these rooms.

I do not want to mention their names because there are so many painful things going on in this world. If I mention their names, I have so many friends all over the world—some of them will speak to them against me and wash their brain, they will tell them not to give money. If they are happy to do that, it is all right, I do not have any problem with that. Therefore, I always keep their names secret. I know who helps me—Krishna knows it, Gurudev knows it. That is sufficient.

Also, I want to keep their names secret because we do not have faith like that of Srivas Pandit. Srivas Pandit's faith is the strongest faith, super strongest you can say. Everybody's faith is not like that. When somebody puts some poison in others' brain, they change their mind. That is why I keep them secret. Therefore, our faith must be strong. Practise, practise and practise.

It is very sad to say it, but there are some whom Gurudev believed but they betrayed Gurudev. They wanted to be a guru and started taking pratistha. They show false renouncement, false humility, but inside they have pratistha coming. They wanted to be a guru, and I have no problem with that. It is only sad that Gurudev believed them, but they betrayed him... Well, if they are happy to do that, I do not have any problems...

* * *

Spiritual Promotion

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Sri Ekachakra Dham, evening class

8 February 2020, part 6

[About the background sounds coming from a temple in the neighbourhood:]

They are singing nonsense things. Do you know what they are singing? Nauka-vilas (boat pastimes). Krishna is the boatman and all the Vraja-gopis are going in His boat to the other bank of the Yamuna to sell curd, yoghurt, butter, etc. They mix it with material things and tell nonsense.

Anyhow, we are starting our preaching again from tomorrow....

...If you live in family life, it is not bad, but do not be too attached with the family life. Gurudev said it, and I also tell it clearly—I do not like it when you always change husbands, always change wives. I do not like it. Harmonise with each other. Sometimes, husband and wife say something to each other one time, one of them gets angry and says, "Get out!" This is not good. You must harmonise with each other.

You struggle so much in your life, but how many days have we got in this lifetime? We do not want to be demoted. We want to be promoted, and this promotion will come through service—through the service to the guru and Vaishnavs. That is the main thing. Ask for Krishna, do not keep any material desires. Only think, "How can I make Krishna happy?"

na dhanam na janam na sundarim kavitam va jagadisa kamaye

mama janmani janmanisvare bhavatad bhaktir ahaituki tvayi

"I do not want wealth, I do not want knowledge, I do not want beauty, I do not want to be a poet. I only want causeless devotion to Your lotus feet. Give me that kind of devotion to Your lotus feet so that I could do Your service life after life."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Antya-lila, 20.29)

Krishna says we are babies—we want to eat soil. When we get the taste of something sweet, then we will think that sweet is better than soil. When we want soil, we are like little babies who do not know anything, who always want to eat soil. Dhruva Maharaj also wanted to get his kingdom, but when Krishna came to him and wanted to give him the kingdom, he said, "Prabhu, I am getting shy. Please take Your kingdom. When You have come to me, I do not want any kingdom any more. When I have got You, everything else is useless for me."

* * *

Puja with Love

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Sri Ekachakra Dham, evening class

8 February 2020, part 7

When Krishna is in Bengal, He takes rice. When Krishna is in Mathura, He takes chapati. When Krishna is in Venezuela, he takes arepa. [To one of the devotees:] What do Russian people take? Noodles? In Russia, they always take wheat, is it not? I do not know how they eat it—one day they boiled wheat. I told them it is cow's food—we give it to the cows here.

...Pujari must serve with love and affection. When you do puja, you must do it with love, wearing clean clothes, etc. Actually, I have always been afraid to do puja. Gurudev also said he was afraid. He told me once, "You will not be a puja man." That is why, I never go inside the Deities' room. I have gone inside two-three times in Nabadwip to clean, when it was being painted, and when there was a flood in 2000—we had to take the Deities to the roof, and everybody was afraid to take the Deities. I did not mind it. Mahaprabhu is a little bit lighter, so I took Him, and two more devotees took Krishna and Radharani (They are very heavy). We put the Deities into a boat and three of us carried them to the roof...

Jay Om Vishnupad Jagad-Guru Srila Bhakti Sundar Dev-Goswami Maharaj ki jay

Visva-varenya Srila Guru Maharaj ki jay

Om Vishnupad Jagad-Guru Srila Bhakti Raksak Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj ki jay

Jay saparikara Sri Sri Guru Gauranga Gandharva Govinda Sundarjiu ki jay

Om Vishnupad Bhagavan Sri Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Goswami Thakur Prabhupad ki jay

Rupanuga-guru-varga ki jay

Namacharya Haridas Thakur ki jay

Sri Chaitanya Saraswat Math ki jay

Tandiya sakha Math samuha ki jay

Sri Mather sevak vrinda bhakta-vrinda ki jay

Ananta-koti Vaishnav vrinda ki jay

Sri Gaudiya Acharya vrinda ki jay

Tridandi-pad-gan ki jay

Sri Chaitanya Saraswat Krishna-anusilana sangha ki jay

Ekachakra Dham ki jay

Hadai Pandit Padmavati Maiya ki jay

Harinam sankirtan ki jay

Nitai Gaura premanande Hari bol

* * *

Our Mistake

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Translated into English from Bengali

15 February 2020, part 1

The Lord can hear everything—whether anyone listens to the discussions about the Lord or not, the Lord Himself can hear it. That is our great fortune. You must give your mind to Hari-katha (listen attentively). You can do everything, but if you do it absent-mindedly, what is the use? You must focus your mind. You must offer your mind at the lotus feet of Krishna; if you do not do it, then you can do so many things, earn so much money, but it is all in vain. The main thing is hearing about the Lord, engaging in sravan and kirtan.

I see devotees are cooking now, so much smoke is coming, everybody will come and take prasadam—so many people will turn up, but not everybody has the fortune to hear about the Lord. Nonetheless, we have got this opportunity today, and we will utilise this opportunity for the supreme purpose.

We have passed many lifetimes for an unlimited time. Since the time immemorial we have been averse to Krishna. Krsna-bahirmukha jivera nahi Krsna smrti-jnana—souls that are averse to Krishna have no knowledge or remembrance of Krishna." We do everything in this world, we have a wife, children, grandchildren, and year after year we keep ourselves so busy that even when there is a class going on, we cannot listen to it attentively.

You are doing so many things in this world, but you are not doing one thing—you are not doing that which is necessary for your life. You love your family who are merely disguised dacoits, but you do not love the Lord. We do not do that which is necessary for our life, that which is the most important duty in human life. We have lost connection with Him for whom we have got this human birth, for whom we have come to this world.

You think you have come to this world for your father and mother, but this is wrong. My parents gave me this body, but they did not give me myself. We are souls and we come from the Lord. However, we are not doing that which is the most important thing in this life. Do you know where that leads? It leads to demotion. Just as there is promotion, there is also demotion. When you work, you can get promoted and you can also get demoted. As a result of our promotion we have got this human birth, but having got this human birth we are not serving Him whom we should be serving. If we come to this world and do the same things we did in our previous lives, then we will be demoted—we will not get this human birth again. We will have to go down and be born as dogs, goats, sheep, cats, mosquitos, frogs, earthworms, etc. we will even have to be born as worms that live in stool. You must think about it.

We have come to this material world and everyone of us will have to leave this world one day, but it is not sure if I will get this human birth again or not. Most souls will not get it again. Out of 100% of humans, 99% will not get it again. We will have to be born in another species. The Lord has left some prescribed rules in Srimad Bhagavatam—if we do not follow these rules properly, our fortune is extremely bad.

* * *

Spiritual Diet

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Translated into English from Bengali

15 February 2020, part 2

We eat so many things just to get some trifle pleasure of the tongue, but whatever we eat here in this world—dal, rice, vegetables, etc.—it is all food for the body. You can see it for yourself. Check your weight the day before ekadasi and the day after fasting on ekadasi—you will se that your weight went down. So, if you do not eat dal, rice and take only anukalpa (non-grain) for one day, the weight of the body decreases by one kilogramme. So, whose food is rice, dal, vegetables, etc.? This is the body's food, it is not our food. Our food is hearing about Krishna consciousness, hearing about spiritual topics.

These spiritual topics do not enter everyone's ears. If you show enthusiasm, eagerness, if you step forward to get the service of the Lord, then you can hear it. Unless we make this step forward ourselves, unless we become our own friends—if we become our own enemies, if we do not make any effort—then Hari-katha will not enter our ears.

Whether you hear Hari-katha or not, whether you chant the Holy Name or not, this is your own matter. Somebody can do it or not do it, it is their matter. Most people do not hear, do not chant. If even one person comes to this line and chants the Holy Name, this person gets benefit.

Anyhow, one day we will all close our eyes and leave this material world leaving all money, cars, houses, wealth, etc.

kaya bara eli kaya bara geli

tabu tattva na sikhili

nijer matha nije khaili

e-dosa dibe kare bhai?

"Coming and going, coming and going, and never learnt anything. You have been eating your own brain, who will you blame now, brother?"

It is our own fault that we have never tried to come towards the Lord.

One time, Mother Yasoda tried to bind Krishna. She tried a thousand times, she brought rope from so many cows to tie Krishna, and as a result of her effort, Krishna allowed her to bind Him. You want to bind Krishna, but where is He? I have told you before—Krishna stays in the hearts of His devotees. Devotees' hearts are cool, and the hearts of non-devotees are never cool or peaceful. Non-devotees always want something—they want money, wealth, cars, houses, etc. The Lord says that this a baby's behaviour.

Babies do not understand anything. For example, you can sit here quiet, but they cannot—they do not understand it. We too are like babies in front of the Lord. If you leave a baby in the middle of the road, it will start eating soil. Then the baby's mother will come and take the soil out of his mouth—and the child will start crying. If I tell you, "Listen, you do not need money! You do not need a car!" you will be unhappy, "What is this Maharaj saying?" I tell you that you do not need anything, the Lord will give you everything you need, but you will still cry just like that baby when his mother took soil out of his mouth. If you give some sweets to the baby, the baby will smile and laugh thinking, "Oh, mother was right. She took out the soil and gave me this sweet, I like it much more." In the same way, if you follow what the guru and Vaishnavs tell you, if you follow the scriptures, you will never be unhappy.

The Lord says that people here are all babies—they want money, houses, etc. Like babies, they eat soil, they eat cow dung, they eat dirt, etc. but when they grow up they become intelligent. For example, cows eat grass—if you give them chhana-rasa and say this is prasadam, will they eat it? They will not. Will a pig eat it? No. But if you give it some stool, it will eat it happily—even if you try to explain to the pig that this food is good, will it understand it? It will not, because stool is its favourite food.

We have got this human birth and we need this, we need that, and we think we cannot do without it, but if you take only what is necessary to maintain life, that is sufficient. It is not necessary to want more than that. If you want much, then the more you want, the more restless and unhappy you will be. It only increases the problems.

* * *

"Does It Cross Your Mind?"

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Translated into English from Bengali

15 February 2020, part 3

We chant so many rounds of the Holy Name—but why are we not getting the result? We sing in the kirtan,

prasada-seva karite haya,

sakala prapancha-jaya

"By honouring the Lord's prasad I conquer all worldly illusions."

(Saranagati, 31.5, by Srila Bhakti Vinod Thakur)

But have anyone's illusions gone away? Maybe yours have, but mine not yet. There are five diseases—avidya (ignorance), asmita (false identification), raga (misdirected love), dvesa (aversion to anything that goes against one's enjoyment), and abhinivesa (being unable to give up unfavourable habits). Perhaps, your diseases are gone, but I still have these diseases—but we take prasad every day, so what should we do? We do prasad-seva, but our material diseases are not going away. We chant the Holy Name, but why are we not getting the result quickly?

Suppose you want to take some water, but if there is a hole in your glass and you do not see it, then all water will fall through it. In the same way, no matter how much we chant, we have holes—these holes are offences. Nama-aparadh, seva-aparadh, dham-aparadh, Vaishnav-aparadh—everything falls through these holes. So, what do we do? It is necessary to practise prasad-seva. If you do prasad-seva, all material diseases will go away—but we do prasad-seva, and our material diseases are not going away; you must understand where the deficiency is. Seva-aparadh, dhama-aparadh, Vaishnava-aparadh...

Listen carefully, do not let your mind wander to other places. You must listen attentively. If you listen attentively, you will understand it. When we worship the Deities, we see if the chamar is clean or not, if our clothes are clean or not, if the lamp stand is clean or not, if the plate with all the items for the worship is set OK or not, but do you ever think if your mind is clean or not? That is why our Param Guru Maharaj wrote a nice "nija dhyan" or "buddhi-suddhi" sloka in the Archchan-kan.

divyam sri-hari-mandiradhya-tilakam kantham sumalanvitam vaksah

sri-hari-nama-varna-subhagam sri-khanda-liptam punah

putam suksma-navambaram vimalatam nityam vahantim tanum dhyayech

s chhri-guru-pada-padma-nikate sevotsukan chatmanah

"Meditate that the Lord’s Temple (your body) is decorated with shining tilak, your neck bears a beautiful tulasi-mala, your chest is adorned with the Names of Sri Hari and sandalwood paste, you are wearing fine, new, clean cloth, and in your pure, eternal form, you are at the lotus feet of Sri Guru, eager for service."

So, if you do not listen attentively (if you do not give your mind to Hari-katha), you will just sit here and not get any benefit—just now this Prabhu was asleep, could he hear anything?

Devotee: The mind is fickle, it goes to other things.

Yes, it does, and it will not do. You cannot be sitting and thinking, "Has a goat eaten my cabbage or not?" You cannot serve like this.

In this world, people chant the Holy Name or serve the Lord for three reasons. First kind of people worship the Lord because they are afraid—if they do not worship the Lord, what if some sin comes later? Number two, they say, "If we worship the Lord, it will bring auspiciousness to our house—everybody will be healthy, we will have children, grandchildren, everything will be ok, everything will run properly." You can say, this is karma-misra bhakti. Number three is kartavya-bodh (serving out of sense of duty).

isvarah paramah krsnah sach-chid-ananda-vigrahah

anadir adir govindah sarva-karana-karanam

"Krishna, who is known as Govinda, is the supreme controller. He has an eternal, blissful, spiritual body. He is the origin of all. He has no other origin, for He is the prime cause of all causes."

(Sri Brahma-samhita, 5.1)

"God is above, so I must worship Him." Many do this. But if a mother loves her child and takes care of the child—does she do it only out of duty or out of love? Sometimes she thinks, "Oh, the child will grow up and look after me." He may or may not look after you. If parents get a good son, they feed him nicely, etc.

Devotee: They bring him to the class to let him have your darshan.

Yes, bring him, let him sit with me, or give him to the temple. Anyhow, a mother loves her son out of love and affection, but how many of us worship the Lord with love? The Lord is the master of the house.

Suppose there are four people staying at the house, but you must say that Gurudev, the Lord are also staying there—we have many family members. Who thinks like this, tell me? Radha-Krishna, Mahaprabhu, this is three, Gurudev, four. So, you have eight people in your house, and you must cook for them. Who thinks like this? People say, "I have a son, a daughter, I must go shopping, work, cook for them"—but does anyone think that they also have the Lord to work for? No, they say, "He is God, so why must I think about Him?" People have no faith in God!

We wake up every morning and sing

dainya, atma-nivedana, goptrtve varana

'avasya raksibe krsna'—visvasa palana

"Humility, self-submission, embracing the Lord's guardianship, maintaining the faith that 'Krishna will certainly protect me'."

(Saranagati, 1, by Srila Bhakti Vinod Thakur)

"Goptrtve varan" means Krishna is our maintainer. We mut have faith that Krishna will maintain us, take care of us. Who will be in charge, who will look after you if for example your child dies? Whose responsibility is it? The Lord's. We forget this. We forget that Krishna is our maintainer, and as a result we suffer since the time immemorial. Our Gurudev and scriptures say that Krishna is our maintainer, Krishna is our protector—they say that if you chant His Holy Name, you will get the Lord one day; if you live in Vrindavan, you will reach the Lord one day. Those who have such faith must certainly reach the Lord.

Devotees: Nitai Gaura Hari bol!

If you do not have such faith, you can go to Vrindavan and stay there all your whole life, but you will not get anything. If you have faith, you can go to Vrindavan once only, or stay in Nabadwip Dham once only, but you can quickly reach Vrindavan. It is necessary to have faith. Otherwise if you keep coming and going and if you have no faith, you will never get any result. You must always remember this.

* * *

Unload Yourself

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Translated into English from Bengali

15 February 2020, part 4

I have told you before that there is Nama-aparadh, seva-aparadh, dhama-aparadh, Vaishnav-aparadh, you must always be conscious of it.

Suppose you take a fifty-kilo sack of cauliflower on your head. You will feel pain on your head, you will struggle—if you come with this sack to an A/C room, will you be happy? No, you will not—because you have all this load on your head. What kind of load do we have on our heads? Not cauliflower—it is the load of ego. I have a house, I have a car, I have beauty, I have so many qualities, I have money. This is all ego.

Suppose somebody donates a lakh rupees (100,000) for the service of the Lord, and somebody thinks then, "If I give more, then my name will be on the top." Then, that other person donate two lakhs rupees. Now, the first man's name becomes second and he thinks, "Oh no! I have given one lakh, but still my name is not on the top!" He becomes disturbed. Where will he get peace? We sing in one of the kirtans, "Chhaudike ananda dekhi—I see joy in all four directions." Do we see joy everywhere around us? We see, "Oh, this man is old," "This man is good," "This man is bad," etc. Do we see joy and pleasure everywhere?

You can judge a tree by its fruit. If you have a mango tree, the tree will bear mango, it will not bear any other fruit. Therefore, if you see mangoes growing on a tree, it must be a mango tree; if some other fruit is growing on it, then it is another tree. So, if you want to see a Vaishnav, you should see how much humility the person has. The greater a Vaishnav is, the more humility he has. You know that in this world, a Vaishnav means something else. People think if you have big temples, big buildings, then you are a great Vaishnav. Is it not so? Those who make huge temples are the greatest Vaishnavs, and those who practise in their small cottage, chant the Holy Name, serve the Lord—they are not Vaishnavs.

This is all explained in the scriptures. How many temples did the six goswamis have? How many temples did Sanatan Goswami have? How many temples did Jiva Goswami have? How many temples did Raghunath Das Goswami have (who lived and serve the Lord on the bank of Radha Kunda)? Tell me, give me the answer. Yet, we cannot understand this, we have all these misconceptions. You must think about it. Pure Vaishnavs are always humble; they never offend or criticise anyone, they do not gossip about others, they do not want to waste their time—they always keep themselves engaged in Hari-kirtan, they keep themselves engaged in the Lord's katha and kirtan and in the service of the devotees of the Lord.

* * *

Universal Remedy

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Translated into English from Bengali

15 February 2020, part 5

"I give many lectures, I do so much puja, I have become a big devotee, I am fixed in my practice"—such thinking is obstructive. "I cannot do anything, I do not know anything." You must never think, "I am doing something, I am serving the Lord!" If you start thinking like this, you are in a big danger.

How will such ego go away? I have told you that ego is like a load on your head, but if you bow your head at the lotus feet of Sri Guru and Vaishnavs, then this load will come off your head.

The other day, somebody asked me, "Radha-Krishna is a combined form of Gauranga, but in the scriptures (in Gaura-ganodesa-dipika) it is written that Gadadhar is Radharani's incarnation. How can this be? Gadadhar is Radharani's incarnation, his guru is Pundariksa, this is so. The thing is that Krishna took Radharani's heart and halo [and what remained appeared as Gadadhar]...

[His Divine Grace notices a devotee dozing off:]

Are you sleeping? Everybody, say loudly, "Hare Krishna!" When you say "Hare Krishna", Maya Devi goes away. When your body becomes weak, then all kinds of diseases start pressing—in the same way, if you become less alert, Maya Devi attacks you. If you do not take the doctor's medicine properly, you cannot get relief from the disease.

enechhi ausadhi mayanasibara lagi'

hari-nama maha-mantra lao tumi magi'

"I have brought the medicine to dispel Maya. Pray for this Hari-nam maha-mantra and take it."

What is this medicine? It is the Holy Name (Hare Krishna Nam). How can Maya be destroyed? If you have cancer, you can take the doctor's medication and the cancer or another disease will be destroyed—in the same way, if you chant the Holy Name, Maya Devi will flee. When you feel sleepy, when you do not feel like chanting the Holy Name—chant the Holy Name loudly. Sometimes you chant the Holy Name on your beads and start dozing off, or your mind is naughty, then, Srila Prabhupad said, you must chant the Holy Name loudly.

hare krsna hare krsna krsna krsna hare hare

hare rama hare rama rama rama hare hare

Others will hear you and think, "He's gone mad," but Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur says, "When will I become crazy?" Moreover, when Mahaprabhu started always thinking only about Krishna, Sachi Mata brought some cooling oil for Him. Srivas Pandit came at that time and said to her, "Didi, the 'disease' He has cannot be cured with any oil. I also want to become crazy like Him! Why cannot I get this 'disease'?"

* * *

Test of Attachment

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Translated into English from Bengali

15 February 2020, part 6

The Lord tests us in many ways. You have read Srimad Bhagavad-gita. When the war was about to start, Krishna told Arjuna many things—karma-yoga, jnana-yoga, etc. Lastly Arjuna said, "I have now become Your disciple, please instruct me," then Krishna spoke the highest conception:

sarva-dharman parityajya, mam ekam saranam vraja

aham tvam sarva-papebhyo, moksayisyami ma suchah

"Give up all kinds of religion and surrender to Me alone. I will liberate you from all sins, do not despair."

(Srimad Bhagavad-gita, 18.66)

When the war finished and Yudhisthir, Bhima, Arjuna, Nakula, Sahadev returned their kingdom, Krishna said to their mother Kunti Devi, "Aunt, your sons have got the kingdom back, My job is finished now. I am leaving, there is no need for Me to stay here now. I am going to Dvaraka." The Lord tests us in many ways—He was testing Kunti Devi, and she understood it. She said, "I do not care for the kingdom, I do not care for anything—Prabhu, if You are not with us, all is empty. We do not need this kingdom. If we have You, we have everything."

There are so many things in Bhagavatam. Krishna tested Kunti Devi, "If they get their kingdom back, will they forget Me?" but she understood it. We, on the other hand, get all kinds of wealth and forget the Lord. When we get austerity, when we get sick, or we get into trouble, then an inspiration comes from within, "O Lord, save me!" Before they say there is no God, there is nothing, but when some trouble comes, then people say, "O Lord, where are you? Why am I suffering?"

In this world, people do not understand that nothing can exist without the Lord. People have no knowledge—they only eat soil like babies. What is said in Chaitanya-charitamrita?

krsna yadi chhute bhakte bhukti mukti diya

kabhu prema-bhakti na dena rakhena lukaiya

"If you ask Krishna for anything except devotion, He can give you those things—bhukti, mukti, liberation, and so on—but He will hide devotion from you. You will not get devotion."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Adi-lila, 8.18)

If, instead of devotion, you want enjoyment (money, house, car, etc.) or liberation from the Lord, the Lord will give it to you thinking, "They are just small children." If a mother or a father want to go somewhere, the child will cry and want to go with them, but then the parents give the child a lollypop or some toy, the child forgets them and they can go. The Lord gives us money, cars, houses—he makes us forget Him and goes away. The Lord says, "I will not give you devotion. I will give you all these things and make you forget Me."

On the other hand, Krishna also says,

krsna kahe,—ama bhaje, mage visaya-sukha

amrta chhadi' visa mage,—ei bada murkha

"Krishna says, 'They worship Me, desiring material happiness—leaving aside nectar, they ask for poison. They are great fools.'"

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Madhya-lila, 22.38)

Krishna says, "I am not a fool—he is a fool! Why must I give him material happiness? I will give him My feet instead and make him forget all about material world."

These are the two expressions made by the Lord. When Dhruva Maharaj went to the forest to practise meditation, he spent five years in mediation. Why did he do it? For his own happiness—to get the kingdom of his father. Krishna became pleased with him, but He did not come to him Himself—He sent Narad Goswami, "Narad, go and explained it to him." Narad came to Dhruva Maharaj, explained the process to him, and gave him initiation. After that, Dhruva Maharaj started practising properly and he got devotion for Lord Krishna. Then, Krishna Himself came to him saying, "Here, Dhruva, take your kingdom!" Dhruva Maharaj replied, "O Lord, please do not embarrass me, I do not want any kingdom. I have got You, I do not need any kingdom now.

When you get the Lord, you will not want anything else—at that time, you will not like all the trifle things, whatever you enjoyed before will taste like mud. For example, you like rasagullas, I give you ten rasagullas, you eat them. I give you twenty rasagullas, you eat them too, and if I offer you more, you will say, "I do not like it any more." Such is this world. People enjoy and enjoy. Some say that if you enjoy and enjoy, this desire for enjoyment will go away, and it is true to some extent—if you enjoy something too much, you will not like it anymore, but your overall desire to enjoy will increase even more, your attachment will grow even more. However, the attachment must be for the Lord, it should be directed in the opposite direction. Always remember this, you will get spiritual benefit.

* * *

Wrong Employment

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Translated into English from Bengali

15 February 2020, part 7

What do you do?

Devotee: I work in a shopping mall.

In a shopping mall? I need many employees. Gurudev has opened a large factory, there are so many vacancies there, and you are going to work in a shopping mall. I need many employees, but you will not get money for this work. How much is your salary? Ten-twelve thousand? Fifteen thousand? How unfortunate it is to be working in a shopping mall. You used to serve the Lord at the temple, and now?... Have you got married?

Devotee: Not yet.

That is good. You have time now, my friend. Gurudev has opened a large factory, and there are many vacancies available. Come to this factory. Leave your shopping mall. Is your mother alive?

Devotee: Yes, she is.

OK, take her and come together to the temple.

Devotee: She does not want to come.

If she does not want, it means there is Maya, it is necessary to pull her. You must pull her out of the house, once one leg is out, I will pull her other leg!

* * *

Step Forward

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Translated into English from Bengali

15 February 2020, part 8

You have heard today beautiful Bhagavat-katha. If we do not try to practise ourselves, if we do not make a step forward, then we will not be able to understand anything. You must be careful in your life.

Accept what is favourable to devotion, and reject what is unfavourable to devotion. If you do a fire sacrifice and give one time a spoon of water, another time a spoon of ghee, then again a spoon of water—you cannot make a fire sacrifice like this. So, if you want to practise Krishna consciousness, you do something good, you do some good service, but in the meantime you also do something wrong too. Both cannot stay together. Reject what is unfavourable.

There are five diseases.

(1) Ignorance of one's true identity as an eternal soul and servant of Krishna (avidya).

(2) Identification with the material body and possessiveness about one's transitory body, wife, sons, and so on (asmita).

(3) Obsession with facilities for the body (raga).

(4) Revulsion to anything opposed to one's enjoyment (dves).

(5) Absorption in things favourable to oneself and incapacity to sacrifice them (abhinives).

There are six urges.

(1) The urge to speak (vakya-vega): using words in a way that disturbs others.

(2) The urges of the mind (mana-vega): various types of desires.

(3) The urge of anger (krodha-vega): using harsh language, swearing.

(4) The urge of the tongue (jihva-vega): desire for any of the six tastes (sweet, sour, pungent, salty, astringent, and bitter).

(5) The urge of the belly (uddhara-vega): excessive eating.

(6) The urge of the genitals (upastha-vega): the desire for sex.

There are also six faults.

(1) Atyahara: eating too much, hoarding material things.

(2) Prayasa: material desires.

(3) Prajalpa: listening to nonsense or talking nonsense.

(4) Niyamagraha: being reluctant to practise favourable activities and being eager to practise unfavourable activities.

(5) Janasanga: bad association.

(6) Laulya: being fickle-minded, material attachment, greed.

It is necessary to go forward. There are also six types of good association.

(1) Affectionately giving a devotee useful materials.

(2) Accepting materials given by devotees.

(3) Discussing confidential subjects with devotees.

(4) Asking devotees about confidential subjects.

(5) Eating rice and other foods given by devotees.

(6) Affectionately feeding devotees.

If you take good association of devotees, if you hear Hari-katha, then you will be able to progress towards the abode of the Lord. We come to the Lord, and what He gives or does not give is, this is His matter—He will give whatever is necessary for us. We must keep such faith. We must have faith, this is the main thing. We are trying to serve the Lord, we are trying to serve Gurudev, and the Lord will take care of the result that I get. We must think in this way. We sing in one of the kirtans:

"tomara saṁsāre kariba sevana

nahiba phalera bhagi"

"I will serve Your family and will never ta the result."

(Saranagati)

"I will serve Your family, but I will not take any share of the result." Remember this. If you do not get any result, you must not worry. If you follow ekadasi, what result do you get? Do you get any result or not? There is no need to have any result! Whatever mercy Guru and Vaishnavs give me, whatever service Gurudev gives me, I will do that. Nijer maner kheyal khusimata bhajan bole na. Satisfying the whims of your mind is not bhajan—following Gurudev, serving the Guru, the Vaishnavs and satisfying them is what is called bhajan.

You have heard all this, but can you remember it all? That is why we have books over there. We have a small kirtan guide book, it is not expensive. You can buy it and chant kirtans every morning and evening. Practise yourself. If you do not practise kirtan of the Lord, if you only blow the conchshell, do huladula, will the Lord come? If you blow the conchshell or do hulahula, will your child answer? If you want your child to come, you call him or her by the name, is it not so? So, you must call the Lord by His Name:

sri-krsna-chaitanya prabhu nityananda

sri-advaita gadadhara srivasadi gaura-bhakta-vrnda

hare krsna hare krsna krsna krsna hare hare

hare rama hare rama rama rama hare hare

This is the Lord's Name. You must call the Lord by this Name, then the Lord will come.

* * *

Value of Faith

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Translated into English from Bengali

15 February 2020, part 9

Malini Devi always treated Nityananda Prabhu as her son—although she was an elderly lady, because of her motherly love, milk would flow from her breasts, and Nityananda Prabhu would drink it. You can see what kind of vatsalya-rasa she has.

One day, Malini Devi was doing puja. Suddenly a crow flew in and took the archan cup she was using for the puja. She began to cry. Nityananda Prabhu came and asked her, "Mother, why are you crying?" "Prabhu [Srivas Pandit] will come, he will scold me—a crow has taken the cup." Then, Nityananda Prabhu shouted, "Hey crow! My mother is crying, return the cup at once!" The crow came back and returned the cup.

Then you can understand—if we have faith in Vaishnavs, in their words, if we can believe in what Gurudev is saying, we will be benefitted. Gurudev says that if you practise Krishna consciousness (if you worship and serve the Lord), you must get the result; if we can think about Vaishnav Dham, about Vaishnavs, then we will be able to serve in the Lord's abode. Such faith must be there. If you have any doubt in that, or if you have no faith at all, then you will never get anything.

You hear, "God takes care of us," and you doubt it, "Will God take care of us or not?" This world belongs to the Lord. We give somebody fifty rupees and think, "I have given it!" But you only give what belongs to the Lord. "You worship the Ganga with the Ganges water." You are serving the Lord with the Lord's things. Then, you think about it—what can you give to the Lord? Do I have any ability to give anything? What can I give to the Lord? Your body, mind, life? The Lord has given you all this.

You must remember one more thing. In our country, there are many gurus in this world who will tell you, "Eat whatever your soul pleases." But the soul does not want to eat all these things. The soul has no connection with this world. The mind always judges the outer world, and the soul judges the inner would, it is always inside. The soul can give the news from Paramatma, and Paramatma knows what is necessary for the soul, whereas the mind is linked to the body, it knows what the body wants...

* * *

My Question to You

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Translated into English from Bengali

15 February 2020, part 1

Once again, we have gathered here as each year. You have all assembled here—so many people listen to Hari-katha, listen to the message of the Lord. We have been practising hearing and chanting in the line of pure devotion for so many years. Some of us are now sixty-eighty years old, but still, none of us has got an opportunity to glorify the Lord (to chant His kirtan) properly.

You love your wife, son, daughter, grandchildren so much, but can you say, from the bottom of your heart, that you love the Lord as much as you love them? That is the question. Your wife, sons, daughters, etc. are all disguised dacoits. A few days later they will leave you or you will leave them. You love your temporary relatives and satisfy them in so many different ways, but can any of us serve the Lord with as much love and affection as you have for them? That is my question to you.

You have a wife, son, daughter, friends, husband, relatives, grandchildren, but the relationship you have with them is bodily, it is a blood relation. Yet, do we love the Lord to the same extent that we love them? We do not. We do not love God—we love our relatives and friends more... We do not even have faith in those who are related to the Lord—we do not have faith in our guru and Vaishnavs; we do not love them as much as we love our material family.

We create many relations in this world that last only one-two days, but the association of pure devotees is eternal. To get their association means to follow what they say. We always call our family and friends, we ask them how they are, what the news are, etc. But do we have that kind of relationship with our guru and Vaishnavs? If such relationship with your guru and Vaishnavs does not come, you will keep thinking—I have been practising for so long, but why must I serve the Lord? There should be eagerness and joy in your service. Why must I leave all my thirst for gain, all the enjoyment in this world and worship the Lord? This is my question for you today.

* * *

Sri Nabadwip Dham Pracharani Sobha

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Morning class, Sri Nrisingha Palli

2 March 2020, part 1

Actually, by the mercy of Gurudev, we are starting to arrange the parikrama of Sri Sri Nabadwip Dham. This year, we started the arrangement many days before. You can see in the internet that we have been doing 'Sri Nabadwip Dham Pracharani Sobha.'

Sri Nabadwip Dham Pracharani Sobha was first started by Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur. 'Sri Nabadwip Dham Pracharani Sobha' means glorification of Sri Nabadwip Dham. Srila Prabhupad would go village to village, preaching about Sri Nabadwip Dham, calling everybody, "Come, join Sri Nabadwip Dham parikrama." Some time later, he made a small group of devotees whom he would send door to door, village to village, to preach about Sri Nabadwip Dham. This is called Sri Nabadwip Dham Pracharani Sobha.

We made it this year, and not only this year. It was done in Srila Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj's time also. Srila Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj did not do it himself, but he would send his godbrothers (Srila Madhusudan Maharaj, Srila Jajavar Maharaj, et. al.) to preach village to village about Sri Nabadwip Dham. Some time later, when Gurudev joined the mission, Gurudev would go with the devotees. He did not only go to collect rice or potato—he would go only for this Sri Nabadwip Dham Pracharani Sobha.

Later, Gurudev told me that he was going abroad and he wanted to preach all over the world, so he told me to start preaching in Bengal and India. He told me, "You go and tell them about Sri Nabadwip Dham Pracharani Sobha."

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Prime Festival

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Morning class, Sri Nrisingha Palli

2 March 2020, part 2

Actually, the duty of the preaching party is to tell everyone about Sri Nabadwip pracharani—the glorification of Sri Nabadwip Dham.

sri-gauda-mandala-bhumi yeba jane chintamani

tara haya vraja-bhume vasa

"Those who always think about Sri Nabadwip Dham, reside in Sri Vrindavan."

Vrindavan's area is forty-eight crosh, but Nabadwip's area is more than that. Nabadwip, Gaura Mandal includes even Ramakeli (Srila Sanatan Goswami Prabhu's place), Kalna, etc. so many places. This is how Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur preached about Sri Nabadwip Dham. Those who know Sri Gaura Mandal, think that they are living in Sri Dham Vrindavan, Vraja Mandal. Therefore, Sri Gaura Mandal is non-different from Sri Vraja Mandal.

You all know that Sri Krishna took Srimati Radharani's bhav and kanti (heart and halo) and became Gauranga Mahaprabhu. Many of you also have heard also about Gadadhar Pandit. Who is he? We hear that Gadadhar Pandit is Radharani, but then how can Gauranga be Radha-Krishna combined? Krishna took the heart and halo of Radharani, and Gadadhar is the incarnation of the remainder of Srimati Radharani.

Srila Gaura Kishor Das Babaji Maharaj, Srila Jagannath Das Babaji Maharaj, Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur, Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur, Vamsi Das Babaji Maharaj preferred to live and lived in Sri Nabadwip Dham. That is why we try to do something for Sri Nabadwip, Gaura Mandal, Sri Nabadwip Dham.

This festival is called the prime festival. We make this festival every year, and Gurudev always told me, "When you make any invitation cards, you can write the secretary's name or your name, but at Gaura Purnima time, I will be inviting everybody myself." The acharya of the mission will invite everybody for Gaura Purnima. Also, Gurudev wrote a very nice poem, you can read it and see how strongly he is writing about Sri Nabadwip Dham parikrima. And Gurudev told me to go door to door, come inside each door and please pull them to come and join Sri Nabadwip Dham parikrama.

You have to make time. You work, work, work the whole year, but only once a year you can take a seven-day leave and take the chance to join Sri Nabadwip Dham Parikrama.

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Importance of Sri Nabadwip Dham

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Morning class, Sri Nrisingha Palli

2 March 2020, part 3

We must understand clearly how important Sri Nabadwip Dham is. We are sitting now in Sri Godrumdwip, this place is also called Devapalli. 'Deva-palli' means a place (palli) where all demigods (deva) live. All the devata—devas, devis (demigods and demigoddesses)—do not get a chance to serve the Lord—they have so much aisvarya (opulence) in heaven that they forget the Lord; so, they also want to be born in a human body to serve the Lord, they wait, "When will I get a human body and serve the Lord?" That is why, demigods come in human bodies and they get a chance to chant the Holy Name, serve the Lord.

This Sri Nabadwip Dham is very important for us. Srimad Bhagavatam also tells this. We can read everything about Sri Nabadwip Dham parikrama and this holy abode. Srila Jiva Goswami Prabhu and Sriman Nityananda Prabhu preached here, did this Sri Nabadwip Dham parikrama. After that, Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur reestablished almost all places—so many places' location was not clear, there were no proper temples, etc. This was the situation in Champahati, for example.

We go to Champahati on the last day of the parikrama. There, Champakalata Devi picks flowers and makes garlands for Srimati Radharani. The Deity of Sri Sri Gaura Gadadhar in Champahati was established by Dvija Vaninath, an associate of Sriman Mahaprabhu, but eventually the Deities were neglected and stayed there in a very bad condition. Srila Prabhupad Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur went to see that Deity and gave Sripad Nayanabhiram Prabhu (his disciple who later took sannyas and became Sripad Bhakti Vivek Bharati Maharaj) the service there—he started worshipping the Deities, making programmes, speaking Hari-katha, etc. In this way, Srila Prabhupad re-established many places in Sri Nabadwip Dham.

There Sri Sri Gaura Gadadhar were hidden before that. Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur also worshipped Sri Sri Gaura Gadadhar in Svarupganj. You can see that temple on first day of the parikrama. Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur Prabhupad established proper puja, worship of Sri Sri Gaura Gadadhar in Champahati.

I remember Gurudev told me once a story. After Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, after Srila Narottam Das Thakur, there appeared so many aul, baul, karttabhaja, neda, daravesa, sani, sakhibheki, jata-goswami sampradayas who did many nonsense things in the name of Krishna consciousness. There was one very big scholar who thought that he knew everything, all sastras, etc. That man would come to the temple of Gaura Gadadhar in Champahati, but he did not like the conception that Sripad Bharati Maharaj (Sripad Nayanabhiram Prabhu) preached. He thought, "I am a great personality, I know everything! Nobody likes me, nobody give me respect, but I will show them!" So, one day, he put on an act—-he started chanting the glories of Srimati Radharani, Jayadev, Padmavati, etc. dancing, etc. and then suddenly fell down, pretending to be overcome by ecstasy, thinking everybody would see it and give him respect. But what happened instead? He had laid as if senseless for five-ten minutes, but nobody reacted, then a big ant came and bit his thigh. It was so painful that he could not tolerate it—he began scratching his thigh. Everybody saw it and said, "What is this man doing?" Later in his life, that man got so much austerity, and in the end, when he was about to die, he told Sripad Bharati Maharaj, "I have done such a big mistake. I had so much ego... I am going to die now, please forgive me." Sripad Bharati Maharaj forgave him...

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Watch Your Step

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Morning class, Sri Nrisingha Palli

2 March 2020, part 4

When I come to Nrisingha Palli or other places, I think about how much austerity Prahlad Maharaj got, how much his demon father Hiranyakasipu tortured him. He beat his son, he gave him so much austerity, you know everything—he threw him from a hill, he tied him to an elephant's leg, he threw him into an ocean, he threw him into fire. He did so many things, but one thing you can realise is that Prahlad Maharaj never once told his father, "Please do not torture me," "Please do not beat me," etc. He never told this to his father. He never asked the Lord, "O Lord! Why are you giving me so much austerity?" "Why are you placing me into so much danger?" He never told that.

In another way also, how much austerity do we get? Whatever happens to us, Prahlad Maharaj suffered thousands and thousands times more austerities. Sometimes, we get some little problem in our spiritual life, or we do not have water, we have some food problems, and we always complain about it. But how much austerity did Prahlad Maharaj get?

Even Sri Ambarish Maharaj also—when chakra (fire) came to him, he did not think, "Oh, my death is coming, I have such a big problem!" He thought, "Whatever will be, will be. What can I do? Everything happens by the will of the Lord. Everything depends on the Lord."

This is the main thing. We must use, utilise our life in this way. Do you understand it? We must think how much our devotional life is increasing, when we increase our devotion. It is necessary to think about this. We must not ask the Lord for anything. This is the main thing. We always ask for something—you can even read Srimad Bhagavatam and see what happened to Dhruva Maharaj, Ambarish Maharaj, Chitraketu, Prahlad Maharaj. When you have read it, part by part, then you can read about the final destination (the pastimes of Radha-Krishna)—you can see what Uddhav Maharaj tells about it and you can realise these things.

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Material Greed

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Morning class, Sri Nrisingha Palli

2 March 2020, part 5

There are two things told in Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita. On the one hand,

krsna kahe,—ama bhaje, mage visaya-sukha

amrta chhadi' visa mage,—ei bada murkha

"Krishna says, 'They worship Me, desiring material happiness—leaving aside nectar, they ask for poison. They are great fools.'"

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Madhya-lila, 22.38)

On the other hand, it is also written,

krsna yadi chhute bhakte bhukti mukti diya

kabhu prema-bhakti na dena rakhena lukaiya

"If you ask Krishna for anything except devotion, He can give you those things—bhukti, mukti, liberation, and so on—but He will hide devotion from you. You will not get devotion."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Adi-lila, 8.18)

In other words, Krishna says, "People worship Me and ask Me to fulfil their material desires (visaya-sukha), but I am intelligent—I am not a fool." Such people are all foolish like babies—when a baby eats soil, the mother comes and immediately takes out the soil, and the baby starts crying, "Oh, my mother does not allow me to take these very nice things!" But when the mother gives the baby some chocolate or some sweet, then the baby becomes happy." Krishna also thinks, "They are all My babies. They want to take soil, they want to eat cow dung, they want to eat stool—people say, 'I want a girl,' 'I want a house,' 'I want this, this, this.' People worship Me but what something in return, but I am not a fool, I will not give it to them. Instead, I will give them Myself, and they will forget all about these material desires."

When Dhruva Maharaj went to the forest to worship the Lord, he had meditated there for five years. What did he worship the Lord for? Because he wanted to get the chair of his father—he wanted to become the king. When Krishna became very happy with his worship, He sent Narad Muni to him (Krishna never comes Himself—He always sends His associate as a guru). So, Narad Muni came to Dhruva Maharaj, and Dhruva Maharaj followed everything Narad Muni had taught him. A a result, Dhruva Maharaj had become a pure devotee, and when Krishna came to him and said, "O Dhruva Maharaj! Take your chair, take raja-singhasan (royal throne; kingdom)," Dhruva Maharaj became shy, "No, no, Prabhu. I feel very shy. Under the influence of Your illusory potency, I had forgotten You—I did not want You, I wanted some bad things, but now that You have come to me, when I have got You, what need is there for any kingdom, house, car, etc.? When I have got You, what need is there for anything else?"

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Undaunted Devotion

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Morning class, Sri Nrisingha Palli

2 March 2020, part 6

When the Kuruksetra war was over, Krishna decided to test Kunti Devi. He told her, "O pishima (aunt)! Your sons have got the kingdom, you should be happy. Now My job has finished, I must go back to Dvaraka." What did Kunti Devi tell at that time? She said, "O Krishna, You are testing me. You know that without You this kingdom is nothing for me. You are with us, then we have everything. We do not need this kingdom. We can live in a forest, it is not a problem, but without You, this kingdom, my sons, etc. it is all nothing." This is what Kunti Devi said.

When we have some material desires, we cannot understand Krishna consciousness because when your material desires are very strong (you want a house, a car, this, this, this), then you cannot hear properly. This is what happened once to Chitraketu.

One day, Angira Rishi came to Chitraketu. Chitraketu prayed to the sage, "Please give me a son who will run my kingdom. I need a son, I have married so many wives, but I have no heir." Angira Rishi thought, "If I give him any advice, he will not listen to it because his desires are so strong."

In one of the holy books, Srila Gurudev wrote about surrender and how to harmonise between different types of surrender. One type of surrender is when a cat picks its baby with its mouth and carries it. Another type is that of a monkey—the baby monkey holds onto its mother and the mother carries it in this way. What will you do? Everybody thinks, "We will do what the baby monkey does because we must hold onto Krishna—Krishna will not catch me, I must catch Him." However, Gurudev says we must have neither cats', not monkeys' type of surrender. What is the proper way? The proper way is the way of Mother Yasoda. What did Mother Yasoda do? When Mother Yasoda wanted to tie Krishna, she laboured so much, she tried so hard ("I will try, and try, and try!")—she was sweating, her hair became unkempt, etc. She went as if crazy trying to tie Krishna always thinking, "How will I tie Him?" We must also become like Mother Yasoda—we must become crazy trying anyhow, by hook or by crook, to tie Krishna. We do not tie Him with a rope, but with our hearts, with our devotion. This is what Gurudev says. This is the main thing. We do not want to be like cats or monkeys, we want to be like Mother Yasoda. We will try, try, try and one day, seeing that we do not leave our attempts, Krishna will come and happily surrender, "OK, please tie Me."

So, Chitraketu asked Angira Rishi for a son. This was his material desire, and because of that material desire he forgot everything. Angira Rishi taught him a good lesson then—he knew Chitraketu would not listen to him because he badly wanted a son. So, Angira Rishi told Chitraketu, "OK, you will get a son, but this son will bring you both happiness and sadness. One day, you will get much unhappiness because of him." Chitraketu forgot about unhappiness, sadness, he was very excited, "I will have a son! I have so much property, so much wealth, what sadness can there be? No, no!" (That is why Srila Guru Maharaj and Srila Gurudev say that if you have much opulence, much property, you will also have many enemies, there will be people who will envy you, and you will be always thinking how to protect your property and wealth.)

Always be careful. We need a boundary wall, we need many things so that we can happily practise Krishna consciousness, worship the Lord, but our main focus will not be all these things. I wrote about this in Guidance, Volume 4. It is coming soon. Our focus will not be making buildings, making boundary walls, etc.—our main focus is how to make the Lord and our Gurudev happy, how to please them. This is the main thing for us. This must be our focus.

So, Chitraketu did not think about the sadness that will come along with his son. After several years, when his son was born and grew up a little, all the wives of Chitraketu became jealous and envious thinking, "Oh, Chitraketu always gives love and affection to his first wife who has given him the son, he does not look after us!" So, one day they decided to make some conspiracy—they thought their problem was because of this son, so they decided to kill him.

I remember also one thing. Aftr Gurudev declared my name on 4 December 2009, I went to Australia together with Srila Ashram Maharaj. One day, Gurudev called me and said, "Come back immediately." When I came back, Gurudev showed me one letter—those who wrote it were saying, "You can give him the chair, it is not a problem, but later you will see or maybe you will not see how much trouble we will give him. We will not leave him alone until his death." I am thinking this is nothing for me. In Chitraketu's time also, when Chitraketu became a devotee, Parvati cursed him to go to hell, but for devotees whether it is hell, heaven, liberation, or whatever, it is sama-darshan (they see it as equal). You know, when I went to jail in Krishna Nagar, I did not have any problem with that. Even there, I chanted, I gave a class, etc. Gradually, I changed the atmosphere there. Krishna also sent one devotee to me (he also got into jail because of some false accusations), he cooked for me. So, there was no problem. Whether I live in Nrisingha Palli, Mayapur, Nabadwip, Tarakeshwar, Ganga Sagar, even in jail, or anywhere else, it is the same for me.

So, when Parvati cursed Chitraketu and saw that Chitraketu does not care, she asked Lord Siva, "Who is this man? I have cursed him, but he is not unhappy, he does not show anything. Who is he?" Lord Siva said, "He is a great devotee! This is Chitraketu, he because a great devotee by the mercy of Narad Goswami and Angira Rishi."

Chitraketu had some material desire before, but then he ended up leaving his kingdom—he took a puspa-ratha (a flower chariot) and would travel all over India preaching Krishna consciousness. He became a great devotee.

Krishna's devotees are not ordinary persons. And there will always be those who are envious. All great personalities have so many problems, but it is nothing for them—they ignore it! Whatever comes, it is not our problem—it is the problem of those who cause the problem. If somebody swears you, it is that person's problem, not yours. In this way, we must forget about material desires. We must understand this, we must understand what is devotional practice. It is very important.

Jay Srila Guru Maharaj ki jay

Harinam sankirtan ki jay

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Complete Engagement

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Evening class, Sri Nrisingha Palli

2 March 2020, part 1

mukam karoti vachalam pangum langhayate girim

yat krpa tam aham vande sri-gurum dina-taranam

"The dumb can speak, the lame can climb a hill—all it takes is mercy from Gurudev."

(Bhavartha Dipika)

First, I am giving my full obeisance at the lotus feet of my beloved Gurudev Om Vishnupad Jagad-Guru Srila Bhakti Sundar Govinda Dev-Goswami Maharaj. Then, I am giving my obeisances to my godbrothers, godsisters and all the beloved devotees who have already joined Sri Sri Nabadwip Dham parikrama and Gaura Purnima maha-mahotsav.

I am very happy because devotees from almost all countries have joined this parikrama. Many have already come from South Africa, Mauritius, London, Sweden, Venezuela, Colombia. Srila Ashram Maharaj arrived in Kolkata from Mexico yesterday, Sripad Tyagi Maharaj and Sripad Sadhu Maharaj are also here. Some devotees are coming from Singapore, Malaysia, I am waiting for them.

Actually, I have got some sad news today—one of my friends from Malaysia, Balendranath Prabhu, has passed away today. It very sad news. I have been to Malaysia many times and I stayed at his house, I gave him much help. He loved Gurudev. Today, he passed away suddenly at about three o'clock. I am praying for his soul that he may go to his own place, that he may practise Krishna consciousness there. That is my prayer to the Lord.

Everybody has got birth and entered this world, but we do not know what will happen in our life—that depends upon the Lord. Anyhow, we have finally got this human body, and we must use this body for the service of the Lord—we must use all senses, all parts of this body, mind, etc. we must use everything properly.

I have seen in our Archan-kan book (it is going to be re-printed soon) that there is one sloka of nija-dhyan (meditation on one's own self). 'Nija-dhyan' means 'buddhi-suddhi' (cleaning your own mind, or intelligence). When we go to do puja, we make sure the pot is clean, the chamar is clean, we make sure everything is clean, but we must also think whether our mind is clean or not. This is necessary. That is why, Param Guru Maharaj (Srila Sridhar Maharaj) wrote this nija-dhyan sloka,

divyam sri-hari-mandiradhya-tilakam kantham sumalanvitam

vaksah sri-hari-nama-varna-subhagam sri-khanda-liptam punah

putam suksma-navambaram vimalatam nityam vahantim tanum

dhyayech chhri-guru-pada-padma-nikate sevotsukas chatmanah

"Meditate that the Lord's Temple (your body) is decorated with shining tilak, your neck bears a beautiful tulasi-mala, your chest is adorned with the Names of Sri Hari and sandalwood paste, you are wearing fine, new, clean cloth, and in your pure, eternal form, you are at the lotus feet of Sri Guru, eager for service."

Your mind must be always pure. "Prabhu, I am going to start Your archan, or puja, but first I am surrendering myself at your lotus feet." That is called nija-dhyan (self-meditation). "I am only a fallen soul, I do not know anything, but I am trying to serve You."

Such mood is the main thing.

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Our Target

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Evening class, Sri Nrisingha Palli

2 March 2020, part 2

We are very fortunate because we are going to start Sri Nabadwip Dham parikrama this Thursday. Today is Monday, tomorrow is Tuesday and the programme will start on Thursday. This year, ekadasi does not fall on the first day—the fasting is on the next day, when we go to Antardwip. The first day is the parikrama until Svarup-ganj (Godrumdwip). On the next, second, day, we will go to Mayapur. We will all go to the ghat by bus, then cross the Ganges in a boat, and when we are in Mayapur, then we will walk. We will return by bus too. On the third day, we will go to Nabadwip. We will go to our Gauranga Setu bridge by bus, our temple is nearby, and from there we will walk. At the end of the parikrama, the bus will be waiting for us there. So, it is not necessary to go by rickshaw so much. This arrangement is very nice. On the last day, the bus will take us a little farther, and we will walk from there; the bus will also pick us up at the end. It will not be necessary to return on foot; everybody can come back by bus.

In this way, we will start our parikrama, and we can easily understand what is necessary for this parikrama. Sri Sri Nabadwip Dham parikrama is very important for our life.

Also, I do not want to give any trouble to devotees, I always think how they will do this parikrama. Those who have a problem walking bare feet, can walk in their shoes, it is not a problem. If somebody can go bare feet, that is their benefit. Indian devotees always walk bare feet because this is a dham parikrama. However, if you have problems with your legs, how will you walk without shoes? Before I too used to go bare feet, but now it has become very difficult for me.

Anyhow, our parikrama is starting on 5 March, and 9 March is Gaura Purnima. I see that people all over the world struggle so much to maintain their life. They do not know when they will close their eyes and leave their body, but even then they struggle so much for themselves. What is necessary is to preach Krishna consciousness—to preach the message of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, to go door to door. This is the main thing in our lives.

I tell this every year. When one person joins this parikrama, they should bring another person with them next year. In this way, if five hundred people come this year, next year one thousand people should come. Our target should be, "I must bring more people. I must preach and make at least one person a devotee." Gurudev always told this. If somebody can make four devotees, that is very high, but minimum is to make at least one person in 365 days of the year—in one year you should try to make one person a devotee. In this way, our family can grow. This is our target, and we should try to fulfil it.

* * *

Loving Service

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Evening class, Sri Nrisingha Palli

2 March 2020, part 3

Somebody serves the Lord because they are afraid. Somebody serves the Lord because they think they will get some material benefit. For example, so many people come to Nrisingha Palli, to Nrisinghadev, they give something, some fruit, etc. and say, "O Nrisinghadev! I want to have a child," "I want this," "I want that." People ask the Lord to fulfil their material desires, but they do not think what Prahlad Maharaj wanted, what devotion Prahlad Maharaj had.

Prahlad Maharaj said, "O Lord, I want one boon. What boon do I want from You? I want You to remove all my material desires so that I never want to ask for anything ever again." This is the boon Prahlad Mahraj asked for.

Therefore, we have come here to Devapalli (Nrisingha Palli), we are living here, but we do not know what is necessary for our spiritual life. That is the main problem. We do not know what is our life's destination, what is necessary for us, what is real devotion.

Among, those who serve the Lord, there is also a third category—those who serve out of kartavya-bodh (sense of duty). It means people think, "Oh, I am doing it because it is necessary to do it. Krishna is the Supreme Personality, so I must serve Him." Most people do that.

How should we actually serve the Lord? Sri Yamuna Acharya composed one sloka a thousand years ago, and our Param Guru Maharaj (Srila B.R. Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj) included that sloka into Sri Prapanna-jivanamrita. In that sloka, Sri Yamuna Acharya says very nicely that we must serve the Lord with love and affection. The most important thing is to serve with love. We must serve the Lord not only out of duty, out of fear, or asking for some material things—we must serve the Lord very nicely, with love and affection. He is our master, He is everything to us, that is why we must serve Him with love and affection. For example, a husband loves his wife, or a child loves his parents—we must serve the Lord with even more love and affection than that. That is what Yamuna Acharya tells. I read it in Sri Prapanna-jivanamrita. We must really, truly understand these things.

* * *

Selfless and Unconditional Service

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Evening class, Sri Nrisingha Palli

2 March 2020, part 4

Krishna is the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Sometimes I see there is some comparison with Ramachandra, the king of Ayodhya—some comparison of the devotees of Krishna and the devotees of Lord Rama. For example, we see that King Dasarath sent his son to the forest because he had promised it to his wife—he told her he would give her anything she wanted; and he did not want to lie. On the other hand, Vasudev told his brother-in-law not to kill his sister (Vasudev's wife)—he said, "I am a religious man (sadhu), and I promise to you that I will hand over all children that we get, one by one, to you." However, when his eighth child was born, although he had promised to give him to Kamsa, Vasudev took Him away and hid Him replacing Him with a daughter that was born of Yasoda. He did not keep his promise. That is love.

Another thing is that when Krishna was born, at first Vasudev and Devaki prayed to Him and worshipped Him as the Supreme Lord, they forgot that their child was born; but Nanda Maharaj and Mother Yasoda did not think like that. One day, Sri Baladev came to Mother Yasoda and said, "Your son is eating soil!" Mother Yasoda came running to Krishna, "Are You eating soil?!" Krishna said, "No, mother, no! It is all lies!" Then, Mother Yasoda opened His mouth to take the soil out and saw the entire universe in His mouth. After a second, she again forgot it and said, "O Krishna, my Gopal, are You OK? Come with me, come. I will give you paneer, etc." That is the difference between Devaki-Vasudev and Yasoda-Nanda Maharaj. Also, Nanda Maharaj got the chance to make the festival for Lord Krishna's birthday—Vasudev and Devaki did not get that chance.

There is madhurya rasa in Krishna-lila, but in Ramachandra's pastimes, all the residents of the Ayodhya kingdom told that Sita Devi was not pure. She had already passed the test (of fire), but even then she did not oppose further questions. However, Laksman cried when Rama ordered him to take Sita to the ashram of Valmiki. In Treta yuga, Laksman came as a younger brother, so he could not oppose Ramachandra, but he said, "When I come next time, I will not come as a younger brother again!" We can see also that even in Dvapar-yuga Baladev does not obey Krishna—Balaram comes as an elder brother, and He controls Krishna; that is the service that He has got—He can control Krishna. In this Kali-yuga also, Nityananda Prabhu came first, and sometimes Nityananda Prabhu controls Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu—He breaks His danda, He does so many things. Baladev does everything.

Then, we can easily understand how to serve Krishna. We see in the scripture of Ramayana, we hear about Hanuman, how he served Ramachandra, how strong his desire to serve Ramachandra was. We also must have such desire to serve the Lord; we also must be anxious to make the Lord happy, to make our Guru and Vaishnavs happy, to make Krishna happy. This is our main purpose in life.

It is very difficult to find a proper guru in this world, but it is also just as difficult to find a proper disciple. Unless you are a proper disciple, how will you be a proper guru? There must be no acharya abhiman (ego of a guru). "I will always be a disciple"—this is the main mood. We must always be disciples.

Ego is a burden. If you put a fifty kg sack of potato on your head, you will feel pain, you will sweat, etc.—even if you are put into an A/C room, you will not feel any peace there because there is so much burden on your head. What burden is that? "I have so much property," "I am a rich man," etc. Somebody is beautiful and they are very proud of it. Somebody is very educated, etc. We must forget out ego. How can we forget it? If we pay obeisance to our Guru and Vaishnavs, then all our ego will be removed just as you will feel relief when you take the fifty kg sack of potato off from your head and put it down. Pay obeisance to the Lord, to Gurudev and Vaishnavs, then your ego will be removed.

* * *

Double Lock Your Mouth

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Evening class, Sri Nrisingha Palli

2 March 2020, part 5

When time comes, we will have to go from this world, and we cannot say when that time will come. Whenever Krishna calls you, when your time finishes, you will have to go within one second...

Actually, I want to tell you something about the obstacles in our spiritual life. The main problem, or obstacle, is the ego. Besides that, Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur, and Srila Gurudev also, always warn us against para-charcha (criticising others, lit. studying others' behaviour), para-ninda (insulting, offending others), dosa-arapa (ascribing faults to others) and dosa-ninda (insulting others because of their faults).

'Dosa-aropa' means speaking bad about somebody even if they have no fault. If somebody has some fault—if you have not seen it, but you have heard about it from others and your brain thinks about it, that creates difficulties and problems in your spiritual life. And if you tell about somebody's fault to others, that is called dosa-ninda. All of our acharya-varga warn us against this. We do kirtan here, but somebody does dosa-ninda ('dosa' [dosha] means 'fault'). If you say, "This person did this," "That person did that," etc., this is a real problem in your spiritual life.

Krishna says you have to always engage yourself in the service of the Lord, then you will have no time to talk to others. Always keep yourself engaged. Those who criticise others do not realise what it does to their practising life.

If you tell something about somebody or if you have heard something about others and your brain thinks about it, then you yourself will lose faith in Krishna consciousness. Telling others about somebody's fault, hearing about somebody's fault is much worse than having the fault. Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur says that those who criticise others, who listen to criticism of others are actually even more guilty! Somebody says something against another person, somebody hears it—both is not right. Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur says,

vaisnava-charitra sarvada pavitra

yei ninde himsa kari'

bhaktivinoda na sambhase tan're

thake sada mauna dhari'

"The character of Vaishnavs is always pure. Bhaktivinod keeps quiet and does not associate with those who are envious of Vaishnavs and who criticise Vaishnavs."

(Sri Kalyan-kalpataru)

Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur says that if somebody criticises others, he does not say anything to that—he closes his mouth. When somebody tells him, "Oh, this person is doing wrong," Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur says he does not say anything.

* * *

Concentrate On Your Life

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Evening class, Sri Nrisingha Palli

2 March 2020, part 6

These are the main things for our spiritual life. I am telling some small points—what mistake we are making, how to correct ourselves, etc. Actually, when we speak Hari-katha, Krishna-katha, it is easy to say, "Na dhanam na janam na sundarim kavitam va jagadisa kamaye—I do not want wealth, I do not want knowledge, I do not want beauty, I do not want to be a poet." We say this, but it is very difficult to actually apply this for ourselves. We say we must be "trnad api sunichena taror api sahisnuna amanina manadena—humbler than a blade of grass, more tolerant than a tree, give honour to others without desiring it for yourself," but it is necessary to practise this yourself first (nija achari). You must experience it yourself. That is why, when we speak Hari-katha, we do not speak it for others—we speak only for ourselves. Srila Guru Maharaj says that if you speak Hari-katha, nobody may be listening to it, but you are listening to it, Krishna is listening to it—that is sufficient. The most important thing is that you are listening to it.

There is also another thing.

gramya-katha na sunibe, gramya-varta na kahibe

bhala na khaibe ara bhala na paribe

amani manada hana krsna-nama sada la'be

vraje radha-krsna seva manase karibe

"Do not listen to the mundane talks, do not listen to the mundane news. Do not eat fancy food, do not wear fancy clothes. Do not expect honour to yourself, but offer all respect to others. Always chant the Holy Name of Krsna, and in your mind serve Radha-Krsna."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Antya-lila, 6.236-237)

Mahaprabhu told many things to Srila Raghunath Das Goswami. We must think about it and we must have a clear understanding about those things. You know, once a Russian devotee, who now lives in Thailand, asked Gurudev, "Gurudev, please give me your mercy. Please bless me"; his flight was the next day, so the next day he again came to Gurudev and said, "Gurudev, please bless me, please give me some mercy." Gurudev replied, "I gave you my blessing yesterday—is it already finished?" I remember this—I heard it from Gurudev and saw it myself also.

So, we say,

na dhanam na janam na sundarim kavitam va jagadisa kamaye

mama janmani janmanisvare bhavatad bhaktir ahaituki tvayi

"I do not want wealth, I do not want knowledge, I do not want beauty, I do not want to be a poet. I only want causeless devotion to Your lotus feet. Give me that kind of devotion to Your lotus feet so that I could do Your service life after life."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Antya-lila, 20.29)

But we must experience it ourselves. This is the main thing. When Mahaprabhu told Srila Raghunath Das Goswami Prabhu, "Go back to your house. Maintain your life as a non-devotee and keep Krishna in your heart without showing it to others." Then, when his parents saw, "Oh, my son is back, he is taking care of the property, etc." At that time, Srila Raghunath Das Goswami said, "They say, 'My son has become very good'—but these words strike me as death. To hear this is the same as death for me." Then you can understand easily what is necessary for your spiritual life.

Somebody thinks, "Oh, I have taken initiation, it is sufficient," but only initiation is not sufficient. Just as in the case of every university or school—you receive admission to a school or university, or a spiritual university, but this is not enough; you must attend that school, you must study all books, then you will take an exam, and only then you will see whether you pass or fail—you will see whether you have really studied or not. We say, "Oh, I have taken initiation, that is it," but no, you must study, you must practise, you must take the exam.

We say we will start practising from tomorrow, but no—start now. There is no time. You must study, and it is actually very hard—you must practise every day, work on it every day. That is the main thing.

* * *

Hanuman's Service Drive

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Evening class, Sri Nrisingha Palli

2 March 2020, part 7

I will give you some example of Hanuman's love for Rama, of his desire to serve Rama.

Hanuman always wants to stay with Ramachandra. When the fighting finished (Lanka was conquered) and everybody returned to Ayodhya, Hanuman wanted to continue serving Ramachandra—so much so that even when Sita Devi was together with Ramachandra at night, Hanuman wanted to stay with Ramachandra. Ramachandra told him to come out, and Hanuman was very unhappy to be sitting outside. One day, he asked Sita Devi, "O Sita Ma! What is this? How come you can always be with Ramachandra and I cannot always stay with Him? Is there something that you have that I do not have?" Sita Devi told, "Yes, there is. I always stay with Him because I have sindur!" (Sindur is a powder that married ladies apply on the parting of their hair to ensure a long life for their husbands). Then, Hanuman went to the market and asked shopkeepers, "Where is sindur? Where is sindur?" Somebody gave him a small box, but Hanuman said, "Oh, this is too small! Give me a big box! Bring it!" The shopkeepers thought Hanuman had become crazy. In the end, they brought a big sack of sindur and gave it to Hanuman. Hanuman opened the sack and put that sindur all over his body. Then, he came to Ramachandra and said, "Can I stay with You now?" Ramachandra said, "O Hanuman, you have so much love and affection for Me! I cannot reject you."

There is also another thing. You know that Hanuman always does all services, so much so that he does not give anyone chance to do anything. Everybody was unhappy, "Oh, he does all service and does not give a single service to us!" Then, one day, Bharath, Satrughna, Laksman, Sita and others decided to make a meeting. At the meeting, they made a list of all services of Lord Ramachandra and distributed all services among everyone—everyone got some service, "You do this," "You do that," etc. They made the list and all that was left to do was to get the signature of approval from Ramachandra. So, they came to Ramachandra and showed Him the list. Lord Ramachandra saw everybody's names were there except for Hanuman's, "What is this? Why is Hanuman's name not there?" Anyhow, He signed the paper.

After that, whenever Hanuman was going to do some service, everybody showed him the list and said, "Hey, it is my service!" Hanuman was surprised, "What is my service then? All service is your service!" Sometimes, when somebody became tired, Hanuman would see it and quickly push them aside and did their service. One day, Ramachandra and Sita Devi went to sleep. Hanuman was very sad, sitting in the garden nearby. Ramachandra is the Lord, He knows everything. He too was thinking, "How can I get back Hanuman's association?" Suddenly Ramachandra yawned—He opened His mouth wide but did not close it. Sita Devi became alert, "What has happened? Why is He not closing His mouth?" She called everyone—Laksman, Shatrughna, and others, but still Ramachandra did not close His mouth. Then, everybody understood that only Hanuman could help out. As soon as Hanuman came, Ramachandra closed His mouth.

In this way, we can see how much Ramachandra loves Hanuman and how much Hanuman loves Him. It is necessary to have such service desire.

* * *

Plane of Faith

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Evening class, Sri Nrisingha Palli

2 March 2020, part 8

I have told today also what Gurudev said about the kind of service mood we should have. There are two ideals—a cat that catches and takes its baby with its mouth; and a monkey that walks everywhere while the baby holds onto it. What service should we accept? Everybody says we must accept the 'monkey' type, but Gurudev says no. Gurudev says, "I want to follow neither the cat's, nor the monkey's example. I want to follow the example of Mother Yasoda." What did Mother Yasoda do? She tried, tried, tried, and tried to tie Gopal with a rope. She sweated so much, her hair became unkempt, etc. We think we want to be like this too—we will try and try and try our whole life to please the Lord anyhow. This is our ideal. Do you understand it? It is necessary to have such mood. In our practising life also, we must go to our real home, we must please our Gurudev, and we will try and try and one day we will be successful!

Nitai Gaura prema-anande Hari bol! Hare Krishna. Hari bol. Hari bol. Jay Srila Guru Maharaj ki jay. I want to sing one kirtan, it is a Saranagati kirtan. Saranagati, surrender, is always necessary,

dainya, atma-nivedana, goptrtve varana

'avasya raksibe krsna'—visvasa palana

Humility, self-submission, embracing the Lord’s guardianship, maintaining the faith that 'Krishna will certainly protect me'...

Krishna protects us, He is our saviour, and not only saviour—He will look after us. If you think, "Krishna is looking after us," then everything else (dainya, atma-nivedan, avasya raksibe Krsna—humility, self-submission, faith that Krishna will protect) will come automatically, then you can understand everything easily. If you think in this way, then you will not have any problem. Krishna is looking after us. We must think in this way. To save us, to look after us, Krishna sends His representative (acharya mam vijaniyam). We must always remember that Krishna Himself is taking care of us. You must believe this, you must have such strongest faith.

Gurudev says that when you have come to this line, you will get real, proper benefit, and it is necessary to believe it. It is necessary to have the strongest faith in this. Gurudev says you will go to Goloka Vrindavan, then you must think, "OK, that is my destination, that is my target." Such visvas (faith) is necessary.

'sraddha'-sabde—visvasa kahe sudrdha nischaya

krsne bhakti kaile sarva-karma krta haya

"Sraddha is firm, determined faith that by service to Krishna all actions are accomplished."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Madhya-lila, 22.62)

If you have no faith, then it is a problem. It is necessary to have faith. Our life is always based on faith. Krishna will protect us, Krishna is our saviour, and Krishna is looking after us. This is what our guru-varga says; and Gurudev says that if you come to this line, you will get real benefit, you will go to Goloka Vrindavan—we must have faith in that. We must tell, tell, and tell ourselves that every day, then faith will come.

Jay Srila Guru Maharaj ki jay.

[His Divine Grace then chants "sarvasva tomara charane sampiya" kirtan.]

* * *

Parikrama Plan

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Evening class, Sri Nrisingha Palli

3 March 2020, part 1, translated from Bengali

We are very happy today that Srila Ashram Maharaj has come. He arrived two days ago, but took a little rest in Kolkata and has come here today. Also, Sripad Tyagi Maharaj has come today. We are very happy that our Sri Nabadwip Dham parikrama is going to start soon. Does everybody remember when it starts? On Thursday, the day after tomorrow. Thursday is ekadasi, but there is no fast on this day, the fast is on the mahadvadasi day (the day after ekadasi, i.e. Friday).

As last year, we will start the parikrama from Godrumdwip. You know that nine kinds of devotion reside on the nine islands of Nabadwip: sravanam (Simantadwip), kirtanam (Godrumdwip), smaranam (Madhyadwip), pada-sevanam (Koladwip), archanam (Rtudwip), vandanam (Jahnudwip), dasyam (Modadrumdwip), sakhyam (Rudradwip), atma-nivedanam (Antardwip). Here, Godrumdwip is the abode of kirtan.

On the first day, we will see Godrumdwip and some places of Madhyamdwip. On the second day, we will go to Antardwip (Mayapur), Simantadwip, and Rudradwip. On the third day, we will go to Koladwip (the temples of Prauddha Maya, Vriddha Siva). On the last (fourth) day, we will go to the remaining part of Koladwip, Ritudwip, Jahnudwip, and Modadrumdwip.

However, there is one thing that you all must remember. From next year, our parikrama will be five days, independent from where we do it—from the main Math or from here. Now, when we do it in four days, we often do not visit some places properly, sometimes it gets very late, everybody has to walk too much every day, etc.—that is why we have decided to increase the parikrama by one day from the next year. So, next year we will start Sri Nabadwip Dham parirkama one day earlier. You know that the calendar has come already out, you can take it home and check there—everything is written there. We will start on the dasami day—the parikrama will be on dasami, ekadasi, dvadasi, trayodasi, and chaturdasi. Remember this.

Now, the present mahajanas (great souls) will speak, and I will speak after them. [His Divine Grace invites Srila Ashram Maharaj, and then Sripad Tyagi Maharaj to speak.]

* * *

Parikrama: More Than Pilgrimage (1)

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Evening class, Sri Nrisingha Palli

3 March 2020, part 2, translated from Bengali

mukam karoti vachalam pangum langhayate girim

yat krpa tam aham vande sri-gurum dina-taranam

"The dumb can speak, the lame can climb a hill—all it takes is mercy from Gurudev."

(Bhavartha Dipika)

First, I am offering my full obeisance onto the lotus feet of my Gurupadpadma Om Vishnupad Srila Bhakti Sundar Govinda Dev-Goswami Maharaj begging him for his causeless mercy, then I am offering obeisance at the holy feet of all Guru-varga, especially Srila Bhakti Kusum Ashram Maharaj, as well as Sripad Bhakti Kamal Tyagi Maharaj and all the sannyasi-vrinda. I also offer my obeisance at the feet of all the assembled godbrothers and sisters, and all the devotees.

When I first came to the Math, the number of people who would join this Nabadwip Dham parikrama was very small. I remember the prasadam used to be taken with us in a bullock cart. Srila Guru Maharaj [Srila B.S. Govinda Dev-Goswami Maharaj] told me to do this parikrama with Sripad Bhakti Kiran Giri Maharaj and Sripad Aranya Maharaj and gave me one hundred rupees pocket money to buy the tickets to cross the Ganges (it used to cost fifty rupees one way for everyone). In this way, I did the parikrama for the first time. At that time, I observed carefully how they did the parikrama. I got an opportunity to observe what places they visited, how they did the parikrama, etc. From the next year, it was 1993, Srila Guru Maharaj told me, "It is necessary to preach. I am going abroad to preach there, but you can preach here in Bengal so that more Bengali devotees could join this parikrama." After that, I started doing this parikrama, and since then, every year, day by day, the number of devotees has been increasing. Srila Guru Maharaj was very pleased that so many people were joining this parikrama and he told me, "Now that so many people come to join, there is no place for them to stay"—this is how the Govinda Kunda building and many other facilities were made and arranged, there were different pandals, rooms, etc. So many things have been arranged for this Nabadwip Dham parikrama.

You all say that you will come and tolerate so many austerities wherever I am—whether I stay in a forest or in a jungle, you say you will still come. Hearing and seeing this, I get enthusiasm to do this parikrama. If you did not come, how would I feel eager to do it? I would not. You come, you tolerate all the inconveniences, many of you do not get a proper place, do not get a room, you sleep on the veranda, in the nat mandir, in different pandals, but you come to join this parikrama, and it gives me so much joy. That is why, I always feel enthusiastic, I always think how to arrange the parikrama next time, how to increase the facilities for the next time. You can see that even during the past year, more rooms were built here, the outbuilding kitchen was expanded, etc. In this way, I am trying to increase the facilities in various places, I struggle and try hard to arrange place for you to stay. To this day, I am still trying hard to do this on the order of my Gurudev.

One thing I have never told any year, but I want to say it today. You have taken so much trouble to come here, but also many have gone to Nabadwip Chaitanya Saraswat Math because they can get a good place to stay, a good room there. But do you think that I do not want to go there? My mind, my heart cries, "When will I go there?" I have made Gurudev's samadhi mandir... Do you think I do not want to go there? But for those who have left me, I say that one day will come, and as Guru Maharaj told me, "Wait and see. Everything will come right one day."

No matter what austerity came, we have never stopped any programmes. We are here now by the side of Nrisinghadev and Prahlad Maharaj—Prahlad Maharaj's father tortured him so much, but he never said to his father, "Father, do not kill me, please do not harass me!" I have never asked the Lord for this, "O Lord, please do not give me so many austerities!", "O Lord, please give me relief from these problems!" On the contrary, I always tell the Lord, "For Your service, no matter how much austerity You give me, I will accept everything."

* * *

Parikrama: More Than Pilgrimage (2)

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Evening class, Sri Nrisingha Palli

3 March 2020, part 3, translated from Bengali

...Therefore, you come here, you struggle so much, sometimes it rains and you get so much austerity, etc. but when you go down the path towards the Lord, there must be some austerity. We must understand this. I remember one thing.

On 4 December 2009, when Gurudev declared my name, I did not understand anything at that time. After that, Gurudev quickly sent me to Australia with Srila Ashram Maharaj. I was going to go to Malaysia from Australia, but Gurudev called me and said, "There is a problem here, it is good if you can return quickly." My programme was fifteen days, but I came back in seven days leaving Srila Ashram Maharaj in Australia. To this day I still remember what problem Gurudev got at that time and how much pain he felt. Anyhow, I came back, and many of you know that at that time Gurudev became very sick. With so much pain, he kept saying, "Ei jagate theke anugatya chole gechhe (এই জগৎ থেকে আনুগত্য চলে গেছে). Ei jagate theke anugatya chole gechhe (এই জগৎ থেকে আনুগত্য চলে গেছে). [Anugatya, chaste adherence to one's guru, has left this world.] There is no more anugatya in this world." Gurudev told me at that time, "When my Guru Maharaj fell ill, I had no other way but to stop Nabadwip Dham parikrama that one time. So, what will you do? This year I cannot go to Nabadwip for 2010 parikrama, tell me if you can still do it or not. If you cannot do it, you can stop it. I know you actually do the parikrama every year yourself, but I have been always present there, but this time I will not be present, I will stay in Kolkata." I told Gurudev, "If you give your mercy, I will definitely be able to do the parikrama."

Later, when we left the [Nabadwip] temple, you know that this temple here [in Nrisingha Palli] had not been completed yet, the Deities had not been installed, but there was no other place in Nabadwip where we could stay, and that year everybody kept calling me, asking, "Maharaj, what is going to happen? Will there be a parikrama this year?" I told everybody to come, and three days before the parikrama was to start, I made the decision. I told Tyagi Maharaj, consulted with Srila Ashram Maharaj, Srila Janardan Maharaj, Srila Trivikram Maharaj, who were here at that time. I said that I would not stop the parikrama—no matter how, no matter with what difficulty, even if we have to stay in a pandal, I will still continue this parikrama. That year I brought Mahaprabhu's vijaya vigraha from Kolkata and, placing Him here, started the worship and the parikrama by Mahaprabhu's mercy.

From then on, you have been coming here.

sri-gauda-mandala-bhumi yeba jane chintamani

tara haya vraja-bhume vasa

"Those who always think about Sri Nabadwip Dham, reside in Sri Vrindavan."

Those who think about this Gaura Mandal parikrama, who do the parikrama of the abode of Gaura, who have got an opportunity to circumambulate the holy abode of Sri Gaura, are very fortunate. Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur, Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur, Srila Gaura Kishor Das Babaji Maharaj, Srila Vamsi Das Babaji Maharaj, Srila Jagannath Das Babaji Maharaj—they all left Vrindavan and came to live here, in Nabadwip Dham. They took Sri Nabadwip Dham as non-different from Sri Vrindavan Dham. We too, following their vision, taking their vision of Sri Nabadwip Dham upon our heads, now receive an opportunity to do this Sri Nabadwip Dham parikrama every year.

Sometimes West Bengalis hear about Nabadwip Dham and think that it is about going to Mayapur, having an outing in ISKCON, etc. When we go to Mayapur we often see that people come there on a bus tour—they come to some temple, have a picnic, and leave. This is not Nabadwip Dham parikrama! If you have a bus ride around Nabadwip, this is just an eye exercise. We do not come for this. We come for sadhu-sanga, that is why we do this parikrama with kirtan, taking this holy land on your head, we come to sit wherever sadhus sit and speak. We do not go shop to shop looking for things to buy for our grandchildren. This is all material desires, we must leave all these desires (I told you the story of Chitraketu the other day). As long as you are attacked by material desires, the glories of Sri Nabadwip Dham will not be able to enter your mind or heart.

You can see from how far people come here. Many of you have come from Hooghly, Bardhaman, Midnapore, etc., but many foreign devotees have come here from hundreds of thousands of miles away, they spend lakhs of rupees to come here just to stay here for seven days or so. For them, everything here is different—the food is different, the water is different, etc. If you think about it, you can understand how far behind you are.

bharata-bhumite haila manusya janma yara

janma sarthaka kari' kara para-upakara

"One who has taken his birth as a human being in the land of India should take advantage of his birth and bring benefit to all other people."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Adi-lila, 9.41)

You are born right here in India but how far out you are from this bringing benefit to others! We come, dance and say "Hari bol! Hari bol!" but we have not taken anything into our hearts—we have not been able to capture anything within our hearts. We have only seen some beautiful buildings, temples, etc. Many also think that the bigger the temple is, the bigger the guru in that temple is, or the more temples one has, the bigger guru he is, and if one stays in a thatched house, he is not a great guru. What great building did Babaji Maharaj, Rupa Goswamipad, Sanatan Goswami, Jiva Goswami, Raghunath Das Goswami stay in? How many temples (maths) of Mahaprabhu have you seen? So, when you go to Mayapur, you goggle at great buildings, many things, etc. but this is not the point! Those who come to walk this Nabadwip Dham parikrama, must understand what is the result of this parikrama. The result of Nabadwip Dham parikrama is devotion for Gauranga Mahaprabhu, for the Lord. How can one get devotion? That is why this Nabadwip Dham parikrama is necessary.

* * *

Parikrama: More Than Pilgrimage (3)

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Evening class, Sri Nrisingha Palli

3 March 2020, part 4, translated from Bengali

You must not imitate the behaviour of the Guru and Vaishnavs. Maharaj told one story when we went for preaching, I am remembering it now. It happened in Champahatti, at the Gaura-Gadadhar Math.

The Gaura-Gadadhar Math is the temple of the Deities of Gaura Gadadhar installed by Dvija Vaninath in the time of Mahaprabhu. After Mahaprabhu, this temple ended up in an unbelievable condition: it was covered by jungle, and the Deities stayed there sometimes fasting, sometimes some offering came. Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur went there and restored the service. Then, his disciple Sripad Nayanabhiram Prabhu (later, he took sannyas and his name became Sripad Bhakti Vivek Bharati Maharaj).

So, there was class, kirtan, Hari-katha running every day at the temple, and one time a big scholar started coming there. He would come there thinking, "Oh, devotees come and pay obeisance to them..." He became jealous, "How come nobody pays obeisance to me? Nobody has so much faith in me!" Then, he decided, "OK, I will behave the way these sadhus behave then!" So, one day, he dressed as a sadhu, came in front of the Deities, and fell on the ground thinking everybody would be impressed by him and, thinking he was a great saint overwhelmed by ecstasy, give him much honour. So, he fell on the ground and remained lying there quietly pretending he was unconscious. What happened then? There were some wood ants in that place, and suddenly the ants bit his thigh. Not being able to tolerate the pain, he slowly, slowly began to scratch his thigh. Seeing this, everybody thought, "What is this man doing?! He is crazy!" Ashamed, that man went away. Later on, before his death he came there again and asked them for forgiveness, "I did wrong, I made an offence at the feet of Vaishnavs, please forgive me." He explained why he did it and repented. Actually, he had been suffering from some disease because of what he had done...

There are such people in our country. Such aul, baul, kartabhaja, neda, etc. people chant kirtan showing ecstasy, they do so many things, but true saints (sadhus) do not behave in this way. I have told you many times that you can find many gurus in this world, but you will not find so many genuine gurus in this world. There are kaulik gurus, laukik gurus, karmi gurus, jnani gurus, yogi gurus. But those who follow the proper process will wake you up in the middle of your sleep and announce in the microphone, "Wake up! Take bath, we are going for the parikrama!"—they take you for the parikrama, arrange prasadam for you, etc. You must think about this yourself.

* * *

Parikrama: More Than Pilgrimage (4)

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Evening class, Sri Nrisingha Palli

3 March 2020, part 5, translated from Bengali

This is your own house. This is not my wealth and property. This is your own home. You must stay here as at your home, serve prasadam to others as you do at your own home, prepare and cook as you do in your own home, help and serve. Service mood means always thinking, "When will I be able to do some service?" Think about it. This is Devapalli—if you even sweep here, if you wash the dishes here, how fortunate it is. All demigods reside here. Sriman Nityananda Prabhu did this parikrama with Srila Jiva Goswami, and we will now do this parikrama all together. What a great joy this is! We do not know whether we will be alive to do this parikrama next year or not.

Just yesterday (I told about it yesterday in the evening) my friend from Malaysia at whose house I stayed for so many days, passed away all of a sudden. He did not have any disease, he was not sick or anything—he was lying down, suddenly some cough came and as he coughed he died. I had spoken to him just a few days before that, he told, "Maharaj, I cannot go for Nabadwip Dham, but I will try to come later." Many also cannot come in winter because it is too cold, so many wanted to come when it gets warm, he also told me that, but we do not know when we have to leave this world. However, you all have come here despite all the difficulties for four-seven days, you are fortunate.

We always worry about our bodies, "Where will I stay? What will I eat? Where will I sleep?" But one day this body will be burnt. Have you thought about that? You always worry where you will sleep, what you will eat, etc. but you do not think about the benefit of your soul. How can you bring benefit to your own self? Sadhus think about the benefit of the soul. The Lord always thinks about your soul's benefit, "How can your soul be benefitted? How can you get spiritual benefit?" Remember this. You must try to realise this.

Start walking, start your journey—the Lord's house has so many wonderful properties, you must go there. It is necessary to start practising now. If you come suddenly once a year and when you go back home you forget everything, this will not do. I go to different houses all the time—I go wherever you call me, and I keep on telling everyone the same thing: I keeping on calling everyone for this Nabadwip Dham parikrama. Despite some difficulties with facilities, you can come and do this parikrama under guidance of Guru and Vaishnavs—this is the greatest, the highest benefit in our lives.

It is especially true about Sri Nabadwip Dham parikrama. Srila Prabhupad says that Nabadwip Dham parikrama is especially good for newcomers, Sri Ksetra Mandal is for those who have progressed on a little, and Sri Vraja Mandal is for those who have attained the highest level. Therefore, this Nabadwip Dham parikrama is necessary for all of us. We do not know anything, do not understand anything in this path of devotion, but we can only try to get some devotion.

Because you have all come here, I am staying here for seven days. I was just thinking the other day, I have been coming here for many years, but how many days have I stayed here over the past year? I counted it and it turns out that I have come here only five times, it means I stayed here only for five days over the past year. I always go to different places—sometimes to Siliguri, sometimes to Bardhaman, sometimes to Bakura, sometimes to Midnapore, sometimes to Hooghly, Tarakeshwar, Ekachakra, Ganga Sagar, Vrindavan, Puri, South India, and so on. This is how the whole year passes. Then, I was thinking that because you are all here, I am staying here for so long (for seven days). After this festival, I will again have to go to different places. Soon I will be going to different places inviting everyone for Puri Dham parikrama. We will go to Puri for Ratha-yatra. Then, there is Vrindavan parikrama in Kartik, I will be going and inviting everyone again. Then, it will be Ekachakra Dham parikrama, I will be going house to house inviting, "Come to Ekachakra. There is Ekachakra Dham parikrama soon, please come." After Ekachakra, I hardly stay one day in Kolkata—I usually come there in the evening and the next day I have to go out again. Therefore, because you are all here, I come here and stay here. Wherever you are, I will come there. I always stay wherever devotees are. Always think about it.

Always remember that I am your own, that I am your extremely close relative. Gurudev's property is not some great buildings, temples, etc. Gurudev's wealth is love, devotion, prema. This is what Gurudev's mercy is. If you have these things, then you will be always able to do this dham parikrama, you will be always able to progress on the path of devotion...

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Parikrama: More Than Pilgrimage (5)

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Evening class, Sri Nrisingha Palli

3 March 2020, part 6, translated from Bengali

You are going to do this Nabadwip Dham parikrama, and you should come with us wherever we go. Sometimes it may be difficult, but try to manage little by little. You know that we always go to different places during the parikrama, and soon the book 'Sri Nabadwip Dham Mahatmya Mukta Mala' (Bengali) is going to come out. You will get it tomorrow—it is already in Kolkata, and it will come here tomorrow in the evening. Take it with you home.

Our parikrama has never gone to Sridhar-angan, but this year we will go there. I have told Tyagi Maharaj to take a car and go there tomorrow to find the place. We will go there this year. Mahaprabhu went there—He would always take bananas from Sridhar Prabhu's house. Sridhar Prabhu would tell Mahaprabhu, "Are there no other shops here? Why do You always come here and take things from Me forcefully? What is this?"

bhakter jinish prabhu lutiputi khay

abhakter jinish prabhu ulti nahi khay

"The Lord eats anything and everything when a devotee offers it, but He does not take anything from a non-devotee."

The Lord takes things from His devotees. Always remember this.

You have also heard about aparadh-bhanjan-pat, Devananda Pandit's place where Mahaprabhu forgave his offence. There is also Jagai Madhai ghat, we went there last year, and we will try to go there this year also. In this way, we will try to do this Nabadwip Dham parikrama. We will try to go to every place. You will not have to walk much as we will go some of the way by bus, I have made the arrangement for you all, so you will not have to struggle much. You must try to listen to what maharajs say attentively—listen and keep what they say in your heart. Always hearing gramya-katha, speaking gramya-varta, gossiping and nonsense talking never bring devotion, they destroy it. It is necessary to reject what is unfavourable to devotion. Always throw away bad thoughts, all the nonsense talks, all the village talks, etc.

When you go to some place, you must think, "Why are we going there?" You must always realise why you visit a particular place. You could go and do a parikrama of Kolkata also, but what did you come to Nabadwip? Why do you do a parikrama of Puri or Vrindavan? There are so many places where you could go, there is no lack of places in this world for sightseeing. The difference is that we come to the places where devotees are,

gaura amara ye saba sthane

karala bhramana range

se saba sthana heribo ami

pranayi-bhakata-sange

"In the company of loving devotees, I behold all the places my Gaurasundar roamed during His ecstatic Pastimes."

('Suddha-bhakata-charana-renu' by Srila Bhakti Vinod Thakur)

We will go to the places where Gauranga Mahaprabhu, where Nityananda Prabhu went; wherever there is Their feet dust, we will go there to take it on our heads. We want to do this Nabadwip Dham parikrama in a pure way. This is the place where Srila Jagananth Das Babaji Maharaj, Srila Gaura Kishor Das Babaji Maharaj, Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur, Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur resided and served. They discovered so many places of Mahaprabhu, and we come to pay our obeisance at all those places.

You have all read Srimad Bhagavatam, you know or heard about Dhruva Maharaj (there was some karma-misra bhakti at first), about Chitraketu's story (who had some material desires), you can read how they got devotion; you can also read about Ambharish Maharaj, Prahlad Maharaj, and then about Uddhav Maharaj. Krishna told Uddhav Maharaj, "Uddhav, you are more dear to Me than even I Myself." That Uddhav Maharaj said, "I have no capacity to touch the feet dust of the gopis, but if I can be born as some blade of grass ('trnad api sunichena'...) in Vrindavan, where those gopis performed their pastimes, where those gopis walk (Vraja Mandal parikrama), then their feet dust will fall on my head." Uddhav Maharaj aspired for the feet dust of the Vraja gopis, he prayed to take it on his head.

I also pray to you all—I pray that your feet dust will always remain on my head. You must not come to grasp my feet; rather, I wish to do this Dham parikrama taking your feet dust on my head. Jay Srila Guru Maharaj ki jay.

If I can take the feet dust of all those who come to do this parikrama, then I will consider myself fortunate. I always tell you that I did not come to this world to become an acharya—I always want to be a disciple. If I can become a real disciple of Gurudev, then I will consider myself fortunate. This is the greatest attainment for me.

We must always remember these things. We must always think how we can serve our Guru and Vaishnavs. You must always think, "How can I make sadhus, guru, Vaishnavs, and the Lord happy?" You always think, "I want this, I want this, this, this"—your mind always judges only the external world, but your atma knows what Paramatma wants. Your soul (atma) has a relation with the Supersoul (Paramatma), your body has no relation with the Supersoul or the Lord. Only your souls has a relation with the Lord. Always remember this. You must know who you are, what your position is. If you know it, then you will always be in the right place.

Jay Srila Guru Maharaj ki jay. Jay Srila Gurudev. Hari bol. Nitai Gaura Haribol.

[His Divine Grace then concludes the class with 'Hari Haraye Nama Krsna' kirtan, and the Jaya Dhvani.]

* * *

World Pandemic: Use This Time Wisely

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Kolkata-Worldwide, 28 March 2020, part 1

Jay Om Vishnupad Jagad-Guru Srila Bhakti Sundar Govinda Dev-Goswami Maharaj ki jay

Visva-varenya Srila Guru Maharaj ki jay

Om Vishnupad Jagad-Guru Paramahamsa-kula-churamani Jagad-Guru Srila Bhakti Raksak Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj ki jay

Jay saparikara Sri Sri Guru Gauranga Gandharva Govinda Sundarjiu ki jay

Jay Om Vishnupad Bhagavan Sri Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Goswami Thakur Prabhupad ki jay

Rupanuga-guru-varga ki jay

Namacharya Haridas Thakur ki jay

Vrinda Devi Tulasi Devi Sri Bhakti Devi ki jay

Sri Shyama Kunda Radha Kunda Sri Giri Govardhan ki jay

Sri Mayapur Dham Sri Nabadwip Dham Sri Vrindavan Mathura ki jay

Sri Purusottam Ksetra ki jay

Baladev Subhadra Jagannathjiu ki jay

Akar Math-raj Sri Chaitanya Math ki jay

Mayapur Yogapith ki jay

Sri Chaitanya Saraswat Math ki jay

Sri Chaitanya Saraswat Math all the worldwide devotees ki jay

Samagata Gaura bhakta-vrinda ki jay!

Harinam sankirtan ki jay

Bhakta-prabara Prahlad Maharaj ki jay

Suddha-bhakti-vighna-vinasankari Bhagavan Nrisinghadev ki jay

Sri Sada-Siva Gangadhar jiu ki jay

Giriraj Govardhan ki jay

Harinam sankirtan ki jay

Nitai Gaura premanande Hari bol

After so many days after Gaura Purnima, I have come today in front of everybody by the mercy of Gurudev, by the mercy of the Lord.

All over the world, all devotees at this moment always think and are always afraid of COVID-19, coronavirus. Actually, we must think that in this world, people are now busy with taking care of themselves, i.e. taking care of their bodies... At this moment, devotees in many countries cannot go out of their homes, there is much restriction, they cannot gather many people, etc., and they are passing their life in their home. This is very difficult for everybody—there is no job, no business, people cannot open their shops, there is a lot of difficulty everywhere, there is a want of money, food, things, medicine, etc. So many things are happening. However, those who are real devotees, they are serving now, they are trying to serve the Lord, they are trying to serve their Guru and fulfil his desire even at this moment.

Now that all the devotees are always in their house, it is a good time—they can read many books such as Srimad Bhagavatam, Chaitanya-charitamrita and all our good books. They can concentrate their mind on Krishna consciousness and chant more rounds of the Holy Name. They can do more service in their houses.

Actually, I came back here to Kolkata the day before yesterday after having visited many temples. I went to Nrisingha Palli, Murshidabad temple, Mahadiya temple (West Bengal), Ekachaka temple, Bakura temple, then Tarakeshwar temple, and then I came here. I had arranged so many things to make Gurudev's disappearance festival, but now we cannot make a big festival, so I thought, "What can I do with all these things?" That is why I distributed everything among all the temples—I distributed all the groceries, rice, dal, sugar, oil, etc. among all the branches. And I was thinking that I should give some message to the devotees.

I am getting many news from all over the world, how is everyone, what everyone is doing, etc. What is happening now all over the world is Kali's pradurbhav (outbreak). Human beings have so much ego, they do not give respect to other jiva souls. I am thinking this coronavirus affects only all human beings—only humans are dying all over the world, I do not see that any animals die of it. Then, this is the reaction—all over the world people kill so many cows, they kill so many dogs, monkeys, etc. and these species are desperate because of human beings' aggressive mood. That is why a reaction is coming now.

Great scientists are making experiments in their laboratories, they try so hard, but they still cannot find the cure to finish this virus—it is not so easy because this virus is coming from Yamaraj. Scientists cannot believe that Yamaraj is giving this virus—they are giving medicine, they are trying to stop this virus, but still so many people have died. I heard yesterday that the British prime-minister is also affected by this virus. Before that, he had told everyone, "You must take good food," "You must do this, this, and this"—he had given so much advice, but after that he himself became attacked by the coronavirus. That is an example for you.

When people suffer too much, they remember the Lord. So, now because everyone is suffering, they are remembering the Lord, and it is also good for them, but when everyone is enjoying, when they have no problem, then they forget the Lord. I am also thinking what can we do about it? Government restriction, lockdown in every country, quarantine in so many places, social distance—on the one hand, all this is good, but on the other hand people do not think that we must remember the Lord, chant the Holy Name of the Lord.

This is the main thing, and this is what our community will do—it concerns everyone, independent of whether or not they are listening to this class right now. Everyone must understand that when we have to leave this body, there is nothing any treatment can do. We cannot do anything about it—when the time comes, we will have to leave our body. However, as many days as we may have, we must not waste our time! You have got a good opportunity now that you are in lockdown, you can chant the Holy Name. Do not always think, "Money, money, money," do not always think how you will pay your bills. This is nothing. You worry how you will maintain yourself, but Krishna will send you some help. Depend upon Krishna.

I have not heard any news so far that any of our devotees are affected by this virus. This is good news for us. I am getting so many news from every country, and everybody is still OK. So, I am telling you all that you must be always careful, it is necessary to always keep some social distance from everyone. Actually, I always tell you that it is necessary to keep distance from everybody—your close friend is a devotee of Krishna, your close friend is the Lord. We must be close with Lord Krishna, we must be close with our Guru (we must make a good relationship with our Guru). This the main thing. Those who are our relatives in this world are not our relatives—they are svajanakya-dasyu (disguised dacoits), they always want to take something from you. So, ultimately, it is not a problem for us—if we die from coronavirus, it is not problem...

* * *

World Pandemic: The Only Relief

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Kolkata-Worldwide, 28 March 2020, part 2

When Anghira Rishi came to Chitraketu, Chitraketu had a material desire and was always thinking, "I have no child, I have no son!" so Anghira Rishi did not give him any good advice. He only told him, "OK, you will get a son, but through your son you will get both happiness and sadness." When Chitraketu heard it, he was very happy and kept thinking, "I will get a son! I am so happy!" He forgot that Aghira Rishi said he would get sadness also. You all know what happened after that, I do not want to explain the whole story to you now. When Chitraketu's son died soon after that, Chitraketu was very sad, and Anghira Rishi could see from far what was happening to Chitraketu. Then, Anghira Rishi came again and gave him some good advice this time. Chitraketu followed it and became a great saint, a great sadhu—he became a great preacher and preached all over the world. After that, one day he came to Sivji Maharaj. At that time Parvati Devi was sitting on Sivji Maharaj's lap, and Chitraketu wanted to give some advice to Sivji Maharaj. Parvati Devi could not tolerate it—she became angry and cursed him to go to hell. When Chitraketu heard it, he did not feel anything. He thought, "OK, I will go to hell, what is the problem?" In this way, for a Vaishnav, for a sadhu or a devotee, whether it is hell, heaven, or even liberation, everything is the same—even in hell devotees will think about Krishna, think about the Lord, about the service to the Lord.

Therefore, wherever we are staying, wherever we live, we must chant the Holy Name. In this situation that is happening in this world, only the chanting of the Holy Name can give some relief to us, nothing else. In this situation, only service to the Lord, only chanting the Lord's Name can give relief to us.

You have heard that after Kali-yuga everything will be finished—Kalki Maharaj (Kalki avatar) will come riding a horse, carrying a sword and kill all those who do not chant the Holy Name. This is happening slowly, slowly.

This virus is coming from China, and you can see how desperate the people there are—they eat carcasses, they eat rats, cows, dogs, buffalos, rams; they eat so many nonsense things. Then, I am thinking there is lockdown all over the world now, people are in their houses, some markets are closed, and they are not getting proper meat. I heard that in one of the states here in India, in Mizoram (it is in the east of the country, and 90% of the population there are Christian), the government has made the rule that they now cannot kill dogs for meat. Now they understand that they have been killing animals and this reaction is coming to the human body. I see that only humans are dying—no animals are dying from this virus, and all the animals are now happy because people are afraid to eat them because of the virus.

I am also thinking that when the proper time comes, Yamaraj will give a proper solution, will give some proper medicine. America, London, Italy have such advanced science, there are so many Nobel prize winners there, but still so many people are dying from this coronavirus and they cannot stop it no matter how much they try. Then, we must think about this, we must tell others to please avoid eating fish, meat, avoid this kind of sinful works. This world is now too much full of sinful works, sinful activities, and it is going from bad to worse and to worst.

* * *

Nurture Faith and Faithfulness

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad

Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj

Kolkata-Worldwide, 28 March 2020, part 3

You must think about it. Scriptures say that the number of human beings is much smaller than insects, trees, etc. So, when human beings come and kill other species, then the balance, the ratio becomes disturbed. Then, now this ratio is getting restored slowly. If some human beings die and the number of animals increases (these human beings die and become animals), then the ratio will be restored. Anyhow, gradually all this will be finished—this whole world and everything in it will be ruined. I saw that in Brazil they set fire and burn so much forest, so many trees. This is not good. You saw also a few years ago they cut the hill, they made a concrete way in Kedarnath (Uttarakhand, near Haridwar) and a huge ashram, a huge hotel, but then one day water came and all buildings, all ashrams, hotels, everything was demolished, but Sivji Maharaj is there—nothing happened to his house.

Therefore, we must think what is our duty. Wherever we stay, wherever we live, we must practise properly, and we must be open-minded. You must tell everything to your Guru with an open mind. Gurudev is the centre of the disciple's heart, and a proper disciple will tell everything to his guru. If you come to a doctor but do not tell him properly what your disease is, the doctor will not be able to give you the proper treatment. In the same way, a disciple will also tell everything to his guru. You only say, "Give me some mercy," "Give me some mercy," but Gurudev always gives you service, and you forget that service—you are always engrossed in family attachment, material attachment and you cannot remember the Lord for one day. "How is it possible to think about the Lord? How can I make Him happy?"—we do not understand it. It is very necessary to understand this. This kind of situation is coming to our life now, how will we overcome it?

All scientists and doctors will give you some medicine, but our proper medicine is chanting the Holy Name and service to our Guru, service to Gauranga. A guru that does not worship Gauranga is a 'maya-guru' (illusory or bogus guru). Service to Guru-Gauranga, service to Gaura-Nityananda is essential for our life. Krishna is the Supreme Personality of Godhead, He controls everything. Only if we surrender to Him, if we pray to Him, pray to His Lordship, then He can alleviate this situation.

Does anyone have any questions?

Devotee: Gurudev, how can we serve you from our houses?

You can serve by following my instruction. My instruction is chanting the Holy Name, not to spend time always thinking nonsense things, and to always practise the panchanga (five main devotional practices):

sadhu-sanga, nama-kirtana, bhagavata-sravana

mathura-vasa, sri-murtira sraddhaya sevana

"One should associate with devotees, chant the Holy Name of the Lord, hear Srimad-Bhagavatam, reside at Mathura and serve holy Deities with faith."

Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Madhya-lila, 22.124

Do this properly, read our Math's books. I have published many books, read those books, read Guidance 4. Have you got this book? Read it.

If your guru tells you, "Do this," but you do other things, then how will you increase your spiritual life, how will you progress in your spiritual life? If Gurudev says, if Krishna says in Srimad Bhagavad-gita, "I will protect you," we must believe it, but the problem is that we do not think that way. Gurudev says, "OK, if you follow the rules and regulations, if you follow proper guidance of the guru, you will get to your real home"—if you have the strongest faith, you will get it, but if you have no faith, you will not get it. That is the main thing. Follow the proper instruction.

Actually, we do not know anything, we always think based on our acquired culture (samskar)—we always think from one side, but Gurudev thinks from all sides. Sometimes Gurudev gives me an order, but I do not like it. Suppose I am coming from a certain culture and I eat rice, but if Gurudev tells me, "You must take chapati," then I must take it. We think, "Oh, I do not like it," but if Gurudev tells you that you must take chapati, then I must take it. I may not like something, but I think according to my culture, but Gurudev thinks with my goodwill in mind.

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