OCEAN OF NECTAR

Divine Service

The Name of Sri Krishna is so powerful it does not care for the capacity of the soil. It may be sown anywhere, and it will sprout. Such a powerful seed! Very easily it can drive away, brush away, the sinful tendency.

If anyone comes in connection with the Name, he will get the benefit. The nature of Krishna’s Name is such: autocratic and boundless mercy. The transaction may go on in any place, any time. Where all have failed, Krishna’s Name has His glorious wave. No adverse circumstance can produce any obstacle to this.

The only condition is that to have the real thing we must have a proper connection. It must be the Name of Krishna and not an imitation. So, it is said that the physical sound may appear, an imitation, but it is not effective, because that is not Krishna.

Our attainment of the goal is not assured simply by increasing the number of times we repeat the Name; only by increasing the quality will we reach success. There are so many sayings in the scriptures to encourage our realization of the Holy Name in different ways, but Sri Rupa has given us a central thought. He quotes Padma Purana, “Our senses, physical or mental, are ineligible to come in touch with the transcendental.” The Name is non-material, without mundane limitation. It belongs to another plane.

So, nothing about Krishna—His name, form, qualities or pastimes—can be touched by our physical or mental senses, but when we have a serving attitude He comes down to us of His own accord. Only then can our tongues really pronounce the Name of Krishna, otherwise only the physical sound of the letters of the Name can be produced.

Our tongues, our hands, physical sound, all these mundane things cannot come in touch with Krishna. Some intervening medium is necessary to connect this body with the supramundane, and that connection is our earnest desire to serve Krishna, to satisfy Him.

A bulb won’t light if there is no electricity. Only when the electrical current is there will the bulb be illuminated. So, the Name may appear on the tongue and in the ear, in the mind or in writing, but we must have the connection from the transcendental realm to this mundane world, and that connection is devotional service, a functional serving attitude. That alone can connect the physical realm with the unlimited spiritual world.

Krishna will appear of His own accord. He will descend upon your tongue and then your tongue will be able to chant the Name of Krishna. A gun that has no bullet, but only a blank, may make some sound, but no bullet is actually fired. Similarly, chanting the Name of Krishna without an attitude of service produces sound, but that is only tongue deep. It is like firing a gun with blanks instead of bullets.

Our chanting of the Holy Name of Krishna must be surcharged with a serving temperament, the tendency to satisfy Krishna. Otherwise the sound we produce is bogus. It is only an imitation, or a permutation. The Holy Name cannot be experienced by our senses. It is supramental and transcendental. An ordinary sound of this mundane world cannot be the Name of Krishna. Our ear cannot even hear the Name if that mediator, the serving attitude, is not there. The earnestness to satisfy Krishna’s will must mediate between Krishna and the ear, through the mind. Then only will Krishna’s Name enter our ear and reveal to us His form, qualities and pastimes.

The Holy Name is not physical, it is transcendental, supramundane. Only through our service attitude will it come down to this mundane world. Only through service can we directly come in contact with Krishna. The real point is to practice to attain the spirit of service. The devotee is doing service and we must imbibe from him the methods of attaining this serving attitude.