19800809 Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 4.20.14

The following is a class given by His Holiness Jayapatākā Swami Mahārāja on August 9, 1980. The class begins with the reading from the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam Canto 4 Chapter 20 Text 14.

Jayapatākā Swami: Here Lord Viṣṇu is advising Mahārāja Pṛthu, how to be a successful ruler of his citizens. It is understood that if one performs his duty as given to him by higher authorities in disciplic succession, that by performing one’s service perfectly, one is able to achieve the highest perfection of life.

A king’s duty is not only to levy taxes, (coughing) punish miscreants, but it is also his primary duty to see that the citizens are Kṛṣṇa conscious or God conscious. Without that, then the kingdom becomes simply a trouble for the king and for the citizens. It becomes a trouble for the citizens in this life and it becomes a trouble for the king in this life and the next. Because in this life, there is all kinds of indiscipline, in the next life, he has to accept one-sixth of the sinful reactions of his prajā, his citizens.

The Presidents of the United States– I don’t know if this is any, but it always seems that they age so much (laughter), immediately after being in office (laughter). I mean if there was a before and after picture (laughter) I’m sure that anyone could say… I just, of course, I have not seen them in person but from the photographs it seems that they go through tremendous changes.

The rulers of this world need to know Kṛṣṇa conscious principles. They are being put on the frying pan, they are accepting one sixth of all these sinful activities of this nation and of the nation they rule. They do not know what they are getting in for. And they don’t, because of the sectarian state so-called sectarian state, where there is no non-sectarian meaning to say, they don’t encourage the prajā, the citizens in any kind of religious activity; therefore, everything is in a very critical state.

You might be interested to know how Rūpa and Sanātana, when they were the Prime Ministers of the kingdom, of the empire of the Hussain Shah, the Mohammedan Emperor of the United Kingdoms of Bengal and Eastern India. That, of course we know that how humble they are! And mainly in Caitanya-caritāmṛta we understand their humility – describing themselves as so fallen, to be employed in the service of Mohammedan. However, there was one devotee, Caitanya das who went with his teacher when he was just a student. You see. And Caitanya das, he described…

(Aside: Caitanya dāsa is the father of Śrīnivāsa Ācārya. There is two Śrīnivāsas: one is Śrīvāsa Prabhu who is in the Pañca-tattva and the other is Śrīnivāsa Ācārya who is the disciple of the sixth, Gopāla Bhaṭṭa Gosvāmī, student of Jīva Gosvāmī, who is the great preacher.

So, this Caitanya dāsa, He went with his teacher to see the Prime Minister. Why… Why would teachers go to see these Prime Ministers? Because you see, Rūpa and Sanātana Gosvāmīs, when they were ministers, they were running the whole government. Actually, the king he didn’t have anything to do but declare war, whatever… just have good time. He didn’t have too many problems, he could spend his time in the conquests, whatever he wanted to do, because actually the whole government was being run by Rūpa and Sanātana.

So, what did they do? They built their own court a bit away from the king’s court, just a few miles in a place called Rāmakeli. And there, they reconstructed a Vṛndāvana situation. They dug a Rādhā-kuṇḍa, Śyāma-kuṇḍa, kuṇḍas for the sakhīs… the other sakhīs Madhumaṅgala and all the… for eight main sakhīs, they dug the kuṇḍas. And they had Rādhā-Madana-mohana Deities which were regularly being worshipped. And every day, countless scholars were coming– paṇḍitas, devotees, and they were always discussing the Bhāgavatam, hearing the lessons of Bhāgavatam, discussing kṛṣṇa-kathā and giving profuse charities to the brāhmaṇas for their Kṛṣṇa conscious and scholarly work. So, as a result, factually the whole culture, the whole Vedic culture were in that kingdom.

Why was Navadvīpa flourishing? Because of the… Because of the just rain cloud like charity of Rūpa and Sanātana. This is the inner secret, why, one of the reasons, why the culture was kept in such a high yip, high tide because of their charity. And when… And they were so humble, although they were so powerful. Generally, people become puffed up, proud; but they were so humble. Even when they were the Prime Ministers, they were so humble. They were very kind, they were very considerate, and they were very exacting in their judiciary skill, they took the advice of brāhmaṇas, but they were bit penetrating in their own expertise for managing. Therefore, they could finish their business very quickly and they could maintain the maximum time in kṛṣṇa-kathā, Kṛṣṇa worship.

So, to see this court of Rūpa and Sanātana, when they were the ministers, this Caitanya dāsa for his whole life he couldn’t forget that what tremendous qualities they had. It’s the duty of a ruler. You see. But actually of course their destiny was not to remain as Prime Ministers. But their duty was to become of course the greatest preachers for Caitanya Mahāprabhu, to discover all the hidden tīrthas of Vṛndāvana and to write bhakti-śāstra, scriptures upon devotional principles.

So of course, one time when Lord Caitanya was going to Vṛndāvana, He went through that Rāmakeli and at that time, there were literally hundreds of thousands of people gathering around Lord Caitanya. He was dancing ecstatically and engaging everyone in saṅkīrtana. Hearing about the proximity of Lord Caitanya, Rūpa and Sanātana were very eager to go to Him. Of course, the king at some point in time asked, “What about this Lord Caitanya?” They, “Oh, He’s just a sentimentalist. Don’t consider it very seriously.” Because they didn’t want him to become obsessed with Caitanya Mahāprabhu. He might create some obstacle.

So, the two of them, they went to see Lord Caitanya. And when they went to see Lord Caitanya, they put a straw in their teeth and, from a great distance, they fell down and they were offering stuti, prayers. When they got up, Lord Caitanya started to approach them and they said, “Please, please do not come near us. We are the most fallen. We are, we are in the mleccha, meat-eating community, we are the most fallen people, we are to accept this service in this community. Do not come near us. We are so sinful.” And, although they were always reading the Bhāgavatam, they were pure in every respect, they were daily worshipping Rādhā-Madana-mohana, just because they had accepted the task as politicians, as Prime Ministers for the Hussain Shah they were taking such a humble position. Then Lord Caitanya said, “Stop, Stop! You are breaking My heart to hear this humility. You are great devotees.” And of course, so He gave them instruction, “What they should do?” And of course, very soon, they made their escape and went off to Vṛndāvana, which of course you know that story.

So, we can see here of course that is the duty of the ruler to first of all be Kṛṣṇa conscious. Then everything goes well. The Hussain Shah, might have wondered how things were going well. They were going well because, of course, because things were Kṛṣṇa conscious. Of course, Lord Caitanya was present. Rūpa and Sanātana were also protecting by their Kṛṣṇa Conscious ruling.

Yudhiṣṭhira Mahārāja, when he was present, things were so well run that, one brāhmaṇa, his son died before him, he could approach and say, “What is this? What kind of king are you? My son has died before I have. This means your kingdom is completely in disorder. This is against the nature, order of nature. How can a son die before his father? You must be removed for this injustice.”

You see. When we hear this, you know, people have to laugh or scratch their head or complete bewilderment. Because we’re in a world where people claim to be advanced, where yet everything is in such disorder in terms of natural harmony, harmony with nature, harmony with each other that is inconceivable that someone could dare complain to anyone that his son is dead before he is.

Here, where you know volcanoes blow their tops (laughter), where tidal waves, you know, hurricanes are every other month coming, where genocide at wars, hot-cold-lukewarm are the continuous situation; where suicides… what to speak of… the suicides in one part of… Where was I? I was just in one city, in Chicago. Within a few block radius, there’s one, one of the most wealthiest suburbs in America, they have the record. They have achieved the highest record of suicides of teenagers in their block. (laughter) Thirty! (laughter) Thirty suicides within not a one block, you know, like 3 or 4 blocks, their neighborhood within 1 or 2 years some time. Thirty suicides! They’re dropping like flies, so to speak.

This is the progress. Because people are told that if you are materially successful, that is your success. Born successful, what’re they going to do? Those people are born, you know, with the car, with the money, with the bank balance and you know! But they are completely frustrated; because that’s not the goal of life. But who’s telling them? You go to the church to play bingo and see… see the marriage of two priests who are homosexuals. So, what is the goal of life? Who can figure it out in the modern society? Therefore, people are completely bewildered.

So therefore, we can see that, Śrīla Prabhupāda said that “In previous times he would go and convince the king, and when the king was convinced, and he would make his whole kingdom.” Just like in India, before Mahārāja Aśoka, before he was converted to Buddhism, Buddhism couldn’t make any progress. When he was converted, he could make the whole India Buddhist. Later, he was driven out. So, of course after some time, Buddhism had to stay in the other nations nearby as Bhārata became smaller. So, but this is the situation.

So today it is Democracy for the people or by the people, whatever… of the people. It is a question whether it’s for the people. But anyway, it is supposed to be by the people. So, who can the people blame if they vote, you see, bogus people to rule them. So, therefore Śrīla Prabhupāda said, “We have to educate the masses about what are the real values of life.” You see, then they can demand, “We want honest, God conscious administrators, rulers in our government.”

Right now, the people do not have any real standard. In such a big nation, bigger democracy, most powerful democracy in the world United States of America and the Presidential election, they are fortunate if 50 percent of the people even bother to vote. The people are apathetic. They know… This one or that one– what’s the difference? They are not interested. So, basically, these systems are not successful because they are not inducing the people to become God conscious. Therefore, they aren’t, they don’t care anymore. So many people don’t care. Caring comes, concern, responsibility when we realize that “I am eternal. How I act will affect me not only in this life, but in the future lives.” It is your… what is the world, then he can understand. So, these things have not been taught. They don’t realize the relationship with Kṛṣṇa. So therefore, we distribute books, we go preach them, we cultivate congregations, to bring them to the platform of understanding.

Actually, the devotees, their lives are completely different. A devotee is always absorbed in Kṛṣṇa consciousness. You see. In fact, just like, there is a prayer that says that the Gauḍīyas, the devotees of Lord Caitanya, their life and soul is Śrī Śrī Rādhā-Madana-mohana, Śrī Śrī Rādhā-Govinda, and Śrī Śrī Rādhā-Gopīnātha. So, the devotees of Caitanya Mahāprabhu, They were accepted as their life and soul, these three Deities.

And these Deities, of course, Their worship was first expanded by the Gosvāmīs in Vṛndāvana. The Deity of Govindajī… You see, When Rūpa and Sanātana went, there were no Deity, that they could, that they had to worship. And Rūpa was…

(Aside: Is it Rūpa or Sanātana, I believe Sanātana is Rādhā-Govinda, Isn’t it?)

Sanātana Gosvāmī, he was feeling very much…

(Aside: Rūpa, Rādhā-Govinda right?! Sanātana is the sambandha)

And… he is feeling, Rūpa Gosvāmī was feeling very dissatisfied because there was Vṛndāvana, there was his service, he was chanting and everything; but where was Govinda? What is Vrindavan without Kṛṣṇa? So, he was very eager to find Govinda.

So, one time he was absorbed in that kind of a separation from Lord Govinda. One, suddenly one elderly brāhmaṇa, Vraja-vāsī came up and said, “Why you looking so sad?” He said, “I want to find Govinda. What is Vṛndāvana without Govinda?” And he said, “Well there is one place, where a cow every day, a most beautiful, celestial looking cow comes and just spontaneously waters the ground with her… with milk from her milk-bags and goes away. Every day! And I forget the name of that place. Gavirdravam or something. And you just meditate on that point and think what it means.” And then that brāhmaṇa disappeared– not in the ordinary way but poof! (laughter)

And then Rūpa Gosvāmī took that this was something very special. So naturally, it didn’t take him too much to think on that subject. Immediately, he ran to that place, when he got there, no sooner did he get there, immediately he started to erupt in transcendental emotion, and he practically fell unconscious by the side of that place. And he knew that, “Govinda is here.” So, he got all of the people from around and said, “Come, Govinda beneath this Earth here.” So, everyone came, and they started to carefully excavate. Rādhā-Madana-mohana, Rādhā… Of course, each Deity is non- different because They are Kṛṣṇa; but each Deity is different in that They are līlā-viśeṣa. Every Deity has got His own relationships and own pastimes with His devotees.

Just like Kṛṣṇa would just expand and He would be the husband of Rukmiṇī, husband of Satyabhāmā, husband of Kālindī, though His relationship with each queen was different. Similarly, we can understand from the śāstra that each Deity has a separate reciprocation or relationship with His own devotees. Therefore, just like that young brāhmaṇa who went with the old brāhmaṇa to Vṛndāvana and then the old brāhmaṇa was so pleased with his service that he said in front of Lord Gopāla that, “I am going to give you my (wife excuse me) my daughter to be your wife.”

And then they went back to Orissa, but then due to so many politics of their family members, they said, “Oh, no! This is not possible.” He wanted to give his daughter, but his wife, the elder son, they all against it, because he is a poor brāhmaṇa. Said, “You should give your daughter to a rich brāhmaṇa in marriage, not this insignificant, poor brāhmaṇa basically.” So, in the face of all the pressure of relatives, he could not.

He prayed to Govinda, “How to save me from this?” And… But he couldn’t face up to it. He said, “No, no. Where is the proof that I said this or something?” Somehow, he avoided the issue. And so then the brāhmaṇa said, “Well if I go out, Gopāla is our witness. If He gives witness?!” And they said, “Oh, yes.” Because all the other relatives were not so faithful. “Yes! Yes! If your Gopāla comes here and gives witness, then we’ll give the daughter.” So just see the affection of the Lord to His devotee! The brāhmaṇa walked all the way back to Vṛndāvana and prayed to Gopāla that, “You were the witness. You must please come and testify what the old brāhmaṇa said. Otherwise his, his religious principles are going to be ruined. He is a brāhmaṇa, he is lying.”

“Then how can I go there? I am a Deity.”

“Here, how can a Deity talk?” (laughter)

“You can talk. You can also walk.” (laughter)

“So, You should come.”

“Well, I’ll come, but I will walk behind you. But if you look, then I’ll stop there. You cannot look behind, how I am walking. You’ll just hear that I am following you by My ankle bells.”

So of course, the young brāhmaṇa began on his journey and Gopāla walked off with him, all the way down to Orissa. You probably knowing this. Then he got there of course he became, at the end, he could not bear to not look and he turned around and there immediately Gopāla, outside the village, He stood in His mūrti form. And He testified on behalf of the young brāhmaṇa that, “Yes, this elderly brāhmaṇa has said this.” But of course, everyone could see that, what a great devotee, that the Lord has walked by foot, all the way from Vṛndāvana just out of the affection of His devotee. And still today the Deity of course, Sākṣi-Gopāla is being worshipped.

So, in a similar way, you see, Govinda didn’t have any Rādhārāṇī. Do you know how Govinda was united with Śrīmatī Rādhārāṇī?

You see. In a similar way, long time ago Śrīmatī Rādhārāṇī had separated from Govinda you see somehow. And She was in Orissa, being worshipped by one devotee by the name of Bṛhad-bhānu who had a relationship with Rādhārāṇī that She was his daughter. And he would worship Her and take care of Her just as his daughter. This was the relationship. Like Vṛṣabhānu also of course has that relationship with Śrīmatī Rādhārāṇī. There is nothing unusual about. These things exist in the spiritual world. But after he disappeared and gradually the sevā, pūjā, the Deity worship became deteriorated and the local people they no longer knew exactly that real nature of this Deity.

They knew the Deity to be Lakṣmī, and so they were worshipping Rādhārāṇī as Lakṣmī. So, what happened was, the Gosvāmīs they wanted to have Rādhārāṇī’s, but they were thinking how to do it. The eldest son of Mahārāja Pratāparudra whose name is Jagannātha Jana, he had a dream where the Lord told him to provide Deity for Govinda and said that the Rādhārāṇī. Actually, Rādhārāṇī came to him – I believe – and told him that, “I’m in such and such a village and they know me as Lakṣmī; but actually, I am Rādhārāṇī. And I want you to send Me back to Vṛndāvana to be with Lord Govinda.” So, of course Jagannātha Jana was very excited that he ran down to that place and saw that the Deity the people were worshipping as Mahālakṣmī was actually two-handed Rādhārāṇī. And so he took the necessary steps in a big ceremony to transport Śrīmatī Rādhārāṇī to Lord Govinda. And in Vṛndāvana, of course there again They were united. And who can express the transcendental joy of that reunion? And all the vraja-vāsīs were of course very ecstatic.

So, this Rādhā Govinda (Aside: I was telling Suvāsa yesterday) that they were very dear to the Gauḍīyas. Actually, they gave the order to do book distribution to one of the great devotees of Lord Caitanya, Śrīnivāsa Ācārya. He actually was sent. Narottama Ṭhākura has a prayer, where he prays, “Lord Caitanya, You have so many energies who have come down to help You in Your pastimes: just like Rūpa and Sanātana, they have been empowered by You to write transcendental literatures, other devotees like Śrīnivāsa Ācārya they have been empowered to distribute these literatures and to spread the knowledge of these literatures. So, I pray to simply, always be engaged in the servants of your servants’ servants.” Like that, this one prayer that Narottama dāsa has sung.

Of course, Narottama himself is a great preacher. So, after a tremendous ordeal, where Śrīnivāsa Ācārya was actually very very sad because he had never seen Lord Caitanya in person and he was always just very unfortunate in a sense that whenever he would go to meet some personality like Lord Caitanya, just before he got there, He would disappear. You see of course when he met Gadādhara he went back to get something and then again he went to see Gadādhara, He had just disappeared. When he went to see Nitāi, Gaura, Advaita, They just disappeared. Of course, he would always go into tremendous spiritual separation.

At that point, sometimes he thinks that I should just leave my body, he’d be rolling in the ground smashing his head thinking how useless his life was. But this was like his history. Finally, when he got to Vṛndāvana, he wanted to meet Rūpa and Sanātana he got there and as he was just bathing in a river some brāhmaṇas came by and were lamenting the fact that Rūpa and Sanātana had left the world. Everything was empty and he heard that, and he just went mad. Just you see and he was practically, he was lying unconscious in the temple of Rādhā-Govinda just thinking that he should take his life… What should he do? There’s no one he could study the Bhāgavatam from. All the associates of Lord Caitanya had disappeared.

You see, at that time Lord Caitanya, Rūpa and Sanātana came in the dream both of Jīva Gosvāmī and Gopāla Bhaṭṭa Gosvāmī. Told Jīva Gosvāmī, “You go to the temple you find him, you can recognize this young brāhmaṇa, Śrīnivāsa Ācārya, and you make sure that he takes initiation from Gopāla Bhaṭṭa Gosvāmī and learns from you the science of the Bhāgavata; you take care of him. His duty is going to be to preach My saṅkīrtana movement all over.” And He told the similar dream Gopāla Bhaṭṭa that,” This person will come and you should accept him as a disciple, he has suffered spiritual agony too much, so much.”

So Jīva Gosvāmī went to the temple and saw that while the ārati is going on that Śrīnivāsa is off in one corner, just, just collapsed, crying. And he could understand, “This is Śrīnivāsa.” And he picked him up with his own hands and embraced him.

And Śrīnivāsa, when he heard that who this was, he fell down and grabbed his lotus feet. And then, Jīva Gosvāmī took him to the, to his āśrama, to his little place where he stayed and took care of him and eventually, he took initiation from Gopāla Bhaṭṭa Gosvāmī. So, making you know long story shorter, what happened was, that you see, all the Gosvāmīs they had written so many literatures.

Caitanya-caritāmṛta was being written in Rādhā-kuṇḍa by Kṛṣṇa dāsa Kavirāja. Different you know literatures and ṭīkās, commentaries were all being written there. But these had not been transported to (Vṛnda…) Bengal, to Gauḍa-maṇḍala-bhūmi. They were all practically drying up, waiting to get the nectar from Vṛndāvana and to preach it. So, this was the situation in time.

One day everyone was present in the Rādhā-Govinda Temple, when Govinda suddenly spoke! He said that, told to Jīva Gosvāmī that, “You give the power to Śrīnivāsa to take the devotional literatures to Bengal and distribute them to My devotees.” That’s all He said, and He dropped His garland. “Haribol! Haribol!” everyone… just suddenly the Deity started speaking, everyone went wild. And immediately the pujārī tears in his eyes, he picked the garland up and he garlanded Śrīnivāsa Ācārya and he started to pay his obeisances, overwhelmed and crying. And so then immediately everyone got prepared, “Alright. Now we have to send the books.” And they made the date and prepared the bullock cart and everything and they carried all these literatures all the way to Bengal. You see; this was the situation. So actually Rādhā-Govinda, we can see that They are very much behind book distribution. You see, actually They initiated this. They were the first books that were really written by our Gauḍīya devotees, and He sent Śrīnivāsa to go and distribute them.

That… Narottama described that some are empowered to write, some are empowered to distribute – these are both confidential services to the Lord. To preach to other devotees, these are confidential services. So, of course, Śrīnivāsa Ācārya was not alone, with him his associates were like Narottama Ṭhākura, Śyāmānanda Paṇḍita, so many other Rāmacandra. Rāmacandra Kavirāja was his disciple actually.

And of course, when they went to Bengal with these books, they went into a country of Bankura, which is in Bengal and there the king, in order to make his treasury full he had a side business, which was called dacoity or armed robbery. He had a special team of trained troops who were actually nothing else but robbers. And he had an astrologer who would study astrologically that who was coming on the road. So, the astrologer studied that the most valuable treasure is coming; and it’s being carried by simply some sādhus. They have a huge box and it’s filled with some valuable treasure which I cannot understand, but I can from astrological, it is the most valuable thing. So, the king, he said, “This is very good news!” So, he sent out his robbers.

And that night of course they were sleeping, you know, the… our great previous ācāryas and the robbers come in and see here is just some sannyāsīs, some preachers and the big box under, this is like taking a candy from a baby. They just came in, took the box and left; no one even knew what happened. They woke up in the morning and, “Oh, no! All the scriptures are gone! All the books are gone!” Śrīnivāsa is again (laughter), he’s just smashing his head, pounding I mean. The others they just went off in different directions – because it was too much (laughter) – and began preaching. But Śrīnivāsa is like, “ I have to find these books.”

Practically he almost left his body in the anxiety. So then, he finally went to, here and there finally got to this king’s court room and there he saw all the brāhmaṇas were sitting and trying to figure out, what is the meaning of these books. And they are giving this interpretation and that and he comes in and says, “These people, appear to be brāhmaṇas, but they don’t know what they’re saying.” So, now the statement like that is a very big challenge.

So, the king immediately said, “So, you think that you can know what theirs. What they can say better than them? If you cannot then it may cost to your life to challenge all these exalted brāhmaṇas in this way.”

“No, by the mercy of my spiritual master, I can try to explain to you, what these means?”

What did happen was, Caitanya-caritāmṛta was on the bottom, when they, when they were carrying the books, but it came to the top of the box. It is the most exalted literature in our sampradāya. Prabhupāda described it as the post-graduate study of devotional service. So, then he began to preach from these literatures, and everyone was amazed. They, They couldn’t stop listening, how he was explaining Caitanya Mahāprabhu, how he was explaining Rādhā Kṛṣṇa, how he was explaining devotional service, this material… everything. And so, the king, he came off his throne and then he fell down at his feet and begged, “You please accept me as your disciple. You must be the king’s guru, for this whole kingdom and guide us how we can advance in our spiritual life.”

You see. So then at that point, Śrīnivāsa Ācārya became the rāja-guru and that whole kingdom, even today there are so many, that’s we make many our devotees from Bankura district. There is ancient temples of Lord Caitanya there. That is where the wooden Deities, beautiful wooden Deities are all carved in Bankura district. Many of the, the best, beautiful Deities I’ve seen are carved there. So, by the preaching, you see, to the, of course to this ruler, converting, the whole kingdom was immediately made Caitanya Mahāprabhu saṅkīrtana movement, Kṛṣṇa Conscious! And, Of course, nowadays, who do you approach? Even if the democratic leader is convinced, he can’t say anything to his constituents, because they will just knock him down, take him off the boat. Therefore, we have to preach to the intelligent people, to the mass of people and convince them.