19820909 Evening Darśana Nāmahaṭṭa Program in Philadelphia

The following is a Nāmahaṭṭa program given in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania by His Holiness Jayapatākā Swāmī on September 9th, 1982.

Jayapatākā Swami: …All the logic, all the scriptural evidences, in a most belligerent, puffed up, so conceited, confident and paṇḍita-like manner, challenging everyone as Nimāi Paṇḍita.  Then His father’s śrāddha, or piṅḍi-dāna was supposed to be done. So Lord Caitanya prepared to go to Gayā to offer worship. You know that Lord Caitanya’s pastimes in His youth was… when He got little older, He started to go to school Gadādhara! and immediately He became the greatest of all the scholars, and He was enjoying there… the transcendental mellow with His devotees as a brāhmaṇa. He was having His pastimes. We were discussing how sometimes the Lord would come down the street with His hundreds of disciples, thousands of disciples, students of Sanskrit and the other brāhmaṇas and paṇḍitas would see Him and they would run away.

If He would see someone, like sometimes He would see… Gadādhara. He’ll say, “Oh, Gadādhara! Where you are going? Why you are running away? Come here, come here.”, and in a very nice way He would speak. “Why you are hiding all the time? I am not seeing you anymore. Just had one question I wanted to ask you. What is the meaning of mukti?” This was His way. He would call a brāhmaṇa, call a paṇḍita, ask them a question. Whatever question He would ask, they knew that now they were finished. He would capture them, ask the question no matter what answer they would give, He would be able to show it was wrong, establish a better answer. So that time Gadādhara said, “Well mukti means that you are free from the material miseries.”. Lord Caitanya said, “I was very dissatisfied with such an answer. You don’t know what the real liberation means. Then He quoted so many ślokas, “Real liberation means to be always fixed at the lotus feet of Bhagavān Śrī Kṛṣṇa.” But even though He knows this, He was also devotee of Kṛṣṇa no doubt, but the mood was conquering everyone who He met. He saw Mukunda, “Mukunda! Where you are going? Oh Mukunda! Oh Mukunda! Then Mukunda said, “Why this Caitanya Mahāprabhu is just a grammarian studying Sanskrit grammar.  What does He know?” That time His name was Nimāi Paṇḍita. “What this Nimāi Paṇḍita know? Why do I want to go and study with Him? I will teach Him a lesson.” He walked over. Nimāi said to him, "My dear Mukunda! Where you are going? I have not seen you for so long. Why you are not coming and studying with the others?” “No because now my dear Nimāi Paṇḍita I am… want to learn poetry, Sanskrit poetry. You are just a grammarian. You are just studying the A, B, C’s and grammar. Why would I want to stay with you? Now I have a different teacher.” Then Lord… Nimāi Paṇḍita, Lord Caitanya said, “Well, if you feel like that, of course, what can we say? But we do happen to know something about Sanskrit poetry. What would you... could you just compose us some poetry? We could study your poetry.”

“Oh…”, then Mukunda composed the poetry and Lord Caitanya took it apart, dissected it, asked him where all the mistakes where, He said, “What mistakes?”. Showed out so many mistakes. Then He again composed so many perfect poems. Mukunda was completely red. Lord Caitanya, “We know something about poetry. Come tomorrow.” Pats him on the... “We’ll see you tomorrow.” Like this… so the pure Vaiṣṇavas seeing these… they are thinking that, “When this Lord Caitanya… when this Nimāi Paṇḍita is going to be a... giving up all these pursuits where mainly He is just challenging people and defeating them, scholastically? When is He going to become a pure Vaiṣṇava? Although Lord Caitanya Himself is Kṛṣṇa, when He was… just as Kṛṣṇa was stealing butter and playing with the cows, Lord Caitanya was playing with the brāhmaṇas when He was eleven, twelve like that.

He was already the greatest paṇḍita. At this… for Him it was childhood play. But even as a child, He had already defeated all the other paṇḍitas. What they call, prodigal son? Well He is divine, prodigal. So but finally His father left the world. He went then to Gayā to offer worship. At that time, He met Īśvara Purī. The promise He had made to so many Vaiṣṇavas, when they requested, “Why you are wasting your time with all this arguing and all this scholastic show? Why don’t you just worship Kṛṣṇa?” He said, “Well I am looking for a guru. You bless me that I can find the pure guru. When I get the spiritual master, then I will become a pure devotee. This is my desire. Now I am having all these scholastic pursuits, academic life. But in the future, if by your blessing I may get a guru, then I can start to actually know what is pure devotion.”. In this way, He would encourage them and at the same time put them off. So when we went finally to Gayā, and He met Īśvara Purī, He took initiation. From that time, as soon as He worshipped the lotus feet of Viṣṇu, Kṛṣṇa at Gayā, the tears started pouring from His eyes just like the Ganges flow.

When He came back to Navadvīpa, it was a changed Nimāi Paṇḍita. Where was that Nimāi Paṇḍita they all had known? Now He was simply crying out ‘Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa’ ‘bolo `kṛṣṇa,’ bhajo kṛṣṇa, koro kṛṣṇa-śikṣā’, this way He was always singing and chanting, telling everyone. His mother said, “What happened to my son?” She got a little frightened when she saw Him chanting Kṛṣṇa and falling unconscious in ecstasy, that maybe He’s now going to also run off like my other son. “Oh Bhagavān Kṛṣṇa! I already lost my father, my husband, I lost my oldest son, took sannyāsa. My husband has left the world. Now I only have one son left, Nimāi, Lord Caitanya. Please also don’t take Him away. Let Him be happy here in Your devotional service. He has a nice wife.” Like this she would say. Thinking in that way, “Why do you want Him to suffer?”, motherly affection, she was thinking. He should just stay there. Be nice and happy.

But Lord Caitanya’s real mission was now becoming manifest. Up to that time, up to 14 years, He was having childhood proclivities. Only very few people could realize that he was Kṛṣṇa. He kept His real purpose hidden. So that time, he started to reveal to the devotees. He called Śuklāmbara Brahmacārī and other devotees to “Please tell everyone…”, Śrīvāsa Paṇḍitaa that now He had something private to tell, something to reveal. When He came to their house, He just embraced one of the pillars like this… but big… big pillar in Śrīvāsa Paṇḍitaa’s house, and He just embraced the pillar as if He was embracing Kṛṣṇa and He was saying, “Oh Kṛṣṇa! I have had you, now I have lost You. When will I achieve Your lotus feet again? Oh Kṛṣṇa! Oh Kṛṣṇa!” and He was crying out. As He was saying, tears were flowing from His eyes. The devotees they couldn’t stop themselves. They all started to cry.

“What a change has come over Nimāi Paṇḍitaa! What… what change has come over Caitanya Mahāprabhu! Then Lord Caitanya in deep separation, He fainted. All devotees one after another, *boom, boom, boom*, they fell down and all fainted. Lord Caitanya started the saṅkīrtana with those devotees, and that was the first. Now everyone knew that Lord Caitanya has become pure devotee. That was the vision at that time. No one knew at that time that He was Kṛṣṇa. That was revealed later.

Anyone who saw Him at that time they become filled with love for Kṛṣṇa. So, He went to His students, and He tried to teach them. But everything He was telling them, they would ask, “Well, how do You decline the verbs, how do You join the words in saṅdhi?” and so on and so forth, different questions. He would say “Every joint is Kṛṣṇa, everything is Kṛṣṇa.” And He would… different ways. “What is the pure verb? How the pure verb… “Ultimately the purest verb, purest noun everything, was only coming from Kṛṣṇa.” Different ways He would… every word, every letter, every syllable He would tie it in directly with Kṛṣṇa. Then He would ask the students “Now you’ve understood?”. Students would look at each other, “All You said was Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa the whole time.” Couldn’t follow. Everything such a sudden change they couldn’t relate to it.

They went to one of the older teachers who had once been a teacher to Lord Caitanya. Lord Caitanya respected him like a Guru. Gaṅgādāsa Paṇḍita. They said “What happened to Nimāi Paṇḍita? Now we’re going to study, all He talks about is ‘Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa.’” We wanted to become great paṇḍitas, great learned scholars, you see, but now we’re a bit confused. What to do?” He said, “Don’t worry I will go and talk to Him.”

He went over and Nimāi Paṇḍita saw His teacher, touched His feet, and the teacher said, “Bless You with a lot of learning my dear Nimāi Paṇḍita. So You know that You are a brāhmaṇa, Vaiṣṇava. It’s Your duty to know all the scriptures and be able to establish Vaiṣṇavism by the scriptural truth. So they should know well all the basics of grammar, Sanskrit everything and all the śāstras. Just teach Your students nicely. You don’t have to just go on all this…. too much Kṛṣṇa. That won’t, what would be the use of that? They should have the foundation in Sanskrit...” and so on.

“Yes, yes master. I am Nimāi Paṇḍita. Was there ever anyone who could stand up to my challenge? Was there ever anyone who could present with any idea that I could not smash, that I could not defeat?”

Then all the students, all His students and the teacher said, “Oh this is the old Nimāi Paṇḍita we knew.”

He said, “Watch, now we will go.”

He went… they went on the street. Students were there. Again He challenged “Anyone is coming? Come forward.”

All the other paṇḍitas, they had already known Nimāi Paṇḍita. They just ran, you know. There was no hope arguing with Him. He just challenged anyone, “You want to argue? Anyone thinks you’re a paṇḍita come forward. Nimāi is here.”

All the students had gained… At that time it just happened that one of the friends of His father’s grandfather, Nīlāmbara Cakravartī, was coming by, and he saw just like a grandson, Nimāi. He would start quoting some Bhāgavatam ślokas about the mercy of Kṛṣṇa, how He’s so kind. Even He delivered the witch Pūtanā, the snake Aghāsura. When Kṛṣṇa Caitanya heard those glorifications, as soon as the vibration of bhakti entered in His ears, He became filled with ecstasy. “Oh Kṛṣṇa! Kṛṣṇa! Kṛṣṇa!” and He just fainted on the ground. His body was shaking. Even ten men couldn’t hold Him down. Tears were pouring down. He was rolling. “Kṛṣṇa! Kṛṣṇa!” His teeth were grating. He was pounding His head, “Oh I had you Kṛṣṇa and now I have lost You.” Just immediately thrown in separation. *gasp* All of His students, *woah* “Nimāi Paṇḍita has changed.”

So, again, when finally He came out of it, the ecstasy, He took all His students, went to the Ganges like this. The students He told, “All right, go home today. Tomorrow we’ll study some more”. Again the next day they came, again the same thing. Finally this time Lord Caitanya became very intense. He started to preach to them the philosophy.

They kept saying, “Why always Kṛṣṇa?”

Then He said, “Why Kṛṣṇa? Is there anything more dear than oneself? In every body there’s the soul. To save one’s life, one will take any extent. It is no doubt that, from the body it’ll produce children. And the children are very dear. But what is more dear, the children or one’s own self? At the time of death, the people they are valuing their own life even more than your children. The self is the dearest, even more than any other by product, and any other relation. But don’t you know what is the self, but a small particle of Kṛṣṇa? Kṛṣṇa is Himself Atīndriya. He is Himself the Ātmātma. He is the Self of the self. So who is dearer than Kṛṣṇa? He is the cause of all the causes.”

Just as the Brahma-saṁhitā (5.1) says:

īśvaraḥ paramaḥ kṛṣṇaḥ
sac-cid-ānanda-vigrahaḥ
anādir ādir govindaḥ
sarva-kāraṇa-kāraṇam

Kṛṣṇa is the cause of all causes.

And In so many ways he established Kṛṣṇa’s position. He is the Supreme Absolute Truth. He is actually the dearmost to everyone. Dearer even than one’s very life. Then Lord Caitanya came out of His ecstatic preaching. He looked around at the listeners. “So what did I say?”

They said, “You said that Kṛṣṇa is everything.”

He said, “All right, so this is… this is My position now. So if you don’t want to know about Kṛṣṇa, if you want to go and study grammar, other things from other people, you can go ahead. Now I can’t think of anything. I can’t say anything. I can’t do anything, except for Kṛṣṇa. This is My condition. So without feeling of any remorse or offense, if you want to, you are free to go and study from someone else. You can take your books and go.”

Now one of the students stood up and said that, “Nimāi Paṇḍita, of course at first it was a great shock to us. It was a sudden change, but frankly we don’t find that what You are doing or saying is at all as a human. When You call out Kṛṣṇa and You fell down, even ten men couldn’t hold You. Tears were coming from Your eyes just like the Ganges was flooding out. How You are constantly speaking about Kṛṣṇa, laughing, chanting Kṛṣṇa’s name, this is something completely astonishing for all of us. We find You to be some empowered divine personality. I don’t want to leave Your association. I simply want to stay with You.”

Naturally, Kṛṣṇa Himself is coming. All of those students are His eternal devotees. All of them are Kṛṣṇa devotees. One by one they all said, “Simply we want to stay with You. If You only want to teach us Kṛṣṇa, why will we learn something else? You are the greatest teacher. You are our master.” Then Lord Caitanya said, “Everyone of you should all chant saṅkīrtana. You should always chant Kṛṣṇa’s saṅkīrtana.” They never knew what was Kṛṣṇa saṅkīrtana. “What is Kṛṣṇa saṅkīrtana? You have to teach us. We don’t know. You are our master in everything. You also should teach us.”

So like that He started clapping. “You chant:

Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare
Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare

hari harāye namaḥ kṛṣṇa yādavāya namaḥ
gopāla govinda rāma śrī madhusūdana

Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare,
Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare

And all these thousands of students started to all chant:

Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare,
Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare

This way the whole Navadvīpa flooded with the vibration of Lord Caitanya’s saṅkīrtana. Where previously all these students had simply been… just see… just like university students, simply academically inclined. By Lord Caitanya’s association they became melted and they all started to chant Hare Kṛṣṇa mahā-mantra.

The pure Vaiṣṇavas saw the change. They were astonished. “How Nimāi Paṇḍita has completely changed.” So in this way Lord Caitanya began His saṅkīrtana movement. Suddenly when He wanted to manifest His real purpose for coming, He started the saṅkīrtana, and from there step by step, it increased. Śrīvāsa Paṇḍita’s house, nocturnal kīrtana. Sending out kīrtana parties to all the parts of the town. Establishing the supremacy of pure devotional service. From that time on it was no looking back, and because Kṛṣṇa Himself had come, anyone who came in contact with that movement, they immediately got the appreciation of pure love for Kṛṣṇa, highest ecstatic love for Kṛṣṇa.

So Śrīla Prabhupāda of course is… in the same way we find from Līlāmṛta, He had different pastimes in His youth. But when the time came, then… All along of course he was always connected with devotional service. He was always a pure Vaiṣṇava from the very beginning. But when the particular time came, he manifested his real purpose which was to bring this message of Caitanya Mahāprabhu all over the world. For that, we’re grateful to Śrīla Gurupāda for manifesting that history in the Līlāmṛta.

So by Prabhupāda’s mercy now today, this ocean of saṅkīrtana of Kṛṣṇa’s chanting congregationally, has now reached all over the world and is going on expanding day by day. Actually, this is the rarest thing. There’s nothing more dear, more rare than to be able to directly chant the names of God. It is not at all a material activity. I was just discussing with one person today in some morning darśana, and they were saying that, “Before I came to the temple. I came once then for two years I didn’t come. Finally, one by one, Kṛṣṇa took away so many attachments and I was thinking that ‘Well I have to go back to the Kṛṣṇa temple.’ And I was thinking that, ‘No… is there anything else I can do? (laughter) Because if I go there, I won’t be able to think. So, I better think now. Is there anywhere? Just nowhere, nowhere. Just nowhere else! I got to go there.” Everywhere… even Indians, why sometime Indians stay away from the Kṛṣṇa temple? Although many are coming. But sometimes these… they know that Kṛṣṇa worship is the end of the line. That’s the top. Beyond that, once the person gets into that, for some reason they don’t come back. Generally speaking they just go on higher and higher in transcendental love for the Lord and then after that, they don’t get into any more frivolous or useless activities like they did before.

So māyā is trying to say “No no, anything else, just see. I have so much to offer you. Take the whole world.” But when someone is actually wanting to find the truth, when they want to achieve their best in life, then finally they have to come to that conclusion, “No I have to go to the Kṛṣṇa temple. I have to go to the devotees. There is nowhere else.”, and then māyā is suffering her first defeat. Of course, she tries and tries again, to dissuade, but if the devotee simply remains fixed in chanting, by the mercy of Lord Caitanya, that Kali is driven away. Wherever the Holy Name is there, the personality of Kali, this age of iron and quarrel cannot remain. So we simply have to broadcast the saṅkīrtana non-stop, continuously without any contamination.

(jaya) śrī-kṛṣṇa-caitanya prabhu nityānanda
śrī-advaita gadādhara śrīvāsādi-gaura-bhakta-vṛnda

Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare,
Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare

In fact, when Lord Caitanya’s students heard that “Alright, you go elsewhere.”, they were crying. They couldn’t think to be separated from Lord Caitanya. “No, no. We won’t go.” Like that the devotees they become so attached to Kṛṣṇa, so attached to the devotees of Kṛṣṇa, they can’t think for a moment. They are praying, “Please don’t deprive me of your association. Please don’t even allow there to be a second of sepāration.” Today we were reading this morning the 11th Canto that even for a half a moment, a devotee will not separate from the service of Lord Kṛṣṇa, even in exchange for all the power, control and opulence of the whole universe. They won’t even agree to separate for one half a moment. A moment is defined as 8/45ths of a second. And half a moment was 8/90ths of a second which would be how much? 4/45ths of a second. They wouldn’t agree to be separate even for that long from the service of Kṛṣṇa. That way we should try to become… to develop our taste for chanting, so that we can become so linked with Kṛṣṇa, that we won’t allow even a fraction of a second to be separated from Kṛṣṇa’s lotus feet. Then that’s the topmost level of devotion.

Anyway, I haven’t been here in Philadelphia since the 19… you know about three years. Very nice to come back. That time actually Śrīla Gurupāda was here. We had some kind of… like a joint darśana, or class. I remember, we were both here. So now, it’s nice to be here. May be there is some questions, discussion. Yes.

Devotee: Śrīla Ācāryāpada, I was talking to you in the car when you came here to the program about getting people to chant one round. I told you we have a… a program like that in the temple, here, and thought maybe you could tell us a little bit about that program of yours. I think we’d be inspired, all the people back here, how to carry that on. How to have them agree to chant Hare Kṛṣṇa.

Jayapatākā Swāmī: When Lord Caitanya was asked, “Who is a Vaiṣṇava?” Lord Caitanya said that anyone who chants:

Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare,
Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare

is a Vaiṣṇava.  Anyone who chants the name of Kṛṣṇa is a devotee, a Vaiṣṇava. Of course, it may be described that there are three standards. One may be beginner, intermediate or advanced. But the minimum requirement: if someone chants the name of Kṛṣṇa he is a devotee, she is a devotee.

So, many years… in 1977, there some crisis at Māyāpur. That time we realized we needed the help of all the local devotees, and I asked Prabhupāda that I had an experience that there were a lot of devotees in India. But that we had no program at that time for really engaging them. But somehow the existing chanters of Hare Kṛṣṇa should be coordinated and should be tied in to the ISKCON movement, for expanding our propaganda work. He told me, “You go on expanding the propaganda unlimitedly.” Later on He told me, “You just travel constantly, you have to take that curse from me. I am not going to travel anymore. I am going to stay here, in Vṛndāvana.”

But anyway at that time, He told that, “You just bring a person to the temple and let them stay for a few days, a week, two weeks, train the person up, how to chant, what is our program and send them back to their house. Let them make their family and their village Kṛṣṇa conscious in that way.” He encouraged like that. So we found that in India many people would chant Hare Kṛṣṇa but very few people would chant regularly. That the habit was on… any particular month of the year, usually the first day, the month or the year, or some month that they consider to be especially appropriate for some reason or other, the people who are devoted to Kṛṣṇa would come together and chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, especially in Bangladesh, Bengal, Orissa this is the habit. But then other times of the year they don’t chant. Rarely occasionally they might chant. Usually on some occasion or other they all chant, or for one month they may chant or every night as a regular. But then on other months they won’t chant at all. And individually, japa, a few people are chanting.

So we started a program there that any group of people, they would chant minimum once a week regularly. And would follow our general program of coordination, distributing of books or receiving our books and reading Prabhupāda literature in their center setting up like a kīrtana place. They were considered to be a group or saṅga, Nāmahaṭṭa saṅga. And if they would further advance in chanting every day, they became a kendra or a center. And if then they expand enough in the future to actually having deity worship and a permanent facility, then they become a Hare Kṛṣṇa Nāmahaṭṭa mandir. So in this way, just by word of mouth, from the Māyāpur Candrodaya mandir, we started to expand the Nāmahaṭṭa organization. Within the first year, we had 45 member groups. The next year, that went up to about 150. The year after that was 250. And then this year, its… now it’s over 500. It’s been going now, for about three years. Has over 10,000 members.

So when we are doing that preaching, just like out of five hundred say, there’s about… daily program 40-50, 500 are once a week, twice a week, thrice a week, and then four-five actually have already established temples or had a temple there, and they’re doing the daily program with the deity worship. Some of the Gauḍīya-maṭha gṛhasthas who were living out. Gauḍīya-maṭha, it doesn’t… it’s almost defunct in many ways. They don’t… not active… in many areas, they’re not active. They join the ISKCON preaching, and they’re acting as our representatives, and people from their village are coming forward.

So, then we saw that individually we had to also get the people to… group-wise we were getting some success, but then individually the people should advance spiritually. So, individually to advance, we made a program that at least they should chant one round a day, and one round a day was about eight minutes and actually, I got that idea when I saw that… when I went out and started preaching in the field, I saw that in Māyāpur we are having a very big effect on Calcutta, and on the local area around Māyāpur. But then, when I went in to more extreme regions like North Bengal, Jalpaiguri, Coochbehar, and other places, that there, there were a lot of Māyāvādī gurus and so-called avatāras who were preaching.

There was some yogī who claimed to be an avatāra, some Lokanātha Gosāi. Then there was a other person. He claimed to be the combination of Lord Caitanya, Durgā and a few others, all combined, and he told everybody to chant a mantra called Rāma Nārāyaṇa Rāma, and he would give big public darśanas and he would have 500 or 1,000 people… have everybody stand up and over the microphone he would, you know “Oṁ”, he would just give initiation like that, 500-1000 at a time, and then after that, then they’d say, “Well, I have already got such and such a guru. I can’t do anything, you know.” I could see that because they were exploiting the sentiment of the people, which was to chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, and then changing it and… and deceiving them, because the people there they don’t have such a philosophical basis, they generally working more on tradition and on some kind of sentiment. So, it was immediately essential to do something to save the situation. So, at that time actually I told Jagadīśa Dāsa who was leading the saṅkīrtana party. I told him, I gave them some money. I said, “You print a hundred cards, giving the order of Caitanya.” Lord Caitanya sent Nityānanda and Haridas, door to door and they requested everyone, “bolo `kṛṣṇa,’ bhajo kṛṣṇa, koro kṛṣṇa-śikṣā”, that, you please chant Hare Kṛṣṇa. You worship Kṛṣṇa and study His teachings. That’s all they asked. This was the order of Lord Caitanya that all His followers should go door to door to beg. Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura said anyone who is a member of his original Nāmahaṭṭa had to go at least to five people per day and request them to take up this order. Every day, every gṛhastha has to go and knock on five doors and humbly request the person to take up the chanting of Hare Kṛṣṇa, study Kṛṣṇa’s teachings and worship Kṛṣṇa. So from that, that this is definitely Lord Caitanyas order, we should request everyone to chant. So then, we requested that since it’s the order of Caitanya, you should take up chanting at least ten minutes a day. You try to chant, and go on increasing from there. So ten minutes is about 108 times. So 108 times is what? One round. So, in this way either count on your fingers or you count on beads, or however you want to count, that we don’t care, but you chant at least 108 times. We are begging you, on behalf of Caitanya Mahāprabhu. And then just so that… we take out a card with their name, address everything, they we have them written down. And that they know that they’re signed up, and they have their card with the mantra on it and address, everything, and so we had going, in this area, which was like the stronghold of all these Māyāvādī gurus, and by this type of preaching, thousands of people came forward and they signed up and they agreed to chant Hare Kṛṣṇa every day, and then in this way the progress of those Māyāvādī gurus was *slash* stopped just like that by Prabhupāda’s mercy.

So then I realized that the people so easily took up, when you requested it in a humble way. They were so shocked, because no one ever asked anybody to be… do any real spiritual practice and it is so simple to chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, read Prabhupāda’s books, that then we went to Bangladesh, and we got… did the same thing with a big, big response. So then we went to South India, and I said… actually then I went to Delhi. At that time, I think actually Pūrṇaprajña was there, and I told Lokanātha Goswami that of we did it here, if you requested the people of Delhi to chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, they’d do it. He said “No no, these people are very different. Bengali persons are sentimental, and very emotional people, but here they’re not.

So he had a program. We were speaking at some Rāmānandi. They were doing hundred and eight fire sacrifices and they are like kind of mixed Rāma-bhakta and Māyāvādīs. So, that time, we were… I was supposed to be the guest speaker. So I had him print out in Hindi and English, on a letterhead 100, 200 forms for chanting, taking up the order of Lord Caitanya, that this was the way of bringing peace in the world. Everyone should chant, in this bringing way spiritual revolution. Everyone should take up the chanting. And so I gave my fifteen minute speech that they allowed, or whatever… half hour speech. At the end I kept ten minutes in hand. I gave my appeal that “Everyone should take up this chanting and those of you who want to pull forward the movement of Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu, you can just stand up.” And *gesturing people getting up* 2/3rds of the people stood up and want to take up this oath to chant everyday Hare Kṛṣṇa. And when all the people stood up in the middle of some Māyāvādī sannyāsīs, I felt it was just like, you know going in and taking you know, Rukmiṇī from the Svayaṁvara. (laughter) He brought them there you know, just to pollute them with Māyāvāda. We got right in there. They all stood up for Hare Kṛṣṇa. They flipped out, grabbed the mic away. “You can’t do this! Ahhh!” and just you know, he flipped out and then you know, just like that, they wouldn’t let us go on.

In spite of that, four people jumped up on the stage and immediately signed up. And one of his own sādhūs came from the back, said, “I want to chant”, (laughter) with a beard and everything. So anyway, after that they could realize that actually if you request people, and somehow by Lord Caitanya’s mercy, people will actually take it up. They have nothing to lose. And somehow, just by Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu’s mercy, it works. That if you request some people, a lot of them will actually take up chanting. So, I was preaching to our life-member makers that, “We always go to the members and take 2-2-2-2 rupees. 2222; now it’s 3333. But, you know, the relationship really doesn’t develop until we get them to actually become devotees. They are devotees of one sort or another, but until they actually chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, they don’t really appreciate what this movement is all about. Because there is not much a change of the heart, so they… you should try to get them to chant. So they started a program there, where the life members were chanting one or four rounds a day, Vaiśya-ṛṣī program. And those members started to become very enthusiastic because of just being able to chant. They became like devotees. So once life members, we started some program.

So, I went to South India. We printed up the cards there, and in Madras, Bangalore, Madurai, even that time there was a lot of problem because Muslims were converting the Harijans into Muslims. Hindu outcaste-type Harijans, sweepers and pigherds, fishermen, they would be converted to Muslims. Was mainly a political stunt, but it created a lot of publicity at that time in all the newspapers, because millions of petrol dollars were going in to India to try to turn the whole Hindu country into Muslims. So, of course now the government has banned all the Muslim and fanatical Christian groups, as well as a couple of fanatical Hindu group from receiving any foreign donations. Thank Kṛṣṇa that they didn’t include us in those categories. We were not at all, of course, under those categories, at all.

So there we started the same program, of course, in each place, maybe it’s a slightly different way that it’s presented, but in the ultimate issue, we’re requesting people to also take up the chanting. Now, there we called it the saṁskāra-patra, “to accept the order of Lord Caitanya, that this actually the order of Lord Caitanya. He said, “bolo `kṛṣṇa,’ bhajo kṛṣṇa, koro kṛṣṇa-śikṣā” Chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, worship Kṛṣṇa. Study His teachings.” So this is the order of Lord Caitanya. So, to take up the order of Lord Caitanya and take up this chanting, is of course, the very first step in spiritual life. So in South India we found that even some of the Muslims were coming forward and accepting to chant. Because no one ever that asked them, they never knew they were even allowed to chant. We said, “No. There’s no hard and fast rule. Anyone, you can be any religion you can chant Hare Kṛṣṇa. There is no restriction. This is universal.”

So in this way, at each program we’re getting 4-500 people, 1000 people to come forward, very respectable people. I was speaking with one man. I was having a darśana in the Bangalore temple. And this people coming in to the room and they were just non-stop. So one very husky older man, maybe 75, big, tall looked like a Marwari, came in to the room and he started to challenge that, “Why should Kṛṣṇa’s name… Why worship the deity?”, so on and so forth. He was like a Māyāvādīi. He said “Everything is one. It’s all void, so there’s no use in chanting particularly Kṛṣṇa’s name.”, and I had a big argument with him. I was preaching for long time. Finally, I became so disgusted, I said, “When you take your meal, you say it’s all one, this, that… you take your meal, you have your chapati, you have your rice, you have your sabji, you have your chutney, you have your sweet rice, you have your sherbet, lemonade, everything, you take the whole thing, and you… you mush it together *mashing gesture* and then you eat it? This is what… you don’t live like that, so why you are trying to impose that into spiritual life? The real quality is… Kṛṣṇa’s filled with variety, filled with variegatedness. He is sac-cid-ānanda-vigrahaḥ and so many… so finally, he was a bit moved, or something. So, anyway I just begged him like this. “My sir, as a humble representative of Lord Caitanya, I am begging you, can you just try to chant Hare Kṛṣṇa for a few minutes every day? 108 times, you just try chanting and you go on increasing from there. You just try it and see what’s there in it."

So he said that “A sannyāsī has never begged anything from me before. And never I have refused a sannyāsī. So I will take up… since you are asking me, I will do it.” That person bowed down and he left. He signed up. So then, about an hour later, one of our life-members came back, who was chanting about eight rounds a day at that time. Now he chants about sixteen. And he came back, and said, “You know who that gentleman was? He’s the richest man in Bangalore. He is a lifelong Arya Samaji. He never comes to the temple; he never bows down before a deity. Doesn’t believe also in deity worship. He’s never ever chanted anything. I drove him back. I’m a director in one of his companies. He said that just because you requested him to chant, that he has promised to chant, that he is not going to break his promise, and he said from the very night today, he is going to chant this one round of Hare Kṛṣṇa. He had the mālā and he is going to continue chanting it, because he gave his word.” He said he had never… “This is the biggest change that this person has ever had in the 75 years of his life. He’s worth over ₹5,00,00,00,000, which is about $550,000,000 dollars. Anyway, because we don’t make any distinction, anyone that comes, we just… there’s a flat plea.

Once they chant one round, we have a second level which is: vegetarian, chanting four rounds, and doing some service, accepting the Guru as a śikṣā-guru, following the instructions of the ISKCON ācāryas, Prabhupāda, as a guideline in life. Because lot of people in India, they especially, they want, “Give me dīkṣā.” But they’re not ready. And if you don’t give them something, then, of course they feel frustrated. But they are not actually ready yet for initiation, by our standards. So, to give… also to encourage them to become vegetarian, to become a little pure in their life, so we made this second level. Four rounds, vegetarian, śikṣā-guru, like that. So that, we read in… since Prabhupāda had the League of Devotees, so we tried to preserve that. So we call that as a ‘League of Devotee’ level. But basically it’s like taking a śikṣā-guru. So then, those persons are you know, they’re given more attention for coming up to the actual level of getting initiation.

Because when you start getting tens of thousands… we get just like, tens of thousands of these cards that people fill out, for chanting. So then, they also, what… they go back, is… then our Nāmahaṭṭa preachers, they take all those names, cause, there, everything is… actually in India everything is more like you know, wholesale type. They send out post cards. Of course, they told me that they were just sending out; because we have age, education, sometimes they would send out like postcards just to the students between 18 and 30 or whatever… 25, and they sent out postcards that, “Everyone should meet at such and such a place. We’re having a meeting.” And then they found that 95%; all the people that had signed up, they all came to that meeting, and they all wanted to take more part in ISKCON because they’d been chanting, and they wanted that relationship with ISKCON. They wanted the continuing relationship and help.

So, in this way, now in South India there also have 56 Nāmahaṭṭa groups. In the Nāmahaṭṭa group, everyone is supposed to be at least chanting one round a day, and as I said, they meet once a week, and by meeting once a week on a particular day, then, that way the Nāmahaṭṭa preachers, they make their rounds, and occasionally, they’re also going there. In Bengal, we have about 25 disciples now, who are now in about as I mentioned, some Gauḍīya Maṭha people and some other people are chanting four rounds, vegetarian and know the philosophy a little bit. So those who we see are able to present, somewhat, Kṛṣṇa consciousness, then we raise them up to a position of a Cakra Senāpati, which was a position that Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura had in his Nāmahaṭṭa. It means a Circle Commander. And he’s in charge of twelve Nāmahaṭṭas. And he has to visit those twelve Nāmahaṭṭas, one in a week. That means within three months (or one quarter), he’ll visit all of them once. And he has three assistants called Upacakra Senāpatīs, who are at least steady, but they may… They’re not expected to know that much philosophy, but they are very responsible to see that the groups are meeting and that they have certain organizational meetings, and so on. And then someone who is initiated, he’s over three circle commanders, and he is called the Mahācakra Senāpati or the Greater Circle Commander. And he’s usually at least initiated by the Harināma, and although we haven’t… right now we have another… over three such Mahācakra Senāpatīs or greater circle commander, which is in charge of 36 group. They have to visit each group at six months, once. We have a Mālā Senāpati, who is in charge of hundred and eight Nāmahaṭṭa groups.

But as yet… because we don’t have any second initiated devotees, or anyone that senior, we are having from the temple itself initiated brahmacārīs, gṛhasthas, take the position of the Mālā Senāpati. And they have to visit once in a year, technically. Of course, because they’re full-time devotees, they actually visit more than that. But we want that in the future, that all these positions from Mālā Senāpati, Mahācakra Senāpati, Cakra Senāpati - the circle commander, Mahā - greater circle commander, and Mālā commanders will be all the village people. And then, we’ll have rather, supervisors, who will be full-time devotees and who will be going around. But that the day-by-day maintenance of the… and the spiritual standard will be maintained within the Nāmahaṭṭa groups themselves, and within the… the devotees that have been produced from them.

So right now we are at the stage of organizing all of this infrastructure, administration and supervision, and actually they need a… I have been busy with lot of different projects recently in India for the past year. South India and other places. So when I get back, I like to concentrate on writing, on seeing that this administration of Nāmahaṭṭa is organized, and with research on the holy places of Caitanya Mahāprabhu. I’d like to concentrate a little more up until December. Then we are trying to arrange a procession taking a Śrīla Prabhupāda deity on the path of Lord Caitanya. Of course, I am not sure if we will be able to do it this year because there is a lot of… of preparations that have to be done, and these things usually take a lot longer to do than expected. Anyway this basic, taking one round, and four round and up to 16 rounds and finally they get their first initiation, this is the basic system. So we try to get everyone to chant one round a day.

So, in the… same thing in South America they told me they couldn’t do it. You see whenever I ask people to chant, usually everybody gets frightened. They figure that no one’s going to agree. But somehow, by Kṛṣṇa’s mercy, generally speaking always a very significant percentage, sometimes even almost 100% and sometimes you know at least 25%, they agree to take up the chanting. So even at South America we had a program at the national Library in Peru. And there all people were wearing suits and ties and everything there. I happened to have with me two hundred and fifty cards from Calcutta, in English and I was determined that just even though they were in English, and everyone speaks Spanish there, I just wanted to try that whether it will also be possible here to make appeal to the people to take up the chanting and what type of response you would get.

So then I requested the people that how many of you have ten minutes a day? How many of you like this movement of Caitanya Mahāprabhu… like this spiritual direction, the process of singing and chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa? Gradually seeing that what was their mood and finally appealing to them that how many could actually give ten minutes a day for chanting and being connected to this movement as a fellow, as a associate. So then to our amazement about 300 people out of all those… it was packed up. The national library capacity of about 500 or so, and it was completely packed. So over 300 people stood up and they all lined up. They lined up so far, it went out… out in to the hallway. And they also announced that anyone at this time could get a Bhagavad-gītā autographed by Ācāryapāda. So then a lot of people at that time they bought Bhagavad-gītās and they were coming up.

I was signing Bhagavad-gītās, signing chanting cards. They were taking the prasāda and bowing down and buying mālās and gītās and it was... they have the whole thing on video. (laughter). It was amazing. They were completely dumbfounded themselves as to how the people took it up. That actually it’s so easy for anyone to chant Hare Kṛṣṇa for ten minutes. Everyone wants to know how to meditate. There’s a lot of people in the world, they wish they knew how to meditate. They have to pay $400 if you want to do this type of meditation, that type of… We are offering but just a simple way, no obligation, no salesman visiting your door (if you don’t want). You just chant Hare Kṛṣṇa in your home. Here’s the thing.

Actually people they want to be visited by devotees or they want to, at least know how to do the meditation. A lot of people are eager to… to learn. Especially those who come to programs and those and come to festivals. In Washington D.C., I met a number of people that were eager to know how to meditate. And I’m sure that if I had some kind of a card or some kind of a mantra card, I could have convinced, you know there was no convincing. And I’m sure that if I had some kind of a card or some kind of a mantra card, I could have convinced, you know there was no convincing. They already wanted to know how to chant and everything. They would have signed up also that for some you know… in North America, I don’t know exactly the exact form, until one does it. Here you don’t get such big crowds at one time. Of course, in Venice they had quite a big crowd. They had a moderately big crowd in Washington D C. A very big crowd they had in Washington. A super big they had in LA.

In those crowd situations I think even then, you could make a appeal, but maybe the North Americans are slightly more sophisticated, still. Even on individual basis, people like to meditate. They’re interested in it. It’s a growing attraction. And the thing about chanting is that, once they chant, I discussed with many Vaiṣṇavas and many “What happens someone promises and then they don’t keep it up?” The thing is that they originally were in the spiritual sky and then they fell down. Like this they promise so many times to do so many things. But even if they chant for ten days, that’s more than they ever did in their whole life. That they don’t… they’re not making a fire-sacrifice oath or something. They are making just… they are making like… just an informal promise or informal agreement that they are going to try, and that’s how we word it. “I am going to try to chant everyday.”

So this way, whatever they chant, that’s to their benefit. Then we have their names, so then we always “Well how is the progress going?” Then, a lot of times the people they stop chanting then, we remind them. “Oh… Its going all right. (laughter). Actually, I slipped for a few days but now I am starting again.”, and it’s amazing that from this chanting; just like in South America with this appeal; two years ago in the temple I use to do this. The last time was in a national library. Even amongst the public such a big response was there. And two years ago, there was one person coming. We requested him to chant one round. He started chanting two rounds. Six months later, I came back to Peru. He was up to chanting about 4, 8 rounds, and he said now he is giving up eating meat. Six months later, or one year later I came, and then that time he said he was already vegetarian. He was chanting about eight rounds, steady. Then he said that “Now I am going to chant twelve rounds and I am going to give up smoking.” Then, the next time, a year and a half later, he says, “Now I’m chanting sixteen rounds.” And then I came back again this last time, after two years. Then now he is chanting sixteen rounds and he is living in the temple but is working outside and giving half of his salary to the temple, or most of his salary. He is still little attached to working outside, but that way, just over a period of time, just because we didn’t let go, he just kept on increasing, but because in the beginning we said chant, the chanting just drew him forward. It took him two years, but over two years, now he is a very good devotee.

And that way we have got many police chiefs. We got police chief, lawyers, doctors, various people in society to take up this chanting as a process of bhakti-yoga. We present it maybe in the west more as yoga or something like that, and in India it’s of course Kṛṣṇa consciousness. It’s their own religion, they know. Don’t have to call yoga or anything. But just once the people start to chant, and you develop that relationship, they actually feel the change come over their life. And then from there, they become more and more fortunate. And with that fortune, they can engage in more and more service, they will become more interested in reading Prabhupādas books. You see some people won’t chant unless they first read all the books and there is some people that they may chant but they may not be able… even they read the book, they can’t understand it, but by chanting then they can understand. There’s all different kinds of people.

So of course, one thing to remember is that in no way we are trying to reduce the standard of our devotees. It’s not like that. Actually the standard of the devotees has to be kept at the highest level. We find that only a devotee who follows the four regulative principles, who chants sixteen rounds, who follows all the principles given by Prabhupāda is actually the best preacher. This preaching cannot be done by someone very effectively, unless they are very pure. So, without this purity, there is no force. There is no preaching potency is there. You can get other people to chant. But it’s hard for them to in turn get others to chant. Maybe a few friends or neighbors or something like that. But it’s hard for them to do any big scale preaching. At best they can get a few friends to chant or they can distribute a few books in their neighborhood. In that way they can be engaged. But to be actually... actually a good preacher one has to be at the standard of ISKCON initiated devotee, or that standard of practice. Then one is able to preach much better and purely. So the whole basis is that the Kṛṣṇa consciousness temples are like the hāṭas (marketplace). They’re like the whole wholesale center for the marketplace of the holy name, and all these others are like travelling salesmen, branch offices, retail shops and they’re all getting their merchandise, the holy name from the wholesale dealerships which are the actual temples, the big market places.

So these temples are the first necessity. To have a pure place where they can come, see how to set up a temple in the house. Then you see once we get them to chant, we don’t stop there. Then we set up altars, temple in their house, get them to worship in their house. Then we get them to become vegetarian, offer their prasādam. In this way we take them up, stage by stage. And get them to give something, whatever they can, on some basis they contribute.  In India we have them contribute to the local Nāmahaṭṭa every week… every month rather, something. And then, in this way Nāmahaṭṭas, they also give some affiliation fee to ISKCON, for covering the administrative cost or offsetting some of them. Doesn’t cover all.

So in this way the preaching is trying to expand in dimensions which were before not even considered. You can imagine that 500 branches. Each of them every day getting… every week getting… just like we have this ISKCON World Review, we take from that and we publish twice a month a Hare Kṛṣṇa saṅkīrtana newspaper giving worldwide news, what is happening in different parts of the world. One page is showing the local news about Nāmahaṭṭas around. This is in Bengal. We have this newspaper and then we also have similar one we’re making now, Bangladesh. And they have a separate one, The English ISKCON World Review they’re using in South India. The people speak English there more, and this last week Rādhā-Kṛṣṇa Swāmī just called up that from Māyāpur they called up that they distributed 8,000 of these samācāra newspapers, and 575 Back to Godheads you know, through all the different Nāmahaṭṭas, and I know that they’ve now started having agents, and some of the agents take up to 500 newspapers themselves for distribution, and minimum, they take about twenty, and they go out every week and some of the… one person, he couldn’t sell them, so he just pays from his own salary, and whenever he goes out he says, “You won’t buy it from me? You take it free.”, because People are telling “Why you are selling these books? It’s business, this, that.” In India, you know they think that because the Christians go in and just flood everyone with as many free Bible books and things that… so much that they take the books and use it for wrapping you know, selling puffies and popcorn and things you know. They buy the books, this… it’s just free. You can buy Communist literature and you can get Christian literature practically free… or free more than you can use.

When they sign you up to get a subscription for the Communist Russian magazine, their sales pitch is that you can get a three-year subscription for ₹20 which is less than $3.00. They say that you get a paper every month week like Life magazine. If you just save the paper, and at the end of three years, so even every year if you sell it as used paper, you will get back double your money than what you’re paying for the subscription. (laughter). This is their sales pitch. The people figure, you know it’s like an investment. “I get a free magazine and I get money out of it in the end. Plus I get the salesman off my back.” So in spite of that, so sometimes they criticize “Well, why the devotees are selling books? You should be giving them away free. You are a big international organization. You have worldwide branches. When the Christians are giving free, when the communists are giving free, why you want money?” Of course, Prabhupāda said we’re not supposed to give away free literature. But, somehow, these preachers, they just, “Alright I will pay out of my own pocket.”. and they are giving, “Alright, you take one.” They’re becoming so determined that somehow or other they’re going to preach Kṛṣṇa consciousness and make their village Kṛṣṇa conscious, their towns Kṛṣṇa conscious. So, that way every year on Nityānanda’s Appearance Day, we’ve been having a annual festival. And for the group that does the most book distribution, we give a bicycle. For the group that has the most preaching, we give a big PA system that they can hook up on their… on their kīrtana hall and blast out the whole village at maṅgala-ārati. (laughter) Of course one village we gave the whole PA system, I went out there I said how come it’s not fixed. You get the PA system but there’s no electricity in our village. (laughter) I said “I didn’t expect that.” He said, “We didn’t have the money to buy a battery.” A big car battery costs about $50, or ₹500 rupees. We couldn’t afford the battery, but they wouldn’t sell it. They kept it all wrapped up, you know, the new PA system. So I said this year they got a second prize this year I just gave them the battery (laughter) to fill up the… so they could use their PA system. Then they take the battery once every week into town and for ₹3 they get it charged up at the automobile repair shop. Overnight they bring back the car battery, and hook up their PA. So, of course you’re dealing there with low-income group in many places. In some places the people are rich. In some they’re poor. But this chanting of Hare Kṛṣṇa is for anyone rich and poor, young and old.

So, I see in America that we meet lot of favorable people. They buy our books they… in airports and different places. We meet lot of people. I just met one person, a Corporal from the Army. He is living in Maryland in some base. I have his address. And he was saying you know, how he really liked… he was reading Bhagavad-gītā. He liked you know, how it was spoke on a battlefield and everything, and didn’t understand it fully, but he could appreciate that it was something really spiritual, the way that Kṛṣṇa was telling Arjuna all the things about spiritual life.

He was, you know… basic understanding, he was getting, so then he also wanted to chant Hare Kṛṣṇa. He said he would chant. But since he was the Corporal, he had very little time off. He could apparently adjust things so he could chant a little bit every day. So there’s a lot of people in America that would be open to chanting. And if we have this organized program, then it can be developed from there that once you got a number of people to chant, then you see that “Well in this particular area there’s so many people chanting.”, then you group them together; once in a month, or once in two weeks or something that they can have a little get-together. A devotee goes there at that particular day and conducts a slide show, or has his wife go there. She shows them how to cook. Like have a little social they start to meet those people. And of course you know people always raise up doubts, “Well some of them might be in māyā, and contaminate the others, because they all are out in the material world.” But, until we actually… they’re are doing it in England, and they’re getting a very good success. The same things that we are doing, other parts are doing in England and their FOLK program is actually very successful.

Some people from their FOLK program have walked in and just given ₤10,000, which is about 16, 17, no it’s $18,000 donation, just appreciating the… the response. In fact, there, their FOLK program is maintained by… by their own mail order. They publish a little paper for the people that are in UK, under the FOLK program. And naturally, they want to get beads, they want to get Deities, they want to get a pūjā equipment, they want to get pictures of the paraṁparā, they wanna… so they have you know like a whole mail order for all the paraphernalia you can use to be a devotee. And those people, just from that mail order of people want to get Kṛṣṇa posters and so many different things, they’re able to pay for the paper and for the overhead of the whole program. On top of that, whatever they send in as donation go for expanding other programs, within that.

So that can be done in England, and if it can be done in South America and of course India its going on. I don’t why it also can’t be done in America. But a lot of times in America people just become pessimistic that, “It can’t be done here, they’re rednecks, they’re fallen, or and this and that.” I mean there’s a lot of good people in America. They did a world study and I think America was either first, second, or maybe third in the world or maybe I think India was first, Thailand was second and America third for people who actually believe in God.

Over 90% of the people in America they said I believed in God. So even in America, it’s the only country in the world that still has written on their money, “In God We Trust”, even after so many atheists tried to get it cut off. So there’s a lot of good people here, and they’ll chant Hare Kṛṣṇa. It’s not too much to ask. And from chanting… then after they chant for a while, some chant for a while and they stop chanting. But they start to appreciate devotees. Once a person chants even for a few days, they start to see devotees as brothers. From a different light. And if you can make them to feel even as associates of our movement, then of course that relationship will help to bring them closer and closer. And someone who starts to chant regularly, then also there’s now 5% of Americans are apparently vegetarian, one recent gallup poll showed. So even in America its probably easier to get people to be vegetarian then lot of the people in Bengal or in India because in different parts of India they are very addicted to fish eating. While in America its much in vogue to get into health foods and vegetarian food. You can ask our Bangladeshi friend, he knows. Bengalis, they like to eat fish too much. (laughter). But they’ll chant, but they won’t give up fish. That’s the tough point.

It takes a long time for them to get over that because they just have that habit. But in America, they’re a little bit more renounced. I mean, if a person starts to chant, then you could expect that within a certain amount of time, he would also become a vegetarian, they might already be vegetarian. And if a vegetarian chanting… affects very quickly. And then they can go on, if they just learn to offer their food before you know it, they are practicing a lot of Kṛṣṇa consciousness activities. And even ? devotees would be able to be engaged in this kind of preaching. When I was talking about Ācāryadeva’s ? gṛhasthas are no longer ?. Now they are actually, actively preaching outside in the society. They have their job but, every night they go out and preach so they kind of redeemed them because while they were living outside, they felt embarrassed cause they left the devotees, at the same time there was no program outside and so they kind of got alienated. So this way we were able to engage them. That they were good gṛhasthas. By every evening they would go and preach in different area to these service groups, and as a result they actually became more and more fixed up. Even though they were living outside, they became enlivened and it kept their spiritual life strong, cause they could do some preaching work, and it freed the book distributors of course, for just continuing with their book distribution and other activities.

All it takes is one senior devotee who knows the philosophy well, who’s is patient, who wants to… who is patient enough to see that the devotees may be approaching over a period of one or two years, maybe progressing, rather, than over a period of days and weeks. And of course, sometimes people do immediately increase. We find that by opening up the doors to many, those moons that we want. Actually more moons become available. Many stars are there, but out of those many stars, like churning the ocean of nectar, a lot more moons are also coming out. A lot of people actually, who were put off because they thought that Kṛṣṇa consciousness was too inaccessible, it was too distant, it was too much for them to aspire for. Because it was made so available to them, that once they started to chant, they got over their inhibitions, and got enthusiastic so then they’re able to quickly advance, and come up to the standard of actually surrendering to Kṛṣṇa.

And those people who chant, they generally respect the devotees. They respect their renunciation. They respect their learning. They respect what they are doing for them, that a devotee is going out of the way. Just yesterday where was it? In Denver Bhakta Steve was saying that how he had been writing letter. He met some devotee in the airport somewhere, he got a book he wrote to Los Angeles, the mail order, and they kept, and then he was surprised. He never thought that they’d would answer back. They wrote back a two-page letter, and they kept correspondence up. Finally, over a period of couple of years, he decided to move into the Denver temple, and just for this Ratha-yātrā, he went to Los Angeles and he met all the people who had written him letters. And he really appreciated that everyone he wrote to, they were writing him back and then… So lot of this encouragement - once the person agrees to chant - can be done through mail or by the phone.

In this way, one person can maintain hundreds of people. And from those hundreds, you’ll find that many people are coming forward very quickly. There are many people in the material world who are being placed there by Lord Caitanya for that level of… the next level of… Prabhupāda wanted varṇāśrama preaching.

Prabhupāda personally told me in Los Angeles in 1970, before he sent me to India. It was a morning walk. There were a number of devotees in the walk. Suddenly he just turned and faced to us and he said “Don’t think that everyone is going to live in a temple. Our temple are for the brāhmaṇas, for the preachers. They’re very rare persons.” I don’t know the exact words, but they’re like more special. But there’ll be many people who will be chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa in their houses, worshipping in temples in their home, and they’ll be coming on festive days and on Sundays to our temple, like they are coming to the churches. And these will be our congregations around all of our temples. In this way Kṛṣṇa consciousness will be spread in the future.

But since 1970 until now, that has only developed slightly. So I feel that in the West, it just requires just a little coordination. I was talking with Mukunda Goswami that if every book distributor that is doing his distribution in the airports is somehow…; what happens is that say a person from Atlantic comes to Philly, or a person from Chicago goes to Denver, and you get their names. So, normally you know, there’s no… it’s usually the person from another place that meets a devotee in the airports. Maybe not always that the person from the same place. If… somehow. If every time we met a favorable person, if there was a way of getting his name and address, and then sending that name either to that temple concerned or to some central pooling office like Mukunda’s. And he just gives it out to all the branches. Accordingly, to whoever was from Philadelphia, that they met in Chicago, or Saint Louis or Atlanta, or anywhere else they would send. In this way, every month you’d get hundreds or dozens of names. And those people could be visited, or written and… who had expressed an interest, who said, “Yeah, I like your books.” and people… I have seen people just walk up and just you know, “I have to catch a plane quick. Here is ten bucks. Give me a book.” I mean I have seen people do that. I have seen lot of people actually eager for Kṛṣṇa consciousness. “Yeah I… I always read your books. I like your people. They are doing good work.” You know, you meet people like that all the time. I stood by the book distributors in the airport. You see a lot of cold people, some demonic people, you see a lot of good nice people who are really interested. But then somehow they just like slip through our fingers. We are not able to, you know… they are there, but we are not cultivating them. With the active preaching that we have, it’s like a open joke that all the media and everyone always says, “The Hare Kṛṣṇas are like all-pervasive in all the airports everywhere.” If we had slightest infrastructure like the Mormons and these other groups; that once they get the name, and even a person sends a death certificate, I don’t think they take them off their mailing list. And as a result, you know their group has expanded because they take a personal interest. So without of course without forcing it on people that don’t want to be. But those that just want to be, who are actually interested. If we have a program of cultivating them and getting them to chant one round, and then gradually letting them know that they can be part of our movement, even they don’t have to come and live in the temple. Then little bit more of a free mood. Automatically more people come and live in the temple, because more people will be eager to just be part of the movement. That’s what we found in India and other places was just that we, rather than the hard sell, we just had a very broad appeal and then what happens you know when someone comes in and then they have a specific… you know, we do our pubic preaching we don’t preach “Shave up, surrender, give up everthying.” In public we don’t preach like that anymore, so much. We preach what is the purpose of life. This that. You should chant. You should come for instruction. When the people come forward, and chant… and they come forward. And then they’re brought inside, they have individual questions. Then you see this person is ripe to be a devotee, then in private you try to give that person the special preaching. But in public so that you can get… just a lot of people people feel that we can be a part. There is no public pressure. Public pressure is just chant Hare Kṛṣṇa. Try to lead a pious life. You know the actual thing like… drive like “If you’re not in the temple, you’re in māyā.” No, you know, “You can try to be Kṛṣṇa consciousness outside, but it is more difficult. It’s better in the society of devotees.” Just a little bit lower-key sell. And then when the people, you see that there’s actually a person who is ready, should be in the temple, is at that stage of development that there’s no use to be for the person not to be in the society of devotees,directly, could become a preacher, then you preach to that person. And because of just making a little bit lower-key, a lot of the people who are put off by hard-sells, they actually come forward, and then, by having more people coming, then they actually… in the long run you get more devotees. And then you have a broader effect in any case. At any rate, this is the way that I’m personally seeing Kṛṣṇa consciousness in the West, is for people I imagine many temples are doing, some temples are finding a good result, I know England they’re finding.

I heard that here you’re having a similar program. I’d be interested to see what type of success you are getting here. And I feel that when Prabhupāda said that I have done half the work, the other half of the work you still have to do. And he was always telling us about varṇāśrama, that he meant people living outside in the society he repeatedly said that. And the way those people will become actually part of the varṇāśrama is that only if they chant Hare Kṛṣṇa. So that definitely this is the next stage for actually expanding the grassroots of Kṛṣṇa consciousness to every town and village and every family, and every society of the world. 

Hare Kṛṣṇa! 

Devotees: Jaya! Hare Kṛṣṇa!

Devotee: Today we distributed Roy Rogers a Back to Godhead magazine. 

Jayapatākā Swami: Who? 

Devotee: Mr. Roy Rogers. 

Jayapatākā Swami: Roy Rogers

Devotee: He’s a…

Jayapatākā Swami: Cowboy.

Devotee: He’s still…

Jayapatākā Swami: Is he still… they still have Roy Rogers’ Show?

Devotee: They probably just have reruns. Previously on. He said, “Thank you.” 

Jayapatākā Swami: I mean in South America, very materialistic people news… news women, journalist, television cameramen they come and do reports. And we tell them that you can chant Hare Kṛṣṇa and you don’t have to give up your job and just chant, which is what Prabhupāda always preached. I mean, I heard him preach like that, thousands of times. And everyone, “You don’t have to change yourselves. Wherever you are. ‘gṛhe thāko, vane thāko, sadā 'hari' bole' ḍāko’. Chant Hare Kṛṣṇa. That’s way he always preached. And when you tell people that, that you’re a cameraman you are newswoman alright, you just chant Hare Kṛṣṇa. You can chant. “Really? I don’t have to like, you know…” 

“No, you don’t have to shave your hair. You don’t have to do, you know, put the paint on your nose. You just chant hare Kṛṣṇa.”

They said, “Well, I’d like to do that. And I like your movement but I mean, I just always thought I had to, you know like shave my hair off or give up my job or something.”

We say, “No no, you just chant.”

And according to time, place and circumstance, according to the each individual, then you give them the specific medicine that they need to hear. But in this way, people the more they chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, the more their lives are going to change. And some of those newspaper people, they are also chanting now. They actually… takes them completely off guard because they usually expect that we’re very elitist, or that we are going to be very exclusive. And when we are actually very open it takes them off guard. When they see that it’s so easy to practice, then they find it hard, if they’re even a little pious, even to refuse. That’s how we used to do a lot of preaching in America, to get everyone to chant. Of course, it’s a little bit corny. They use to say this is the spiritually way to get high and so on and so forth. Those were in the ‘60s. It was a different time. Now Kṛṣṇa consciousness has become much more strong. Devotees become much more strict. They become much more steady in their devotional service. We have a different standard. Even the Indians from India, they appreciate that our temples are the most beautiful temples. So clean and everything, they are really impressed.

Nonetheless, the people in the material world they have not progressed along with the Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement. Rather, they’ve have gone further in to māyā. So there still has to be a program for the people who are in the lower rungs of situation to get… let them come up to the standard. Now our devotees are actually like first-class brāhmaṇas. But the brāhmaṇas should see that the whole society, even the vaiśyas and śūdras and other fallen conditioned souls are able to come up to the standard of Kṛṣṇa Consciousness.

So this chanting of Hare Kṛṣṇa is universal. There’s nothing better. There’s nothing more perfect, and we have Prabhupāda’s books. We have so many facilities to preach in America that we don’t have in India. You have video. You have movies. We can’t afford to put a video in many places, but everybody has a television set. And if you have a video player, you can hook it in any television set and show them many ITV movies.

Or they can just pitch together and get their own thing and they can see the ITV movies in the service group meetings. In this way they can be closer and closer to Kṛṣṇa consciousness. They can see Gurupāda’s lectures. They can see Prabhupāda’s lectures. They can see Māyāpur festival. If we had that facility in in India, that would be really something. But we don’t have that much finance to afford, you know. Plus it’s pretty hard to get around India with video… television set in village. It maybe takes slide projectors. But here there’s a lot of facility.

In Sweden they have 24 hours a week on the radio. Of course, Italy they have 6 of their own radio stations. And now they have one in Paris. So through radio also this preaching is going on now in different countries. So by using media, by using these facilities while we have them, it’s very easy to be able to train up people in Kṛṣṇa consciousness than it was before. We can use all these machines to train them up, to expose them to advanced devotees. Even Roy Rogers has now got a Back to Godhead. (laughter) How is the subscription program going here? 

Devotee: Going nicely.  We signed up 5,000 people in our zone. Seeing how they’re paying. They run an analysis on which distributors in what situations signed up people, you know. Because you don’t pay it on the spot. There’s a whole billing system. So we’re just now getting the results from that.

Jayapatākā Swami: First before you go ahead, you want to see that… under what situations, that people sign up, who pays up. (laughs)

Devotee: Right.

Jayapatākā Swami: To see, you know… So they don’t just…

Devotee: That we don’t make a cheap thing. So we can train up every… all the others well… as well, and you’ll see that, exactly the one that worked, nicely, so you make those payments.

Jayapatākā Swami: How many… Though it takes maybe a month or two before they all send in.

Devotee: It’s been a month, now. They’re just coming up with the results. We got some results coming in. 

Jayapatākā Swami: It’s an exciting program.

Devotee: That… you were saying how to send all the names and that to the Back to Godhead magazine those that signed up from a different part of the country. Like now they’ve put in Philadelphia, then automatically, the names are sent to the end… the center.

Jayapatākā Swami: And now, this, it’s automatic. They can sign up for Back to Godhead, anyone who is favorable. So, it’s automatically happening. Of course, see the main thing, “Books are the basis.” We’re giving the books this is just that… the other reason why I got into the… the other reason why I got into the whole preaching. In India, we are finding that lot of people are reading the books and finding that they are actually very interested in the books. And they would come forward in India and they would read the books and say, “I believe in your philosophy, I want to be a devotee, and so what can I do next?”

Then we’d ask them, well… the preacher would say “You can move in our temple in Māyāpur.”,

He’d say, “Well…”. The person might be like 50 years old, have a wife and 13 children. You know, have a house with 25 acres, with crops on it. Two of the children or sons are already married. Each has two kids and the father has got 12 years more to work before he retires at 68 or something from the railway, which he’s been working as a conductor his whole life. So then, you know, it’s just not possible for that person, even if he came with the whole 27 family members, the temple would not be in a position to house them or provide for them in any case, there. And even if… you know… and it’s… plus, you know it’s… to shift is just like, almost impossible in that situation.

⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐