19830505 Lord Caitanya's Pure Love is Contagious

The following is a lecture given by His Holiness Jayapatākā Swami on May 5th 1983, in Heidelberg, Germany.

Jayapatākā Swami: So, I am very happy to be here today, and to be able to address you, coming from India here to West Germany. The topic I would like to tell you about is especially the great personality called Śrī Kṛṣṇa Caitanya Mahāprabhu. His figure is there in the painting, in the center, with the raised arms and the yellow robes. His name Caitanya means the living force. The living force as well as the... Mahāprabhu means the great master. 

Actually, every one of us is the living force, and we know that in this body there is a living force. Without living force, without a living energy, this body has no consciousness. If we are to refer to the Bhagavad-Gītā, then you will find that, there it is described,

īśvaraḥ sarva-bhūtānāṁ
hṛd-deśe 'rjuna tiṣṭhati
bhrāmayan sarva-bhūtāni
yantrārūḍhāni māyayā

(Bg. 18.61) 

That we are actually situated in the heart. We are actually the living energy, the living force, and this body is a machine made out of the material nature. So, Lord Caitanya, He has come to give knowledge of the living force. The Vedas describe that from the heart, the consciousness is spread all over the body. The heart is also part of the machine. The consciousness is subtle, more conscious... more subtle is the living force.

So if we did an experiment, we know that if we cut off the circulation by wrapping a tourniquet around our arm, then we will lose all the consciousness in the hand. That means that this body has no consciousness. The consciousness is being induced through the bloodstream, and the source of the consciousness is the living force. So, this science of chemicals, of physical properties may be very interesting, and be very useful, but the most subtle science, which is actually most applicable to each one of us, is to know about the living force.

I am very glad that here in Heidelberg there is an institute for Vedic Studies, so that here, people may come to learn about the living force, because you won’t find about the living force in university. You won’t find about it in the other places, but you can find out here about the science of the living force. So there are different yogīs, and they have described this living force in different ways. Some of them describe the living force as a light, as an energy. Some of them describe the living force as a being filled with knowledge. Others describe the living force as being filled with qualities and ultimately a personality which, just like different colored glass, allows different colored light to come through.

In the same way the different bodies are like colored glass, they are presenting different types of personalities, but there is an original personality behind it all. This is the third viewpoint about the living force. So Caitanya Mahāprabhu, He actually taught that the living force can be realized in all the three ways. That one can realize the living force as a light, as knowledge, as well as a personal form, and the highest realization is the personal form because that includes the other two forms. Ultimately, that… our minute living force is the part of the greater living force or the Supreme living force. That Supreme living force we address, with the vibration “Kṛṣṇa”, ‘Kṛṣ’ means All Attractive, ‘Ṇa’ means the reservoir of all happiness. When you combine the two words together to get the word Kṛṣṇa, that means the Supreme living force. So, in the meditation, or in the activity, Lord Caitanya, He gave a special gift to the philosophy in India.

His gift is that the spiritual realization does not have to be dry, that yoga does not have to be dry. That in the ultimate issue, yoga, in its pure realization, is actually realizing various types of spiritual emotions, you see. That in the living force there is another type of emotion, which has got no inebriety or misery mixed with it, and that we call as love... pure love. In this world what we call love, would not come up to His definition. In this world love is always a type of direct reciprocation, going through the material senses, but Caitanyadeva... Caitanya… Lord Caitanya, He describes that love or prema means complete selfless, and that is completely pure without any mixture of sadness or anxiety of material misery with it.

Caitanya Mahāprabhu came with a secret mission. Lord Caitanya came to actually demonstrate this realization of pure love, and no one in the history of yogīs or religionists or anyone has ever exhibited the level of love, which Caitanya Mahāprabhu has exhibited. And one unique quality of Caitanya’s love is that, He is a… is very contagious. Simply by coming in touch with Him, others would also become filled with this loving quality. In fact, not only that but someone who came in touch with someone who came in touch with Lord Caitanya would also get this same experience of pure love, you see. That pure love is not dependent upon anything material. Therefore, the great yogīs, when they experience that, they find that to be most fulfilling of all experiences.

So just to give some examples that Lord Caitanya, when He used to go on His tours, to propagate this Kṛṣṇa consciousness, He used to chant…

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

with so many devotees, with so many followers, and they would be playing the cymbals, the drums, and they would create a total mood.

We were describing last night we read from one of the texts in the Bengali language, that how, whenever the people would see Lord Caitanya with His party, they would come forward spontaneously from their houses, and they would just forget about everything, and they would run after the party of Caitanya Mahāprabhu. They would run after... some people, they would be filled with desire to offer some respect, so they would start to offer candles or lights made from clarified butter, some people would be throwing flowers, and what happened was a whole festival was created.

Now, I know many of you have been coming here for some time. Some of you are here new, newly. So in this regard, I’ll just have to address those who have been coming here more frequently at this time, that you’ll be knowing that this is Kṛṣṇa with some of His devotees while they are having a festival. So, Caitanya Mahāprabhu, He would also have a festival through this chanting of Hare Kṛṣṇa, and the same type of festival that you see on this side will mentally be experienced by this chanting of Hare Kṛṣṇa.

Now Caitanya, He only came 500 years ago. In fact He came 497 years ago, and we are about to observe the 500th anniversary in only two and a half years. So, we are hopeful that you all would be present for our big celebrations at that time, which also would be held here in Germany and all over the world. So, that wasn’t very long ago. It was very recent. Actually during His time, He had propagated this chanting of Hare Kṛṣṇa all over India, and today it’s the main chant or meditation, which is common to all. There may be many chants, but this is the common chant for everyone. Caitanya is the one… Lord Caitanya is the one who actually gave this chanting.

So, when Lord Caitanya, just as an example, when He came, that time Bengal was under Mohammedan rule. You may know from the newspapers, from Iran, from Iraq, from the Lebanon crisis, that the Muslims are very fanatical people. In fact, the ruler of the Muslims, Hussain Shah; at that time, he was famous for destroying temples of Kṛṣṇa, and he would do so many violent acts against various saintly people. In spite of that, Lord Caitanya took His party and He went within three kilometers of the capital of that Nawab, the Hussain Shah, the Muslim ruler, and with His party, He was doing massive chanting of Hare Kṛṣṇa. He would chant from the morning to the night and thousands of people they would all come to see, and when Lord Caitanya danced, He would simply become absorbed in that meditation. He would be sometimes jumping, sometimes spinning, sometimes He’d be dancing slowly, and He would be manifesting various symptoms of ecstasies like crying, laughing, even quivering in His body, sometimes fainting, sometimes jumping up, sometimes loudly crying out and He never stopped. So much energy, that even the other people chanting with Him, they’d have to change, they could not keep up the pace, but He would go on from the morning till the night.

So, some of the leaders of the... of the Hindus, they had a meeting that “We should tell Lord Caitanya to leave this place for His own benefit. That the Nawab, Hussain Shah, if he knows that Lord Caitanya is here, he may kill him, he may do anything, he is a very cruel ruler who is very envious against anything to do with any other religion or culture except for Islam. So, they just sent a messenger to go to tell Lord Caitanya to leave. The messenger went to see Lord Caitanya, but Lord Caitanya’s kīrtana was going on and on, and he waited for one whole day, there was not a gap to go and tell Lord Caitanya. Then he went to take his meals, take his rest, again the next day there was again kīrtana.

Like this for three...

...able to say anything to Lord Caitanya. “I am coming on behalf of all the leaders of the… that we respect Lord Caitanya, but we are afraid for Him, that if He continues to chant Hare Kṛṣṇa here, so close to the Nawab - the Muslim ruler - there may be some violence, there may be some danger. Ask Him to leave, go somewhere else, He is very unpredictable, this Nawab, this Sultan.

So… but even those the secretary could not oppose Lord Caitanya. They are just going on and more and more people are coming. They are coming from miles away, from 10-15 kilometers they’re walking, 30 kilometers they’re walking, and literally hundreds of thousands of people, they were congregating, there was a huge crowd to see this festival of chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa. Even today, at Rāmakeli, the place where Lord Caitanya chanted, even after 490 years, this festival is still being observed, and a minimum of 500,000 people are coming every year. That will be held in uh, the last day of the Bengali month equivalent to May, that is Jyeṣṭha. It goes May 15th till June 12th, like that. In the lunar month.

So, the crowds were building up. Now some of the secretaries of Lord Caitanya, the devotees, they became very worried, because that fear has been brought to them by these other people, from the ministers favorable to Lord Caitanya and the cabinet of the Hussain Shah. So, finally Lord Caitanya could see that some of His devotees were in anxiety. He called them inside. He said, “Why are you having a dark face? Why are you looking so fearful?”

“My Lord, we are afraid for You.”

“Why are you afraid for Me?”

“We are very afraid that You are very close to the Mohammedan ruler, that if anything happens!”

“You think I don’t know?” Lord Caitanya said, “You think I don’t know who I am? I am not afraid, why are you afraid? You should just chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, there is nothing to fear.” Then again Lord Caitanya, He began His chanting.

So, in the meantime naturally Hussain Shah, he got information that Lord Caitanya is there, He is chanting. So, he did an investigation, how much are the followers of Lord Caitanya being paid, how none of them are being paid anything? Try to figure out, you can analyze what is motivating them. He did this study unknown to everyone, for over six months or a year. Even two of His main ministers, they also left his cabinet and joined Caitanyadeva’s movement, they were known as Rūpa and Sanātana Gosvāmīs, the great leaders of the six gosvāmīs, who have written so many literatures. In German, some of the most literatures are also available, that is called The Upadeśāmṛta, and the Nectar of Devotion, you see. I may read these words by these ex-ministers of this Hussain Shah, who were known as Rūpa and Sanātana Gosvāmī.

So, one of the people, they approached Hussain Shah, that “Lord Caitanya is chanting here so many days.”

Then Hussain Shah asked him, “Who do you think this Lord Caitanya is?”

That person said, “Well, I think He is a… saint…… He is a beggar, He has no money, saint… He goes here and there singing, Hare Kṛṣṇa” that person was trying to tone it down, afraid that if he said too much he would get the wrath of the Shah.

The Hussain Shah said, “No, I do not accept. I think that Lord Caitanya is not different from Allah, or what the Hindus say Īśvara, or God.”

They were astonished, “How he is saying this. He is a follower of Islam, how can he say that Lord Caitanya is same as Khuda hafiz, same as Allah.” he saw they were bewildered.

He said, “Yes, it must be, I have studied. I know in my own kingdom, in my empire, everyone is running, why? For money. If I don’t pay the salary of my army, my ministers, my spies, if I don’t give facilities even to my wife… no one will do anything, everyone will desert me. It is all running on my fear and my money. But I noted that Lord Caitanya, He has no army, and He has no money, yet everyone is going after Him, therefore He must be empowered by God or must be God, otherwise how can He attract everyone simply on their feeling, He must be giving them something out of this world, this is my conclusion. Therefore, I order that no one, and you broadcast this throughout my Empire, no one should interfere with the movement and with the activities of Lord Caitanya.” It is inconceivable how a fanatical Muslim ruler, during the time of Lord Caitanya, could give the order that no one would disturb Caitanya’s activities. This was the type of power that Lord Caitanya had manifested.

After some time Lord Caitanya left with his followers and they were travelling in different parts of the country. Our movement of chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa in a big group, is actually started by Lord Caitanya. But that doesn’t mean that this process of chanting mantras is just 500 years old. Chanting mantras is very very old. You will find in the Vedas there are so many examples of chanting mantras.

Mantra is just like fire, if you put your hand in fire you will be burned, in the same way if you chant the mantra properly, somehow or another if the vibration comes from the mouth, it will have its effect. Therefore, it’s not simply some type of artificial process, it is not an imposition on the mind. Because otherwise it would not be possible that even without knowledge, even without practice, even if you are skeptical, even then by chanting there’s also an effect.

There were a group of very cynical people who used to criticize Lord Caitanya’s movement. They would criticize by mimicking, they would say ‘Hare Kṛṣṇa Hare Kṛṣṇa’, make funny faces and make funny noises and say Hare Kṛṣṇa, and what happened? They could not stop thinking about Kṛṣṇa, they couldn’t stop chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa. They thought that, “What is this?” Just by chanting they became more and more prone to chanting, why? Because actually the vibration Hare Kṛṣṇa is alive. It has its own living force, that is the Supreme living force. And if we chant, we can actually experience - as we can become more and more awaken - that the chanting is actually alive, and the chanting is with us. But don’t take my word for it.

You may experiment, you may try chanting, and experience that what change comes to your life. Actually, what happens is that the identification that ‘we are the body’, which is the cause of all our problems, that is gradually purified and we are able to realize that we are the living force, and the natural happiness of the living force in relation with Kṛṣṇa is manifested. So there are of course many examples of this. I’ll just give one example, but first I would like to give examples about the chanting.

That one time there was a thief, his name was Dasyu Ratnākara, and he used to rob people to maintain his family. He had a wife, two children, mother and father, who were very old mother and father. He was the only earning member in the family, so he would regularly go and rob people, sometimes he would kill them and he would take their wealth. So, one of the great spiritual masters, in our line of spiritual masters is called Nārada Muni. He is possessing all the mystical powers of yoga and at will he can travel by the… he can travel anywhere in the world. So, this Nārada Muni, he happened to be in such a place that this thief saw him, and he was ready to attack him.

He said, “Alright, give me your wealth. Well! You are actually only having this vīṇā, this tānpura.”

Nārada said, “I’m not having anything except this.” Then he played this musical instrument. That had a great effect on the thief.

The thief said “Nevermind! Give me whatever wealth you have; you must have something.”

So, Nārada said, “I will give you my wealth, but you must tell me that who are you stealing for?”

He said, “I am stealing for myself, my wife, even my children, and my old invalid mother and father.”

“So, you know that by stealing and killing you are getting many bad karmas? That for every action we do, there is a reaction. That action will again come back to us. If we cause pain to others that pain will come back to us. If we make others happy, that happiness will come back to us. So, you are creating so much pain for others that, who is going to share that pain when it comes back to you by the laws of karma?”

So, then he said, “Well, naturally my wife, my children, they will all share, they are all also benefiting by this, they will take a share.”

Then Nārada said, “I give my word, I will wait here. You ask them, who will take the share.”

So then, he went back… Dasyu Ratnākara, the thief, the robber, he went back to his cave, and first he approached his old mother and father and requested them, that, “My dear mother and father, I met a great saint on the way and he explained to me about karma, that for every murder, killing, robbery, that I have done, that I have to get the reaction, in the future, but I have been doing all these to maintain you, my beloved parents, so I just wanted to ask you that you also take a share, a percentage of the reaction.”

They said, “What? What, no… we are very old. We are going to die any minute; you want to send us to hell in our last days? We tried to raise you up to be a good boy, but you took this path. You could have done some other occupation, don’t hold us responsible. We have already done a lot for you. We are not saying that you have to do these things. Don’t put us in difficulty at the last leg of life.”

So he was a bit disturbed with his mother and father. They wouldn’t take any share.

So then he went to his children, “That my dear children, I am feeding you, I am clothing you, I am providing you everything in life, but surely you will take a share of the reactions for all the activities that I have done. Just as you are taking a share of the wealth that I am bringing.”

They said, “We are your children, we didn’t ask to be you children. You could have been a businessman or something, we didn’t ask to be your children. Somehow, we took birth in your family. We are forced to eat whatever you give us. We can’t be held responsible for all the other things you do, don’t ruin the future of our life by giving us these reactions.” They refused to take any of these karmas.

So this time that robber, he was very disturbed, that nobody is taking any reactions.

Now he went to his beloved wife, “My sweetheart, my companion through life, you have heard the discussions. Through thick and thin, through happiness and distress, we are always together. So surely you will be taking half of all the bad karmas that I have accrued, murdering, killing, everything, to maintain the family.”

“What do you mean? You don’t give me any good clothing, we don’t get to go out in the society, we are always hiding in the cave. I have to raise the children, I have to do the cooking, I have to do everything for you, wash your clothes, and now you want me to take your karma? No I won’t do it, nothing going.”

So he was completely shocked, nobody would take any karma. So he was robbing, stealing, he was killing, everything. And also, he was giving everything to them, but they wouldn’t take one bit of the responsibility. Then he came back to Nārada Muni, the great master. He was shook, that “What you said is true, nobody would take any of the karma for all the work I was doing. What should I do, how can I get freed from the karma?”

So then, Narada Muni told him, “You should chant the name of Rāma, you should chant the transcendental name.”

He said, “No. No. I can’t say any names like that. I have… I have no habit of saying anything pious or anything good. This is not my nature. I can say kill, I can say rob, I can say swear words. All these holy words I can’t say, doesn’t even come in my mind.”

So then Narada Muni told him, “Alright, so you chant the word marā.” In Sanskrit the word marā. Marā means to kill, or touch, to attack, to beat. Marā.

He said, “Yes, I can chant marā, this is my nature. I have been doing this all along… murder, kill.”

“Yeah, so you chant marā, marā, go on chanting that.”

Then he sat down and he started to chant:

“marā marā marā marā
marā marā marā marā
marā marā marā marā
marā marā marā marā
marā marā marā marā
Rāma Rāma Rāma...” 

“marā marā” when you chant together it comes “Rāma Rāma Rāma Rāma Rāma.”

“marā marā ma…” after the first syllable it is “Rāma Rāma Rāma Rāma.”

So in this way he was not even thinking of Rāma, wasn’t thinking of the vibration as being anything (inaudible) he was thinking of only murder, murder, murder but he was saying the vibration. After some time, he was actually able to actually see the complete spiritual realization, he was actually able to see his self. He became completely free from all the karmic reactions and he was able to see the whole pastimes of Rāma - the incarnation of Godhead - and he wrote down the book called Rāmāyaṇa, which is celebrated all over India as the most sacred text on yoga and on various spiritual matters. So he became later completely changed. He became known as Vālmīki Muni, the great sage Vālmīki, just by chanting the vibration Rāma, even it was an indirect way. Like this, there are many examples of people chanting these vibrations, but they would normally chant individually or in small groups, but the same chanting is there.

Lord Caitanya introduced this chanting in a very big way. In Calcutta we have sometimes up to 1 million people chanting together at one time, for the big festival. That vibration is simply incredible. Anyway, we would request all of you, either alone or by yourself, or in a small group, or come here together for this function, try chanting this vibration Hare Kṛṣṇa. It will protect you from so many dangers. It will help you understand the philosophy given in Bhagavad-Gītā, and will also actually give you an experience of the happiness which is coming from... directly from the living force, which is beyond the body. We don’t deny the body, because we say the body is a machine, it doesn’t mean we deny it. We take care of it, we clean it, we give it all the essentials. But we experience happiness which is even beyond the happiness of the body. That is the sublime contribution of Lord Caitanya. That is the purpose of human life, to experience what goes beyond the body.

In the animal life they cannot experience beyond the body. But human life, they can experience the body and beyond the body, beyond the mind, they can have… human beings can experience the living force, can experience Kṛṣṇa… the Supreme Living Force. cetanaś cetanānām, nityas nityānāṁ. There’s that cetanāḥ, there are many living forces in the material world, and there is one cetanānām, there is one supreme living force. Nitya, all the living forces are eternal, they are indestructible, and there is one Supreme nityānāṁ, indestructible living force, who is above all.

So that realization is the goal of yoga, this branch is called bhakti-yoga, or the yoga through the process of loving devotion, through the process of spiritual practices, through hearing, chanting, remembering, through offering various composed prayers, and the words through worship, through service, through friendship, and through surrender. These are the nine practices of bhakti-yoga.