19850429 Caitanya-caritāmṛta Ādi-līlā 8.21

Caitanya Caritamrita Adi Lila 8 21 New Orleans

Book:

Caitanya Caritamrita (CC)

Date:

Monday, April 29, 1985

Collection:

Enlightenment 3

Audio player:

19850429_Caitanya_Caritamrita_.21_New_Orleans_Literal Version The following is a lecture given by His Holiness Jayapataka Swami on April 29th, 1985 at New Orleans, Louisiana. The class begins with a reading from the Caitanya Caritamrita, Adi Lila, chapter-8, text- 21. JPS: Jaya Jaya Sri Caitanya Jaya Nityananda, Jayadvaita Chandra Jaya Gaura Bhakta Vrinda Devotees: Jaya Jaya Sri Caitanya Jaya Nityananda, Jayadvaita Chandra Jaya Gaura Bhakta Vrinda JPS: Jaya Jaya Sri Caitanya Jaya Nityananda, Jayadvaita Chandra Jaya Gaura Bhakta Vrinda Devotees: Jaya Jaya Sri Caitanya Jaya Nityananda, Jayadvaita Chandra Jaya Gaura Bhakta Vrinda JPS: Jaya Jaya Sri Caitanya Jaya Nityananda, Jayadvaita Chandra Jaya Gaura Bhakta Vrinda Devotees: Jaya Jaya Sri Caitanya Jaya Nityananda, Jayadvaita Chandra Jaya Gaura Bhakta Vrinda JPS: mukam karoti vacalam pangum langhayate girim yat-krpa tam aham vande paramananda-madhavam yat kripa tamaham vande sri Caitanya ishvaram Ajanulambhita bhujo kanakavadata Sankirtanai kipataro kamalayataksha Viswambharo dwijabaro jugadharmo palo Vande jagat priya karo Karunavataro Vande jagat priya karau karunavataro Shri Chaitanya Caritamrita Adi Lila Chapter-8, text- 21 svatantra isvara prema-nigudha-bhandara svatantra isvara prema-nigudha-bhandara bilaila yare tare, na kaila vicara Translation: Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu, as the Supreme Personality of Godhead Himself, is fully independent. Therefore, although it is the most confidentially stored benediction, He can distribute love of Godhead to anyone and everyone without consideration. Translation with repetition: JPS: Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu, Devotees: Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu, JPS: as the Supreme Personality of Godhead Himself, Devotees: as the Supreme Personality of Godhead Himself, JPS: is fully independent Devotees: is fully independent JPS: Therefore Devotees: Therefore JPS: although it is the most confidentially stored benediction Devotees: although it is the most confidentially stored benediction JPS: He can distribute love of Godhead Devotees: He can distribute love of Godhead JPS: to anyone and everyone Devotees: to anyone and everyone JPS: without consideration. Devotees: without consideration. Purport: This is the benefit of Lord Caitanya’s movement. If one somehow or other comes in contact with the Hare Krishna movement, without consideration of his being a sudra, vaisya, Jagai, Madhai or even lower, he becomes advanced in spiritual consciousness and immediately develops love of Godhead. We now have actual experience that throughout the entire world this movement is making many such persons lovers of God simply by the chanting of the Hare Krisha maha-mantra. Actually, Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu has appeared as the spiritual master of the entire world. He does not discriminate between offenders and the innocent. Krishna-prema-pradaya te: He liberal… liberally gives love of Godhead to anyone and everyone. This can be actually experienced, as stated in the next verse. adyapiha dekha caitanya-nama yei laya krishna-preme pulakasru-vihvala se haya adyapiha dekha caitanya-nama yei laya krishna-preme pulakasru-vihvala se haya

Translation: Whether he is offensive or inoffensive, anyone even now chants….who chants… anyone who even now chants sri-krishna-caitanya prabhu-nityananda is immediately overwhelmed with ecstasy, and tears fill his eyes. Sri Krishna Caitanya Prabhu Nityananda, Brahmananda… Prabhupada had told him that in Africa some of those, Prabhupada told just to train people to chant Sri Krishna Caitanya Prabhu Nityananda Sri Advaitya Gadadhara Srivasadi Gaur Bhakta Vrinda Because, I don’t know if this because ah… there is one of the places where the only way they take cow’s milk is they cut the jugular vein of the cow and take a little blood and put it in… I don’t know that was why, that is the reason why… whatever it might be, that even if a person is offensive or inoffensive that if they chant the name Sri Krishna Caitanya Prabhu Nityananda, they can get ah… spiritual benefit you see. Generally speaking any practice of religion the first thing is that the person has to be inoffensive because unless… of course even in Krishna consciousness it is certainly recommended people should become free of offenses. However, just that we can understand the depth of the mercy of Lord Chaitanya, that it is not a prerequisite for him to give his mercy. If someone chants the name they can immediately get the mercy of the Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu. Of course once one takes that mercy and advances to a certain stage, then Lord Caitanya expects that the person would… once they make a commitment not to commit sinful activities again, and Lord Caitanya expects of course they would maintain that, but the initial state practically speaking there is no disqualification. Lord Caitanya is so merciful that even if someone is an offender one can get the mercy. So someone can say that, “Well, what is the rational for that?” It’s not logical or it’s not following any established system. Well it’s because as Lord Caitanya is the supreme personality of godhead, He doesn’t have to follow any established system, he is independent, hee can do whatever He likes. He makes the ground rules. In this particular avatar, In this particular descent, His mood is just to give out the mercy. You start to go through the credentials, then so many people may not get the mercy. Move it just to give it out. It’s like sometimes we have house clearance, everything must go, you see the advertise, that time everything you get flat discount. So here Lord Caitanya, He is in the mood, let everyone go, let them all go back to godhead. Of course there are so many stubborn, mudhas that even though this great opportunity is there, they don’t take it up. Who could be more of a mudha, than someone who has this opportunity and he doesn’t takes it up. Prabhupada once told story about lazy men, the… some people are so lazy when it comes to their spiritual life, they don’t want to lift a finger. So, sometimes we should avoid being lazy in this time because we have to just take a little effort and we can get mercy. Prabhupada told the story of a lazy man. One king wanted to feed all the lazy men in his kingdom free. So he advertised, there was a big hall, but so many people came that there was more than he could feed. It had become a big burden on the exchequer. So he asked his ministers what is to be done ? So the minister said, “you light the whole hall on fire, the people inside.” So then he lit the hall on fire. Naturally everybody started running and screaming and running out of the burning building, then they went inside and they found that ah… there were two people laying down there, and ah… one was telling the other one, “that ah…seems a little bit ah…, seems a little bit hot in here, feeling the heat on my back, what should I do?” The other one said, “ah… roll over to your other side.” “Don’t you feel hot? ” They are so lazy that ah… even if the house is burning down, they would run out. And the king saw those two… these are real lazy guys, these guys are really lazy. So he agreed to feed them. So for most people they are not really lazy but they are ah… just say, they are awake pretending they are asleep, just like when it is time to get up for mangala arati, somebody is asleep you can wake him up but if he is awake, he doesn’t want to go for mangala arati, he is pretending to be asleep it is very hard to wake such a person up. Even if you shake him, he will be having the cover over his head or her head or whatever. So a person if they are asleep naturally they can be woken up, but if they are being a bit devious, pretending they are asleep when they are awake then what can you do? So there are people, that they know that what they are doing isn’t rightly situated, but they pretend as if they don’t know, that type of situation is of course very unfortunate. So nobody gets cheated but the person himself. It’s said that in the material world, whatever you want you can… you get it but whatever is your do rather by the law of karma that would come of it’s own accord, you may not get everything exactly the way you want it. Eventually you get the opportunity to get everything which is available in the material world if you have sufficient karma, that’s another thing. The point is that whatever your karmas are, you will get some results or you won’t get any results according to what the karma’s are. Something will happen automatically, positive or negative, but being Krishna conscious doesn’t happen automatically. It’s not that if you are here 10 billion births, you will go back to godhead. Just like somebody gets a sentence, you have to spend 10 years and few… five years of good behaviour, you get off. Everyone in this material world is a nitya badha. They are here eternally, until they want to get out. If they are one of those lazy fellows, they just want to roll over to avoid the heat on this side or that side, they are going to be here. But if they actually want to get out of material suffering or they want to achieve Krishna’s service or they want to achieve eternal love of Godhead or whatever it may be their desire if they want anything transcendental, you may have to try for that specifically. Doesn’t happen automatically. Unless of course some… just like Sivananda Sena, he somehow took a fancy to some dog, was taking the dog with the sakirtan party that was going down from Bengal to Jagannath puri, and somehow or another he would feed the dog, pay for it’s ah… ferry charges, take it across the river, but it get lost, send people out, bring it back, he gave some special mercy out of his own accord, out of his own initiative. Finally that dog disappeared right when they were outside of Jagannath Puri. When they came into Jagannath Puri, Sivananda Sena went to see Lord Caitanya, there he saw that the dog was sitting there. Lord Caitanya was taking some coconut Prasad, just throwing the dog little pieces, the dog was just catching it with his mouth, this way the dog went back to godhead because of the mercy of Sivananda sena. So whether one’s own initiative or in some cases someone like Lord Nityananda had to take initiative with Jagai-Madhai or Sivananda Sen took iniative with this dog, that’s like special causeless mercy Generally speaking, in any case it requires some initiative, doesn’t happen on it’s own, it’s not just automatic thing. Automatically, according to the karma just the reactions in the three modes are happening. This is totally beyond the modes of nature, so therefore it doesn’t happen according to karma, can’t! karma is only the three modes- nistrai gunya, this is beyond the three modes, gunatit. So if you want to get the mercy of Lord Caitanya, whether you are qualified of unqualified, whether you are good or bad or whether you are whatever you may be, but if you just take little step forward, just go there, just ask Lord Caitanya for the mercy, just chant the names he has given just for the asking you can have it. Of course people are so unfortunate that they don’t take it. They don’t even know it in some cases, that is their misfortune. So the devotees, by hook or by crook they try to get the people to chant knowing that’s their… If somehow or another they chant, then Krishna… then he will tell, “alright, they have taken an initiative”, he will give his mercy. Just like Buddhimantha Khan one devotee of Lord Caitanya, he went to the Chad Kazi, he will always say, “why don’t you chant hare Krishna? you should chant hare Krishna.” So finally the chand kazi said, “well I will chant hare Krishna tomorrow.” “hari bol, hari bol, hari bol, he was jumping up and down, hari bol, hari bol, you already chanted, you just said hare Krishna today. Your already good fortune has begun, hari bol, hari bol, chant kazi has begun chanting hare Krishna.” So this way the devotee, somehow or another they get the people to chant, that even Haridas Thakur when he walked down the road, sometimes the kids would say, “look at that, there comes that Haridas Thakur, he is always chanting hare Krishna, let’s get him angry, let’s make fun”,” hare Krishna, hare Krishna, make some kind of mimicking, Haridas Thakur would look very offended knowing that they may get more inspired to chant louder.Inside he was very happy that somehow or other they are chanting, outwardly looked very formal, very offended but… So then they chanted louder… so the devotees somehow or another they get people to chant, that’s their mission. Rupa Goswami said, “yena tena prakarena Krishna mana nivosite” By any means you get people to become… to accept Krishna by any means. Once they have accepted Krishna, once they become attached to Krishna consciousness, and you can introduce rules and other ways they can maintain purity, because without purity how they will get a higher taste, they may get a flash, they may get a glimpse, but they wouldn’t be able to maintain it because it will be like a hati snan, bathing of the elephant. Elephant goes in, bathes, srubs, we have a swimming pool in Mayapur, not for… not for people. I mean for people but not for humans… for elephant people. So swimming pool only for the elephants. And they go in there and they go and take their bath, specially now in the hot water, twice a day, they go in the swimming pool, kandra prabhu knows. But they like to come out, they like to take the dust and throw it on their back. We don’t keep much dust around us, I don’t know if you give a chance, but if they do they pick it up. So what’s the use, you just scrub yourself clean, then you come out and you start rubbing yourself with dirt again, what’s the use. That’s elephant, somehow that’s their mentality, they like to have the dust on them. So that type of bath, where the person is chanting, he is getting purified and then they go out and they commit offenses just like the elephant bath. So naturally, that’s not going to give one a very continuous feeling for transcendental ecstasy, for spiritual realization. So when they come to point of little bit of purification, then of course it’s necessary to introduce what are the basic, minimum standars of purity that they should maintain so that they can continuously the taste nectar of Krishna consciousness so that their devotional service would be inoffensive. Ahaituki aprtihata, or anybhilsita sunyam jnana karma anavritam, anukyulena Krishna anusilanam, it should be favourable following Krishna. So once they get a little bit ah… purified that you can enter… So that’s the basic program, but what Lord Caitanya, His special nature for Lord Caitanya, Nityananda is that without… even though one hasn’t achieved that type of purity even though they might be unqualified. Still Lord Caitanya, he gives that causeless mercy. The devotee tries to induce people to, after they get a little bit advanced they become pure. But Lord Caitanya is so liberal that he is giving his initial mercy without considering anything. Papi tapi jata chila hari name udharilo, tar sakhi jagai-madhai. Adhyapiha means even upto date. He is saying adyapiha dekho, Chaitanya nam je loy. Even see upto this date whoever takes Lord Caitanya’s name, Krishna preme pulakasu vivalasu hoy. He immediately becomes overwhelmed with ecstasy, tears fill his eyes. …25.30… Prabhupada gives his purport. Aprakrita sahajiya, who chant Nitai Gaur Radhe Shyam, have a very little knowledge of the bhagavat conclusion and they hardly know the Vaisnava rules and regulations, and yet because they chant, “bhajo nitai gaura radhe shyam”, their chanting immediately invokes tears and other signs of ecstasy although they do not know the principles of vaisnava philosophy and are not very advanced in education , by this symptoms they attract many men to become their followers. Their tears of course help them in the long run, but as soon as they come in contact with a pure devotee their lives will become successful. Even in the beginning however because they are chanting the holy names of nitai-gaur, their ….26.28… on the path of godhead is very prominently visible. Every day behind our temple in Vrindavan you can hear, depending on which room you get, the back of the guest house there the group …26.45-47…. they are chanting always “nitai gaur radhe shyam hare Krishna hare ram” and that goes on day and night, you hear them chanting ….and they don’t accept all of the six goswamis, they are not very strict but some of them they say they manifest in chanting this mantra nitai gaur, nitain gaur radhe shyam, they start to manifest some ecstatic symptoms. This attracts the people, this seems pretty easy. Prabhupada of course he did want us to, wanted us to… wanted us to purify the chant, one time he said that we should chant nitai gaur radhe shyam, jay Krishna balaram. In new vrindavan we have our nitai gaur deities, Radhe Shyam and Krishna balaram… nitai gaur radhe shyam jay Krishna balaram- names of the deities. But he told us that he was very much against this kind of breaking up, that Bhaktisiddhantha Thakur also said that this breaking up of the panchatattva name, hare Krishna mahamantara, this is not bonafide. We should take mantras and start cutting them up, and then re-mixing them around, you don’t have the authority to that. It is given in the scripture…the vedas has given the hare Krishna mahamantra. The panchatatva mantra is given by Krishnadas Kaviraj, other great acaryas, so just taking a little bit here, little bit there. Once I got a discussion with another group who had a similar mantra and then I challenged them on this point that why you are giving khanda nam, khanda nam means you are taking the name and you are breaking it up into bit by bit, that is called khandas, broken mantras, bit’s and pieces of mantras. So discussion went on, he was a great scholar, he knew caitanya caritamrita by hard, he could say whole chapters. He didn’t have any answer for that basic question and finally using Prbhupada’s technique of just fighting the weak point, coming back again and again, then finally he had to surrender after trying every means to duck out of the argument. Their techniques you see what we discussed with this pandits, when you get a square on your corner, then they return with a question to distract you, a high question, just like hit him with that, then he said, “well, you said ah… all that… hare Krishna is the greatest mantra, then why did ah… Haridas Thakur the last breath of life, why did he say, when I leave, I take my last breath I want to say Sri Krishna Caitanya, he is the namachary, he chanted Hare Krishna mantra his whole life, why was the last desire he wanted to say Sri Krishna Caitanya, when he took his last breath?” Of course he had nothing to do with our point, but he just told like that. So of course at that time Prabhupada is very merciful and he gave us some intelligence to be able to discuss, even though we are not such a great scholar like… we haven’t had the time to memorize …30.53… chapters of Caitanya Caritamrita, although by Prabhupada’s mercy, with his purport’s, and with his instructions, we are able to understand something of this great literature. Without his mercy nothing is possible. Of course that type of logic that…. Haridas Thakur, his whole life he chanted the Hare Krishna maha-mantra and we are not to imitate Haridas Thakur, when he is leaving his body and he is putting his… just like Bhisma, he is leaving and he concentrated on Krishna and he left his body. So Haridas Thakur just concentration his consciousness on the lotus face of Lord Caitanya and leaving, it’s nothing wrong with that. It doesn’t in any way reduce the value of chanting of Hare Krishna, but in any case we have to follow the order of Haridas Thakur, not to imitate. He, his whole life his example was he chanted Hare Krishna mahamantra and he also instructed us to do the same. But at first we chant Sri Krishna Caitanya and then Hare Krishna. So then again we asked that why you are breaking the Hare Krishna mahamantra, then again he threw out a bunch of Sanskrit verses instead and then finally he said, “alright! In our spiritual, when a pujari is doing worship he is within the material… she is within the material body. At that time on the altar you have simultaneously Radha-Krishna, you also have Caitanya, Nityananda, they have Lord Caitanya. Radha Krishna in madhurya rasa and Lord Caitanya is in Adwarya rasa, Radha Krishna in Vrindavan, Caitanya Mahaprabhu is in Nabadwip, in the spiritual reality of the altar, you are worshipping them in your meditation, they are in their respective abodes, so the devotees of Lord Caitanya are supposed to take a…. have the siddha swarup, the male form, the devotees of Radha- Krishna in their siddha swarup have the female form, so how do you simultaneously worship both of them when you sitting in your one material form? That was his next question? There is nothing at all do, but why cannot be the hare Krishna mantra and the panchatattva mantra, and nothing whatsoever to do with that topic. This is their technique to come up with some… normally ah… blows away people once you are asking for that. Fortunately Srila Prabhupada ...34.10… discussed this point with us in some private meetings in Mayapur, that in the spiritual world that the devotees of Lord Caitanya simultaneously appear in both the places. So we brought that point out so he said “alright, 34.30-35…knew that one”, but you are not, but then when you are in your… you are doing your puja, you are not able to simultaneously do the worship, you have to one after the other, so which one will you do first? We have to do Lord Caitanya first, and the Radha Krishna because that’s the way the parampara goes, ….34.55-35.00. So finally, when he couldn’t get any, any… again he said, “listen we have to break it up, the mantra because it is more of a public appeal, people like it, Radhe-Shyam, Radha-Govinda,Nitai… people don’t know Lord Caitanya, they know Radhe-Shyam, they know Radha-Govinda, so we break up the mantra and we put it together, it is more attractive, everybody you know, it has got little bit of everything, a little bit for the Rajasthani’s and the North Indians, for the eastern Indians, it’s… it’s very tropical , it’s… very” I said, “what does that have to do with transcendental knowledge, you just break up the mantras given in the scripture just because it is… for popularity context, where does the scripture allow us that the licence to take the mantra’s and divide them up?” Then he said, “You know well actually we chant Hare Krishna too once a year, Gaur Purnima for one day, you people are doing a good work”, and then he answered. So even though they have a lot of academic knowledge, somehow Maya steals it from them. They have so much little technical knowledge, that’s what the danger, you see some of the devotees they read some of the books, get all these details and they lose sight of just the basics, lose sight of what is the purpose of what is Krishna consciousness. Just like you get some of these pandits, they know so much they miss the whole point, they just start to speculate, you don’t know how to bring it all together not following the strict parampara, that’s why they are called sahajiya. They may know this or that, some technical points, but then they make a whole mess of it. Still somehow or another by chanting Caitanya’s name they…they get some vibration going there. Gradually many of them surrender to Srila Prabhupada and take shelter of ISKCON. Lot Of people, more and more as time goes on taking shelter in Krishna conscious movement because they see that we are following strictly the principles of Caitanya Caritamrita, strictly the principles of srimad bhagavatam, there is no short cut. Shorter than the direct root, any other detour, offences, some other speculation is a detour, is a delay, it’s not a short cut, short cut is this way, the way approved by the acharyas- by Jiva Goswami, by Rupa Goswami, by Srila Bhaktisiddhantha Swami Prabhupada. So Prabhupada, he told us that don’t break up mantras, don’t make up any mantras, don’t chant any bogus mantras, just keep it simple, chant Sri Krishna Caitanya, Prabhu Nityananda, sri Advaitya Gadadhara, Gaur Bhakta Vrinda, chant Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare, Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare, and he also would sometimes in Mayapur he said that we could chant Hari Hariya nama Krishna Yadavaya namah, gopal govinda ram sri madhusudhana. Even sometimes in kirtan. One time I was trying to get devotees to chant, so I was leading Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare, people were chanting, so I just threw in there, “Bolo”, please chant, Hare Ram Hare Ram Ram Ram Hare Hare. Prabhupada called me over, he said what is this bolo? I wasn’t you know, I was just trying to get the people to chant, Prabhupada was very sensitive, he didn’t want any more bhajo’ or bolo’s or anything stuck inside the mantra, it was the straight authorized mahamantra, panchatattva mantra, sometimes hari haraya, sankirtan mantra, or sankirtan chant but apart from that there was another form of mahamantra. Apart from those authorised mantras, no additions, no substactions, sub…. ah tractions, as it is. Nityananda bolite hoi Krishna prema uday Aulay sakal ashru ganga bay Aulay sakal ashru ganga bay Translation: nityananda’ balite haya krishna-premodaya aulaya sakala anga, asru-ganga vaya Simply by talking of Nityananda Prabhu one awakens his love for Krisha. Thus all his bodily limbs are agitated by ecstasy, and tears flow from his eyes like the waters of the Ganges. Translation with repletion: JPS: Simply by talking of Nityananda Prabhu Devotees: Simply by talking of Nityananda Prabhu JPS: one awakens his love for Krisha. Devotees: one awakens his love for Krisha. JPS: Thus all his bodily limbs Devotees: Thus all his bodily limbs JPS: are agitated by ecstasy, Devotees: are agitated by ecstasy, JPS: and tears flow from his eyes like the waters of the Ganges. Devotees: and tears flow from his eyes like the waters of the Ganges. One time we read the glories of Miniketan Ramdas. He will just go and touch people with his flute and they will become ecstatic. You find that Lord Nityananda is very popular, in Bengal and Orissa, this… even to this date. His personality is very blissful, and as Lord Nityananda Prabhu was always manifesting… Lord Caitanya would consider who is watching, or sometimes try to maintain a certain gravity. Nityanand Prabhu a lot of times he didn’t bother for anything, he just… he was feeling very ecstatic enough for Krishna, he wouldn’t… he wouldn’t limit that, whether one is watching or not. Sometimes Lord Caitanya would chastise him, you have to be real conservative, people don’t understand your transcendental activities always, you don’t want them to commit offences. The main thing is Lord Nityananda of course, he would give his ah….benediction pretty liberally even when Junior Haridas was banned by Lord Caitanya, Nityananda tried also to reinstate him or Nityananda is very kind, very forgiving and we are very fortunate here in sankirtanpur that ah… we have Lord Nityananda and Lord Caitanya personally present and somehow or another if we get the mercy of Lord Nityananda… It’s Narottam Das Thakur saying, “ha ha Prabhu Nityananda Premananda Sukhi”, that O my dear Lord Nityanda, you are always filled with transcendental love, bliss of transcendental love for Krishna, that ecstasy you are always filled with. “Kripa bolo ekhono karo aami boro dukhi”, so please have your mercy upon me because I am very, I am most ah… miserable, therefore I need the ah… your mercy. Lord Nityananda is very liberal, he is always very ecstatic, his devotees are always very ecstatic. So if we worship Lord Caitanya, Lord Nityanda because they are very merciful. So we are very fortunate that they have appeared here. We should try to give them what they like most, lot of spontaneous devotional service and ecstatic kirtans. By their presence naturally one can experience the ah… perfection of Krishna consciousness. Just as last night we heard some of our guest or some of the devotees, the folk members express some amazing experiences they had, I don’t know if you all were here then they might have been busy, some of them were saying some amazing things about the waves of ecstasy they were experiencing some of the kirtans. So even though certainly they also admitted that they had a lot of problems in following some of the principles, still by the mercy of Nitai-Gaur inspite of their not being… always very pure, they are able to experience some very sublime experiences in Krishna consciousness. So it’s all by the mercy of Lord Nityananda and Lord Caitanya, they are personally present here. ‘krisha-nama’ kare aparadhera vicara krisha nama balile aparadhira na haya vikara There are offenses to be considered while chanting the Hare Krisha mantra. Therefore simply by chanting Hare Krishna one does not become ecstatic. Here they give the whole description of the ten offences. In this regard Prabhupada said, “it is very beneficial to chant the name Sri Krishna Caitanya Prabhu Nityananda before chanting the Hare Krishna mantra because by chanting this two holy names, Sri Krishna Caitanya Prabhu Nityananda one immediately becomes ecstatic and if he then chants the Hare Krishna mantra, he becomes free of offences. Text-25 tad asma-saram hrdayam batedam yad grhyamanair hari-nama-dheyaih na vikriyetatha yada vikaro netre jalam gatra-ruhesu harsah Translation: “If one’s heart does not change, tears do not flow from his eyes, his body does not shiver, nor his hairs stand’s on end as he chants the Hare Krisha maha-mantra, it should be understood that his heart is as hard as iron. This is due to his offenses at the lotus feet of the Lord’s holy name.” Translation with repetition: JPS: If one’s heart does not change Devotee: If one’s heart does not change JPS: tears do not flow Devotee: tears do not flow JPS: from his eyes Devotee: from his eyes JPS: his body does not shiver Devotee: his body does not shiver JPS: nor his hairs stand on end Devotee: nor his hairs stand on end JPS: as he chants the Hare Krisha maha-mantra Devotee: as he chants the Hare Krisha maha-mantra JPS: it should be understood Devotee: it should be understood JPS: that his heart is as hard as iron. Devotee: that his heart is as hard as iron JPS: This is due to his offenses Devotee: This is due to his offenses JPS: This is due to his offenses at the lotus feet Devotee: This is due to his offenses at the lotus feet JPS: of the Lord’s holy name Devotee: of the Lord’s holy name Purport by Srila Prabhupada: Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura, commenting on this verse, which is a quotation from Srimad-Bhagavatam (2.3.24), remarks that sometimes a maha-bhagavata, or very advanced devotee, does not manifest such transcendental symptoms as tears in the eyes, although sometimes a kanistha-adhikari, a neophyte devotee, displays them artificially. This does not mean, however that the neophyte is more advanced than the maha-bhagavata devotee. The test of the real change of heart that takes place when one chants the Hare Krisha maha-mantra is that one becomes detached from material enjoyment. This is the real change. Bhakti paresanubhavo viraktir anyatra ca (Bhag. 11.2.42). If one is actually advancing in spiritual life, he must become very much detached from material enjoyment. If it is sometimes found that a kanitha-adhikari (neophyte devotee) shows artificial tears in his eyes while chanting the Hare Krisha mantra but is still completely attached to material things, his heart has not really changed. The change must be manifested in terms of one’s real activities. Om tat sat. So any questions? Vana Rupa Dasi? You should always be friendly. The problem is not discussing with such people, they are willing to hear, it’s not a problem discussed within, the problem is that there may be other sincere people who are walking by they were missing. When we are in sankirtan, sometimes people are going by, so if we occupy the time with someone who is not very sincere, then we may miss ah… the opportunity of preaching to many sincere people, otherwise ah… Prabhupada said, “the standard for discussing with someone in general apart from the sankirtan environment is that if the person is actually ready to listen, if when you are speaking… before you are even finishing they are already coming with some other arguments, they are just trying to push their point, they are not actually listening to what you are saying and there is no use in wasting time with him but right firmly, impolitely, invite them to come by to discuss in the temple where there is more time and explain it. You just have to try to meet as many people as possible that… you don’t have to give him a small book and say, “you have to pay for it.” They like it if they sell something in, sometimes. Generally don’t like to give too much time unless the person is little bit sincere. On the street I mean if the person wants to come by the temple we don’t mind because that’s what really, that’s what it is for. But if you take a lot of time in sankirtan and that can have those negative effects. Sure the most devotees they like to play little bit by ear. Sometimes they take the risk, but such people many times they would get burned. Sometimes it pays off, it’s hard to just make a blanket rule but in generally we just avoid spending too much time with anyone. We are out in sankirtan because we are like bumble bees, we have visit a lot of flowers, each flower only gives one drop of honey, one particle of pollens, we have to collect so many to create one drop of honey, what to speak if there is no… if you go to a flower and it has no honey and no pollen. Then nothing the bee will spend too much time. If you see a little spark you fan it, try to get the person engaged, if they are not interested politely bow out. In this regard, how we get advice from the other sankirtan devotees who are more experienced. They have… they give some practical realization in this regard, which kind of people potentially, cultivatable under those circumstances. Any other question? Even though there is this mercy of Lord Caitanya, we shouldn’t…. even though one may get the… some feeling, some symptoms for love for Godhead while chanting, Lord Caitanya’s name, to be a true follower of Lord Caitanya we should also try to avoid committing offences. As per the sahajiyas, they… sahajiyas are…. They consider that well because you chant Lord Caitanya’s name and he is so merciful and you get ecstacies, so why bother trying to stop committing offences? Thinking that sounds great, there is a certain brand of religion that’s like that also. Since someone’s died for this… since, don’t try to stop committing sinful activity. So also seems to be a sahajiya tendency in the Christianity. Although Lord Chaitanya gives his mercy but alright, so by chanting if you get some ecstasy, if we get some inspiration, if we feel some half-transcendental happiness, then we should try to understand what is the way of solidifying it, our position of actually, if we feel any gratitude for what Lord Caitanya has given, any experience or any kind of realization, then we should try to do what he has instructed, not just exploit his generosity and ah… not reciprocate with that. We won’t be able to maintain the love of Godhead, those type of devotees who even though they get some feeling temporarily but they don’t go back to Godhead very… don’t get pure love of Godhead on a permanent basis. They are not considered to be confidential devotees of Lord Caitanya because they are deviating from his true teachings, they are taking advantage of his special generosity. Even Jagai, Madhai they were real rascals but once they took the mercy of Lord Caitanya they corrected themselves. And once they took initiation, they didn’t fall down anymore, they stopped their rascaldom. Any more questions? If someone is having trouble, they one should chant a lot of Lord Chaitanya’s names, so that get a special mercy, some special benediction, he is the most merciful. Hare Krishna!

Transcription done by Sadananda Dibrugarh, 23.06.2016