19960106 Bhagavad-gītā 18.68

The following is a class given by His Holiness Jayapatākā Swami on October 6^th, 1996 at Leicester in The United Kingdom. The class begins with a reading from the Bhagavad gītā 18th chapter, 68th verse.

TEXT 68

ya idaṁ paramaṁ guhyaṁ
mad-bhakteṣv abhidhāsyati
bhaktiṁ mayi parāṁ kṛtvā
mām evaiṣyaty asaṁśayaḥ

Translation: For one who explains this supreme secret to the devotees, pure devotional service is guaranteed, and at the end he will come back to Me.

(*repetition*)

TEXT 69

na ca tasmān manuṣyeṣu
kaścin me priya-kṛttamaḥ
bhavitā na ca me tasmād
anyaḥ priyataro bhuvi

Translation: There is no servant in this world dearer to Me than he, nor will there ever be one more dear.

Purport (by Śrīla Prabhupāda): Generally, it is advised Bhagavad-gītā be discussed amongst the devotees only, for those who are not devotees understand neither Kṛṣṇa nor Bhagavad-gītā. Those who do not accept Kṛṣṇa as He is and Bhagavad-gītā as it is should not try to explain Bhagavad-gītā whimsically and become offenders. Bhagavad-gītā should be explained to persons who are ready to accept Kṛṣṇa as the Supreme Personality of Godhead. It is a subject matter for the devotees only and not for philosophical speculators. Anyone, however, who tries sincerely to present Bhagavad-gītā as it is will advance in devotional activities and reach the pure devotional state of life. As a result of such pure devotion, he is sure to go back home, back to Godhead.

Thus ends the Bhaktivedanta Swami translation and purport to text 68 and 69, of chapter 18 of the Bhāgavad-gītā as it is.

Jayapatākā Swami: So, explaining the secret science of Bhagavad-gītā, of the bhakti-yoga, is such a important service that Lord Kṛṣṇa says that the one who does this pure devotional service is guaranteed: at the end he will certainly go to Kṛṣṇa. There is no servant in the world more dear to Kṛṣṇa than that person, and nor will there ever be one more dear. So we can see how important it is to preach the glories of the Lord amongst those who are eager to hear, who want to hear the glories. Preaching the science of Kṛṣṇa consciousness is the very greatest gift, benediction. It’s not like some kind of very difficult austerity that we do, but it’s a great opportunity to win the favor of Lord Kṛṣṇa, to act as an instrument in the hands of the Lord.

Lord Caitanya in the Caitanya-caritāmṛta, He gave the instruction that every man in the universe should accept the Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement and give it to others. We were studying this point. Many times in our Kṛṣṇa conscious movement, people think that sannyāsīs like me or other senior devotees, they should do all the preaching; and the congregation, they will come and listen to the lectures and chant and go back home and practice in their home. But actually that’s only a part of it. Every devotee needs not only to practice but to also spread the message to others. When Lord Caitanya was touring in South India, there was a brāhmaṇa in Kūrmadeśa. You know Kūrmadeśa? Anybody here from Andhra Pradesh? In Andhra Pradesh there is place called Kūrmadeśa. Originally people thought that the deity there was a Sīva-liṅga, because it was round. So they thought that anything round, it is a liṅga. But then Rāmānujācārya came. (Hare Kṛṣṇa! Very good boy.) Rāmānujācārya came and said, “It’s not Siva-liṅga because it has got legs and head.” You know... like Kūrma means the tortoise avatāra. So tortoise is round back but then has four arms, I mean four legs and then little head coming out. So it had all those symptoms and he showed that it was not Śiva, it is a Kūrma. So then he took over the temple worship. They are worshipping like a liṅga instead of worshipping like a Viṣṇu deity.

So Lord Caitanya went there to visit that place and the brāhmaṇa in that place, Lord Caitanya had stayed at his house and taken meals. He said, “You know I have got relatives and I have got enough money, children, family, land, cows everything. But I don’t like this material engagement, this material saṁsāra, entanglement. I want to give up everything and just go with you. So let me go with you.”

Lord Caitanya told him, “Whatever you do, you don’t say this again. Never say this again. We don’t want people artificially renouncing things, prematurely, and making a mockery of everything. It’s my order to you that you tell the message of Kṛṣṇa to everyone you meet. On my order you become a spiritual master and you deliver your whole place, your whole land.

yāre dekha, tāre kaha ’kṛṣṇa’-upadeśa
āmāra ājñāya guru hañā tāra’ ei deśa
(Cc. Madhya 7.128)

So everywhere Lord Caitanya went, He stayed in different people’s home, and He would advise them that you preach to the other... your neighbors, to the country people, to your family, you can tell people about the message of Kṛṣṇa. You practice, then you tell others. And in this way, you can deliver the people. So what happened was that Lord Caitanya would tell one person, and that person would tell his neighbor, and then the next person, and then the next person, and that person would get inspired and tell the next person. In this way it would spread one after another. So every one person would tell five, and every five, they would tell another five. So from one it became five, and it became twenty-five, then it became 125, and then it became 625 and… my mathematics is you know... (laughter), how much I don’t know. So it kept on expanding in this way like anything. And each of the person just see what... it’s a sublime thing that Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura explained. That this is the market place of the Holy Name. When we give the Holy Name to someone and they pay... like pay the proper price, can’t buy it with money. You have to buy it with faith and love and devotion. You pay the price; you take your goods which is the pure Holy Name. The person who is giving the Holy Name, their own stock doesn’t diminish. rather they get a commission also, on the distribution. So in this way the persons who are distributing the Holy Name, they get a lot of mercy. So Lord Caitanya, anyone knows where Lord Caitanya was born? Only one. Anyone else?

Devotee: Navadvīpa

Jayapatākā Swami: Navadvīpa. Okay. And in Navadvīpa where was the place? The Yogapīṭha, Māyāpur, okay. You know I just came from Māyāpur, in September... October, beginning of October, end of September there was a flood there, if you heard about that. So Prabhupāda, he said in Caitanya-caritāmṛta Ādi-līlā that in Śrīdhāma Māyāpur, there is sometimes a great flood after the rainy season. This indicates that from the birth place of Lord Caitanya, the inundation of love of Godhead should be spread all over the world. For unless the inundation of love of Godhead is spread here over entire Leicester, it’s going to flood Māyāpur again. (laughter) So you have to have mercy on us so that we don’t get flooded every year. Of course, not only Leicester but everywhere. The whole world needs to be inundated. So just before the centennial year; now we are in the centennial year, just few months ago before the centennial, there is a big message from Lord Caitanya, “Now it is time to flood!” So I have some practical experience about flood. Anybody...? Do you have flood here in Leicester? You can imagine that the room where we are in now is filled with 6 feet of water, what would be the experience? (laughter). In the whole... in the whole Leicester, like everything was like 6 feet of water, then where would you go?

Devotee: On the roof?

Jayapatākā Swami: On the roof! (laughter) It would be a bit hard to move around, wouldn’t it? Even whether you liked it or not, you would get some… you would get a little bit of contact with water, wouldn’t you? So like that, for Lord Caitanya’s mercy, everyone, in the transcendental flood they all get swept away. So Lord Caitanya, He says that Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement will inundate the entire world and drown everyone, whether one be a gentleman, a rogue or even lame, invalid or blind, you see. You see, there is any gentleman or gentlelady here, or any rogue or lame or invalid or blind or anything in between, everyone is meant to be swept away by this flood of love of Godhead. Being drowned in love of Godhead, doesn’t mean... doesn’t have the same effect as drowning in water. You don’t lose your life, but you lose the demoniac nature and you get the godly nature. One loses the misfortune and gets the good fortune, which I think everyone likes. Sometimes people don’t know in the beginning, but actually, eventually they like it. Lord Caitanya explains that… the activities in Antya-līlā, it is explained by Kṛṣṇadāsa Kavirāja.

Cc. Antya 5.88

Translation: The activities of Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu are just like an ocean of nectar. Even a drop of this ocean can inundate all the three worlds.

Purport: To inundate the three worlds with nectar is the purpose of the pastimes of Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu. How this could be possible was exhibited by Śrīla Raghunātha dāsa Gosvāmī and later by Ṭhākura Narottama dāsa and Śyāmānanda Gosvāmī, who all represented the mercy of Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu. Now that same mercy is overflooding the entire world through the Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement. The present Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is nondifferent from the pastimes performed by Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu when He was personally present, for the same principles are being followed and the same actions performed without fail.

Jayapatākā Swami: So Lord Caitanya, He predicted what?

Devotee:

pṛthivī-paryānta yata āche deśa-grāma
sarvatra sañcāra haibeka mora nāma
(Cb. 4.126)

Jayapatākā Swami: Hare Kṛṣṇa! (laughter) What’s the translation?

Devotee: In every town and village of the world my name would be spread.

(laughter)

Jayapatākā Swami: He knows anyway. He is very expert. So… every town and village, the whole place inundated. I got this… I started reading these things because we are in a flood, what to do? We shouldn’t know about inundation, but I got a very good idea that what it means to inundate, and I got very inspired that we really have to, now in the centennial here, see that everyone gets inundated by Lord Caitanya’s mercy. You know what happens when you get inundated by the spiritual mercy, what does it say?

Devotee: (*reads a verse translation*)

Cc. Ādi 7.27

When the five members of the Pañca-tattva saw the entire world drowned in love of Godhead and the seed of material enjoyment in the living entities completely destroyed, they all became exceedingly happy.

Jayapatākā Swami: When a seed is kept in water a long time what happens? No no… if it’s just kept in the water, it doesn’t germinate. It rots. If you keep it one day in the water and take it out, then it germinates. So sometimes, little people they do little Kṛṣṇa consciousness, they go out again in material enjoyment and then a little bit of Kṛṣṇa consciousness, a little bit of enjoyment… that’s not the best thing for spiritual life. You want to maintain that constant minimum level of Kṛṣṇa consciousness so that we are always getting the spiritual ecstasy. Then we don’t become so much effected by all the material things. Material attraction is such, that we get attracted materially to something, we think this is going to make me happy, but later that makes us suffer. In material life, happiness is the cause of suffering. Every time we go for happiness, in the end we get suffering. Even if initially, there may be happiness. But in the end, it becomes suffering. That’s the unfortunate reality of material happiness, but spiritual bliss, spiritual happiness has no suffering. That’s why Prabhupāda used to use the example, material happiness is like trying to enjoy sweet-rice with sand in it. Have you ever had sweet-rice here? Pāyasam? Have you ever tried pāyasam with 25% sand? (laughter) What would the taste be like? (laughter) Even though you add a little bit of sand, it creates a whole… you know you won’t be able to enjoy it. It’s said material happiness, we are trying to get some sweet taste, but with that all the sand is there. The suffering, the anxieties, the stress, the lamentation, the fears. You either hanker for something, when we get it we fear we are going to lose, and when we lose it then we lamenting, “Oh, I lost it.” In so many ways we get put in anxiety. But with Kṛṣṇa… so to bring things in balance, the more we get attached to Kṛṣṇa, then those things we are not so affected. Prabhodānanda Sarasvatī said that we can live in the material world and we won’t be so much affected because Kṛṣṇa consciousness breaks the fangs of the serpent of material attraction. Just like if you see a cobra, actually you will be frightened. But if you know the cobra has no teeth, no fangs, no poison, so even if it puts the hood up and makes a big show, but ok but... it can’t bite me. So having our seed of... in the heart, completely always flooded in spiritual happiness from devotional service, we get protected from that serpent, the poison fangs are taken out. Therefore devotee can remain steady. Svāyambhuva Manu, was a very great emperor in this universe. He was the grandfather of Kapiladeva, incarnation of Godhead. So Svāyambhuva Manu, he had a lot of material opulence, being an emperor. And he was an emperor who had control over many planets, not only one planet, although that may be hard for modern people to understand. But it’s said that in spite of having so much opulence and so much facility for enjoyment, Svāyambhuva Manu always remained Kṛṣṇa conscious. Every morning when he would wake up, there would be a whole musical group playing Kṛṣṇa-bhajanas. He would go to the temple, he would see the deity, he will do a little sevā, take some caraṇāmṛta, hear the class. Then he had to go to do his kingly duties. Kings have also a lot of duties to do. And then in the evening he will again... when he is taking rest, the band would come and play bhajanas for him, so the last thing he would be remembering also is Kṛṣṇa. So like this, throughout the day, in the morning, in the night, he would have remembrance of Kṛṣṇa. Everything he did, he did it as an offering to Kṛṣṇa. So in spite of having material enjoyment, he was always transcendentally situated. He never lost his perspective. His attachment to Kṛṣṇa was always stronger, stronger than his attachment to other things, even though he was living in so much opulence. Of course someone told I can’t afford a band. But nowadays the modern technology... you can just get a tape-recorder, right? Put on a Prabhupāda bhajana tape or something and you can hear Prabhupāda in the morning, in the night. You can chant Hare Kṛṣṇa every day, you can do service to Kṛṣṇa, to Nitāi-Gaura, you can chant and you can tell others about Kṛṣṇa consciousness. We can also keep a Kṛṣṇa conscious environment.

So Prabhupāda explained that in the modern age, he doesn’t expect that the people would be able to follow the very strict austerities of other paths, but even a householder in the comfort of his/her home, they can practice Kṛṣṇa consciousness and they can achieve the perfection of life, if they follow in the footsteps of Svāyambhuva Manu and keep a Kṛṣṇa conscious environment. Now one thing, just keeping environment is also difficult if you are not telling other people about Kṛṣṇa. When you tell other people, then you get the special mercy from Kṛṣṇa. He said that there will be no one more dear than that devotee who tells other devotees about this great secret, this great mystery, mysterious science of Bhagavad-gītā.

So in our Kṛṣṇa conscious movement, we are understanding that now the number one priority is that every person in the movement, not only the temple devotees, but also the congregational devotees, everyone should become trained in Kṛṣṇa consciousness nicely and should be empowered to be able to bring others to Kṛṣṇa consciousness. That’s how Lord Caitanya spread the movement. Lord Nityānanda… Lord Caitanya told all His followers, everyone...go out door to door. Even Lord Nityānanda, He was going door to door, “Hello?”. Someone comes and answers the door, “My dear sir please chant Hare Kṛṣṇa. Bala kṛṣṇa, bhaja kṛṣṇa, kara kṛṣṇa-sikṣā (Cb. Madhya-khaṇḍa 13.9).” Chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, worship Kṛṣṇa, study Kṛṣṇa… He was teaching. Live a holy life, chant Hare Kṛṣṇa. They would ask everyone, even they asked who? Jagāi and Mādhai. That’s a whole other big thing. So even Lord Nityānanda, what to speak of all the other brahmacārīs, Śuklāmbara Brahmacārī… what to speak of the householder. Lord Caitanya made no distinction, “No, you a householder, you can’t do this.” They send everyone, “Get out there, tell everyone, ‘Chant hare Kṛṣṇa.’” So they are all going door to door.

Maybe nowadays you don’t need to go exactly door to door, maybe we should do it. I am not going into the detailed strategy, but there are so many people want even a visit from a Hare Kṛṣṇa devotee. They want someone to do kīrtana in the home. There maybe somebody sick, there may be somebody who is in anxiety or from a new house they are entering. So if someone would go and do kīrtana they would be very happy. And when we engage in those activities, then that seed of material enjoyment in the heart gradually gets neutralized, then we get really peaceful.

Lord Caitanya was in that Kūrmadeśa. There was one brāhmaṇa there called Vāsudeva. Vāsudeva was a devotee, but unfortunately Vāsudeva had leprosy. You know, leprosy means that the circulation doesn’t properly go to the end of the body. So gradually your limb starts to become decompose and rot and fall off. So he was rotting, he lost part of his hands, but he was very self-realized. He understood, “I am not this body, this is my karma from some previous sins... bad karmas I had done, and if I can remain Kṛṣṇa conscious I will go back to Godhead in the end of this life. I am not the body.” So he would even sometime even... because the skin was rotting and everything, flies were coming and maggots were coming there. Sometimes one of the worms would fall off and he would feel bad. The poor worm you know... it’s his karma to eat me and it fell off and it’s just there rolling in the ground starving, he picked it up and put it back on, “Ok, enjoy!” We can imagine, I mean how detached he was... you know. If we get a little cut we freak out. His skin is rotting and he is not even bothered. He was a very detached person, but he wanted to see Lord Caitanya, heard Lord Caitanya had come and so he went to the house where Lord Caitanya was staying, he reached there about. So everyday Lord Caitanya, He would get up early in the morning, He would take His bath, do His prayers and about 7’o clock he would take off. He would go to the next place. So Lord Caitanya had left just 15 minutes before. So Vāsudeva, the leper, he came and he said, “Where is Lord Caitanya?”

And they said, “I am sorry, but He is gone.”

“No! No!! No!!! He is gone, no no!! How can it be??” And he is like rolling in the ground and he is beating his head, “No, no! But I wanted to see Lord Caitanya. This was the only hope in my life to see Him, Gaurāṅga!” What did he say?

Devotees: Gaurāṅga!

Jayapatākā Swami: And Lord Caitanya, Immediately He came back. He just (*appears*) appeared right out of the air.

Nitāi-Gaura premānande, Hari Hari bol!!

Because the devotee’s desire was so strong, and Lord Caitanya being so merciful, He just appeared there again. And Vāsudeva was overwhelmed. He was paying his obeisances, he was so happy, and the Lord just picked him up and embraced him. He said, “No, no, don’t touch me. I am dirty, I am polluted, I am rotting, I am diseased.” But Lord Caitanya embraced him anyway, and embracing him, Vāsudeva became completely cured of his leprosy. Even the fingers that had rotten off were restored to their whole condition, and he was completely restored, a complete person. The complete body was restored. So he was so detached, he was lamenting, “Oh my Lord, what have You done, now You have restored me, I am going to get all attached again to the body, and I will get entangled by material life, and Lord Caitanya said, “No, don’t worry about that, you just go on chanting,

“Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare,
Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare”

and you will be able to overcome all this thing and you will come to me in the end. So just tell everyone to chant Hare Kṛṣṇa. Even in our, even in the Indian community, of course I am an Indian citizen, I live in India since 1970, that’s ah… 26 years and I have been a Indian since 1978. I am coming here on my Indian passport, I don’t have any other passport, and so I can speak also as an Indian. (laughter)

Devotees: You are more than Indian. (laughter)

Jayapātāka Swami: Anyway Lord Caitanya, He said that,

bhārata-bhūmite haila manuṣya janma yāra
janma sārthaka kari’ kara para-upakāra
(Cc. Ādi 9.41)

So those who are born in Bhārata, you can take that as bhāratīya-saṁskṛti also. So that they have specially the responsibility to perfect their life and to help others to perfect their life. Janma sārthaka kari, you perfect your own life and kara para-upakāra, and uplift the other people. Of course, Prabhupāda said in the broader sense Bhārata means the whole planet. In the more direct sense that means India or those who are Indian origin. Lord Caitanya told everyone, all human beings also to take up Kṛṣṇa consciousness and give to others. So everyone has got different kinds of mandates but there are many Indians who don’t know about Lord Caitanya. They don’t know about the saṅkīrtana because in the past few hundred years this message has not been widely spread. In Bengal or Orissa, in a few places, few pockets of India, there are people who know about the Harināma-saṅkīrtana, but there are many who don’t know. One Gujarati girl told me that the first time she saw the devotees, she thought they are all kind of crazy, what they are doing chanting on the street. This is not anything she ever heard about. But later when she was explained the whole process and her friends explained that, “No, this is a very nice process. They are very nice people.”, then she changed her opinion. So there are many people they don’t know what this Kṛṣṇa conscious movement is. They don’t know what the process of bhakti-yoga is. And the best way for them to learn is from their own friends. Everyone has friends. It’s says everyone, according to some mundane calculations, they figured out that… I don’t know, this is not śāstric so it could be different, but they say that every person has 22 friends on an average. Friends and near relatives. But some people have less and some people may have more. But on an average about 22 for normal person, and little bit of introverted person might be about nine or ten. And there is somebody who is downright neurotic, then they may only have three or four and one of them may be the dead cat (laughter) that they are still talking to all the time. So if everybody has 20 or so friends or more, there are so many people that could be given Kṛṣṇa consciousness. And everyone we meet, they could also tell their 20 friends. And even if one of those friends takes it up…. (Jaya!), then it would be a very wonderful thing.

So that was how Lord Caitanya spread the saṅkīrtana movement. We do have temples and we do have brahmacārīs and sannyāsīs and some brāhmaṇas and gṛhasthas, living in temples. But Prabhupāda he also said that the purpose for these temples is to help the people on the neighborhood. So that I am glad to know that our temple activities are affecting good results. The boys and girls in the neighborhood coming to help the temple activities is the good result of our attempt. So the temple center started just to present an example to the neighboring residents how they can make a small temple on each and every home. It is not necessary that hundreds and thousands of people live in our temple so that we can make effective propaganda, then the neighboring householders will be inclined to be initiated and follow the modes of temple life. Prabhupāda said that we want to show people how they can peacefully and happily live, if they follow the routine worship method in the temple and establish this in their home, to be happy in all respect. The Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is actually attempt to make all people happy generally and become liberated in this life from material contamination, to be thus eligible to enter the kingdom of God after quitting this body. This was a letter written by Prabhupāda in 1969 to Tamāla Kṛṣṇa. 

So Prabhupāda wanted that we learn the mode of temple worship and then we establish that system in our own homes that can be not only for Indians but for anybody. Whether someone is Chinese or English or American or an Indian or African or whatever, everyone can learn this process and apply it. Then there is also Advaita Ācārya, he set an example. An ideal example for all householder devotees. Are there any householder devotees here? Who is a householder devotee here? Those who are householders? He said he had an execution of a daily festival in his home. So if one has the proper means and wealth, he should occasionally invite the devotees of Lord Caitanya and hold a festival at home simply by distributing prasādam and talking about Kṛṣṇa, and holding congregational chanting for at least for three hours in the evening, and Prabhupāda said that this procedure must be adopted in all centers of the Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement. Thus they will daily perform saṅkīrtana-yajñas. There will be centers to do all this home programs, and every house holder that can be able to invite people and do a house program. Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura, he explained that one can, in his Nāmahaṭṭa meeting. that you don’t have to make big, opulent prasādam. It can be simple. But to invite people into the home to chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, have the devotees come over and chant in the home, this purifies the whole house, and this engages all the family members in the spiritual activities. So it’s a very auspicious activity. So we know that Vṛndāvana is famous because it has 5000 temples. Did you ever hear that Vṛndāvana has 5000 temples? But most of the 5000 temples are in people’s homes. The seven very big temples and there may be another 50 or hundred secondary temples, of course there is the Kṛṣṇa-Balarāma temple. But the vast majority of the 5000 temples are home temples. That means that in Leicester if you have 5000 temples, you can become like a UK Vṛndāvana. You can become a spiritual world. This is what we are trying to do is encourage very systematically, and it’s something that I can’t do. It’s not something that not even the devotee there in the temple can do alone. But it’s something that together everyone works and systematically we organize ourselves, then we can reach everyone. Every devotee should be thinking for the centennial, how many people can I enliven to practice Kṛṣṇa consciousness in their home. For I just gave a seminar last Friday in the manor. A little demonstration how one center like this could have half a dozen house programs going on in different parts of the city. I know Leicester is a big place, I know I was just driving around it for about 45 minutes trying to find this temple. From the holiday inn to here, you know, I…we weren’t on… what’s that Edington street, then we go into the East-West road or something, and then Saint Barbados (laughter) and then we came around and then we saw quite a bit and finally we made it somehow. And everywhere you know we asked directions and of course many people… one person we asked, “Where is the Hare Kṛṣṇa temple?” She said, “Hare Kṛṣṇa temple?”, she pointed the opposite direction. (laughter) Not everyone… but then one store keeper told us the… but I don’t think that was also exactly correct. Anyway, eventually Nitāi Caraṇa and Gopī Bhakti, they led us here. So it’s a big place that can have just like a Sunday programs here where people gather together, in the week there could be so many programs going on in people’s homes, short programs on working that keeps people very simple, short two… two hour programs or so. In this way, I told this in Buenos Aires two months ago, they got 39 programs already going on. In Melbourne, they have 18 or 23 regular programs. They have a whole map shrined with different programs are. Some programs are weekly and some are forth-nightly but generally they have a once a week in a different area. They don’t give the address, people phone up, so that way they don’t give… you can scream. But one center in a city like this could have 100 little programs going on, bringing in so many different people. But it starts gradually, I mean over a period of time, not all of a sudden. Even you have one group, this whole system… how they can expand. So I gave a little demonstration in the manor last night and they liked it. They said they liked it very much. But the idea is that everyone is empowered by Lord Caitanya, everyone has a mandate. We have to study Prabhupāda’s books, we have to learn from the Vaiṣṇavas and the guru, from the… how to practice Kṛṣṇa consciousness and how to give Kṛṣṇa consciousness to others. So someone may be able to give a big lecture and speak to 50 or 100 or 50,000 people. But it doesn’t matter. If a person can speak to five people or one person, that also is equally valuable. Most people get convinced not when they just somebody in a 50,000 or 5000 crowd or the 50 or hundred but when they also get confirmation from the people they know. That’s when they tend to take it more seriously. So both things are needed you know. You do not need some big preacher who can speak to a big audience. You just need someone who can speak at other levels. It’s not that everybody has to be able to give a big lecture to be a preacher. Everyone can be a preacher; even little children are sometimes are most empowered preachers. You read in the Caitanya-caritāmṛta about children who used to preach Kṛṣṇa consciousness and Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura said that women should also preach Kṛṣṇa consciousness. But to preach you have to be convinced right? If you are not convinced, you will not be able to preach very much. But if you are convinced that that this is the way that can make people happy, this is the way to lead a spiritual life, this is a good thing. And if you love people, and if you people who you really care about, you have family members, you want to think how to give them. Of course, you have to do it kind of tactfully and strategically. If you present too much, the people get freaked out sometimes, so they they get frightened and they don’t know how to deal with it. So one has to learn to give it very gradually, according to a person’s appetite. Just like if somebody is sick, if he comes and, “Here have a big feast!” He just got over the flu, you know. If you give him a big feast, probably he will get more sick. It’s depending on how spiritually strong they are. Some people are really sick, you just feed them liquids like caraṇāmṛta. So little bit of tactfulness, how to deal with different kinds of people is needed.

So anyway, I am the minister of congregational preaching in ISKCON. So I am very much eager to see that our congregation gets activated and empowered and we see that wherever it happens, wonderful things happen. There are on a campaign now for the centennial, for building their congregation. The first year, two years ago, I was just talking about the temple leaders and then I realized that well I can talk to them but the actual people that have to do the preaching, even more than the temple leaders, are the actual devotees. And even if he only has time to meet a person a week or… or to go out once a week or to get together in someone’s home once a week, and then come to the temple on the Sunday. This is a big sacrifice. Certainly it is a very big sacrifice but Kṛṣṇa says that who preaches this message to the other devotees is the very most, dear most devotee, that no one will be more dear. No one has been and no one ever will be more dear than that person. And if we are dear to Kṛṣṇa, then everything is perfect. I mean how powerful devotional service is, we don’t even have a slightest idea. How powerful every one of you are. You are carrying much more powerful weapons than nuclear bombs. Because what does the nuclear bomb do? It just blows the people bodies and homes and things like that but it doesn’t free them from birth and death. He has to again take birth in some other place. But you are carrying the weapon of the Harināma, you are carrying this weapon of giving people prasādam, Bhagavad-gītā, Harināma. You give someone that weapon, that medicine, you can completely cure them from them from the whole material disease. You can cure them from the cycle of birth and death. They can have a peaceful, happy life. And you free them from birth and death, so it’s much more powerful than some violent weapon. This is a weapon of love.

I know one mātājī was a very good devotee but her husband was bit slow and didn’t know what to do. If she said too much, the husband would get angry. So she didn’t know what to do. I said just bring some prasādam from the temple, keep feeding your husband little caraṇāmṛta, even doesn’t want prasādam just give him. So he kept feeding prasādam to the husband over about one years’ time, the husband started becoming automatically more favorable to Kṛṣṇa consciousness and encouraging the wife and started chanting. This prasādam, the Holy Name, so many things, they have so much effect, we cannot imagine. So everyone one of you can give mercy out. Even you are working, give a friend a cookie, as a prasādam cookie. Give some friend a book. I had one disciple, he was working as a quality control manager in a big factor, Wimco factory. In India, they make matches, and he would take 10% of his salary and buy books and with that he would go and give a book to each member in the factory. And he had a little can. He’d say, “Whatever you would like to give you can give a donation, or if you don’t want to, you don’t have to. But if you do I will use that money to buy more books to give to other people.” So he would get about 60-70% of the cost of the books back. With that he would buy more books. So in this way he gave to one whole factory 6000 workers. Even the communist workers that were there also, they said, “Hey! Why you not giving to us?” He was little shy, but then he gave them also. And they used to say, you know… ‘Lal Salam!’ (commie greeting) and he said, ‘Hare Kṛṣṇa Salam!’ (laughter) After that he got promotion, became director of quality control over six factories, so he started on the other factories as well. (laughter) So we don’t know, but we can help people in so many ways. We may not know, we may not be able to feel like Dharmasva, the Yamadūtas, and the whole drama behind it. But the mercy that you can give out can have such a far-reaching effect, you can make a impact in the whole universe.

And this is the way to become a very… in Kṛṣṇa’s best book. Not the good book but the best book. He said that there is no one more dear to me. The most dear book that Kṛṣṇa has, you can be in that, just by giving out Kṛṣṇa consciousness to others. One has to learn how to do that from people who are able to do it, and in this community there are many senior devotees here who know this technique and it’s the question of organizing. Those who know how to speak nicely and properly they can teach about this to other ones, the newer ones to do the same thing, and one person train another, train another. So any way this is just a philosophy about the whole topic. I don’t know after that there will be any time, today after your prasāda, if you want I could explain more, even give some other details about some of the new techniques that… I don’t know if they are new, they are probably old techniques which were newly applied in Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement. The techniques of Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura and Nityānanda Prabhu. How from one center there can be many many groups in different neighborhoods spreading the whole movement, empowering the devotees in a very gradual way, once a week. But having a bigger impact. And they are doing this in now different parts of the world and just the past four months, they have really put a big drive on for… for the centennial. In one place in three months, they said that already the congregation has increased by 50%. In Madras they told me that they can increase, they can double every four months, three or four months they will double, the way that they are going right now. In Bengal of India, we have 2000 Nāmahatta groups with over a hundred thousand members, just ones in Bengal and North Orissa. In Bangladesh there is about three-four hundred groups already. But now we are doing all over the world, we have of course in England a big Nāmahatta. Even a big Nāmahatta can subdivide into many smaller groups as well for penetrating and for spreading out the mercy in a more dynamic way and they get many together as a big group also. You have the both benefits. But anyway it is time… if not this time, in the future time we can or maybe Kṛpāmaya Prabhu could also explain whatever you like but this is a programs now we are doing to see that Lord Caitanya’s mercy gets spread but the whole basis of it is what this verse of the Bhagavad-gītā said, that every individual needs to give out Kṛṣṇa conscious mercy and become very dear to Kṛṣṇa. We are not the doer but we are just an instrument in Kṛṣṇa hands. Lord Caitanya wants to have this done. He is going to do it but you should just be his instrument, just like Kṛṣṇa used Arjuna as His instrument in the Kurukṣetra battle. Every one of you can be an instrument in Lord Caitanya’s hand, in Prabhupāda ’s hands to spread the Kṛṣṇa conscious movement. So thank you very much.

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

Any questions?

Question: The Pañca-tattva became very happy to see the whole world give up the seed of material enjoyment, did it happen that the whole world give up the material enjoyment completely?

Jayapātāka Swami: Did that actually happen means? It all actually happened, and it happened. When the five members of the Pañca-tattva saw the entire world drowned in love of Godhead. Drowned in love of Godhead means you are completely immersed in transcendental ecstasy of love for Godhead and the seed of material enjoyment of the living entities is completely destroyed. And you have so much happiness in love for Godhead, then you don’t have to work you know. Like you know… usually we talk about giving a lot of things up but actually the process of Kṛṣṇa consciousness is not so much of giving up but… that happens. But it happens in such a natural way that actually when you get Kṛṣṇa, when you actually develop your Kṛṣṇa consciousness and you get the taste of love of Godhead, automatically you become detached. The seed of material enjoyment is, the seed of the desire to have material enjoyment gets rotted out. Just like if you keep a seed in water continuously, instead of sprouting it just rots. And what happens, the material enjoyment… the desire for that makes us in anxiety. As soon as I want to desire some material enjoyment, I get immediately an anxiety. If somebody wants to enjoy something material, then immediately they are thinking, “How do I get it? What do I have to do?” You are immediately in an anxiety. When you are already internally happy in the love of Godhead, then whether material enjoyment is there or not there, a person is already happy. So they can survive. So everyone became exceedingly happy. So that’s what happens and that’s what will happen as the world becomes more and more Kṛṣṇa conscious. Then they get detached from all this material enjoyments which have no spiritual contact.

Of course, there are basic things you can’t avoid. Just like by eating you get happiness. But we eat Kṛṣṇa-prasādam. Devotees, they want Kṛṣṇa-prasādam. The devotees, they have material happiness but they don’t have any desire for independent material happiness. They want the happiness of Kṛṣṇa consciousness. So that desire grows by this process of bhakti-yoga, and the detachment from the mundane desires automatically gets neutralized because of a higher taste.

Is that all right? What’s your name? So we met before? Yes.

Could you repeat the quote you made again? What Kṛṣṇa says in the Bhāgavatam, that’s for people who are dear to Him but they are very attached to some material things. So one way he shows mercy, is by temporarily taking those things away from the person. The person can see the temporary nature of the material world. The actual… that these are not the things that one should be so attached to. And it’s said that when it happens, then that person, the devotee takes full shelter of Kṛṣṇa. And then when Kṛṣṇa sees that the devotee is now matured, then even He gives those things back but then the devotee has already transcended the material desire and is no longer entangled by those things. But in the eight canto of the Bhāgavatam, when Bali’s wife mentioned to the Lord saying that, “This was just special mercy, this is Your top mercy You have done on my husband by taking everything away because he was getting falsely proud, and thinking he was a proprietor because he conquered over the whole universe.”

Then Viṣṇu who had been sitting and listening to everybody, He couldn’t stay silent then, He objected and said, “That’s not My topmost mercy. That somebody who has got all this opulence but does not take himself as a proprietor, they don’t actually remain intoxicated by it. They remain fixed in My service and desire to serve Me, you should that they have got My top most mercy.” Like Svāyambhuva Manu, he never lost everything. The losing comes when we are really clinging on to the material things and not taking shelter of Kṛṣṇa. You may be praying to Kṛṣṇa, “Kṛṣṇa I want to be your pure devotee.”, but we are really holding on you know… to certain things. And then Kṛṣṇa will go, “You want to be My pure devotee, you want to take shelter of Me but you are holding on to these other things. All these material crutches and if you just depend on Me then it will work.” But so how to make it work? So that one point if nothing else works, then Kṛṣṇa takes away your crutches and you have to lean on Him. And then after that when you have realized the wonderfulness of depending on Kṛṣṇa, then Kṛṣṇa can give you any facility again. Prabhupāda quotes that verse many times because he felt that although he was not so much so much attached, still he didn’t have so much desire to leave it, being a householder. But when he was 56, then he kept having different dreams and at that point in his life he felt that Kṛṣṇa taken away a lot of things from him and that it was a mercy of Kṛṣṇa to compel him to fully take shelter. He would quote that verse many times… what’s the… it ends śanaiḥ. Yasyāham anugṛhṇāmi hariṣye tad-dhanaṁ śanaiḥ (ŚB. 10.88.8)

So Prabhupāda… one businessman, when he was preaching and I was in Calcutta sitting and one man came, said “There are many bābās and many people they show so many mystical powers, magical powers. What kind of magic can you show me? I want to see something mystical.”

So then Prabhupāda said, “Well I went to the West with 40 rupees, and now five years later I have got 40 crores and thousands and tens of thousands of devotees all over the world, isn’t that miraculous?”

“Ah… yes, yes!” (laughter)

“What is the use of showing you a piece of fruit or a rasagulla or a ring or some ashes.”

“No, No, Swamiji, very good!”