20050508 Bhagavadgītā 14.19 Mothers Day Special Lecture

The following is a Mother's Day special lecture given by His Holiness Jayapatākā Swami Mahārāja on May 08th, 2005 in Atlanta, USA. The class begins with a reading from the Bhagavad-gītā chapter 14, verse 19.

Nice to see all of you again. Nice to be here back here in New Pānihāṭi and I’m coming from the North American Strategic meetings and  festival of inspiration in New Vṛndāvana and from Gītā-nagarī where one of our great ISKCON Preachers Bhakti Tīrtha Swami Mahārāja terminally ill with cancer, but the is in very dynamic spirits preparing himself to go back to Kṛṣṇa and giving pertinent spiritual guidance in this crucial moment. Usually this moment comes in all of our lives [inaudible] strength [inaudible] prayer and for the time facts I’ll chant the prayer. When I go like this you can chant with me… when I go like you can chant responsively.

oṁ ajñāna-timirāndhasya jñānāñjana-śalākayā
cakṣur unmīlitaṁ yena tasmai śrī-gurave namaḥ

nama oṁ viṣṇu-pādāya kṛṣṇa-preṣṭhāya bhū-tale
śrīmate bhaktivedānta-svāminn iti nāmine

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

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

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

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

jaya rādhā-mādhava kuñja-vihārī
jaya rādhā-mādhava kuñja-vihārī

gopījana-vallabha giri-vara-dhārī
gopījana-vallabha giri-vara-dhārī

yaśodā-nandana, vraja-jana-rañjana
yāmuna-tīra-vana-cārī

jaya rādhā-mādhava kuñja-vihārī

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

oṁ namo bhāgavate vāsudevaya!
oṁ namo bhāgavate vāsudevaya!
oṁ namo bhāgavate vāsudevaya!

nārāyaṇaṁ namaskṛtya naraṁ caiva narottamam
devīṁ sarasvatīṁ vyāsaṁ tato jayam udīrayet

mūkaṁ karoti vācālaṁ paṅguṁ laṅghayate girim
yat-kṛpā tam ahaṁ vande śrī-guruṁ dīna-tāriṇam
paramānanda-mādhavam śrī-caitanya-īśvaram

Harihi oṁ tat sat

Bhagavad-gītā 14.19

nānyaṁ guṇebhyaḥ kartāraṁ yadā draṣṭānupaśyati
guṇebhyaś ca paraṁ vetti mad- bhāvaṁ so ‘dhigacchati

Translation (by His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Śrīla Prabhupāda kī jaya!): When one properly sees that in all activities no other performer is at work than these modes of nature and he knows the the Supreme Lord who is  transcendental to all these modes, then you can know My spiritual nature.

*repetition*

[Anybody here doesn’t know English? I guess if I ask in English. Keyo hain aṅgrejī nahin jānta hain, Hindi jānta hain keyo?

Mātājī: Jānta hain English, lekhin bohot achcha se nahi.

Jayapatākā Swami: Okay, maybe someone can translate for her. Aur keyo hain kevala Hindi jānta hain? So you will translate, will you help her. [in Spanish] When we give classes in some parts of the world. In our Middle East programs, we have about twelve different languages translated and in Māyapur, during the festival we have maybe 50 languages. They have FM radios with six languages going on Chinese, Japanese, Russian, Spanish, English, of course, and something else. And then other than that, they have so many other subgroups. Like everybody here that they can understand.

Purport (by Śrīla Prabhupāda): One can transcend all the activities of the modes of material nature simply by understanding them properly by learning from the proper souls. The real spiritual master is Kṛṣṇa, and He is imparting this spiritual knowledge to Arjuna. Similarly, it is from those who are fully in Kṛṣṇa consciousness that one has to learn this science of activities in terms of the modes of nature. Otherwise, one’s life will be misdirected. By the instruction of a bona fide spiritual master, a living entity can know of his spiritual position, his material body, his senses, how he is entrapped, and how he is under the spell of the material modes of nature. He is helpless, being in the grip of these modes, but when he can see his real position, then he can attain to the transcendental platform, having the scope for spiritual life. Actually, the living entity is not the performer of different activities. He is forced to act because he is situated in a particular type of body, conducted by some particular mode of material nature. Unless one has the help of spiritual authority, he cannot understand in what position he is actually situated. With the association of a bona fide spiritual master, he can see his real position, and by such an understanding he can become fixed in full Kṛṣṇa consciousness. A man in Kṛṣṇa consciousness is not controlled by the spell of the material modes of nature. It has already been stated in the Seventh Chapter that one who has surrendered to Kṛṣṇa is relieved from the activities of material nature. For one who is able to see things as they are, the influence of material nature gradually ceases. [Surrender-Unto-Me]

Hariḥ oṁ tat sat.

Thus ends the Bhaktivedanta Swami translation purport to chapter 14, text 19 in the matter of the three modes of material nature.

Jayapatākā Swami: Actually, I was looking for some verse about Mother’s Day appropriate, but I couldn’t find anything in Bhagavad-gītā. So I just opened so this was a very nice verse, but we’ll bring it around to Mother’s Day later.

That in the material world, there is the three-modes. Anybody here knows the three modes? What’s the highest mode?

Devotees: Sattva.

Jayapatākā Swami: Okay! Sattva. Sattva means goodness. What’s the intermediate, the middle mode?

Devotees: Rajas.

Jayapatākā Swami: Rajas. What does that mean in English?

Devotees: Passion.

Jayapatākā Swami: Passion. What is the lower mode?

Devotees: Tamas.

Jayapatākā Swami: Tamas, which means ignorance. Just like there’s three primary colors yellow, red and blue. And when you mix them in different combinations. In our computers we get how many colors? 16 million or something. And when There is unlimited colors just by mixing three colors to various degrees. So according to the way that our mix, that’s how our nature tends to be. If someone is predominantly angry, they got a strong mode of ignorance. Or if they’re envious, they’re predominantly greedy, passionate, or lusty. Then it could be in a mode of passion and predomination. Nobody has a pure mode. They may be very their right charitable, care about others, they’re by nature very religious, God loving, God fearing. They could be in the mode of goodness. But then because there’s all these mixes, you get a mix someone who has religious but he’s very angry, things like that. Or someone who’s… usually the normal mixes you get are the ignorance and passion. But everybody has a little goodness. You always find that even in people that may have a lot of different baser kind of modes, but there’s still some good qualities always shine too. Ultimately what the philosophy is, that the spirit soul is beyond these three modes, these are all coverings that the living force that’s in this body is who we actually are. We’re this living force or this spiritual energy.

We are transcendental to these three modes. Because we have this body, we’ve been conditioned. How many of you are going through some educational institution? They’re trying to condition you with particular kinds of knowledge. Some may be neutral or some may be really pointed. But through the whole education we go through in our life we tend to get conditioned to seeing things in a particular way. Depending on the environment we grow up in, the type of association we keep… Say if somebody hangs around with alcoholics, they’ll probably become an alcoholic. And they hang around with drug addicts, they’ll probably become a drug addict. They hang around with thieves, they’ll probably become a thief. So association peer pressure is very strong impetus on us. We get affected by the modes of the people that we are associated with. Therefore, it’s important to associate with people, who are spiritual or transcendental. The goal is not just to be good, but to transcend all the three modes. The mode of goodness is better for spiritual development than the other modes. So the more we can have mode of goodness, that’s usually helpful. But ultimately, we want to transcend these modes and become situated in a transcendental platform. In the material world everything is being done by this influence of these different modes. And we think that this is what I’m doing, but it’s actually… we’re just being swept along by a flow of the influence of our conditioning, of our association. Just like someone, they may not want to get into a fight, but they get into the fight anyway. They get into an argument just because their nature is such, it just drags them into certain situations. How do we rise above this nature? That’s where the chanting of the mantra, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare, Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare. This is so effective because it awakens our spiritual consciousness, liberates our mind from the contamination of the modes of material nature. There is a verse in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam that says, this present Age of Kali is basically filled with so many defects, so many faults, that it is like an ocean of problems – kaler doṣa-nidhe rājan asti hy eko mahān guṇaḥ. Amongst all those problems, there’s one overriding good quality. Kīrtanād eva kṛṣṇasya. That’s the possibility to chant the names of Kṛṣṇa. Kīrtanād. Kīrtana means chanting, Kṛṣṇasya means chanting Kṛṣṇa’s names. Mukta-saṅgaḥ paraṁ vrajet. We get freed from the contamination and the association of this modes of nature, and we get transferred at the end of this life back to that spiritual world. Normally it is very difficult to get back to the spiritual world, even in better ages; but this chanting is so powerful that it works very quickly. This is just as Kṛṣṇa says that, “I’m transcendental to all these modes. Supreme Lord is transcendental, when we realize that, then also when you understand that Kṛṣṇa and His name are not different. And by chanting the name of Kṛṣṇa, we are directly associating with Kṛṣṇa in the form of a sound vibration, a transcendental sound vibration. This is known as śabda-brahman, or transcendental sound of absolute sound.   Just like there is the Jagannātha Baladeva Subhadrā, They are known as dāru-brahman. Dāru means wood. Brahman means absolute, so absolute truth in wood, because Jagannātha is always made out of wood. So one of His names is Dāru-brahman, and this is śabda-brahman sound, śabda means sound. To have the absolute truth packaged in a sound, you can sing the absolute truth. You can associate by sound. So many people nowadays they are walking around with these MP3 players and you see now they have little stick ones hanging around their neck and they just put in the ear and they are going. So they want to be always in contact with some kind of sounds. I don’t know if… I doubt it’s śabda-brahman for most people… but you can put any sound on those. You can also be, hearing Prabhupāda’s chanting or some bhajanas or some different mantra chanting. And we want to be in connection with sound. That’s the kind of environment that we create, sound environment. And if we can have that environment be spiritual, the chanting of the holy names, then we become purified from this contamination of the three modes. We get uplifted to complete spiritual happiness. There is happiness in all the three modes but those happinesses are temporary and limited. But happiness that comes from the transcendental realm that’s unlimited and that’s completely satisfying.   This morning in Gītā-nagarī, we were discussing about Mother Śacī. She is like a universal mother. She was mother of the Supreme Lord and how Lord Caitanya was glorifying her. That somehow, I took sannyāsa and this was not a wise thing for Me to do. But like a madman I did it because of certain situations. In this way I have not been able to serve My mother but she is always been serving Me so nicely. So in this way I committed some offense. She is so merciful because she is such a loving mother that she doesn’t hold these things against Me. She forgives her… even her mad son for some mistakes that He has made. She is cooking for Me some very nice vegetables. I don’t know if I described all you the things, the beautiful things that Mother Śacī cooked then you might get too hungry for the feast. With all kinds of vegetables and rices and beautiful sweet preparations and just a wonderful feast she prepared. Then she was thinking that my son, He loves these vegetables. Especially in eastern India, in Bengal, Orrisa and Bihar and parts of UP along the you can get it, there is a wide variety of vegetables. There is a vegetable called poṭala which is like little torpedoes, small-gourds but very thin skin. So that makes a very beautiful vegetable. And sometimes they make eggplant with neem leaves called nīma-beguna. They have some types of spinaches, pālak and other type of spinaches. In Bengal, once they cooked me a spinach feast of 13 varieties of spinach. We just here mainly have the pālak in the west; but there is so many varieties of green leafy vegetables. Some are more bitter, and some are less bitter. The leaves of the pumpkin, tender leaves of the pumpkin plant are maybe the sweetest of the types of green leafy vegetable, what they call śāk. And there is one that grows like a creeper on ponds with lotus flowers. That’s called heleñca — that is very bitter. But all these different kinds of green leafy vegetables were very dear to Lord Caitanya. He said by taking such prasāda and offered to Kṛṣṇa… mostly people that they know bitter… the spinach may not be their most favorite especially for the kids right there.   They promoted a lot with Popeye and everything; but you kind of grow into that taste. For Lord Caitanya, He really liked those green leafy vegetables and said this awakens love for Kṛṣṇa, when you offer such nice natural vegetables to Kṛṣṇa and partake of that remnant, that prasāda. So Lord Caitanya was telling Śrīvasa that there was this time she is thinking she made all these beautiful… it was on the day of Vijaya Daśamī, a very special day in the Hindu calendar – The victory of Lord Rāma over Rāvaṇa. So she had prepared a wonderful feast. She was lamenting that, “My son is not here to eat it. He likes all these things.” Because of her devotion, Lord Caitanya said that, “I went there. She pulled Me there.” Her motherly potency was so great. It just pulled Me there. Because He is also incarnation of the Supreme Lord so He can do such things. We may not be able to do that. But her devotion brought Him there. And she was just thinking, lamenting that I offered all these nice things but my son can’t take them. I ate all the prasāda. She looked down and saw the plates are empty. Then she got confused, “How did it go? Maybe some animal came and ate it. Maybe I didn’t offer. It so clean.... Maybe I forgot to put on the plate” and she went back in the kitchen and saw that all the pots are full. And she thought, “Oh! Then what happened? Maybe I didn’t offer. I was I thought I offered.” Again, she filled up all the plates and washed them and filled them up and offered again to that Deity of śālagrāma-śilā. So Lord Caitanya said, “I want you to tell her that all these things happened, that she knows that when she cooks for Me I go there and I accept her offering. She sometimes thinks that I’m there. But then she doesn’t know for sure. She thinks maybe she’s just imagining it. I go there every day I go.” So Mother Śacī’s love is so great. Every day she cooks for Lord Caitanya and He personally goes there and eats. There’s one of those five places Lord Caitanya always resides. One of them is wherever His mother is cooking. She’s like the mother of all cooks too. She is a super cook. Whenever there is some big festivals, she would cook. People just by eating that prasāda, they would awaken their love for Kṛṣṇa. How many would like some of Mother Śacī’s cooking?  

Devotees: Haribol!  

Jayapatākā Swami: Haribol! She was cooking for… there is a festival at Śāntipur for the disappearance day of Mādhavendra Purī and Lord Caitanya happened to visit there after about ten years of being in Jagannātha Purī. He came and He was there. And His mother was cooking the offering for the Deities. And there was such an elaborate arrangement. They didn’t count like the quantities of things by numbers in the normal sense. They counted it by.... they built small rooms like sheds for the different ingredients. And they would count by how many sheds they built. Ten sheds of banana leaves, five sheds of yogurt, so many sheds… They count like that. I can’t remember all the quite... It’s like this is a huge village just for the sheds for all the ingredients. For our feast, we fill up one go down; one little room or storeroom.   By the way, in June 17, 18, 19, we will be having the Pānihāṭi festival. [Haribol!] How many going to be coming for Pānihāṭi festival? [Haribol!] Guess, where it is going to be held? [Here!] Right, this is New Pānihāṭi dhāma name given by Prabhupāda. So we are going to request Mother Śacī to do the cooking. We will remember that on Mother’s Day we were glorifying Mother Śacī, and also those people there is the details are posted somewhere where?  

Devotee: It will be here.  

Jayapatākā Swami: You can see Śikhi Māhiti. There is also some opportunities for service to sponsor some of the prasāda and different kinds of āratis and things. It’s a three-day festival, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Ratha-yātrā on Saturday and Sunday will be the prasāda, the ciḍā-dadhi festival and many other Prabhupāda-līlā smaraṇa and different things. There will be more details will be worked out and posted.   So Mother Śacī, she was also cooking at this festival at Śāntipur. Lord Caitanya, He saw the elaborate arrangements and everybody so blissful. And He said anybody who comes here on this anniversary and takes prasāda, they will develop pure devotion for Govinda, for God. [Jaya!] We take about 1000 devotees from Māyāpur, sometimes 2000 on... It’s four days before, three-four days before Gaura Pūrṇimā. We take them to Śāntipur, so that they all can get a little prasāda there and get love… They said what… One condition, you have to eat there. Anyone who comes here and eats prasāda at this place you get Govinda-bhakti. The austerity, you have to go there and eat. You have to eat feast. What other process? There are many processes for advancing in spiritual life. Many are saying we are the only way in this. But here we have different processes. But this is, I never heard of any other where you can get liberation, you can get all this salvation by eating. but, because we eat the spiritual food, it’s also a kind of sacrament. Well, I guess, in holy, in the church, they also have the sacrament, but you still have to eat something else. Here the sacrament is a whole meal. So the Lord knows our weakness and that we need to eat more sacraments. Give us this special mercy. But the principle is the same.  

Mother Śacī, He was told that you tell her all these things and she will know that whenever she is cooking for Me that I am coming there. She is, as mother of the Supreme Lord; she showed so much devotion by caring for the Lord of the universe. Then actually, everyone is very much indebted to her. She showed so many motherly qualities... Mothers are always giving. In fact, even… Prabhupāda was explaining once, in this material world very hard to find any instance of pure love; what people consider as love, generally, it’s always that there is some conditions to it. You scratch my back, I scratch yours. If you satisfy my desires, then (you know) I will love you. If you don’t satisfy, then I don’t… if there’s anything that comes closest to pure love in the world it’s the love of the mother, of a loving mother for the children; selflessly they are giving.  

I was thinking that how in Kṛṣṇa consciousness now in the modern world there is not a lot of appreciation for parents; and many quarters, I mean, it depends. One family to the next can’t say anything universal. But generally, at least in the west, it’s gone down quite a bit. Here, when we came to the Kṛṣṇa conscious movement were trained more to see that how we are so much indebted to our parents for bringing us up for all the efforts they did all the sleepless nights while were teething. Usually when people go through the gṛhastha life themselves then they have their own children. They realize what my parents had to do for me. But in the youth, we may not be so appreciative, not think of all those things. Part of Kṛṣṇa consciousness is to respect the family members, especially the parents, the mother and father for their care, tender loving care (TLC). Then all the efforts they made for that, we to come to wherever we are now.   And of course, sometimes there’s conflict. The parents may be well meaning, but they may not understand when their son or daughter wants to become Kṛṣṇa conscious. They want to chant Hare Kṛṣṇa. Sometimes they think that this will be an impediment because they may be conditioned by these three modes of nature. It’s not their fault, really. It’s just whatever conditioning they have. Some people, they are more in the mode of goodness, they may appreciate, “Okay, it is religious, it is something good.” Depending on their conditioning, they may like it, or they may not like it. But from their point of view they are probably thinking that whatever is something that they try to think in the interest of their children usually. If their ideas and sentiments are misplaced, it may be an obstacle that way sometime there is a conflict between children and the parents in Kṛṣṇa consciousness.  

When the parents don’t want the children to do anything we are encouraging children to finish their education. We are not suggesting anybody should take sannyāsa let them be married and serve Kṛṣṇa as they like. But they should have a spiritually oriented life. That is an essential thing for this age. And part of it is that to appreciate we want to appreciate and be respectful to our elders or to parents. Ideally, as the whole family can be Kṛṣṇa conscious grandparents, parents, children, grandchildren, four or five generations, that’s ideal thing. Everybody can be Kṛṣṇa conscious together and all practice unified spiritual light. Since Lord Caitanya was in that situation and then He was being very polite and saying that there was really no need of Me to take sannyāsa, but He had to do that for some other reasons. But He was wanting to very humbly kind of appease His mother. Normally, it is His duty to serve.  

Of course, then there is Kṛṣṇa. His mother is two mothers, Devakī and Yaśodā. Devakī was being held prisoner by Kaṁsa. So Kṛṣṇa went to save Devakī. All the childhood pastimes are realized by Yaśodā. It is said Yaśodā is always thinking about Kṛṣṇa’s welfare. So many wonderful qualities of these divine mothers. Someone who is able to be the mother of the Lord or one of His divine manifestations or representatives, they are all very holy. Like Mother Mary very special position.  

In the Vedas. Because there are so many avatāras, many of them appear in human form, then they may have a mother. Kapila Muni’s mother was Devahūti. In the case of Devahūti, she asks questions of her divine son. In the third, canto Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam the whole instruction are son-to-mother. Son is an incarnation of Godhead and He is revealing absolute truth to His mother. Very interesting. She is a very awakened mother. She wants to get all the spiritual knowledge from her divine son. She has very potent and very poignant questions. The discussion is the basis of the sāṅkhya-yoga, which is scientific study of the material energy to bring one to a spiritual understanding.  

As Kṛṣṇa says in this verse here, “If you understand the three modes of nature, if you can understand the material world and then you understand that I am transcendental to this material world, then you can know my spiritual nature.” This was possible by Mother Devahūti, she could understand everything from her divine son. Kapiladeva.  

Kapila Muni is supposed to still be meditating at Sagara island. There is a temple there of Kapila Muni. Two years ago went… two-three years ago… well this year, one, two… Two years ago went to Sagara island with our Gaṅgā Safari, with about 150 devotees, who went by boat, sleeping overnight in the boats. For ten-days were going from Māyāpur down to the ocean confluence of the Ganges in the ocean. And there we saw the āśrama of Kapila Muni. There is a Deity there of Devahūti, the spiritual mother, who asked so many questions.   Prabhupāda once told me that I had to preach to Mother Lorrie like Kapila Muni did to Devahūti. She comes here for our Pānihāṭi festival sometime. But she has not asked me those questions yet. [laughter] Maybe I have to take more initiative. But she is also very wonderful mother. So who else…  

Devotee: Rādhārāṇī!  

Jayapatākā Swami: Rādhārāṇī! Generally, we consider Rādhārāṇī in a relationship with Kṛṣṇa, in mādhurya-rasa. But in her Rādhā-sahasranāma, one of Her thousand names is also universal mother. She is the source of Lakṣmī and Durgā and all the other mothers. So She is the original mother. Especially when she is caring for the devotees, She is guiding them how to serve Kṛṣṇa in a very motherly way. So mothers are always giving. They are caring about the welfare. That was what was unique about mother Śacī. Because Lord Caitanya came before her after taking the sannyāsa [to Śāntipur]. Because she knew that well if He has taken sannyāsa then if I tell Him to leave His sannyāsa, it will be very detrimental for His religious principles. Once taking such a vow, you cannot leave it. Although it was heartbreaking for her, but she couldn’t tell Him that He should forsake his vows. Even, it was very difficult for her. That was how she was such a selfless mother. Lord Caitanya fell at her feet and said, “You please forgive Me. Whatever I did. Maybe I did it in madness or I did it in some sentiment. I wasn’t level in my thinking. But I did like this. Actually, My body belongs to you. You gave My body birth. What do you want Me to do now?” So then Lord Caitanya’s intention was He was going to go to Vṛndāvana, which is in… Māyāpur is in eastern India in Bengal and Vṛndāvana is in northwest India, about 1400 km, almost 900 miles away. So that will be very hard. It was very difficult terrain to cross, to make the Mogul kingdoms and things in those days. So the Jagannātha Purī was much closer. So Mother Śacī said, “You make Your base at Jagannātha Purī, sometime You go to Vṛndāvana. But You live in Jagannātha Purī. That way all the devotees, I can get some news about You. Otherwise, we won’t hear from You much.” So all these different exchanges; that particular exchange happened again at Śāntipur. So there were intense devotion between mother and motherly love of mother Śacī.  

There was one situation where mother Śacī, she showed that she had to use to have a son like what Caitanya, Nimāi Paṇḍita, it was no joke. First the father thought maybe in the future some astrology said, “He might take sannyāsa. So better, I don’t get Him educated.” So he said, “No school for You. Better You stay uneducated but stay in the house.” But then Lord Caitanya, He wanted to go to school. He wanted to be playing the pastime. Like Kṛṣṇa was a coward boy pastime. But Lord Caitanya was a brāhmaṇical pastime. So He wanted to study śāstra. He wanted to go to school. But the parents wouldn’t let Him. So He became very naughty. the mother would, the lady of the house usually would do the cooking. She would cook. She didn’t have to wash any pots. They were disposable. They cook once and you throw it. So is that primitive or? We don’t have disposable pots now. [laughter] You got to scrub and wash. If you burn the rice, you are in trouble. What they would do is, people they had to have a little like in the back of where they didn’t have all this sanitary engineers, technicians coming and picking up that. They used utensils, because it was all biodegradable. They dig a hole in the backyard and pile it there. When it was finished, filled up, they would cover it with dirt and dig another one. So there was such a refuse. The plates in most days, even today India is still there. The plates are banana leaves or sometimes some other kind of leaves, śālpāta or something. These banana leaves considered a really pure plate. I was reading from the Vedic point of view, lotus leaf is considered the purest. Although Prabhupāda said onetime that stone plates are also pure, purest. Then after that comes gold plates because they don’t react chemically with the food. After gold plate comes a banana leaf, then next after that is silver. Next, I think is some brass and then clay, but they only use it once. Of course, here for expensive, China, where I don’t know if they like it, throw it out. There they would have simple fired clay and use once and throw. Then the worst was considered iron. Now stainless steel is like maybe high up on the list, the modern… Kali-yuga, the iron age. They would eat off of banana leaves. So you don’t have to wash the plates either. I heard in New York that somebody sells banana that sells leaf plates. Maybe we should get for the Pānihāṭi festival. Rāma Bhadra, he was telling me, if I’m not mistaken.  

So Lord Caitanya anyway, He went and stood on the pot on top of these broken pots and rotten leaves, and decomposing there in the back. Mother said, “What are You doing? My dear boy? You are a brāhmaṇa boy. You’re a supposedly cultured, educated family. What are you doing standing on the garbage pit?” She said, “This is aśuci. Aśuci means impure, unclean.” He said, “What do I know of śuci, aśuchi? Clean, unclean? I’m uneducated. [laughter] I don’t go to school, so I don’t know what is right, what is wrong. I have to learn that by reading, by education.” He was being very naughty. Finally, mother Śacī told her husband that, “Look it, this is not working. We cannot… nobody can stop somebody’s karma or fate. If they are going to be a sannyāsī, whatever they are going to be, then that’s we cannot stop working, not send Him to school.” Mothers are… the wife is considered the intelligence for the husband. Sometimes she is giving the good advice. Of course, he has to decide what to do, what not to do, was in the traditional arrangement. But then what is tradition? Nowadays everyone makes their own arrangements. I read one verse in the Bhāgavatam said that, wife is intelligence of the husband. Her duty is to give some advice. And you know, wives ever give. Some of the husbands I don’t know they are laughing or crying?   

Devotee: Mahārāja! Not a good advice.  

Jayapatākā Swami: There must be some good advice. The Kṛṣṇa conscious wife is gṛha-lakṣmī - she is goddess of fortune in the house. So she must be giving good advice then. And you know all the husbands will be waiting for Father’s Day. They want their turn. I don’t know if I will be here then.  

Mātājī: Yes! Pānihāṭi day is the Father’s Day.  

Jayapatākā Swami: Really!  

Devotees: Haribol!  

Mātājī: June 17 is the Pānihāṭi.  

Jayapatākā Swami: It is actually the Father’s Day?  

Mātājī: Yeah.  

Devotees: Haribol!  

Jayapatākā Swami: She is just making it like that.  

Mātājī: No Guru Mahārāja, it is true. That is the Father’s Day weekend.  

Mātājī 2: Mother’s Day and Father’s Day. Haribol!  

Jayapatākā Swami: So anyway, like this one time, Mother Śacī and little Nimāi. Mother Śacī gave him plate of śandesa. You know what śandesa is? It is a special sweet made from cheese curd. And it is kind of ricotta cheese sweet, like a cheesecake, like a filling of cheesecake. There is something like a śandesa. You all know what cheesecake is. If you ever want to give some favorite preparation to Bala Bhadra Prabhu, he likes cheesecake, [laughter] he doesn’t keep it as a secret. So this śandesa is like that filling, little… something like that, not exactly. But that’s the closest I can get like that. So she gave the śandesa some sweets. But Lord Caitanya didn’t eat that. Instead, he was eating dirt. His very little toddler at that time, He was say, maybe two, three years old. Mother says, “What are You doing? I give you sweetmeats and You are eating dirt.” He said, “But everything is coming from dirt know, it is all one.” Three years old, He is preaching her Māyāvādī philosophy. All is one, advaitavāda. “You see what is śandesa or dirt. It is all you see the same substance, same material ingredients. So I can eat anything.” “No, if You eat the sweetmeats, You get healthy; already, (you see) prepared in a certain way. If You eat dirt, You get sick. Just like if You take dirt and You take clay, which is nothing but dirt, and You fire it, make a pot. Then You can hold water. If You just put water on dirt, it will become mud. So it is not… every earth has different transformations. One transformation is edible, another transformation is not edible. Although it is dirt, it is simultaneously one and different.” She had to preach the unity and diversity philosophy. And then, “Ho! Why you didn’t tell Me this earlier?” So Nimāi made her work overtime to keep up with all His antics. Like that she was such a special mother. We can remember her as the universal mother for appreciating all mothers and all the kindness they give. We hope that the best thing, of course, is the mother can give their children God consciousness. Prabhupāda, I asked one mother, “Why you are taking care of your child?” And she said, “It is my duty.” Prabhupāda said, “No, you are taking care of your child because you love your child. Because you love your child. You want to give your child the best in life. You want your child to become God conscious, Kṛṣṇa conscious, so that the child can get back to Godhead in this lifetime. End the cycle of saṁsāra, birth and death.” So on so. Because the mothers love their children, they want to see that their children become spiritually developed.  

There is another mother, Of course, we are talking about Gaṅgā. Sometimes Mā Gaṅgā, she is also like a mother. We go to her, we bathe in her waters and she purifies us. This year, just in conclusion, I told two years ago went to the ocean and the Gaṅgā confluence. This year we wanted to go out to the Himalayas to the beginning of the Gaṅgā. But we couldn’t go, I mean by boat, it would take too long. So went by train along the way some places went by boat on the Ganges. We went to Kānāi-Nāṭaśālā. From Māyāpur to Kānāi-Nāṭaśālā. Then we went to Patna, Pataliputra, anybody here from Bihar? Patna? Yes. The Pataliputra. Lord Caitanya gone there. Went to Gayā, side-ship off the Ganges, because there it’s the 500th anniversary of Caitanya Mahāprabhu getting initiation. So we to that initiation place in Gayā. Then we went back to the Gaṅgā in Vāraṇāsī, where they do a beautiful Ganges pūjā there in Vāraṇāsī with thousands of tourists. We had 160 devotees from about 40 countries. And we did a kīrtana. They had five pūjārīs doing ārati for one hour with so many different articles. It is late now, I won’t go into all the details. But anybody wants to hear, I can tell later, maybe at the Pānihāṭi, I can show slides; very beautiful Ganges pūjā in Vāraṇāsī. Then we went towards Allahabad, stopped at Sītāmāri, where Sītā entered into the earth. She is another universal mother. And we went to Prayāga Tīrtharāja in the confluence of Gaṅgā, Sarasvatī and Yamunā took our bath there. Went down also to the other places there, we saw… like this we followed there are so many places that take a long time to say everything really. We went up then to Hardwar, Har-kī-Pauḍī, where we also did chanted while doing the Gaṅgā-pūjā. We were given special gifts by the Gaṅgā-pūjā society, there they gave us bottles of Ganges water, one of the nice gifts. [laughter] And other prasāda. Then went to Rishikesh, there we were also chanting there they do Gaṅgā-pūjā. We got so inspired by Gaṅgā-pūjā that I told that at Māyāpur about Gaṅgā-pūjā. They decided, “Okay, Māyāpur, we are going to start Gaṅgā-pūjā.” So they are arranging all the details and they are going to do. We will have a regular year on Gaṅgā-pūjā. We are doing from the samādhi, but we will do in a formal way also. Then we went to the place where the Ganges comes down in different streams. There is Alakānanda, there is Bhāgīrati and they join together at a place called Deva Prayāga and from that point on she is known as Gaṅgā. We went to the Deva Prayāga and we took our bath there. That’s a really amazing place. Through the mountains you see all this Alakānanda river comes down blue color and the Bhāgīratī comes down a brownish color. Pretty fast they are meeting together. You have to hold on a rope and just dip in and it is melted glacier. So it is very freezing cold water there. So all the devotees went and so went to that’s where the Gaṅgā begins. We completed now Gaṅgā safari and all this both sides. Gomukha was close, but anyway, officially Gaṅgā starts at Deva Prayāga. As far as known as the Gaṅgā. Everything is very easy for us in this age, if we take advantage of the mercy that is given by the Lord. Bath in the Ganges, chant Hare Kṛṣṇa and you can take some prasāda, some holy food, read the Bhagavad-gītā and try to understand what are these three modes, how we are transcendental to the three modes. Then we will see that Kṛṣṇa is transcendental, we are part of Kṛṣṇa. That’s why we are transcendental. Thank you for coming here every Sunday and participating in the Love Feast. Happy Mother’s Day for all the mothers and for everyone. Praying for Rādhārāṇī’s blessing on all of us. Mother Subhadrā Devī, she is yogamāyā spiritual potency. We always call Rādhā-Kṛṣṇa, Sītā-Rāma, Lakṣmī-Nārāyaṇa, we address the mother first because they are more merciful. Address the mercy form of the Lord first. That way it’s easier to get the mercy of the Lord. So we hope that today we can get more mercy on Mother’s Day hare Kṛṣṇa.    Any question? Yes! Sir!  

Devotee: Not a question but enlightenment.  

Jayapatākā Swami: Argument?  

Devotee: No! Please enlighten us.  

Jayapatākā Swami: An enlightenment.  

Devotee: Two aspects of the thing is same. Who is preferred better, more auspicious? Jananī or Janma-bhūmi? The mother or the birthplace. And the second thing, second is not related. Rādhārāṇī is not known to be Mother. Why does Kṛṣṇa give her so much honor? To the extent that He dresses like and wants to become Rādhā? That’s it.  

Jayapatākā Swami: To the last point I already answered in the class that generally people think that Rādhā is not addressed as mother because of Her, She is serving Kṛṣṇa in another relationship as the consort. But in the sahasranāma or the thousand names of Rādhārāṇī, there are a number of names which address Her as the Supreme Mother. So She is also a mother. Just that… that may not be the most common way of addressing Her. That may not be the predominant thing, when we remember when we think of mother Rādhā, but she is also mother. Janma-bhūmi means birthplace. These are kind of external things. Every time we take birth, we have a birthplace, we have parents, we take birth many many times. In this life we have one janma-bhūmi and next life we have another janma-bhūmi. In the past thousand births, how many janma-bhūmis we had, how many mothers we had, how many fathers we had. Although we are in a normal nithi, morality, we should respect it is recommended to respect your parents, respect your janma-bhūmi. That’s a normal nītī-śāstra, moral code. But if you have the higher vision that our eternal father is God, the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Eternal mother is Lakṣmī is Rādhārāṇī. So then all the other mothers and fathers and all the other janma-bhūmi everything is representing Them. They are the original, they are the primordial, they are the most important. Jagatpati, Jagannātha, Kṛṣṇa is known as sometimes Jagatpati, also the universal father, protector. ahaṁ bīja-pradaḥ pitā: I am the seed giving father for all living entities [Bg. 14.4]. We want to see things with in the perspective. We have a mother, we have our father, we owe them, we are indebted to them. But everyone is indebted to Kṛṣṇa. Everyone is indebted to Kṛṣṇa’s energies. So that’s a primary debt we have. We pay Kṛṣṇa, everyone else, all the mothers and fathers in this life and all the lives will be automatically satisfied and paid. If you are not able to serve Kṛṣṇa, okay, then at least serve your parents. If you are able to serve Kṛṣṇa and your parents both, that is the ideal situation. So Kṛṣṇa is known as the root of the tree. As far as I don’t know if that answered exactly your question. Which is more important, pitā, the janma-bhūmi or the mother? But I am seeing in more higher level that relationship we need to see that higher, most important is actually Kṛṣṇa. He is our jagat-pitā, universal father. And all other mothers and fathers are His representative. He is also… There is a song in Bengali that mother… that Kṛṣṇa.... Kṛṣṇa-mātā kṛṣṇa-pitā, kṛṣṇa-dhana-prāṇa. Kṛṣṇa is mother, Kṛṣṇa is father, Kṛṣṇa is our life and soul. So ultimately, we had to see Kṛṣṇa like that. He is our mother, He is our father. Like Brahmā is born from Viṣṇu. The Lakṣmī is on aside massaging Viṣṇu’s legs. Viṣṇu gives birth, He is also mother to Brahmā. The wife doesn’t have to do anything. Father is giving birth, both He is self-sufficient. So that is why, really He is mother and father. But because we are under the care of Rādhārāṇī and all the energies of the Lord, they are guiding us how to serve Kṛṣṇa that way they are truly also our mother. Hare Kṛṣṇa!  

Devotee: Swamiji, I have a question.  

Jayapatākā Swami: Raise your hand! Okay, our old friend.  

Devotee: As everybody knows, 500 years ago, when the Mogals were ruling India and Caitanya Mahāprabhu took birth in India and started nāma-saṅkīrtana, which had disappeared and He traveled everywhere. But, in the last 50, 60 years, why this has happened, that in the land of His birth, Bangladesh, the sanātana-dharma and harināma-saṅkīrtana has totally, almost disappeared. They have gone out of to another religion. In recent past, people in Tripura and Manipur, these were Vaiṣṇava states, they are also being converted into other religions. So what should be done to reverse the cycle, what Caitanya Mahāprabhu initiated 500 years ago?  

Jayapatākā Swami: Well, we don’t talk so much about it, but I am also the GBC for Bangladesh. Of course, Lord Caitanya appeared in West Bengal. And then there was the partition of India, which was very traumatic decision of the powers that were there at that time, dividing a country into two parts. America was almost divided in the civil war, but they resisted. But somehow India didn’t resist. Since that time they have been fighting wars with the parts that were separated. Pakistan repeatedly. So that is a long history. There is last census there’s, 80% are Muslims in Bangladesh and 20% are Hindus. Those 20% are under… they are minority, and they are oppressed, you could say somewhat oppressed people. They don’t have the opportunities that the majority has in their country, but the Kṛṣṇa conscious has been doing, we are working with the favo.... We don’t get into politics, we stay out of the political scene, but we try to just encourage them in their own spirituality and their religion. Although basically we are not sectarian in other places, we don’t mind that we are open door for any religion, any people to come. We have Muslims and Christians and many people coming. Anybody who likes to share and know more about the spiritual process from our point of view, we are happy to share with them. But in Bangladesh, it’s quite natural that we get at this point in time, more of the Hindus are coming. We have about 20 temples in Bangladesh. This next year, I want to take the Gaṅgā safari into Bangladesh and see and visit all these holy places, many holy places connecting the Lord Caitanya. We have temples in Jessore, Khulna, Chittagong, Hatazati, Sylhet, Brahmanbaria, Kumila. We have a 300-year-old archaeologically recognized temple, is our center in Kumila, about 3kms from the Tripura border. It’s very difficult because it’s a very poor place. When I go other places, they contribute for my airfare or different expenses. When I go there, every time I have to open up my wallet and just start giving profuse donations. Because of the donations we are getting from outside, we have some temples, we have prasāda distribution, we have festivals, we have food-for-life. And recently, many temples are being offered to us and in Barisal. I don’t know, anybody here from Bangladesh? (Bangladesh thake keyo ache na ki?). Many holy places there, many [inaudible] nice places. This minority group they don’t get support from anybody. They are very much underprivileged people. If anybody feels concerned about them, you can just consult with me. We definitely have projects to help them, but there are… at least there is a very strong minority. If you go there, you would not be surprised how much devotion they have. They are the most fired up devotees that I’ve seen. They are very fired up because for them just to have that belief, they have to accept so much hardship, so much persecution and difficulties. Even when I go into the country, sometimes I have to wear pants and shirts to an initial entry point to avoid any offending anybody’s sentiments. A difficult place but the people there very devoted, very enthusiastic. I was just there for Rāma-navamī festival and there was about 40-50,000 people at our temple in Jessore, by the birthplace of Rūpa and Sanātana Gosvāmīs. And sometimes they have even hundred thousand people, but they don’t have enough money to feed all the people prasāda, 50,000 people, it’s a lot. You feed 500 or 1000, how much? Of course, food is cheaper there, but still, they eat simple. But we are trying in that; I can’t speak so much about. Of course, there are other religions, they get tremendous finance from their missionaries and so a lot of people are kind of purchased over. It will be good if people let people choose whichever path, they find works best for them. But you know in some poor countries in the name of missionary efforts, they… there is a lot of difficult discussion I want to get into right. There are some unethical practices that are used to get converts by some people. We are quite open that people practice whichever process they have faith in. And this should be a level playing field. So now that there are so many Indians that are here in the west who are better off, maybe we can make some nonprofit to just help the underprivileged people. Anybody who wants to practice Kṛṣṇa conscious, some underprivileged place, let them have an opportunity, please provide them prasāda, education, basic facilities, then we would have little bit, we could compete a little bit on the level field. Okay, at least we are giving you the basic needs, we can discuss later. Now I think we are overtime. So thank you very much, Hare Kṛṣṇa.   

Transcribed by JPS Archives team [7^th May 2023]