20181202 The Lord's Pastimes with Students after His Gayā Yātrā

Śrī Kṛṣṇa Caitanya Book work 2^nd December 2018 in Chennai, India by His Holiness Jayapatākā Swami Guru Mahārāja. Reading from Caitanya-bhāgavata Madhya-khaṇḍa 1.205-216.

Under the section: The Lord's Pastimes with Students after His Gayā Yātrā

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Jayapatākā Swami: So we continue with the compilation of the Kṛṣṇa Caitanya book. We welcome the devotees who have come here from New Delhi and thank you for the persimmons and other gifts. Yesterday I was walking 20 steps and today I tried to reach that but at 17 they said stop, otherwise I would be too tired for the class. Today I did not have our usual physiotherapy, and the voice therapy happened yesterday. But we had meeting over the internet regarding the Temple of Vedic Planetarium exhibition. So that is the western wing of the TOVP. So we discussed how to move the people up either by elevator or by escalator. It seems that elevator was more practical because escalator could not be submerged in the water. Since last every 5, 6, 8 years we have flood there, we have to build the escalator one story up. After that we will have elevator that goes to the down floor. If it floods, then we won’t take it down to the ground floor. The main TOVP said they offered themselves to do the work but they said that financially they don’t have any budget for the elevators. At least not before the main temple opens. So these things we were discussing. Next week we have weekly call, and next week we will have a new agenda to discuss the exhibits on the first level. Varadarāja Prabhu is our art director and he is one of the executive committee members, along with Rāmeśvara Prabhu, Hari Śauri and others. So we have these live meetings. People from all over the world are getting on the call. LA, NY, Europe, India and Australia. So it is hard to find time when we can get everyone. India early in the morning is late at night in America and mid-day in Australia. So right now, it seems meeting early in the morning in India is the best time. So tomorrow is Ekādaśī in India and so we are getting ready to observe Ekādaśī.

So, we continue with the compilation of the Kṛṣṇa Caitanya book. Lord Caitanya came back from Gayā. He was initiated by Īśvara Purī Mahārāja. And He had been in great separation from Kṛṣṇa. He revealed His mind to several, five or six advanced devotees and now He is instructing His mother, just like Lord Kapiladeva instructed Devahūti. I remember Śrīla Prabhupāda told me that, I should instruct my mother like Kapiladeva instructed His mother. So I got that order from the guru. Eventually my mother she became favorable to chanting, I think she chanted 3 or 4 rounds and she would go to the temple, and she would say, “why is that Subhadrā Devī watching me wherever I go?” And she wrote in her will that she wanted some of her ashes of cremation to be put in the Ganges. She told me she had a religious experience in the Ganges, but she never told me what it was. Now we are reading how Lord Caitanya instructed mother Śacī.

Śrī Caitanya-bhāgavata Madhya 1.205

kaṭu, amla, lavaṇa—jananī yata khāya
aṅge giyā lāge tāra, mahā-moha pāya

Translation: “All the bitter, sour, and salty preparations that the mother eats creates great inconvenience to the body of the child within the womb.

Jayapatākā Swami: “All the bitter, sour and salty preparations that the mother eats create great inconvenience to the body of the child within the womb.”

Śrī Caitanya-bhāgavata Madhya 1.206

māṁsa-maya aṅga kṛmi-kule beḍi’ khāya
ghucāite nāhi śakti, maraye jvālāya

Translation: “The worms within the mother’s stomach bite the tender flesh of the child. Yet the child is unable drive them away and continually burns with pain.

Jayapatākā Swami: So, the body of the embryo is so much flesh and meat that the worms in the stomach they come and eat and bite the body of the embryo. The embryo doesn’t have the power to defend himself. He is burning and almost dying with so much pain. So the worms in the mother’s stomach bite the tender flesh of the child but the embryo is unable to drive away these worms and continually burns with the pain. So, when we go thru birth this is the description of what we are experiencing every life, but we forget what it is like to be in the womb. So Kapila Deva revealed this to His mother and Gaurāṅga is revealing this to His mother.

Śrī Caitanya-bhāgavata Madhya 1.207

naḍite nā pāre tapta-pañjarera mājhe
tabe prāṇa rahe bhavitavyatāra kāje

Translation: “Being encased within the hot ribs of his mother, the child cannot move. Yet he survives by the arrangement of providence.

Commentary: The phrase bhavitavyatāra kāje means “due to unseen or inevitable fortune.”

Jayapatākā Swami: “A child, embryo is encaged within the heart ribs of the mother. So the embryo cannot move much. Yet he survives by the arrangement of the providence.”

Śrī Caitanya-bhāgavata Madhya 1.208

kona ati-pātakīra janma nāhi haya
garbhe garbhe haya punaḥ utpatti-pralaya

Translation: “Some most sinful persons do not even take birth; they repeatedly enter and die in womb after womb.

Jayapatākā Swami: Someone who is a great sinner, he doesn’t get birth, he goes from one womb to another womb and again his growth is destroyed. So sometimes a child for some great sinful act enters into the womb as miscarriage or abortion, thus they are born and dying, they are actually born, they enter the womb and die in the womb. We heard that in some country in Europe only one out of three conceptions end up in childbirth. Two, either for natural causes or by abortion or something, they don’t take birth. So to be born in a country is a great mercy of the parents. I had a friend in America and his mother told him that “you are simply an accident, contraceptive didn’t work, we never wanted you.” So, you can imagine psychologically how the person felt when parents say that “we never wanted you, you were an accident.” So, he became kind of a criminal. Bhagavad-Gītā talks about varṇasaṅkara. So, we need to have responsible gṛhasthas who have children and bring them up with love and care so that they can be also devotees of the Lord.

Śrī Caitanya-bhāgavata Madhya 1.209

mātṛgarbhasthita jīvera jñānodaya—

śuna śuna mātā, jīva-tattvera saṁsthāna
sāta-māse jīvera garbhete haya jñāna

Translation: “O mother, please hear attentively about the fate of the living entity. At the end of seven months, the living entity develops consciousness.

Jayapatākā Swami: “Listen with attention mother, the truth about the jīva. Seven months the living entity, the embryo in the womb, he gains his consciousness.”

Śrī Caitanya-bhāgavata Madhya 1.210

garbhasthita jīvera anuśocanā o kṛṣṇa-stuti—

takhane se smariyā kare anutāpa
stuti kare kṛṣṇere chāḍiyā ghana śvāsa

Translation: “At that time the living entity remembers his previous sinful activities and repents. He sighs deeply and offers prayers to Kṛṣṇa.

Jayapatākā Swami: “At that time the embryo remembers his previous sinful activities and he repents. Sighing deeply he offers his prayers to Lord Kṛṣṇa and prays for mercy.”

Śrī Caitanya-bhāgavata Madhya 1.211

“rakṣa, kṛṣṇa! jagat-jīvera prāṇa-nātha
tomā bai duḥkha—jīva nivedibe kāta

Translation: “O Kṛṣṇa, O life and soul of the universe, please protect me! Other than You, to whom can a living entity submit his sorrows?

Commentary: The word kāta (the ancient Bengali words kuthā, kothā, kathi, kāta come from the Sanskrit word kutra) means “where,” “whom,” “with who,” or “at whose place.”

Jayapatākā Swami: “Oh Kṛṣṇa! OH KṚṢṆA! LIFE AND SOUL of the universes, PLEASE, PLEASE PROTECT ME! Other than You, to whom can the conditioned soul submit His sorrows?”

Śrī Caitanya-bhāgavata Madhya 1.212

ye karaye bandī, prabhu! chāḍāya se-i se
sahaja-mṛtere, prabhu! māyā kara’ kise

Translation: “O Lord, one who binds someone can alone set him free. Therefore, O Lord, why do You deceive one who is dead by nature?

Commentary: While living within the womb of his mother, a living entity in his seventh month pathetically prays to the Lord as follows: “The Supreme Lord’s illusory energy, who has bound me with the three ropes of goodness, passion, and ignorance as a prisoner within the prison house of material existence—in other words, the external material energy of the Lord by whom I, who am averse to and forgetful of Kṛṣṇa, have been bewildered and who is constantly burning me with the threefold miseries by making me mad to enjoy material happiness—this same illusory energy of the Lord, on seeing my inclination towards the service of the Lord that I receive by the mercy of Guru and Kṛṣṇa, can, in her form as the internal spiritual potency, deliver me from the miseries of the material prison. O Lord, the moment I forgot You and became averse to You by not accepting You as my eternally worshipable Lord and the cause of all causes and the moment I became absorbed in illusory objects not related to You, from that moment, as a result of my perverted intelligence, I have become like a dead body, though breathing. In other words, as a result of identifying myself as the enjoyer and becoming the servant of unconscious matter, and I am no better than a dead corpse. Why are You again further deceiving me through Your illusory energy, which bewilders persons who are averse to You?”

Being forgetful of Kṛṣṇa and always remaining busy gratifying our senses with the help of our sensual knowledge, we become averse to the transcendental service of Adhokṣaja. This the proof of our natural tendency for either lording it over the material nature or becoming the servant of matter. In other words, just as material objects are bereft of the characteristic of independent action, as a result of misusing our constitutional propensity for independence, we also become merged in ignorance, being bewildered by the illusory energy.

Jayapatākā Swami: “Oh Lord! oh Prabhu, who ties one up He alone is able to free him. One may easily die my Lord, but why do you put me in the illusion in this way?”

So after seven months in the womb the living entity regains his consciousness. He prays to Kṛṣṇa to be released from the womb. He accepts that because he was averse to serving the Supreme Personality of Godhead and the illusory energy made him mad after enjoying material, dead matter. So, because of his service to the dead matter, he became like a dead person. So, he was praying to Kṛṣṇa, that “the same illusory energy is Your internal potency, if I have an inclination to serve You, Your internal potency can deliver me. I the conditioned soul in the womb of my mother no longer want to serve the illusory energy, I want to be Your servant. And therefore, I can be taken back to Your spiritual abode.”

So, we have some minute independence. So we can either serve the material energy or the Supreme Person. So one hand we are immersed in ignorance and other hand we use our constitutional position to serve the Lord and get eternal freedom. These are the two options.

Śrī Caitanya-bhāgavata Madhya 1.213

mithyā dhana-putra-rase goṅāiluṅ janama
nā bhajiluṅ tora dui amūlya caraṇa

Translation: “I have wasted My life in vain, seeking pleasure in wealth and children. Thus I have not worshiped Your priceless lotus feet.

Jayapatākā Swami: So the embryo in the womb of a mother prays that “I wasted my life in vain. I sought pleasure in wealth and children and in this way, I neglected to worship Your priceless lotus feet.”

Śrī Caitanya-bhāgavata Madhya 1.214

ye-putra poṣaṇa kailuṅ aśeṣa vidharme
kothā vā se saba gela mora ei karme

Translation: “Where are the sons that I raised through endless sinful activities now gone, leaving me alone to enjoy the results of my deeds?

Jayapatākā Swami: All the children that I cared for, performing so many sinful activities, where are they now? Where did they go? Leaving me alone to suffer these reactions to my sinful activities. Some parents they do various sinful, irreligious things just to get money to maintain their wife and children.

So like that there was one thief who met Nārada Muni and he wanted to rob Nārada muni. Nārada Muni said, “if you rob me, it is a great sin. So who is going to share the sinful reaction with you? I will stay here, you go and find out from your wife, your parents, and children. Who will take a portion of your sinful reaction?” So he went and asked his parents, will you take a portion of the sinful reaction that I get by robbing people? We grew you up, we took care of you in your childhood, we never expected you to be a thief. Now our life is almost over. Don’t give us these sinful reactions which will cast us down into hellish existence. We can’t, we can’t share this karma with you.

Then he went to his wife. “You are my dear wife, together we are one. You are my ardhāṅginī, so will you accept half of my sinful reactions for killing and robbing that I do to maintain you? Arrey bāba! I don’t have any new sarees, you take sarees from the dead body you kill, I am living in this cave. I am just staying here because you know, I am your wife. But I have nothing to do with your occupation. I didn’t tell you to be a robber and murderer so I cannot take any of the karma. Thank you for maintaining the family but I can’t take the karma.”

Nobody was willing to take his karma!

Then he went to the children. “I am maintaining you and I am growing you up. So will you take even a small portion of the sinful reactions?” “Father, we didn’t ask you to be our father. Somehow, we got you as your father. And we are just children, we don’t, we have a whole life ahead of us. Don’t burden us with your sinful reactions. And after childhood it’s going to be difficult for us for our whole life. So we can’t share any of the karma with you. You do what you have to do but we can’t share.”

So he went back to Nārada Muni and said, “nobody will share with me, nobody is ready to take any karma.” So Nārada Muni told him to chant Hare Kṛṣṇa. That will save him. So he began to chant.

Haribol!

Śrī Caitanya-bhāgavata Madhya 1.215

ekhana e-duḥkhe mora ke karibe pāra?
tumi se ekhana bandhu karibā uddhāra

Translation: “Now who will deliver me from this miserable condition? O Lord, You are the only friend who can deliver me.

Jayapatākā Swami: “Now, who will cross me over this great suffering? Now You are my friend and You can alone deliver me.”

Śrī Caitanya-bhāgavata Madhya 1.216

eteke jāninu—satya tomāra caraṇa
rakṣa, prabhu kṛṣṇa! tora lainu śaraṇa

Translation: “I have therefore understood that Your lotus feet are the Truth. O Kṛṣṇa, I take shelter of You. Please protect me.

Jayapatākā Swami: “By now I have realized Your lotus feet are truth. Please Prabhu Kṛṣṇa, accept me. I am surrendered at Your lotus feet.”

Śrī Caitanya-bhāgavata Madhya 1.217

tumi-hena kalpa-taru-ṭhākura chāḍiyā
bhulilāṅa asat-pathe pramatta haiyā

Translation: “Giving up a desire tree like You, I became maddened and took to sinful life.

Commentary: For an elaboration on the second line of this verse, one should discuss Brahmās prayer to Nārāyaṇa found in the conversation between Maitreya and Vidura in the Śrīmad Bhāgavatam (3.9.6) as follows:

tāvad bhayaṁ draviṇa-deha-suhṛn-nimittaṁ
śokaḥ spṛhā paribhavo vipulaś ca lobhaḥ
tāvan mamety asad-avagraha ārti-mūlaṁ
yāvan na te 'ṅghrim abhayaṁ pravṛṇīta lokaḥ

“O my Lord, the people of the world are embarrassed by all material anxieties—they are always afraid. They always try to protect wealth, body and friends, they are filled with lamentation and unlawful desires and paraphernalia, and they avariciously base their undertakings on the perishable conceptions of ’my’ and ’mine.’ As long as they do not take shelter of Your safe lotus feet, they are full of such anxieties.”

Jayapatākā Swami: “You are like a desire tree and I have given You up foolishly. Instead, I wrongly went on a sinful path being maddened.”

One can also read in elaboration of these teachings of Lord Caitanya. in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 3.9.6, Brahmā’s prayer to Nārāyaṇa.

Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam says how people of the world are always embarrassed by their material anxieties - “They are always afraid trying to protect their wealth, friends, and they are filled with lamentation, unlawful desires and unlawful paraphernalia and they have base their undertakings on the perishable conceptions of my and mine and on the base of body. So as long as they don’t take the shelter of Your lotus feet which are safe, they are full with such anxieties.”

So, we will end here tonight. Are there any questions?

Question: How do we believe those sayings about embryos? Nowadays we can see with ultrasound and other means that there are no worms in the womb? They do not get there from the intestines. Also, embryos born after five months often survive, meaning they have consciousness by that time. How not to let this scientific fact break my faith in scriptures?

Jayapatākā Swami: Śāstra says there are worms in the stomach and worms in the abdomen. Somehow they reach over to the embryo in some cases. I don’t know how accurate the ultrasound is. Maybe worms, they go at a particular time, or some people have more worms than others. So in seven months it says, sāth-māse, the living entity develops consciousness. So that is an approximate. Maybe someone develops earlier and maybe they are semi-conscious earlier. Just like moving but they really regain full consciousness at seven months. How can you say that you see something in ultrasound, and they say all śāstras are wrong.? So then you should have some mother from fifth month nonstop every day on ultrasound then we can see for sure. See if they have sleep-apnea where you wear a recorder means whether you stop breathing in your sleep, you have to have a thing on for the whole night to see how my heart works and they kept this recorder on my chest for 24 hours. So you just see for 5 minutes and then you are willing to give up all the śāstras. If you want to be scientific have the ultrasound checking the activities in the womb around the clock. Who will submit to this? What lady? So the scientists I don’t know if they, some may five months or some may say seven, anyway the point is that while in the womb, at the end of the development of the embryo, they develop consciousness. That is why we recommend the mothers to read Bhagavad-gītā, Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam loud so that the embryo can hear. Nārada Muni gave mother Kayādhu the wife of Hiraṇyakaśipu, who was carrying Bhakta Prahlāda He gave instructions When Prahlāda was born he remembered all those instructions but Kayādhu forgot.

So we will want to take volunteers who want to be four months’ ultrasound to prove whether or not there are any worms-bite!!