20220506 Question and Answer Session

The following is a Question & Answer Session by His Holiness Jayapatākā Swami Mahārāja on May 6th, 2022 in Śrī Māyāpur, India.

♫ Question: It is said nityam-bhāgavata-sevaya - does it mean that we should read Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam every day or we can read any other books of Śrīla Prabhupāda?

Jayapatākā Swami: You should read all of Śrīla Prabhupāda’s books but having read, you may read other books one time. But Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam you should read every day. Bhagavad-gītā is necessary for preaching, the Bhāgavatam takes you to saṁbandha, abhideya and prayojana.

♫ Question: How to understand saṁbandha, abhideya and prayojana with proper discrimination. Please enlighten me.

♫ Jayapatākā Swami: Saṁbandha is understanding of our relationship that we are the servant of Lord Kṛṣṇa. Abhideya is engaging in that relationship. And prayojana is achieving the perfection of life, pure love of Kṛṣṇa.

♫ Question: We see you are so much attached to Śrīla Prabhupāda’s instructions and feel eternal indebted to Śrīla Prabhupāda and ready to give your life and soul to fulfill them. How can we also develop such consciousness and determination giving up desire for enjoyment in this world?

♫ Jayapatākā Swami: See, if you read Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, it tells you how the material world is a kind of a jungle and the pleasure here is temporary. So we should side by side render devotional service. I was thinking how in this age of Kali it is recommended that most people should get married and how will they be Kṛṣṇa conscious. We see that people normally are very much attached to their material desires. But we realize that these material desires, these material things are all temporary, and if they render devotional service, it is not temporary. So devotees need to render devotional service and material life won’t be so much important for us. Since it is illusory or temporary, we want to do all our activities in such a way that Kṛṣṇa is pleased. I was thinking how when one has children, we try to bring up the children to be devotees, and all our activities we try to do in a Kṛṣṇa conscious way. Say we like to eat, we offer the bhoga to Kṛṣṇa and we take the prasāda. That is a different thing than just eating for our enjoyment. And we have Deities in our house, we do worship of the Deities, we read the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam regularly and then we understand what the difference is between temporary happiness and real happiness. We want devotees to actually achieve this happiness. Maybe temporarily the temporary happiness is considered important but gradually one develops higher taste. Just like Lord Caitanya, He would chant and dance, sometimes in great ecstasy He would cry, His hairs stood on ends various symptoms of love of Kṛṣṇa would manifest. So we want all the devotees to experience that love of Kṛṣṇa, it may take some time but then naturally the material desires diminish.