20230401 74TH Vyāsa-pūjā Address

mūkaṁ karoti vācālaṁ paṅguṁ laṅghayate girim
yat-kṛpā tam ahaṁ vande śrī-guruṁ dīna-tāraṇam
paramānanda-mādhavam śrī caitanya īśvaram
Harihi oṁ tat sat

Jayapatākā Swami: My dear godbrothers, godsisters, grand disciples of Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura and the assembly of devotees, I would like to offer you my praṇāmas! I don’t know if you saw the beautiful outfits of the Deities! They offered a new set on the day of the Vyāsa-pūjā. Really very amazing set of clothes! I would like to extend my gratitude to the donors, to the designers and the seamstresses and everyone involved. I would like to thank all the speakers who spoke this morning. Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura told my gurudeva His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupāda a few instructions. He told him to spread the message of Kṛṣṇa consciousness to the English-speaking countries. He told him to print books and distribute books. He told that we have a governing body commission. These instructions were established by His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupāda himself. Actually, he went to the west, and he fulfilled what Lord Caitanya had told. He had said that we want to deliver four kinds of people, the foolish, the lowborn, the fallen and the distressed. So although in the Western countries they have money but they are foolish. Because they think they are the body. And they are lowborn. I mean in the West, Yavana, mleccha, this standard is there. Very hard to find even śūdras. The fallen are those who take meat, fish, egg, onion, garlic, etc. and those who take intoxication. Those who gamble and those who do illicit sex – sex outside of marriage. There is no scarcity of these kind of fallen people. This was the order of Lord Caitanya to Lord Nityānanda Prabhu. His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupāda, he went to the West to deliver all these people. And I became a devotee, I was qualified with all these non-qualifications!

Śrīla Prabhupāda told me to come to India. Now from 1970 I came to India. First thing, I was just 21-years old, Śrīla Prabhupāda told me to take sannyāsa. He made me the temple president in Calcutta. Then he sent me to Māyāpur. He said, I have given you the spiritual world, now you develop it. He told me to make at least 50,000 disciples. But actually making disciples is one thing, making them qualified, taking care of them is another thing. He told me, give up your nationality and become Indian. Now with Śrīla Prabhupāda’s mercy I became an Indian. As Rāmeśvara Prabhu mentioned, he gave me many other instructions. In 1977, he made me a member of the GBC or Governing Body Commission. He made me the Life Chairman of the Bhaktivedanta Swami Charity Trust. And he asked me to unite the disciples and grand-disciples and families of Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura Prabhupāda. He told me to understand the 5^th canto and help in the making of the Vedic Planetarium. He told me to make the Calcutta Ratha-yātrā in a very grand way. And he also ordered me to do the Navadvīpa and Māyāpur parikramās. And he also told me to develop the śrīpāṭs in Gaura-maṇḍala-bhūmi. This way the devotees in Bangladesh have immensely supported and helped in acquiring the birthplace of Advaita Gosāñī, the birthplace of Śrīvāsa Ṭhākura, birthplace of Gadādhara Prabhu and the birthplace of Puṇḍarīka Vidyānidhi. Included in this is Māyāpur and Ekacakra in West Bengal. In Bangladesh, the Śrīla Rūpa and Sanātana smṛti-tīrtha, memorial place, where Śrīla Rūpa and Sanātana Gosvāmī grew up in Bangladesh, that place is in our care. There are many other places in West Bengal that we also need the help from our West Bengal residents. Then Śrīla Prabhupāda, he told me to write books. As a sannyāsī, he told me to travel and preach. He gave many different orders. For that I need the assistance of all the disciples. This way, the guru-paramparā tradition is coming down to us.

In the 9^th canto of the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, Ūrvasī, she talks about the unreliability of women. But in the purport Śrīla Prabhupāda said this is regarding ordinary women, when women become Vaiṣṇavas, this not applicable to them, they become equal to men. Once Śrīla Prabhupāda in London, in 1973 gave a lecture. And he said that my gurudeva sent some sannyāsīs to London but they could not much. A Lord asked Śrīla Prabhupāda can you make me a brāhmaṇa and he said, “Haaan! Yes!” You have to give up meat eating, gambling, intoxication and illicit sex. Impossible, that Lord said - I cannot live my life like that. But Śrīla Prabhupāda said that I sent some gṛhasthas and they went to London and they conquered London. So, he told the London gṛhasthas that I want all my gṛhastha followers to be paramahaṁsas. Śrīla Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura was a gṛhastha. He had a child like Oṁ Viṣṇupāda Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura. You should all have children like that, we want to have many ācāryas like that. Lord Kṛṣṇa sends us children, they are Vaikuṇṭha kids, Śrīla Prabhupāda said. Gṛhasthas should take care of their children and should see that they are properly brought up and trained as devotees. We should see that in no way they are mistreated, neglected, or abused. Those of you who are grhasthas this is all of your responsibility. Now we need to make the words of Lord Caitanya become completely successful – my name should be spread in every town and village all over the world. Lord Caitanya told the Kūrmadeśa brāhmaṇas - yāre dekha, tāre kaha ‘kṛṣṇa’-upadeśa āmāra ājñāya guru hañā tāra’ ei deśa (Cc. Madhya 7.128) - Whoever you see you, you instruct them about the science of Kṛṣṇa consciousness and on My order become a spiritual master.

So, the real qualification to be a guru is that you should know the science of Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Lord Caitanya said, kibā vipra, kibā nyāsī, śūdra kene naya yei kṛṣṇa-tattva-vettā, sei ‘guru’ haya (Cc. Madhya 8.128) - whether one is a brāhmaṇa or a sannyāsī or a śūdra, it does not matter, if he knows the science of Kṛṣṇa consciousness, he is qualified to be a spiritual master. I want all of you to learn how to present Kṛṣṇa consciousness. This way, you all can give lectures and you preach. Anyway, today the Vyāsa-pūjā has been arranged for my disciples. Now some people glorified me. Now, whatever I could do was because of the blessings of my spiritual master, and I hope that all of you can also do some wonderful things.

You see, if someone remains a brahmacārī his whole life that is called bṛhad-vrata. But if someone wears the dress of a brahmacārī but his mind is somewhere else, that is not a good thing. So better to be a good gṛhastha than a bad brahmacārī. So, we have a Vaiṣṇava Marriage Bureau and we hope that all the devotees who would like to get married will join the Bureau. In the Gajendra-līlā, Gajendra fought with the crocodile. But in the water. Gajendra was an elephant and was an animal of the land. And the crocodile is an animal of the water. In the purport Śrīla Prabhupāda said that in whichever situation we feel stronger to fight māyā we should be established in that situation, and continue our fight against māyā. So those who feel stronger in fighting māyā as a gṛhastha should remain grahastha and those feel more strong to fight māyā as a brahmacārī should remain a brahmacārī. Gṛhe thāko vane thāko sadā hari bole ḍāko - whether one remains in the householder life or one remains in the forest one should always chant the holy names of Lord Śrī Hari. So we want to see that everybody we there the gṛhasthas or brāhmaṇas, they should all chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, they should all study Śrīla Prabhupāda’s books and they should all preach. We are goṣṭhy-ānandīs. We want to see the number of devotees’ increase. Haribol! Haribol! Haribol! Gaurāṅga! Nityānanda!

Śrīla Prabhupāda kī jaya!