Bring out the Hanuman within not the Ravana within

[Rama Navmi Class at ISKCON, Phoenix, USA]

Podcast

Podcast Summary

I am grateful to be here amongst all of you for this auspicious occasion and i will speak on the topic of who is a real hero we all instinctively look for heroes we see we watch movies we read novels and in all of them we want some heroic characters to identify with to adore even in real life we want some models who we can look up to and this urge is seen in everyone right from childhood if we see children they have their heroes cartoon heroes they may be they are heroes and as we grow up our dreams be successful to different degrees for different people in this life however at the end this urge unfortunately ends in frustration the movies talk about happily ever after but actually there is no such thing as happily ever after because no one lives forever no relationship lasts forever in fact the Bhagavad Gita says that this world is Dukkha Nam Ashashvatam so now if you compare Dukkha Nam Ashashvatam happily ever after exact opposite exact opposite Bhagavad Gita says this world is a place of distress and it is temporary so what happens over here is that in the world we live in our longing for lasting love can never be lastingly fulfilled and we even while we are seeking relationships in the world we also fantasise about some extraordinary object for our love and that’s why there is so much hero worship whether it be sports stars movie stars or even fictional stars so when we worship the when people worship these stars there is a West Indian cricketer he came to India for the first time and he saw how Indians literally worship their cricketers so he said that if reincarnation is true I hope in my next life I’ll be reincarnated as an Indian cricketer because then Indians worship their cricketers so in the Bhagavad Gita there is this picture of Krishna as the Vishwaroopa Krishna exhibiting his universal form in which all the demons are entering and are getting devoured so after India won the world cup in 2011 I was just going for a programme I saw a big picture of a famous Indian cricketer he was shown in his Vishwaroopa and all the captains of all the other teams were entering into his mouth so what had they done basically they had replaced God with someone else so essentially we are all looking for some object to worship so where does this as I said longing come from it comes from our soul and we can say that we live at the physical level of reality and at the physical level we experience some reciprocation with someone we have some heroes but the physical level the heroes are either inaccessible for us or they are never fulfilling for us that’s why we create fictional heroes it may be it may be batman superman he-man or wonder woman or whatever we create all these heroes and we get captivated by them the ancient epic of india describe the heroic activities of the supreme lord when he descends to this world and lord ramachandra is the supreme lord who is present in our heart who is present beyond this world in the spiritual world and who descends periodically to this world that beyond all this world where things will sooner or later be destroyed there is another world which is indestructible and that world is the abode of the supreme lord that is where he resides and from there he descends to this world now what is the purpose of his descent he descends to attract us to him so that we can fulfil our longing for love so when lord ramachandra descends to this world he is god he is the supreme omnipotent being and for him he can do anything that he wants thus when he has to go to lanka he actually constructs a bridge over a ocean but the bridge he constructs is made up of floating stones so now how is it possible that stones may float when ravan who is the person who has abducted the consort of ram sita he hears that ram and his monkeys are actually performing a miraculous feat they are building a bridge the basic storyline of ramayana is that if you consider many typical movies there is a hero there is a heroine and there is a villain and the villain has a evil eye on the heroine the villain abducts the heroine and then the hero and the villain confront each other and the hero rescues the heroine defeats the villain and they are united so if you see this is a typical story of many movies and this is the story of the ramayana also actually it’s not the story of the ramayana also that is the foundational story from which all other stories are derived so rama abducts sita he thinks that ram is important he can’t do anything when he hears that ram is constructing a bridge with floating stones how is this possible so actually the same question comes to ram also ram is supreme being himself but when he descends to the world he the mystery of the avatar when the lord descends to the world is that he sometimes conceals his divinity there will be many miraculous things that happen when the lord descends to the world but the miracles are not the primary thing that is happening lord descends to the world but 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descends to the world but when the lord descends to the world but when the descends to the world but but when the descends to the world but when the lord descends to the world when the descends to the when the descends to the world but when the lord but when the lord descends to the world but when the descends to the when the descends to the when the descends to the world but when the descends to the world but when the lord You can make all the planets float.
Because of you all of creation is existing. But you are teaching us a lesson that if you drop someone, that person will sink. So, it is when you hold us that is how we stay safe.
On the opposite coast, Ravan also hears that the Vanaras have built a bridge. He wonders how can stones float? Now, he has himself a flying plane called Pushpaka. But he knows there are mystical powers by which the stones can float, by which the plane can float.
But he says monkeys, they are just ordinary beings and stones are ordinary stones. How can they float? So, at night he also sneaks out of his palace. And then he picks up a stone.
He starts wondering, is there something special about the stone? Is there something special about the water? What is it? So, he picks up a stone and he drops the stone. And it just sinks. He also becomes embarrassed and looks back to see if anyone noticed.
And his wife Mandodari is there. And she notices. She says, my lord, Mandodari is in a very difficult position.
She knows her husband is doing a terribly wrong thing by abducting another man’s wife. And she tried repeatedly to persuade him to return Sita. She tells him that, my lord, the stones float not by your power or your lack of power.
They float by the grace of one who you have offended. It is whatever power you have that is also coming from him. So, she is a very wise lady.
But Ravan is blinded by his power. He says, just neglects her and he goes away. He thinks that he has enough power to defeat anyone, to overpower everyone.
Now we may get the question, how can stones float? Even if the name of Ram is written on it, how can that make stones float? Actually, at a fundamental level, if we ask how does anything happen? How does anything happen means that, say, Newton observed a fruit falling. And from that he inferred the law of gravity. So, now when Newton was asked, when Newton said actually planets, when they float in the sky, when they move in their orbit, that’s also the law of gravity.
So, one of the strongest critics of Newton’s theory was Leibniz. And he was another peer. And so, one of his peer scientists, he said that, how can a force act mystically over thousands and thousands of man like this? So, Newton said, I don’t know.
He said, I am not talking about causes. How this force is caused, I don’t know. All that I am saying is, I am giving a mathematical formula for measuring observed effects.
So, what I am giving is, this is how things happen. Now, why they happen that way, we don’t know. Science is a very powerful tool for understanding how nature works.
But science can’t explain why nature works that way. Newton observed and measured the law of gravity. But why should nature act according to certain laws? At all.
Albert Einstein said that, the most incomprehensible thing about the universe is that it is comprehensible. The most incomprehensible thing about the universe is that it is comprehensible. What he meant by that is, that if nature were a result of unguided forces, the world out there is resulting from unguided natural forces, if our brain is resulting from unguided natural forces, then why should there be a correlation in between the way how nature works and how our brain works? Why should nature work in a way that we are able to figure out? So, actually that is because both nature and our brains are made by some higher intelligence.
So, it is by the lord’s will that objects fall by the law of gravity. Mayadhyakshenaprakrti suyate saccharacharan. Under my supervision, all material changes happen.
So, by his will, the law of gravity acts. And when he wills, the law of gravity stops acting. So, when the stones are to float by the power of the name of Ram, the law of gravity will stop acting.
When he wants, the laws act. When he wants, the laws stop. We accept that the laws are there, but why are the laws there? That is because they are manifesting the will of a higher being.
So, when Krishna lifts up the Govardhana, or when Hanuman, as described in the Ramayana, lifted up, a hill and brought it all the way from the Himalayas down to the Indian Ocean, in coastline, to Lanka, how did he get it? How could he lift such a big hill with his hand? Normally we can’t lift it. But, what happens is, if somebody asks, how did Krishna lift up the Govardhana? Now suppose, I have to lift up this bottle. If I have to lift up a finger from below, I have to put the finger right at the bottom.
Not at the bottom, at the centre. In physics, it’s called centre of gravity. I have to put my finger right at the centre of gravity, and only when I put it carefully over there, will this bottle balance itself.
So, if Krishna has to lift up the Govardhana hill, he has to put his finger right at the centre of gravity. How did Krishna know where the centre of gravity of Govardhana was, that he could lift it up? Krishna doesn’t need to know the centre of gravity, because he is the source of gravity. Because he is the source of gravity.
So, miracles, when they are performed by the Lord, or those empowered by the Lord, miracles are not against science. They are above science. We accept the domain of science, but beyond that is miracles.
Now, why are we talking about all this, the topic of who is the real hero? We see that in most heroic characterisations, whoever they may be, they do all kinds of fantastic things. So now, we may ask, how is this possible? But people enjoy watching that. Why? Because the human heart longs for something special.
Human heart longs for something unusual. On the altar, we have Narasimhadev. Narasimhadev is a manifestation of the Lord, who is a half-man, half-lion.
How can there be a half-man, half-lion? Actually, people, when they watch movies, they watch a half-man and a half-spider. And they watch a half-man and a half-bat. So, the attraction to the supernatural is natural within all of us.
The attraction to the supernatural is natural within all of us. It is only where we direct that attraction. So, this is the physical level of reality.
From this physical level, we can go to a fictional level. And create, imagine characters whom we get attracted to. Or, we can go towards a spiritual level, where we become attracted to sublime characters.
And that is the Supreme Lord. So, when Ram descends to this world, he is descending so that we can become attracted to the sublime characters in his pastimes and ultimately to himself. One of the most interesting pastimes in the Ramayana is a relatively smaller incident which happens between, in Ramayana, the central hero is Ram.
Then, there is the competitor hero, that is Ravana. And then there is the servitor hero, that is Hanuman. So, the whole mood of the Ramayana is to show the glory of the servitor hero and to show the futility of the competitor hero.
The Ramayana’s purpose is to inspire all of us to become devoted to Ram just as Hanuman was devoted to Ram. And to show to us the futility of the way that Ravana lived. So, when Hanuman is fighting on behalf of Ram, at that time, in the final war that happens in Ramayana’s final battle, at that time, one after another, Ravana sends his generals and they are all fed.
So, when all his generals are fed, at that time, Ravana finally comes out himself. He sends first his son Indrajith, and Indrajith defeats Ram and Lakshmana. Apparently kills them.
But, they are not dead. They are revived by the miraculous intervention of Hanuman. Then, Ravana comes out himself.
He says, I will teach these people a lesson. And he is furious at having his authority challenged. And he breaks a path of destruction in the army of Ram.
So, all the formidable monkeys, they start coming and fighting. So, right in the beginning of the war, what had happened was, when the two armies were observing each other, so, Ravana had come out onto the border wall, where there is an observation point. And he is observing the army of the monkeys.
The ocean was behind and he saw this ocean of monkeys. As far as he could see, he saw monkeys. And from here, Ram was observing.
So, when Ram was observing, along with Ram, Sugriva was there. So, Sugriva saw this. Sugriva is the general, is the king of the monkeys.
And he just, he is a monkey, he can jump huge distances. So, suddenly, right from Ram’s camp, he just jumped across. And jumped right onto the tower, where Ravana was there.
And in front of all the Rakshasas who were watching Ravana, he just gave Ravana a straight punch on his nose. Bang! And Ravana fell on the ground. Just observing in his royal majesty, and suddenly a punch on the nose and knocked him down.
And then, Sugriva just climbed on top of him and started pummeling him. And Ravana was more shocked and infuriated than wounded. Of course, his pride was wounded.
He tried to shake off this monkey. So, Sugriva, as Ravana pushed him off and got up, Sugriva just came from behind and caught Ravana by the hair. Started pulling him round and round and round.
Ravana was furious. It was humiliating enough to be pulled around by the hair, but to be pulled around in public view in front of his soldiers. So, he decided enough is enough.
And he decided to use his mystic powers. Now, as soon as he decided to use his mystic powers, to use those powers, he started chanting some mantras. As soon as Sugriva saw him chanting mantras, he understood what was happening.
Sugriva immediately took a huge jump and went back to the camp of Rama. And, Ravana was left seating in anger. Ravana was about to chase him, but then he saw there is a whole army of Anarasis.
He thought, I will get my opportunity soon. And he just let go. So, Ravana time and time again, he had been shown the futility of his promise.
The suddenness and the forcefulness of his opponents caught him off guard again and again. So, on this particular day, he decided to met out his breath. He fought with Sugriva, he wounded Sugriva.
He fought with Hanuman, Hanuman fought heroically, but eventually he wounded Hanuman also. He fought with all the monkeys. And finally, Lakshman came to fight with him.
Lakshman told him, why are you fighting with these monkeys, come and fight with me. And Ravana said, I want to fight with your brother. If you love your life, just go ahead quietly and send your brother.
So, Lakshman was infuriated. Lakshman said that, you are not worth fighting with my brother. I will kill you and take your corpse to my brother.
So, then the two of them started fighting. And again, Ravana’s bane was that he always underestimated his enemies. Because he thought, I am so powerful, who can defeat me.
So, constantly he would think, I am so powerful. He was fighting with Lakshman and the speed and the skill of Lakshman’s arrows stunned him. He just couldn’t make any break at all.
He was being hit by his arrows, he was countering, but he just couldn’t make any impact on Lakshman. And finally, he took one of the most powerful weapons that he had, the javelin. He chanted some mantras and he hurled it at Lakshman.
Lakshman saw it coming and tried to counter it, counter it, counter it. But it just was so forceful, it came and hit him on the chest. And Lakshman fell unconscious.
At that time, Ravana, God of his chariot, ran across. And his plan was to hold Lakshman as hostage. He said that, this way I already have Sita as hostage, but I will have Lakshman also as hostage.
He knew that he couldn’t do anything to Sita. Because he wanted to enjoy her, so he couldn’t kill her. But he couldn’t enjoy her because he had a curse which stopped him.
He thought, if I have Lakshman as hostage, I will torment him and I will make Rama surrender. So he came along and Lakshman had fallen off his chariot and had fallen on the ground. Rama and Lakshman didn’t have chariot at this time.
They were fighting from the ground itself. They had fallen on the ground. So Ravana came and he put his 20 arms and Lakshman’s boy to pick him up.
He put it and he couldn’t move. He couldn’t move at all. Now Lakshman is actually Anantashesh.
He is the person who sustains all the universes. So Ravana was panting and grunting and yelling. But he couldn’t move Lakshman’s boy at all.
And in the meanwhile, before this he had fought with Hanuman. He had knocked Hanuman unconscious. So Hanuman came back to consciousness.
He came back to consciousness, he looked around. He saw Ravana trying to pick up Lakshman. So he shouted, Jai Shri Ram! And he got up and charged towards Ravana.
Now he could have attacked Ravana from behind. But he wanted to distract Ravana from his evil determination. So Ravana just turned around.
Hanuman hit him full on his chest. And he hit him with such force that Ravana just fell back. And he fell back and he was shocked by the sheer force.
And he was trying to gather his bits. In front of his eyes, Hanuman put his two hands under Lakshman, picked him up and ran away. Hanuman saw Ravana, the moment of his victory, turned into defeat.
In a sense it was humiliation for him. He had come out to prove his prowess. But he ended up not proving his prowess, but being bested, being shown that his power was less than the power of a monkey.
He just couldn’t bear this humiliation. He was thinking of chasing Hanuman, but Hanuman had gone far ahead. Right into the fold of the monkeys.
So he went back to his chariot. Now Hanuman took Lakshman to Ram. And when Ram saw the condition of Lakshman, he was brutally wounded.
So he said, tears came to his eyes, and he said, Oh Lakshman, oh brother, you have sacrificed so much for me. He said, when I was sentenced to the forest, at that time, no one had to come with me. Sita came with me because she was my wife.
But you Lakshman had no obligation to come with me. You came simply out of your love for me. For a brother who has sacrificed so much for me, and who has now risked his life.
Brutal gash in his chest, from which blood was flowing out. He said, such an assault on one whom I love, will not be tolerated. So there were some doctors, some monkeys who knew medicinal herbs.
So they applied some herb potion, and Lakshman recovered. He came back to consciousness. And Ram saw that Lakshman had come back to consciousness.
He got up. He said, This wound will be avenged. And then he started marching out.
And then this was the first encounter between Ram and Ravan. And Ravan had been waiting for this, waiting for this. And so had been Ram.
Ravan had heard so much about the power of Ram. He thought, today I will finish this battle. And fighting, fighting, fighting.
But not one of his arrows could even penetrate the wall of arrows that Ram was releasing. Ram was shooting arrows with such speed and such prowess, that Ravan was stunned. And one by one by one, Ravan found that he was being overpowered.
His charioteer was finished. His horses were destroyed. His bow string got broken.
He picked up another bow. But before he could shoot arrows, that was broken. He picked up another bow.
Before he could shoot arrows, that was broken. He had his chariot equipped with many different weapons. He picked up an axe to throw.
Before he could throw it, it was cut off. He picked up a javelin. Before he could throw it, it was pierced into two.
One by one he found that all the weapons that he had were exhausted. He just couldn’t even make a mark on Ram. And that time, finally Ram shot an arrow and just shattered his chariot.
And as the debris of his chariot broke apart, Ravan just leapt off the chariot to save himself. Now Ravan was charioteer-less, chariot-less, weapon-less. But Ram was not merciless.
So Ram lowered his bow. And he told Ravan, Oh king of the demons, today you have already fought with many great monkey warriors. And therefore you must be exhausted.
There is no joy in defeating an exhausted enemy. So go and take rest. Come tomorrow, I will defeat you tomorrow.
When Ram said this, Ravan just couldn’t bear this at all. He just didn’t know what to do. But there was nothing that he could do.
He had no weapons. So right in front of all his soldiers, he had to turn to his heels and run away. And Ram let him go away.
Through all this, Ram was giving Ravan the opportunity to see sense. That he would never succeed if he went against the supreme lord. But Ravan never understood this lesson.
So ultimately, the next day the final battle came. At that time, Ravan came with his full prowess, determined to fight till the end. Both Ram and Ravan knew that this was going to be a fight from which one of them would not go back alive.
Ravan fought fiercely. The battle went on and on and on. And finally, Ram was able to shoot and knock off the heads.
Ravan was a demon who had ten heads. But the idea was that he wanted to just show his power to everyone. How I am special, how I am superior to everyone.
So Ravan had said that he had ten heads but no brains. He just couldn’t understand the basic point of the intelligence that ultimately we are not the supreme and we can never be the supreme. We can have intelligence in many different things.
But the most important intelligence that we need is to understand that we need to subordinate to the supreme intelligence. Without that intelligence, all other intelligence will become futile. बहुनाम जन्मनामन्ते घ्यानवान माप्रपद्यते Krishna says that those who are knowledgeable, they surrender to me.
So on the final day, Ram got on the shoulders of Hanuman and he fought. And as they kept fighting, kept fighting, Ravan started targeting his arrows at Hanuman. Hanuman just bore all the arrows stoically.
Ram got incensed at him shooting arrows at Hanuman. And then Ram told Hanuman, get off. And Hanuman, till now he was carrying Ram but he couldn’t fight.
He was also itching to fight. So with a giant roar, he fell upon the Rakshasas and started just pummeling them. And then at that time, Indra sent his chariot down.
And Ram got on his chariot. And then the final battle took place among both of them. Ram started shooting and cutting off the heads of Ravan.
But those heads kept appearing again and again. At that time, Vibhishan, who is Ravan’s brother, told Ram that you have to not just hit at the head, you have to hit at the heart. He said, in the heart is the reservoir of his life.
Then Ram used, he chanted the Aditya Ravya Mantras. And he got, that incantation filled him with sublime power. Then he shot an arrow.
And that arrow seemed to rip the sky apart as it created a blazing flame of fire. Even before Ravan could use any arrow to counter it, that arrow had spread through the sky and just pierced through his chest. And with a scream that shook the earth, Ravan fell to the ground, dead.
Ram Chandra Bhagwan Ki Jai. So, Ravan, he, through trying to be a competitive hero, teaches many lessons. These ten heads represent, at one level, his huge ego.
Everybody who is successful, they feel, I am very intelligent. And they are very proud of their intelligence. So, we all have a self-defeating desire within us.
It can be lust, it can be pride, it can be anger. And this keeps destroying us. It keeps damaging us, it keeps hurting us, it keeps destroying us.
And no matter how many times you try to control it, it comes back. See, Ravan was openly demonic. Most of us, we are not openly demonic.
But there is a Ravan within us and there is a Hanuman within us. There is a Sai within us which wants to be selfish, which wants to be self-centred, which wants to be exploitative, dominating. And there is a Sai within us which is virtuous, which is pure, which is selfless, which wants to serve, which wants to contribute.
And there is this battle which is going on within our hearts. The Ramayan is Itihas. It is eternal, it is a history that happened long ago.
It is based on history, but it also reflects something beyond history. It reflects the nature of the battle in the human heart. So, in the human heart there is the Ravan and in the human heart there is the Hanuman.
Hanuman, like both forces are there. And both can impel us to act. So, some people who live materialistically, they try to become great on their own.
They try to become like Ravan, they try to become like competitive heroes. And the whole materialistic culture around us is inciting us to follow the path of Ravan. But within us is also the Hanuman.
And the sacred epics like Ramayan, they inspire us to follow, to bring out the Hanuman within us. To bring out the servitor hero in us. Hanuman is heroic in his own way and by Ram’s glory, he sometimes becomes more heroic than Ram.
Ram walks across the ocean of rage, Hanuman flies across the ocean. Krishna Prabhupada would say that the devotee of the Lord becomes greater than the Lord by the grace of the Lord. So, Hanuman demonstrates this.
And when the Ramayan narrates its story, the purpose is we glorify Ram. Of course, but it is not just to glorify Ram. It is, the purpose is not just recitation of some historical pastime.
The purpose is redirection of our own heart. That the whole world is nourishing, is fuelling and fanning the Ravanic tendency in us. But when we come in spiritual circles and when we come in the association where spiritual vibrations are being vibrated, then we can have the Hanuman within us nourished.
And as the Hanuman within us comes out, that Hanuman starts manifesting for our good and for the good of others. If we can bring out the Hanuman within us, that is the best thing we can do for ourselves and the best thing we can do for others. When the Hanuman within us comes out, at that time our focus is on doing wonderful things.
But not out of our ego but for the wonderful Lord. And in that mode of devotion, we can do things which might otherwise have been assumed impossible. Srila Prabhupada was one such talented devotee of Lord Ram, of Lord Krishna.
Just as Hanuman flew single-handedly across the ocean to go to Lanka to find Sita, Srila Prabhupada also went across the oceans. His mode of travel might not have been as miraculous. He did not fly.
But his purpose was as transcendental as the purpose of Hanuman. Srila Prabhupada came from India to America on the same mission. What was that? That mission was to reclaim souls like Sita.
Souls who had potential devotion within them but that potential was covered. That potential was obscured. That potential was suppressed by the materialism of the world.
Srila Prabhupada came to America all alone. Except Hanuman came to Lanka all alone. Just as Hanuman was empowered by the Lord to do extraordinary things, Srila Prabhupada too was empowered by the Lord to do extraordinary things.
As an American professor of religious studies, Thomas Hopkins, he said that if you look at the entire religious history of the world, do you see anyone like Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada? He said that if a novel writer, if a fiction writer wrote a novel, in which he said that a 70 year old man went to a distant country to meet people whose culture, education, religion, everything was different from his. And he used them, he used people who were actually for most purposes good for nothing. Their hippies were rejected.
He said he used them and he started an international organisation. Normally if some company wants to expand, they want to get the most qualified candidates. Multiple levels of interviews are there before you can get into a company.
Prabhupada, he took just people who were the hippies who initially joined Srila Prabhupada’s movement. They were actually, their only regulative principle was to break all regulative principles. So Prabhupada engaged them.
And he actually just within 10 years, he spread the Krishna Consciousness movement all over the world. So Hopkins says that if a novel writer presented a novel like this to some publishing company, the publishing company would dismiss, this is unrealistic. It will not happen.
But he says in the case of Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, fact is stranger than fiction. He says where in the history of the world do we see this? That some unknown person comes and just tells people and people by hundreds and thousands leave everything and become devoted to the cause of spiritual elevation, the cause of sharing spiritual wisdom. So he says we may say that this is what Jesus did.
He says yes it’s true, but there are differences. Jesus preached in the same land where he lived. Jesus preached to people of his same age group and culture.
Bhaktivedanta Swami went to an entirely different land and preached to people who were of a different culture, different background, different education level, different religion and yet he elevated them. He said that this has no parallels anywhere in the history of the world. So the capacity of the Lord to empower his devotees is not something that is just seen in the Ramayana.
It is something which we can see even now in the life of Shri Prabhupada. And we can see it in our lives. We may not be miraculously empowered to start a global movement, but the biggest transformation is the transformation of the human heart.
If we internalise the mode of devotion to Ram and try to bring out the Ram Hanuman within, we will find that we can become dramatically transformed. Whatever negativities are there within us, which we may have normally thought impossible to give up, we will find that the power of devotion, we will be able to give up. The miracles in the Ramayana, we may say whether they happen or not happen, I don’t know.
But the real miracle is within our own hearts. And that can happen. That is waiting to happen if we just let the Lord do his magic.
So if we connect with him in a mode of devotion, then he will empower the Hanuman within us. And that Hanuman will come out and we will see ourselves dramatically transformed to become better human beings, better devotees. And ultimately achieve the best destination in life.
Return to that eternal spiritual world where there is an endless and ecstatic reciprocation of love between the Lord and his devotees where our longing for love will be eternally and perfectly fulfilled. I will summarise what I spoke today. I spoke about who is a real hero.
So we all look for some object of love who is heroic. And we seek it in this world or we seek it as the object in the fictional world. Why do we seek it? Because we are eternal souls who are parts of the whole.
Who is supremely heroic? So that longing which is meant to be fulfilled at the spiritual level, we are trying to fulfil it at a physical level or at a fictional level. The Lord descends to this world to perform extraordinary pastimes to attract our hearts to him. These pastimes are like a trailer which are meant to attract us to the eternal reciprocation of love between the Lord and his devotees.
And through his sweet pastimes, he demonstrates miraculous capacities. Now, similar miraculous capacities are demonstrated by fictional heroes. But they are simply imagination.
We know that fictional heroes can’t do these things. Nobody can do these things. At least in a normal experience.
But still we long to see them because attraction to the supernatural is natural in the human part. And that is meant to be directed towards the Lord. So, the Lord, the Ramayana demon, is something similar to a normal story.
Of a romantic hero, there is a heroine, there is a villain. But it is a purifying story because it attracts our heart towards the Lord. And that tension over there is between whether we become a competitor hero like Ravan or we become a servitor hero like Hanuman.
So, time and time again, although Ravan shows his prowess, Hanuman is shown to be far far more devoted. And he surpasses at times even the power of Ravan. And ultimately, when Ram fells Ravan, what that demonstrates is that the felling of the Ravan in our heart can happen by the power of Ram.
So, this battle of Ramayan is happening in our own hearts. There is a Hanuman and a Ravan within us. And to the extent we devote ourselves to Ram, to that extent that Ram will empower the Hanuman within us and will disempower the Ravan within us.
And that same miraculous empowerment that Hanuman had, Srila Prabhupada also had, by which he was able to transform the hearts of millions of people. And that inner transformation is the greatest miracle. That miracle is awaiting each one of us if we invoke the presence of the Lord in our hearts with a prayerful, devotional mood of surrender to Him.
That is what we can aspire for on this day of Ram Navami. We can pray, my dear Lord, please manifest Yourself in my heart and please make me devoted to You. Sri Ramachandra Bhagwan ki Jai! Srila Prabhupada ki Jai! Gaur Bhakta Vrinda ki Jai! Jai Gaur Premanand Devi! Thank you very much.
So, we have come to the last session of our retreat today.