As bhakti centers on smarana, is just chanting enough to take us back to Godhead?

Thank you.
Question from Vikant Puri. Normally we say that the process of chanting is enough for self-realization, going back to Godhead. But chanting is a verbal activity.
On the other hand, we also hear frequently that what will essentially purify us and take us back to Godhead is remembrance. We have to remember Krishna, as is illustrated in various places like Antakal Eche Maameva, Smaran Mukta Vata Veda. So, Smaran is an activity of the mind, and normally the mind perceives through sight.
When we visualize some things, we think of perceiving some visions primarily, which is involving sight. So, whereas chanting is involving hearing, speaking with the tongue and hearing with the ears. It is not a visual activity, and it may not involve the mental faculty.
So, is chanting actually enough for us to go back to Godhead? Or does it have to be accompanied by a smaranam on the Roop of the Lord, by which we will actually become purified? The two are progressive. Chanting may start initially at an external or verbal level, where we simply repeat the holy names of Krishna with our tongue and hear them with our ears, as much as our capacity for attention is. But over a period of time, as we keep chanting, and we keep practicing Krishna Consciousness process in general, we develop a relationship with Krishna.
And we also hear the past tense of Krishna. And initially we may not connect the utterance of the name, of the words or the sounds Krishna with the person Krishna. But over a period of time, that connection will become spontaneous.
And naturally when we chant Krishna’s name, we will think of Krishna, the person. So, they don’t have to be necessarily two different sadhanas. One for doing kirtan and one for doing smaranam.
Actually, the process of chanting itself over a period of time will lead to smaranam, will lead to inner remembrance. What does this mean? It will lead to inner remembrance. We sing Madhurya Leela, Gunaroopa Naam Naam.
So, these four items, Leela, Gunaroopa and Naam, are the four kinds of dhanas, which are among the few kinds of dhanas, that Rupa Goswami talks about in the Purushamrit Srimad Bhagavatam. So, the central dhana for us is Naam dhana. But by Naam dhana, Roop dhana, Leela dhana, and of course one common form of dhana is Seva dhana.
But by Naam dhana, gradually our relationship with Krishna will develop and from it, Roop dhana and Leela dhana will emerge. Vishwanath Chakravarti Thakur has written a book, Madhurya Kadambini, which elaborates on the stages of bhakti, as are given briefly in Bhakti Samaj Chandra. And there he describes the advanced stages of bhakti, in which the devotee by chanting will gradually start getting visions of Krishna.
So, he didn’t say specifically that a devotee has to take up some other separate sadhana, apart from chanting, or that the devotee has to give up chanting, by which eventually the smaranam will happen. So, chanting itself is not just kirtan, it is not just shravan, but chanting itself is smaranam, because we are trying to remember Krishna. So, if you consider the example of a person suffering from amnesia, who has forgotten his or her past life, because of some blow on the head or something like that, then just the remembrance of a name of a person from the previous life may not necessarily bring back all the memories of that past life, but the speaking of that name, or hearing of that name, or contemplation on that name will slowly arouse the lost memories, or retrieve the lost memories.
And as those lost memories get retrieved, then the connection between the name and the person will be established spontaneously. So, the whole process of Krishna consciousness is like curing our amnesia, our spiritual amnesia, where we have forgotten our spiritual identity, and have forgotten our relationship with Krishna. So, by chanting, chanting the holy names is the most accessible, the most easy, and the most, in Kali Yuga, the most powerful way of providing ourselves a spiritual stimuli, which will revive our past memories, our lost memory of Krishna.
And as the memory gets revived, we shouldn’t think of chanting only as a verbal activity, because there is, in the soul itself, has the capacity to speak. When the soul is in the spiritual world, the soul doesn’t speak with the physical larynx and the voice box. The soul has spiritual capacity for speaking.
And even in the mind, there is the antah karana, in the subtle body there is antah karana. Karana means senses, antah means inner. So, antah karana means what we, the subtle senses, including the subtle eye, the subtle ear, the subtle mouth, all these have subtle counterparts.
And beyond that there is the gross sensory organ, that is the mouth for speaking. So, now to get an example or an experience of what we mean by subtle senses, sometimes when we wake up early in the morning, maybe some other devotee is waking up us and saying please wake up, or the alarm is going and saying wake up. But something within us means to say go to sleep.
So, we generally call this as the voice of the mind. So, the mind has a voice, similarly the mind has a sight also. So, we see something in the mind’s eye.
So, initially our chanting is largely at the verbal level. So, the mind may or may not be involved in it. The mind may be dreaming and scheming about other things while we are chanting.
And that is what we call as distracted chanting. But over a period of time as we become steady and focused in our chanting and as we start developing an attraction for Krishna and some kind of faith and conviction in the potency of chanting, then the mind also starts getting absorbed. And then when the mind starts getting absorbed, at that time the chanting doesn’t remain verbal.
It also becomes an activity in which our inner faculties, our mind is also involved. And over a period the mind is like a doorway to the soul. Let me say if the door is closed, I cannot see what is outside.
So, let’s say the soul is here, then the mind is a doorway and then from the doorway of the mind the soul’s consciousness comes out. And it’s radiated outwards to the gross body and to the outer world. So, for example, rather than conceiving of the mind as just one door, we can conceive it as a door that leads to multiple ways.
For example, like a crossroad. Like the door you turn this way, you can go in direction A. You turn this way, you can go in direction B. You can put a path A, path B, path C. Or you can consider the mind to be like the screen of a TV channel. So, you press one button, one channel turns on and you see one thing on the TV.
Press another button and you see another thing on the TV. So, basically the mind can tune to various stations. It can think of various things.
So, sometimes physically we are chanting, but the mind is tuned to maybe our job or our sleep or some other tensions that might be there. That is distracted chanting. But over a period of time, the mind becomes tuned to chanting itself.
Then our chanting becomes more and more attentive. And Rupa Goswami has also described that अदव शद्धा साधू संग भजन क्रिया अनर्थनिवर्ति विष्ठा रुची आसत्ति भाव और प्रेज। These are nine stages of bhakti. So, especially from the stages of ruchi onwards.
So, actually the mind goes to Krishna even when the person externally is engaged in other activities. Before अनर्थनिवर्ति and even during the last stage of अनर्थनिवर्ति we may be externally engaged in bhakti, but the mind goes elsewhere. Whereas, once we go beyond अनर्थनिवर्ति and after we go beyond निष्ठा to रुची, which is positive taste.
At that time, even if I am doing external activities, my mind will be staying with Krishna. So, that way there is an inner connection with Krishna constantly. And to come to this stage one doesn’t have to do anything extraordinary.
One just has to persevere in the process of bhakti, putting in as much of our inner life as possible. And because the soul is the doorway to the mind, the more the mind is fixed in the chanting of the holy names, more the sound vibration goes through the mind to the soul and awakens the soul. And when the soul gets awakened, then our spiritual memory and our recollection of our past life, of our life with Krishna, all that starts getting revived, activated.
And that’s how all the connected aspects of Krishna’s glory, His beauty, His activities, His leela, His rupa, they all start getting spontaneously revived. सेवान्मुखेः जिवादव स्वयमेवस्पुरत्यदः So, सेवान्मुखे, by सेवा when we look towards Krishna, at that time, जिवादव, so it makes it very clear that, Padma Purana makes it very clear, and Rupa Goswami quotes in Bhakti Samasindhu that the service will begin with the tongue. When the service starts off with the tongue, then स्वयमेवस्पुरत्यदः that this revelation happens spontaneously.
So, I’ll repeat this process, how it happens. Firstly, we may chant externally and our mind is not in chanting. That is the stage before Ananta Nivrtti and even during Ananta Nivrtti.
But when we go beyond that, especially after Nishtha Ruchi onwards, during Ananta Nivrtti also, we try to bring the mind in as much as possible. And when we actually do this, we become purified. And then from the Ruchi onwards, even if I’m not doing externally devotional activities, internally my mind will be with Krishna.
And the more the mind is with Krishna, the more the external stimuli of the holy name helps us, helps to awaken the soul and thereby bring about the recollection of the various attributes of Krishna that are dormant in the soul. So that’s why we don’t have to do anything separately. We just have to chant and try to chant as attentively as possible.
And of course, if some other aspect of Krishna attracts our heart, then definitely we can take more shelter of that. If, say, a particular pastime of Krishna absorbs our mind, or if a particular bhajan or a kirtan or a shloka helps us to absorb our mind, or if a particular darshan of the Lord, it catches our attention and it stays in our memory, then what, these are all anukul for our bhakti. Whatever is the attraction to Krishna in whatever manifestation, that is anukul.
And we should cherish that. But that is not a substitute for the core sadhana of chanting of the holy names. By the chanting of the holy names, as well as by whatever other way we feel inspired, attracted to Krishna, then we use all that and develop our relationship with Krishna.
And once the relationship with Krishna is developed, that means through the physical stimuli that we are offering, through the physical stimuli that we are offering, through the mind, the stimuli goes to the soul and then awakens the soul’s dormant or shrunk relationship with Krishna. And that’s how we start experiencing the ruha, the leela,