Bhakti Shastri (036) – The Nectar of Instruction Text 6

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Hare Krishna Welcome back to the Nectar of Instruction series which we are doing in the Bhakti Shastri now we will go deeper into our discussion on association in the previous two texts we have discussed first about six fold exchanges Dadi, Pati, Grahanati and after that we discussed about respecting different devotees who are at different levels of spiritual advancement and now we will discuss about the advanced devotees especially how such a devotee should not be seen with material vision so let’s look at the text over here so it is Dhrishtai Svabhava Janitair Vapushascha Daushair Na Prakratatvam Miha Bhaktajanasya Pashet Tangambhasam Nakalupudbudhafe Nipankair Brahmadravatvam Pagachatini Radharmain so Dhrishtai Svabhava Janitair Vapushascha Daushair so Dhrishtai means when we see with our eyes Svabhava Janitair, what is born from the Svabhava, from nature Vapushascha Daushair, Vapusha is the body so the Daushair is the false so whatever difficulties are present in the body Na Prakratatvam Miha Bhaktajanasya Pashet, so they are Dhrishtai they are visible but one should not see them Prakratatvam because they are material the devotee is essentially practising spiritual life especially the Acharya is teaching the spiritual life so Na Pashet Miha Bhaktajanasya for such devotees one should not see the example is given how one should not see Kangambhasam Nakalupudbudhafe Nipankair Kangambhasam, in the water of the Ganga Budbudhafe Nipankair, so there are bubbles there is foam, there is dirt but these one does not see, one understands that the purity of the Ganga is transcendental Brahma Dravatvam Dravatvam Apagachyati Neera Dharmai so what will happen because of it being water, that will happen Neera Dharmai, but Brahma Dravatvam its transcendental nature is not affected, Apagachyati so just as Ganga water remains pure in spite of the presence of impure things like bubbles and foam and dirt, similarly a pure devotee remains, advanced devotee remains transcendental even if there are some bodily defects so being situated in his original Krishna conscious position a pure devotee does not identify with the body, such a devotee should not be seen from materialistic point of view indeed one should overlook a devotee having a body born in a low family a body with a bad complexion a deformed body, or a deceased or infirm body according to our innovations, such imperfections may seem prominent in the body of a pure devotee, but despite such seeming defects, the body of a pure devotee cannot be polluted it is exactly like the waters of the Ganges, which sometimes during the rainy season are full of bubbles, foam and mud the Ganges water do not become polluted those who are advanced in spiritual understanding will bathe in the Ganges without considering the condition of the water so Srila Prabhupada actually integrates the purport in the translation, because he gives multiple examples, here for example this whole sentence is, Srila Prabhupada explains so the various things that may be seen this sentence, one should overlook what one should overlook, the specific examples are not there in the text but Srila Prabhupada is giving it to make it clear for us, what Nata Kruttham means, don’t see from a material point of view so born in a low family, bad complexion deformed body, or deceased or infirm body difference between bad complexion deformed and deceased, is that bad complexion means, the looks are not very good, deformed means the body is shaped improperly, maybe some limbs are missing, some fingers are missing, and deceased or infirm body means, maybe there is a lot of cough and mucus coming out or there is sparse because of some disease, as it happened to Sanatana Goswami Chaitanya Mahaprabhu did not see that and still embraced so these are all different points they are distinctive, all of them and in spite of that a devotee remains transcendent, and Prabhupada says these may be prominent, they may seem prominent but despite and actually they are not even defects, they are seeming defects, the body is not polluted, why? because it is used for the service of Krishna, and in that sense it remains always pure so let’s look at the purport you see over here the overview so in the sixth text over here the offences against a pure devotee, what are the possible offences, Prabhupada explains, criticism of bodily defects so what are the bodily defects possible Prabhupada gives a list of that and Prabhupada connects that with Apichet Sudracharo so we may wonder, why are bodily defects present in the body of someone sometimes you may start thinking, oh because of that person must have done some bad karma because of which those bodily defects are present first thing you have to understand is that the principle of karma is not to be applied for post-mortem it is always to be applied for prognosis post-mortem means that when a person is suffering we have no business enquiring what bad karma the person did because of which that person is suffering, it is karma the principle of karma is for us to understand if I do wrong activities I will get wrong consequences if we start applying karma for post-mortem then there is no limit when a mother is caring for a baby and the baby starts crying the mother starts thinking, baby is crying must be feeling some pain, that pain is because of some past karma, so let the baby cry no, we will just choke all love and choke all humanity out of our relationships if we start bringing past karma into our interactions with each other we need to interact with each other based on human culture and indeed devotional culture which is extremely sensitive Shri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu did not ever say to Sanatana Goswami all these boils have come upon you what sinful karma did you do he said no, I am a sanyasi and I should be able to see beyond the externals so if I don’t see beyond externals to the essence, the soul then there is a defect in my sanyas I am not truly renounced so he did not focus on what that person’s karma was he focused on what his dharma was so in all situations when we are dealing with others we have to consider what is our dharma, imagine if we start thinking that people are suffering because of their bad karma then a thief goes and robs in a person’s house and the person goes to the king and says I have been robbed, it is your past karma that you have been robbed where will justice remain in that situation so when we deal with people we deal with them based on their this life situation based on their this life situation what is their situation in this life if a person has earned money honestly and after that has been robbed then there is no way, no point for us we have no right to consider what the past karma of that person was from this point of view it is wrong and the king has to take the responsibility and make sure that the robber is punished and the stolen amount is returned when this last year there was a terrible gang rape in Delhi so I wrote an article about that so after that I was asked a question on my website now what was the karma of that woman who was raped so this is not a question which we should be asking at all when Draupadi was disrobed, nobody asked what was the karma because of which you were disrobed they all understood that this was a monstrous injustice and it had to be punished so when a person is suffering at that time we should not be doing a post mortem all this suffering has come because of some past karma we should be thinking what is my dharma, how can I help in such a situation so if we don’t keep the philosophy of karma in its proper perspective its perspective is it is a philosophy of accountability, that we are accountable for what I do I will get the consequences and therefore I should act according to my dharma so if a king even if the king thinks philosophically oh this person has been robbed because that person must have done the bad karma but that is not the king’s business the king has to think what is my dharma right now my dharma is to protect my citizens and to punish wrongdoers so I must do that if I fail in my dharma then I will be doing bad karma and I will get consequences for that so we are not meant to judge people based on their karma we are meant to decide our actions based on our dharma so what is our dharma a mother’s dharma is to care for the child she has given birth to the child, it is her child that infant depends on her the infant is crying, it is her dharma to take care of the child so at that time we cannot bring the past karma into the issue now we also talk from another perspective that people are suffering because of their past karma so what is the use of humanitarian help so when we say what is the use of humanitarian help, it just means that humanitarian help is incomplete we shouldn’t get too sentimental and think oh people are starving I should give them food, yes we should help people if they are starving we can give them prasad definitely but the point is that if people’s karmic wrongs are not corrected then at a material level only helping will not lead to any lasting solution so that doesn’t mean that all material help is banned the point is we recognise material help is incomplete but incomplete doesn’t mean that it is useless when a mother cares for a crying child cares for a crying child that doesn’t solve the child’s problem completely but that doesn’t mean mother’s caring for the child is useless it has to be there that care has to be there that’s a part of the mother’s dharma but when we talk about Krishna consciousness we say that dharma is not just to take care of the body it is also to take care of the soul so there is a complete social service we should not become insensitive in the name of being spiritual so now this is with respect to even ordinary people we cannot apply this postmortem analysis why is this person suffering because of past bad karma more than that we also should think of further what is my dharma and all the more so with respect to devotees if some devotee is sincerely practising devotional service then even if that devotee has some bodily defects now those bodily defects may be because of some past bad karma but that is none of our business so why because we should consider what is my dharma ok this is a serious devotee advanced devotee by serving that devotee I can make spiritual advancement so let me serve that devotee I have nothing to do what that person’s karma was that is between that person and Krishna so I don’t have to bother about that and Prabhupada says ok even if we assume that somebody has done some bad karma Prabhupada takes the possibility and says over here this verse from the Bhagavad Gita 9.30 31 these are very important verses Krishna says Apichet suduracharo bhajate mam ananya bhag sadhur eva samantavya samyagya vasito isa so even if my devotee commits the most sinful activity apichet suduracharo suduracharo durachara is bad behaviour sudurachara is extremely bad behaviour apichet suduracharo bhajate mam ananya bhag if a person stays fixed in the practise of devotional service if a person is sadhur eva samantavya considered a sadhu samyagya vasito isa samyagya vasito isa means fixed in one pointed it should be considered a sadhu because it is fixed in devotional service so now we will discuss this verse elaborately when we study Bhagavad Gita but in this context even if a devotee has committed some sudurachara in the past that is how actually Prabhupada is integrating it out here even if the devotee has committed something in the past now what is the situation bhajate mam ananya bhag now the devotee is serving Krishna sincerely then sadhur eva samantavya person is to be considered sadhu considered saintly samyagya vasito isa because the determination is properly situated so we shouldn’t let the thoughts of karma contaminate our vision when we look at devotees we should think that whatever these defects are they are peripheral and essential aspect of a devotee is that the devotee is serving Krishna and because the devotee is serving Krishna the devotee is glorious now this actually applies to many things now one time Jaya Dwait Maharaj Jaya Dwait Prabhu in his brahmachari days so he asked Prabhupada Prabhupada sometimes we see that the pure devotee commits mistakes so how do we understand this so all the devotees became a little tense and they were going for a morning walk and we know that there are four defects in the conditioned soul and we say that shastra is reliable because those four defects are not there in shastra and also we say those who those who teach shastra that was the background understanding and devotees thinking is this question offensive and then they said no pure devotee never commits any mistakes so but Jaya Dwait Maharaj insisted Prabhupada we see that sometimes the pure devotee quotes some verses wrong Prabhupada would often do that janma karma cha me devyam evam tat tat tva deham pura janam naiti maha meti sa arjuna naiti maha meti sa pandava or Prabhupada would quote some verses wrong we see that the pure devotee quotes some verses wrong Prabhupada said that is an incorrect vision of perfection this is what you mean so Satsvarupa Maharaj was also there he asked Prabhupada what does it mean that is external vision Prabhupada said that means we have a wrong conception of perfection Prabhupada said yes the perfection of a pure devotee is that whatever the devotee does is for the service of Krishna is for the pleasure of Krishna so when we are talking about perfection here it is spiritual perfection spiritually there is no mistake in the devotee’s intention the devotee’s intention is to serve Krishna and for all of us conditioned souls we can’t say that for us our intention is not always to serve Krishna we have so many other intentions sometimes we may have the intention of serving Krishna most of the time our intention you know like doing devotional services that I don’t want to get into trouble I don’t want to get into the miseries of material existence or I want to be considered a good devotee by others I want to be praised by others that’s why I am doing all this so there is no mistake ever in the intention of a pure devotee but when the devotee is going to act through a physical body the devotee’s intentions are transcendental the devotee’s intentions are not affected by the bodily covering that is there around the body that the devotee is using for serving Krishna in this world but those intentions when they are expressed in this world there can be some defects which come out because of the limitations of the body so when we say that a pure devotee’s body should not be seen materially what it means is that it should not be seen to be only material it should not be reduced down to the material a pure devotee has transcendental intentions and then with those transcendental intentions the pure devotee tries to serve Krishna sometimes there may be some limitations of the physical body because of which certain problems come up Prabhupada’s English was not perfect English grammar when Prabhupada would dictate his purports there would be a lot of grammatical inconsistencies and Jaidut Maharaj has written a whole series of articles explaining what editing he did and why did so it is given the title editing the unchangeable truth that which is unchangeable how can that be edited but Prabhupada himself told his editors Prabhupada in fact told Hayagriva who was his first editor that one mistake in a book kills the book let there be not a single mistake in the book so Jaidut Maharaj is my writing guru, he has taught me writing so he told me that for every Bhagavatam volume that has come out they would have almost like a sack full sack full of its prints which were proofread, at that time computers were not so common, so whenever they were typed and there would be a printout taken printing would be through a printer, it would be read out and so there would be a sack full of proofread material for each volume of Bhagavatam they worked painstakingly hard so we asked Jaidut Maharaj, generally if you are publishing a book how many times should you proofread it so he said not more than 25 times not more than 25 times so I had a friend in my pre-devotional days whose hobby was to purchase popular books and read those books and find out mistakes in those books and then pack that and send it to the writer these are the mistakes I found in your book so he used to get some kick out of that try to show how his English is better than the English of the best author, most popular author of the times, so he got Prabhupada’s books and he read so many books, he just couldn’t find any mistake anywhere so that was because the devotees worked so hard over there so in the early days, the devotees were thinking so one time, while speaking, Prabhupada had used a word that was not there in the English language now from the context we can make out what is the meaning that Prabhupada intended and the devotees understood that it should be a new word so the editors were discussing they were all young and quite naive at that time they said if your devotee has used this word, then rather than changing the word, we should change the dictionary and we should include this word in the dictionary so the devotees started thinking what should we do sentiment is good, but then they decided we should ask Prabhupada what to do so they went and asked Prabhupada and Prabhupada said no, change the word so Prabhupada was very practical Prabhupada was very practical in the sense that he understood in fact when Hyderabad offered to edit, Prabhupada said make it perfect Prabhupada himself admits in his, not just in a conversation or a lecture or a letter, in his own Bhagavatam purpose, Prabhupada says that our attempt to present this great literature in a foreign language will certainly be a failure but since this is a science of technical values, of transcendental values we hope that that essential message will be accepted by intelligent people all over the world so Prabhupada wrote his first canto he published his first canto in India and his publishing in India, at that time he was practically alone, poverty stricken living in Vrindavan somehow managing his finances as a sanyasi, as a vanaprastha and for many years, first he was vanaprastha then he was sanyasi, but at that time he had no assistant, so he had no editor at all so Prabhupada would himself write then he would himself type, then he would himself take to the printer, then he would himself proofread and then he would himself collect the copies then send them to shopkeepers and distributors so he was a one man army at that time, so Prabhupada writes in the purport that he was aware that his English was not perfect and there were defects in English, but Prabhupada said that he gives the example in the Bhagavatam purport this is the purport which, there are two verses in the Bhagavatam in the fifth chapter of the first canto which compare that literature which is glorifying Krishna that is perfect and that so those words they will do a revolution in the sinful lives of ordinary people even if every shloka and this is not even talking about English translation, it is saying even if that literature, it is a shloka it is written in Sanskrit to glorify the lord even if that has defects and not just unorthodox defects even if there is a defect in each word, still because it is glorifying the supreme lord that the wise people will hear it, will accept it and relish it, will speak it so this is not just Prabhupada saying this, Prabhupada’s elaborating his situation his presentation in English language but the original is talking even about Sanskrit shlokas having defects so the point here is that material defects do not affect the transcendental potency of a pure devotee or a pure devotee’s words so now why was editing required? because when people approach a book, people don’t realise the transcendental potency immediately so if they see material defects then they will just put off grammar is also not good, what will be the use of the message and they will reject the message so because people will approach this message with material vision, therefore for them, to assist them in accessing the message without any unnecessary negative perceptions we remove the defects whatever defects are there in the terms of grammar or punctuation or things like that so these are peripheral and we should be able to see beyond this to the essential message and the essential message is transcendental the central message is transcendental so we were discussing about apichet sudracharo apichet sudracharo so even if a devotee has committed some terrible sinful activity in the past that doesn’t matter and because of that there are some limitations now whatever be the limitations that have come now, it doesn’t matter because now the devotee is serving Krishna so whatever defects we see in a devotee’s body we should just put them aside even if the Ganga has some dirt in it, has some fae in it, still Ganga remains transcendental because Ganga there is an essence of the Ganga that is coming from the lotus feet of Lord Vamanadev and that transcendental potency of the Ganga is there within its waters even if those waters are materially contaminated so of course now if the water is toxic now because there is so much pollution, the water has almost become toxic so if we have to drink it we might even get poisoned by that so what we will do, we will just take one drop we may not drink it, we just sprinkle it then we have to see whatever is required because it is material, there will be a material reaction to it, if there is toxic substances in it, that may have a reaction of a toxic effect on us but irrespective of what happens at the material level, the transcendental potency is there and by bathing in the Ganga at a transcendental level, we will be purified we will be elevated so we should not mix the transcendental and the material so there are two possibilities of mixing one is that we mistake the material to be everything and don’t see the transcendental at all that means we see the defects in a pure devotee’s body and we think this person is suffering sinful reactions what can I learn from this person and the other is that the aspect of we seeing the transcendental and not paying any attention to the material especially if in certain forums that is required like say editing so if a book has to be presented to the public, then as per Prabhupada’s instructions, it has to be edited, so the material aspect has to be adjusted in whatever way is required so that the transcendental can be accessed so we should not let the material block the transcendental by either way, by thinking that there is no transcendental or making people see the material so prominently that they can’t perceive the transcendental so that’s why we do the editing but we understand the essential message is not required to be edited so editing the unchangeable truth was there is no essential message that was edited it was only the presentation, the language, the style the techniques that were edited of presentation basically language is a tool, it’s a technology which is used for communication editing that doesn’t change anything some people unnecessarily criticise this editing actually the editing many of the mistakes didn’t come from Shri Prabhupada they came because early days the devotees who were hearing Prabhupada’s books who were hearing Prabhupada’s dictaphone dictations and typing them they just had no familiarity of what Prabhupada was telling so for example in one of the early editions of Bhagavad Gita there was a Triloka now where is Triloka in the whole universe see there is no Triloka that was just the devotees that had misheard Pitraloka to be Triloka so now changing this is not only essential not changing it is violence to Prabhupada it is violence because we are so terribly misrepresenting Prabhupada by saying that he has talked about a Triloka and there is no Triloka as per the Vedic cosmology so leaving such blatant mistakes within the books would be violence to Prabhupada so we have to remove that now moving forward as a devotee now editing is a specialised field with which a few of us may have to interact but most of us have to interact with devotees at other times so Srila Prabhupada often talks about how there were problems which his disciples faced because of they not being born in Brahmin families or Goswami families so when Srila Prabhupada brought his western disciples to India at that time the general Indian community was amazed to see his western devotees practising so in a sense actually the whole operation was often at the platform of false ego so at the platform of false ego yes our culture is so great that even western people have started practising our culture but then this is our culture so we are greater than them they should not be considered greater than us we were born in this culture we are Brahmins so if people are anyway if people appreciate Krishna and Krishna’s devotees that is good but if that causes if their platform of perception causes them to fail to appreciate Krishna and Krishna’s devotees then that is going to be a problem in their spiritual prospects so therefore Srila Prabhupada clarified so they were saying that these people are born in Vaishya families how can they be devotees and how can they be spiritual teachers so Prabhupada quotes over here from this verse he says that yes being born in a low family it might be a fault of the body but the body is external to the person and the essential person the soul has now devoted become devoted to Krishna so therefore there is no need to stay obsessed with the externals Bhakti Siddhartha Thakur would talk about the story of the naked Pancho you know some woman when she was some child when he was small he might have been wandering around without clothes and his friend saw him like that and then that person grows and becomes a high court judge and that time the person in the high court judge very responsible position very committed very competent very respectable and then as soon as the friend says you know I saw him unclothed what is there to do with this now whatever way a person was it doesn’t matter because that person is now in a very respectable position so even if a devotee was born in a low family that doesn’t affect the devotee now because the devotee has practised devotional service and has made spiritual advancement so one should not sit and then Prabhupada explains further that who is actually a Goswami so there are who is a Goswami actually Goswami is there is no such thing as by birth Prabhupada says that actually this is very provocative Goswamis say that there are caste Goswamis who are descendants of the various formations coming out of the Goswamis and they say actually teaching Krishna consciousness giving Diksha is all our monopoly so Prabhupada just turns the argument on his head and he says that actually the title Goswami is the monopoly of the pure devotees he says you are not Goswami Goswamis at all he gives the example that Rupan Sanadhan Goswami they had become converted to Muslims almost because of the pressures of Agusensha and Chaitanya Mahaprabhu accepted them Chaitanya Mahaprabhu gave them the name Goswamis and what was the basis for giving them the name if it had to be caste or birth they had lost their caste so they could not have been called Goswamis but Chaitanya Mahaprabhu the supreme lord himself called them as Goswamis and on what basis because of their pure devotion so Prabhupada says that the title Goswami is the monopoly of the pure devotees actually nobody else should have this title but from a cultural legal point of view some people may be born in a particular dynasty where the surname may be Goswami but that itself doesn’t make a person a Goswami.
Goswami means one who has conquered the senses and who has conquered the senses generally speaking without the practising bhakti it is very difficult to conquer the senses so one who has devoted oneself to Krishna will be actually a Goswami and Chaitanya Mahaprabhu has two possibilities. One is that somebody is born in the devotee’s family and has truly controlled the senses and such a person is a Goswami. Other is somebody is not born in the devotee’s family somebody is not born in the Goswami family is born in a nature family also but by practising devotional service one has become a Goswami.
So the fact that even the western disciples of Sri Prabhupada following the four regulatory principles indicates that they were advanced that they were serious about the practise of devotional service and they kept practising for years and years and years together. Sri Prabhupada said especially those who have taken sanyas they are advanced so they should not be seen with material vision and rejected because of some peripheral considerations so one should not see like this and then Prabhupada after talking about this he talks about the criticism that happened on himself actually speaking we discussed this briefly yesterday we have to understand the history of the Gaudiya Math to understand the context of the criticism Bhaktasiddhanta Sri Thakur preached vigorously and he opened 64 Gaudiya Maths in India and further 3 outside India. One was in Rangoon one was in Montreal and one was in London.
Actually in Montreal and London they were not exactly temples they were centres. There were no Deities over there just centres were there. But basically he did enormous outreach and through that outreach he taught so many people to take up Krishna Consciousness.
How would he do this? It was through his disciples He was no more their inspiration, he was their leader but his disciples were also very dedicated and they all came together under the guidance of his spiritual master and they preached vigorously. Now when Bhaktasiddhanta Sri Thakur departed in 1937 so at that time he told his disciples to form a united body, a governing body commission and work unitedly So somehow his disciples just couldn’t digest the idea Now to say that they disobeyed their spiritual master is true but it is also oversimplification of a very complicated situation. So the tradition was that generally every sampradaya, every matha, every organisation would have its mathadipati, its sampradaya acharya.
So who is like one presiding head and under the authority of that person everybody else would function So such a person’s word is taken as final and that is the way to resolve all problems but when they had the idea that okay we have to form a committee, how will the committee work? Sometimes they will have discussions debates and who’s opinion will be final. If a devotee believes okay this person, my spiritual master, my spiritual master is a pure devotee and then actually his connection is in contact with Krishna and then whatever is speaking actually is the will of Krishna then for the disciple to follow it is very easy this is Krishna’s will coming through but then can the disciple have the similar faith if you know there are a body of ten people and before taking a decision they discuss and they debate and they vote and after that a decision comes out. Now is that a result of a political process or is the decision that has come out is that a result of a devotional process? So is this is a resolution that is passed by a body of people? Is this the will of God? Is that a binding instruction for me, the way instruction of my of a pure devotee who is connected with Krishna will be? So actually Krishna can manifest his will in any way Krishna can Krishna, a pure devotee instructs this is how you should work and by working in that way Krishna’s will will become manifested so we can or can’t pigeon hole the ways in which Krishna manifest his will to certain stereotypes Krishna can manifest his will in many ways but the point is this is a difficult concept to digest you would like things to be simpler I have one authority as authority as a pure devotee and the connection with Krishna whatever that pure devotee speaks is Krishna speaking and it will make things simple, but that was not the way Bhaktsanjee Thakur wanted devotees to work so they tried having a committee for a few days but he just felt we are not able to function like this that’s why they made one of them as a successor and when that person his authority couldn’t be accepted by others and then there was some sort of split and then that person had some problem in spiritual life which aggravated the split and then there were two parties which were created and then the parties fought in court and there were many sincere disciples of Bhaktsanjee Thakur who were very distressed by this fighting in the court.
The fighting was who will have the control of the property of the Gaudiya Math especially the Bagh Bazaar Mandir which is very opulent and there were many sincere disciples of Bhaktsanjee Thakur who just distanced themselves from the conflict and made their own Mathas and tried to preach according to their capacity but the power that the united institute Gaudiya Math had was lost forever because of these internecine conflicts and then the isolated individual efforts then when Shri Prabhupada was trying to practise share Krishna Consciousness as per the instruction of Bhaktsanjee Thakur Prabhupada several times tried to work with his Gaud brothers for sometime he was in the Gaud brothers ashram editing their magazines and trying to share Krishna Consciousness that way but somehow their vision was too parochial. They did not want the magazine to expand. So Prabhupada felt choked inside that.
Then Prabhupada tried to at a Vyas Pooja of his spiritual master tried to inspire them all to become united and to preach unitedly but they did not take him very seriously thought his words as eloquent poetry and nothing more and then Prabhupada himself tried to preach but he was not offered any assistance and then finally he himself went to America all alone without any assistance and even when he wanted, even when he had he got a sponsor who was ready to offer donations so that Prabhupada could build a temple in America for Bhaktsinghania who said he will help but then all that was needed was the Indian government had to get clearance that Indian government had to give clearance and somebody had to go to the Indian government apply and tell this money please clear it on the foreign exchange so one of Prabhupada’s godbrothers was very close to the president of India also and he could easily have got the permission but he did not do that and none of his godbrothers actually came to help him at that time and Prabhupada had to single-handedly there is a chapter in Ilam where it is crying alone in the wilderness it is talking about Prabhupada’s preaching in India all alone especially in Delhi but Prabhupada’s situation even in America when crying alone in the wilderness there is nobody to help you and there is also a chapter it will not be possible to assist you that talks about how from all sides he got the response no we can’t help you Prabhupada despite all these discouragements continued his solitary effort with determination and overcoming almost impossible difficulties he made people into devotees and he inspired them to take to Pushto and he brought them to India and then he wanted to show them the culture that he had introduced them to and so he brought them to Vrindavan, to Mayapur, to Puri and he introduced them to his godbrothers now because Prabhupada had gone to America and had become successful in American preaching so that brought him a lot of fame and for many of his godbrothers the idea that a person who had been a peripheral member when Bhaktsansur Thakur was there that person should now become a mainstream leader, not just a mainstream leader, a mainstream leader but the mainstream leader the primary, most visible, most celebrated exponent of Gaudiya Vaishnavism during their times and they themselves who had been leaders, sanyasis and very powerful speakers and preachers, they themselves got sidelined, so they somehow found it difficult to digest now of course there are several of Prabhupada’s godbrothers who publicly and lavishly appreciated his efforts and his success even saying that he was, he is the synopathy of the product of Chaitanya Bhagwat he is a Shaktya Vishavatar he has fulfilled the mandate of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, he has fulfilled the desire of Bhaktsansur Thakur they appreciated him also but often there were others whose appreciation was actually a concealed form of renunciation for example initially Prabhupada brought a bus full of western devotees to Vrindavan it created a sensation in Vrindavan Prabhupada had been living in Vrindavan before so and at that time Vrindavan was quite a small place so Prabhupada was like a hometown boy who had become successful in a foreign country, suppose there is a small village and in that village there is some boy who somehow comes in the merit list and goes to a very famous college and that college goes and gets a degree and then becomes very famous, becomes popular and then comes back and that boy is like the pride of the village and everybody comes to see him and congratulate him so like that the leaders the political, cultural leaders of Vrindavan decided to organise a public festival to congratulate Prabhupada to felicitate him for spreading the glories of Raja all over the world and making people from all over the world Krishna devotees so at such a programme one of his god brothers came and he said and he said what Bhaktivedant Swami has done it is extraordinary but we have been sanyasis and we have been preaching to elite class of people Bhaktivedant Swami was a he was a businessman and he had material skills of organisation because of his Vaishya profession and as a Vaishya he had to deal with all kinds of people, that’s why because of his material skills and because of his experience in dealing with all kinds of people when he went to the west he was able to preach to low class people and he made them into devotees also so but anyway whatever he has done is good and we appreciate that so actually is this appreciation or is this minimisation that means you know we are very advanced and we preach to high class people you people preach to low class people ok you did something good we appreciate it but actually what was Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s mercy Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is patita pavan he is not pavan pavan pavan pavan means he is not a purifier of pure Chaitanya Mahaprabhu doesn’t say that one has to be living a pure lifestyle before one gets his mercy in fact Chaitanya Prabhu when he heard about the misdeeds of Jagai and Madai his eyes became big in excitement because he thought that if these people can be delivered then just as the Puranas sing the glories of Lord Narayan for having delivered Ajamel then in the future everybody will sing the glories of Gaura for having delivered Jagai and Madai he said this is how I want to celebrate the glory of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu proclaim it to the whole world by making him do that which would be otherwise impossible to elevate the Jagai and Madai and to purify them so that is the adventurous spirit of a devotee so Prabhupada did that so to actually take those who are at a very low level of consciousness and to elevate them that is a sign of extraordinary potency and that ambition is indicating a true heart of devotion so Prabhupada had that ambition to indicate he had an intensely devoted heart devoted to glorifying the Lord and after the attempt to do it he succeeded in doing it so after Prabhupada did all this for some of his God brothers to minimise him, to criticise him it was very unfortunate and Prabhupada himself was quite pained by this at times yeah so here we will see that they were jealous Prabhupada said you cannot take disciplinary action against the pure devotee, you cannot advise you cannot correct the effect of this will be that it will be obstructive and dangerous for one’s spiritual advancement and what we should focus on is that the pure devotee is serving the Lord and what do such people think that what is the origin of this extroversion they think that Krishna consciousness is limited to a certain section of people a certain section of devotees and a certain tract of land so certain section of people means at a global level they will think that only people in India can become devotees or they may think not a certain tract of land but a certain section of people only Goswamis can initiate there are misconceptions that are actually against the spirit of bhakti and we see that the spirit of bhakti has always been opposed by the entrenched interests entrenched interests means those who were in power and they wanted to stay in power and because of their desire to stay in power they wanted to put aside anyone who did not have that power so historically especially in the mediaeval periods when bhakti spread rapidly all across India because of many saints so the saints were often from lower castes and they were opposed very strongly they were persecuted often by the higher caste people those higher caste people couldn’t see that these saints had devotion, they only saw you are lower caste how can you teach dharma what right do you have to worship the deity what right do you have to do this do that so they basically condemned so there are many stories about different devotees how despite their condemnation of being lower caste they were protected by the lord and they were elevated so bhakti has actually been very inclusivist that bhakti includes everyone in its fold so we see Haridas Thakur the Nawab arranged to have him beaten not just because he was a Muslim who was chanting the holy names of a Hindu god that was the perception of Nawab but actually there were so many Hindus at that time that the Nawab would not even have noticed Haridas Thakur but it was the Hindus who went and complained to the Nawab what did the Hindus say they said actually this person is spoiling, he is a low caste person he was actually a Muslim now he has become a Hindu and he is teaching Hindu Dharma to Hindus he is contaminating our religion check him it was at that time that Nawab Hussain Shah took action and he called Haridas Thakur and Haridas Thakur gave an excellent ideal interfaith speech he said actually the Puran and the Quran both talk about the same god only one god and he said if you think that I am punishment worthy then if a Hindu became a Muslim whatever punishment you would give him you should give that punishment to me because different people worship the lord according to how he inspires them from the heart so Nawab was quite impressed by the speech of Haridas Thakur I am describing it very briefly but the point is it was an elaborate speech but then his assistants were there and they were hardline and they said punish him whip him to death and then he was whipped and whipped and whipped and he did not die and finally his whippers said if you don’t die then we will have to die because the king will sentence us to death then Haridas Thakur said please there is no need for you to die for my sake if for your living I have to die that will make you happy then I will just see how I die and he went to Samadhi so people thought that he had died and they threw him into the water threw his body the devotees got the body back and they were trying to get the body back but Haridas Thakur actually he stayed in Samadhi for some time his body kept floating when he came out of Samadhi he again came back to the court of the Chand and he said that here I am so so so the so the Muslim authorities basically they realised this person has miraculous powers he is a saint because he made a mistake by punishing him and then they forgave him and they said that there should not be any persecution of Haridas Thakur anymore so the point which I am making by all this is seeing the internal vision, seeing the defective vision, seeing the material vision has affected all traditions, even Jesus when he was crucified why was he crucified? the Romans, they did not want to interfere in the religious affairs of the Jews Jesus was born in a Jew family but he was overthrowing the ritualism that had become the centrepiece of the Jewish religion at that time of the religious culture at that time and he was trying to bring some spiritual vibrancy and return to the essence so at that time when he was betrayed what happened? It was Jews who opposed Jesus and they complained to the Roman authorities and then the Roman authorities decided to have him tried in a mock trial and they had him sentenced to death and he was crucified so the point is that those who have tried, taught the time-honoured principles of devotion they have faced persecution so as devotees, when Shila Prabhupada faced persecution, that is not unexpected but what is unexpected is the source of that opposition that is what distressed Prabhupada very much it had been the mainstream society criticising that it wasn’t bad but it was people who actually were fellow Vaishnavas like him sometimes his own godbrothers, other Vaishnavas, but they were acting in ways that was rebuttable and that was what distressed Shila Prabhupada very much of course Shila Prabhupada never discouraged he was distressed naturally he saw his godbrothers as his equals all disciples of Bhakti Siddhant Shri Thakur and Prabhupada’s condition says that ultimately we are doing his work if Bhakti Siddhant Shri Thakur sees it fit to work through me then who am I to stop him not only who am I to stop him, I am no one but even if my godbrothers are truly devoted to Bhakti Siddhant Shri Thakur then they should be able to see Bhakti Siddhant Shri Thakur acting through me then they will make future advancement so now Shila Prabhupada he continued his sharing Krishna Consciousness no matter what the difficulties he faced and that’s how he built the Krishna Conscious Movement and not just Krishna Conscious Movement, he inspired many devotees to many things within the Krishna Conscious Movement and by that he attracted many many people to Krishna’s feet, now if you look at a pure devotee, why should we not offend because we cannot be sure because the defects are external material, because we are not here, our goal is not to find out false followers, our goal is to serve Krishna and to return back to Krishna, to the extent for the sake of that purpose if we have charge of disciplining, regulating, overseeing the spiritual life of certain people then we can do whatever is required to help them in whatever ways possible, but we can’t make that as a licence and justification for all lack of affection in our relationships so to advise, to correct a pure devotee as some people try to do they are all offensive and they should all be avoided at all times and now we can see over here this circle why lot of Prabhupada’s disciples did not appreciate the extraordinary activities of spreading Krishna consciousness worldwide and if empowered persons don’t preach then who will? so without the energy of Krishna without the empowerment of Krishna, one cannot bring about any change, the fact that Prabhupada was able to bring about change indicates that Krishna Shakti was there and the fact that Krishna Shakti was there indicates that Radharani was there so thank you very much Shiv Desha Amrit Ki Jai Hare Krishna.