How Lord Chaitanya manifested, shared and savoured love for Krishna

[Gaur Purnima talk at ISKCON, Sydney, Australia]

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Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Hare Krishna.
Today morning is an extremely auspicious day of Sri Gaurapurnima, the appearance day of Sri Gauranga Mahaprabhu. And today I will discuss on this theme of how Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu relished and shared Krishna Bhakti throughout His life. So I will talk one pastime, an analysis of the Adi Leela, then one pastime analysis of the Madhya Leela, and one of the Anta Leela.
So we will try to draw some lessons from each of them. So I will talk about this in three phases. The Adi Leela is more of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s love for Krishna surfacing.
It’s a surfacing stage. The love surfaces and comes to the forefront. Then the Madhya Leela is about His sharing love for Krishna with everyone.
And the last Anta Leela is primarily about His savouring love for Krishna. So surfacing, sharing, and then savouring. Of course, any analysis is never foolproof.
Because even when Chaitanya Mahaprabhu was sharing, He was also savouring. But towards the end of His life, He didn’t travel much. He was focused on relishing internally.
So this particular verse in the Chaitanya Amrit comes when Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is still in Puri, in Gauradesh, and He is endeavouring to go to Vrindavan, but He is unable to go there. So He comes back and then eventually He goes afterwards. So when He is endeavouring to go, He is saying that even when the Lord does not succeed in going to Vrindavan, still He is successful in fulfilling His mission of taking people towards Vrindavan.
That is, wherever He goes, there is a beautiful alliteration in the first line of this verse itself. It says that, Gaurodhyanam Gauradesh So Gau-Gau is the alliteration over here. Gaurodhyanam.
So Gauradesh refers to the area in Bengal, broadly speaking. One of the names for Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s movement or the tradition that he started is either Chaitanya Vaishnavism or Gaudiya Vaishnavism. Now the word Gaudiya Vaishnavism has two meanings, one external, one internal.
Gauda is a geographical name and it’s an area around Bengal associated with the Ganga river. So it’s a particular nomenclature that comes from there. So that Vaishnavism which arose in that area is called as Gaudiya Vaishnavism.
Now this is simply a geographical marker. But Gaudiya Acharya has also explained that there is an internal meaning. The word Gauda is a variant of the word Guda.
Guda means jaggery, a special delicacy. And while Guda is available in various parts of India, jaggery is available in various parts of the world, the jaggery in Bengal is considered especially sweet. Has anyone tasted Bengali jaggery? It’s almost like chocolate.
It’s delicious, it’s natural, it’s delicious, it’s nutritious. So the idea of the name Gaudiya Vaishnavism from the internal perspective is that while Vaishnavism, the path of Bhakti manifested through different Acharyas in different places. There is Ramanulacharya, there is Madhvacharya, there is Nimbarkacharya, Vishnuswami.
So all these great devotees, they manifested Vaishnavism in various parts of India. And broadly speaking, the idea of theistic devotion is there across world religious traditions. But there was a special sweetness to the mellow with which Shaitanya Mahaprabhu manifested his devotion, manifested Bhakti.
That is Gaudiya Vaishnavism. So Gaudiya Vaishnavism from the internal perspective refers to the special sweetness of the flavour of Vaishnavism that Shaitanya Mahaprabhu manifested. And what is that special flavour? That is actually the love of Srimati Radharani for Krishna.
That this अनार्पित चरिंचिरात करुणया अवतीर्ण कलव समर्पैतुम उन्नक उज्ञुलरसाम is described that अनार्पित चरिंचिरात for a very long long time that which was not bestowed that is shared by Shaitanya Mahaprabhu. What is that? That is special love for Krishna in the mood of Srimati Radharani. So that is considered the highest mood of devotion.
And that is what Shaitanya Mahaprabhu manifested. So गउड़ो ध्यानम् गउड़मेखः So the metaphor over here is First there is the alliteration. Alliteration is the same sound.
But along with that there is a metaphor over here. Whenever there is a work of poetry is there there are various figures of speeches that come in over there. So here the one metaphor that runs through is that there is a garden.
गउड़ उध्यानम् So the गउड़ देशे is like a garden. And in that गउड़मेखः Lord Shaitanya Mahaprabhu is like a cloud who has risen up in the sky. And the clouds come.
The cloud is a very beautiful metaphor because although the cloud blesses a particular showers water on a particular area but the cloud does not belong to that area. Or that the cloud is up in the sky way above the earth. But from there it showers down water on the earth.
So of course nowadays is the age of litigation. So there are disputes over property there are disputes over custody. There is also a new kind of dispute which was not there in the previous time.
It’s called cloud property rights. It is not cloud means the cloud computing where you store it’s not like that. Sometimes what happens there is not much rain and there are clouds in the sky but the clouds don’t shower water.
They are there up but they are not showering water. So then what happens through artificial through some scientific means they try to seed the clouds and shower water on them. So what happens by seeding sometimes little rain comes but then you can’t control.
You may seed the cloud and the rain might fall in a river. And then you don’t get any rain practically where we want it. But anyway when some clouds are somewhere and they try to do seeding the other state claims this cloud by it’s natural wind was going to come to us and it will shower on us.
So you stole our property. So clouds are not human property at all. So similarly although we make clay claims on it but clouds are above.
Similarly when the lord descends to this world although he may seem to be one among us but he is like a cloud above us. He is at a different level of consciousness. And just as the cloud showers rain now cloud can shower rain anywhere.
But if it showers rain on the river still water has come on the earth but that doesn’t benefit as much as the cloud showers rain where there is there is there is a shortage of water. There is a need for water. Now the need for water can also be in different degrees.
There is a place where there is water shortage. There is a drought. There water falling is special.
It’s very very helpful. But imagine if there is a fire. There is a wild fire.
And even with the best of human technology today human resources when forest fires break out it’s very very difficult for us human beings to extinguish them. A few months ago I was in California and there is a place which is called as paradise. It’s a very beautiful whole of California is very beautiful.
Paradise is very beautiful. But paradise recently turned into a hell. What happened? There was a wild forest fire that came up and the whole town it was not exactly a city very beautiful city it just burned to ashes.
Nothing was left. Like an inferno. And with the best of machinery still this couldn’t do anything.
So if forest fire is there then we can try with our human efforts to try to extinguish the forest fire. But if rains come there is nothing like the power of rains to extinguish a forest fire. So we need rains normally.
We need rains when there is a drought. But we need rains the most when there is a forest fire. So here in a drought yes there is distress and there may be pain and there may be gradual death.
But forest fire means sudden devastation. One night the city whole town is there. Next morning there is nothing there at all.
So forest fire can destroy like that. So here the example is given is bhava agni dagd janata that because of the influence of Kali Yuga is a forest fire a huge fire bhava agni so there is dava agni and bhava agni dava agni is a big forest fire and bhava agni is the whole material world itself is like a fire. bhava agni dagd janata people are just burning because of that.
In the Bhagavad Gita in the 7th chapter 16th verse Krishna says there are 4 kinds of people who come to him. Those 4 kinds of people are people who are distressed people who are distressed and people who are distressed. Not exactly but actually in Kali Yuga almost everybody who comes to Krishna is because they are distressed.
Yes there are 3 other categories people who need money people who want knowledge people who are curious inquisitive but actually unless there is some distress people who are curious they can just google and find so many objects to be curious about. Somebody wants money they can just take a loan from somewhere they don’t have to come to God today. Technology has created so many different even people who want knowledge there are so many different kinds of knowledge people can get.
So unless there is some kind of distress which makes people think is there something more in life? Broadly people come to Krishna either because life becomes unbearable there is so much distress that what is the point of living? Life becomes unbearable or life becomes unfulfilling unfulfilling means we have some goal we have some dream we achieve that and after achieving it we find it is an anticlimax. Nothing great and we ask what more in life? Isn’t there something more? So either way the point is that there is enormous distress and everybody is burning in the past there were wars the distress was much more physical and visible now the distress is psychological and visible but still it is great distress so distress is always there and few things make people as unhappy as the belief that everyone else is happy. Few things make people as unhappy as the belief that everyone else is happy.
And unfortunately that belief is what is fostered today in the world because of the media, because of the culture. We see happy people in the commercials in the infomercials, in the movies and we think oh I alone am having so many problems. But no, everybody has distress.
So bhavagni dhag bhajanata all living beings are burned in the fire. What is that fire? That fire is of dissatisfaction of disillusionment, of distress and ultimately it is the fire of desire. The desire, I want this, I want that I want that, I want that and all these desires we crave and slave to fulfil them now most of the desires we are unable to fulfil them and that frustrates us and a few desires we fulfil them but still that doesn’t satisfy us and that also eventually frustrates us.
So whether desires burn us whether they are fulfilled or they are unfulfilled whether they are fulfilled or unfulfilled desires burn us. There is a Greek philosopher Socrates who said that if you marry you get a good spouse you are fortunate. If you don’t get a good spouse, you become a philosopher.
So the idea is that distress is there everywhere in the world and and So what now Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is compared to a cloud who showers loka means to aloka is ice, so aloka means his own glance he showers nectar now it’s one thing if there is fire and if you shower water then at least the fire will get extinguished but here the idea is there is not just fire which is burning but virudhaha there are plants, trees, shrubs which are all burning and dying so water can extinguish the fire but it is not just water that is being showered but nectar is being showered samajivayat so nectar will not only save their life but bring them back to prosperity now we don’t just want to survive, we want to thrive we want to live in life and Chaitanya Mahaprabhu doesn’t just enable us to survive his mercy amidst this fire of metal existed, it enables us to thrive it’s not just that we give up our desires and live up a dry dreary life of abnegation Chaitanya Mahaprabhu enriches our hearts with spiritual desires and that makes our life even more stimulating and fulfilling that is the mercy of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu so let’s look at how Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is a cloud showered mercy over people, janata so let’s look at this from the point of Adi Leela, Maddi Leela and Anta Leela so after each part of the analysis we’ll have a few minutes of reflection if any of you have any questions or comments you can speak that so this was the first part where I was explaining basically the verse and the metaphor any comments or questions? so the Adi Leela of Chaitanya Charita Amrit first 12 chapters are actually philosophical or rather not just philosophical, they are more of analytical, it’s not past time start from the 13th chapter Chaitanya Charita Amrit is actually setting the scene in a literary, philosophical and intellectual context of who is Chaitanya Mahaprabhu so the reasons for his descent are described how he is, the internal reasons the external reasons and then his position is described and 13th chapter is where he appears and in fact there is a beautiful verse where Chaitanya Charita Amrit says that Krishnaswami says that actually I offer obeisances not only to Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu I offer obeisances to the day on which Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu appeared because even that day is sacred now you may say how do you offer obeisances to a day do you put a calendar date and offer obeisances no, offer obeisances to the day means the idea of offering obeisances is that it’s sacred, it’s permeated in spiritual ecstasy so just as the lord may descend in space as a deity or the lord may descend in space as a temple, a temple is a place which becomes spiritualised by the presence of the lord so similarly the lord may descend in time and that descent in time is the holy day so Kaur Purnima, Ram Navami, Narasimha Chaturthashi, Janmashtami these are days which are sanctified because the lord has manifested on that day and then it describes the childhood pastimes and now when the lord descends so the first part, the surfacing, that’s what we’ll discuss in the Adi Leela whenever the lord descends his purpose is to ultimately attract people towards him in the Bhagavad Gita Krishna talks about the purpose of his descent in two parts, first he says is to establish dharma externally that’s 4.8 but next verse 4.9 he says ultimately the purpose of establishing dharma in the world is to establish prema in the heart ultimately this world, no matter how much order we establish, there will be disorder order, chaos, order, chaos that’s the things which go on in the world like that but next verse says so Krishna says that I descend to this world he descends for the purpose of attracting us towards him that when we hear his pastimes his activities, we get attracted to him and then we attain him so the purpose of establishing dharma in the world is to establish prema in the heart so how do we become attracted to someone, how do we develop love for someone, when that person is attractive and attraction doesn’t suddenly manifest out of the blue actually we all have certain conceptions of what is attractive and then we see something which is extraordinary within that conception it’s so beautiful if we have some taste for some attraction for beautiful natural scenery and then we go to a place where it’s exquisite this is astounding so people have a definition of beauty of attractiveness, a conception and when something within that is extraordinary they get captivated by it it’s like say if people are today very much badly in love with cricket in cricket you know what to expect how a batsman should be, how a bowler should be how a fielder should be and within that broad understanding of how cricket is played if somebody bats extremely well, then that person becomes extraordinarily popular but if a person is an extraordinary ice hockey player but nobody there knows what is ice hockey so then no matter how superlative that player may be, people will not be attracted to that player unless of course they become attracted to ice hockey and they turn towards that player the point I am making is we all have certain conceptions of attractiveness and when something extraordinarily attractive manifests in that conception we get captivated by that similarly when the lord descends to the world he demonstrates the contemporary definition of attractiveness to a superlative degree when the lord descends he demonstrates the contemporary conception of attractiveness to a superlative degree thus when the Kshatriya kings ruling the earth and that time the lord manifests as Ram Rama Shastra Bratama he is the foremost of the archers able to defeat demons whom nobody would face and thus he attracts people when he comes as Krishna similarly he is not just as the ages descends, see Ram is simply a very committed principled and skilled warrior but as the ages descend people become more and more manipulative so when Krishna descends Krishna is not just a great warrior but Krishna is also a great strategist great strategist so Krishna strategically brings down Jarasandha he doesn’t just go and attack him he uses Jarasandha to bring down all other armies all the various demons from the world he gets them in one place and one by one by one let Jarasandha go but Krishna is like a very efficient demon eliminator he sits at one place and let Jarasandha go Jarasandha attacks him Krishna destroys all the demons who have come all the demonic people have come to Jarasandha and Krishna lets Jarasandha go why? Jarasandha will go and collect other demonic people and again he will come and attack and again Krishna will let Jarasandha go so in this way sitting at one place Krishna eliminates all the demons from various places so Krishna is not just a great warrior Krishna is a great strategist but when Shaitanya Mahaprabhu descends the times have changed he comes in Navadvip and Navadvip although it is broadly at that time India was under Islamic rule but still within that also Navadvip was a place of scholarship so it was a place of great Vedic scholarship and so when Shaitanya Mahaprabhu descended at that time he manifests excellence within that definition of scholarship so he is when he is a small child he is just playful so mischievous, very similar to how Krishna is mischievous in his childhood and he just endears himself to people by his childishness and mischievousness but then as he grows he becomes like a prodigy he is just so brilliant that just at the age of 14 nowadays if somebody imagine that if somebody gets a I think the youngest PhD in the world is 16 or 17 or 17 years old or something if somebody gets a PhD at the age of 14 that’s outstanding we will suspect this is somebody with a honorary PhD this child get a PhD at the age of 14 but imagine if somebody at the age of 14 has already started their own educational institute see okay we have prodigies but nothing like that but Chaitanya Mahaprabhu was such a prodigy that he had not only mastered Sanskrit grammar and Sanskrit grammar is actually very difficult to master it says traditionally it takes almost 12 years to learn the rules of grammar itself to master them. Chaitanya Mahaprabhu it takes 12 years to master Chaitanya Mahaprabhu just by the age of 12 had not only mastered everything he soon got the blessings of his teacher and his teacher told him you don’t have to learn from me now you teach and by the age of 14 he had established himself as the most prominent scholar over there and he had his own teaching school Istola and there people from far and wide would come to learn from him and he would teach with such brilliance that there is there is scholarship that reveals the truth or that establishes the truth this is the truth and establishes the truth but there is scholarship which is such that whatever that scholar says people accept it as the truth Chaitanya Mahaprabhu was so brilliant that he could argue from one side and establish that as the truth and then he would argue from the opposite side and establish that as the truth and then he would argue again from the first side and say this is the truth and finally at the end who are we hearing him he says so what is the truth whatever you say is the truth so he was so brilliant that whichever side he would take he would just establish it and in that way he captivated people and then after that when he was just 14 there was this formidable scholar Keshav Kashmiri he had travelled across the world and he had this victory card so whichever scholar he would debate when they would be defeated he would ask them to write their name and sign it I have been defeated by Keshav Kashmiri and that was like some people in their homes have their wall filled with their trophies I won this trophy, this trophy, this trophy so this was like his trophy chart all these people whom I have defeated and when he came to came to Navadweep because Navadweep was a prominent centre of learning but all the scholars over there they said we can’t face him because it was said that he was blessed by Saraswati Devi and what to do if Saraswati Devi has blessed someone how can we how can we even debate them and they just became MIA missing in action just went away from there they went to some relatives place, this place, that place where Keshav Kashmiri came there there was nobody there and then he came to the he came to the banks of the Ganga to take a bath in Ganga and at that time Chaitanya Mahaprabhu was sitting over there with his students and when he saw Chaitanya Mahaprabhu shining like a bright moon among the star like assembly of his students, he was captivated he says who are you and Chaitanya Mahaprabhu at that time was a Nimaye Pandit so Nimaye Pandit he very respectfully said to him oh you are the famous Keshav Kashmiri, he says I am just a simple grammar teacher he says my name is Nimaye, oh you are the famous Nimaye Pandit and I have heard a lot about your scholarship some people are like itching for a fight and there is no one to fight then what to do so like Jagai and Madai they wanted to fight with someone and when they couldn’t fight with anyone, they started fighting with each other so so what happened, so now Keshav Kashmiri was looking for someone to fight with so then he thought Nimaye Pandit he was about to let us have a debate Nimaye Pandit preempted him, he says you are such a great scholar and we are sitting on the banks of Ganga so can you please speak some verses glorifying Ganga and then he just on the spur of the moment composed not one not two but hundred verses glorifying Ganga now for us to even memorise a verse, even if you recite it hundred times still it doesn’t get memorised imagine to compose hundred verses on the spur of the moment extraordinary scholarship just read that and Nimaye Pandit students were stunned just amazed and then Nimaye Pandit said your scholarship is so amazing there one Ganga was flowing and now here from your lips another Ganga is flowing and he was if you understand my glories he was very appreciative we are all grammar students so can you please review your grammar verses and tell us what are the strengths and the weaknesses of the verse you have composed now he was just floating in a cloud of ego and immediately said no weaknesses in my verses, they are perfect no no no, don’t say like that actually even in the compositions of great poets in the past Bharat, Rohari, Adan there are also weaknesses over there so please I will review it there are no weaknesses if you think there are weaknesses, you tell me what is the weakness and ok Chaitanya Mahaprabhu said let us consider the 63rd verse you have spoken and Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, Nimaye Pandit repeated the 63rd verse and he was taken aback I just recited all the hundred verses how could you recite the 63rd verse like that how could you remember it by the grace of Krishna, some people can recite hundred verses on the spur of the moment and by the grace of the same lord Krishna some people can remember hundred verses whenever they hear it so he was slowly raising his consciousness not your scholarship, it is Krishna’s mercy and then Chaitanya Mahaprabhu started analysing and he analysed there have been several technical faults he found but he said one word Bhavani Bhartu so Bhavani Bhava is the name of Shiva Bhavani is the wife of Shiva so Bhartu is the husband, so husband of the wife of Shiva what do you mean by this are you implying that Shiva’s wife is Anchis, that she has some other husband and he tried to speak and he just couldn’t speak couldn’t speak and then when Nimaya Pandit just baffled him completely the students started laughing Chaitanya Mahaprabhu immediately said don’t laugh don’t laugh Chaitanya Mahaprabhu wanted to remove his pride but he didn’t want to dishonour him there is a difference there is normal respect there is over respect and there is humiliation so some people they demand more respect than what is due and we may not give that respect but we don’t have to humiliate people ever Chaitanya Mahaprabhu was very even at that time he removed his pride but he did not remove his, he did not strip him of his honour he gave him a graceful way out, he said it’s been a long day today, it’s in the evening and just compose 100 verses, you must be tired go and take rest, study your books and tomorrow come back and we will discuss it so he gave him a graceful way out and the next morning, that night, Keshav Kashmiri he begged Saraswati Devi he said you had promised me that you will never that you will never let me down, that you will always appear on my tongue whenever I want to speak so I will never be defeated by anyone in this world so why, why he started crying, have I offended you in any way please tell me crying and agony Saraswati Devi came in his dream and told him that actually I told you that you will not be defeated by anyone in this world but the person who defeated you was not from this world he is the lord of my lord go and surrender to me and that’s what that’s what he did eventually and Keshav Kashmiri became a great Vaishnava after this the point of this story is that at that time, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu Nimai Padu was thought of to be okay, he is one boy among us he is a scholar among us but by this, he became like the foremost scholar and many people have this habit of congratulating themselves for things they haven’t done that means that means many people, they say that okay, if somebody else does some wonderful Rath Yatra programme or some wonderful Janmashtami festival oh, Janmashtami in our temple was so good okay, it was good but what did you do did you do any service over there so what happened similarly, the resident, the scholars of Nimai, scholars of Navdeep, they all came back and they said just see how great Navdeep is even a 14 year old boy from us defeated Keshav Kashmiri so they were congratulating themselves when they had done nothing but anyway this is what happened now after this then when Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, Nimai Pandit chose to become a devotee by the association of Ishwar Puri that activated people so much because many people used to think because of the influence of Advaitavad from before that actually for intelligent people, there is Gyan Marga and Bhakti is for the sentimental people but Chaitanya Mahaprabhu demonstrated that he was the top most scholar of his times and yet he chose the path of devotion and that’s how he was able to attract so many people he, when he became a devotee it was sensational because he was he was among the most well known persons in Navdeep at that time and when he started manifesting devotion it is like say if you go to a college and some student becomes a devotee, it’s wonderful but if some student who is the universal top person number one in that college becomes a devotee then they attract everyone oh why this person become a devotee something special in devotion so Chaitanya Mahaprabhu the way his devotion surfaced was that he that every culture has a trajectory to success say in Indian society the trajectory to success is when you go to IIT you go to IIM, you go to America or you go to the west and then you become successful so similarly at that time the trajectory to success was that you study, you become a scholar so Chaitanya Mahaprabhu followed the trajectory of success and then he gave up that success to do something else so if you by that way he just attracted everyone towards him sometimes when I go to university and I speak in India once a professor came and asked you were an engineer before you wasted one engineering, India lost one engineering seat because India lost one engineer because you became a sadhu I said India did not lose an engineer America lost an engineer I was on my way to go to America so most Indians they go and actually fuel the American economy not the Indian economy so much and I said I am trying to serve and preserve India’s spiritual culture and spiritual wisdom so the point is that in every culture there is a standard definition of success and if somebody who is successful within that definition, if that person gets attracted to Krishna the effect on people is much more than if anybody else gets attracted so when Chaitanya Mahaprabhu followed this Chaitanya Mahaprabhu would have manifested devotion right from the beginning but he did not do that of course there are some glimpses that when he would cry he would become pacified only when he would hear the holy names but he did not manifest his devotion right from the beginning because then people would say you are just a devotee, you are sentimental he became a great scholar the greatest scholar of his time in his place and then he manifested his devotion he just captivated everyone by that that is the surfacing of devotion this is in one way the cloud has to shower rains but people everybody knows that I want water and they will take the water but in the case of bhakti it is nectar but people don’t understand that it is nectar people don’t think that they need it so then what do we have to do see for us we not only have to provide water to people we have to create thirst in people actually not create thirst it is more that we have to remind people they are thirsty when you say you are thirsty how can you forget it no people don’t forget their thirst but they misdirect their thirst now there is so much entertainment, so much distraction so much addiction so the thirst of the heart is for Krishna but instead of searching for Krishna people are searching for hundred other things, million other things people love to surf on the net, play this video game, watch this site go to this, watch this movie now whatever people are surfing for ultimately they are surfing for Krishna, they just don’t know it so for us we have to create the thirst or remind people that they have this thirst and then when you give them water they will appreciate it that’s why Shri Prabhupada when he was sharing Krishna Bhakti in India the idea of great religious teacher or great religious organisation or somebody respectable was we should have big temples so in India Prabhupada focused on building big temples where people would come to see the temple and then they would be attracted to Krishna and they would take Krishna Bhakti seriously so that’s the which Adan Mahaprabhu manifested his devotion that is the first part, surfacing then we have sharing and the second part is in the Madhya Leela the Madhya Leela has a very interesting literary structure because Krishna was very old and he was not sure whether he would live on or not so till the end, so first he describes in summary all the past times in Madhya Leela and then he starts describing further so now Chaitanya Mahaprabhu did not just manifest his devotion by the end of Adi Leela Chaitanya Mahaprabhu has also taken sannyas so why sannyas so that he would have that position of respect in that society by which people would hear him seriously we don’t want respect for ourselves but we do need respect so that Krishna’s message will be respected Chaitanya Mahaprabhu took sannyas and he went so far that he actually took sannyas from the Advaita Sampradaya because that was what was respected at that time, he did not become Advaitavadi but he took sannyas from that Sampradaya so that he would have that respect and then when he travelled around sharing Krishna Bhakti probably he had several majestic confrontations so here we see that Chaitanya Mahaprabhu goes on his way to Vrindavan now the devotees they tell him so Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is in Mayapur then he goes to Puri because his mother in Vrindavan is so far away I will never get to hear about this, goes to Puri and from Puri he wants to go to Vrindavan for almost a year there is this loving tension between aspiration and affection there is individual aspiration personal aspiration of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s heart is I want to go to Vrindavan and there is a social expectation, affection of the devotees oh please stay here we don’t want you to go away and they say oh now it is Rathyagraha oh now it is Holi, now it is this now it is Janmashtami, now it is Kartik now it is this and they just keep delaying Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s going and Chaitanya Mahaprabhu cannot desist, cannot say no to them so finally after a whole year goes by again the same festival comes and Chaitanya Mahaprabhu says you never let me go, now I am going and then he starts off he accommodates his devotees by saying I will take one assistant with me and then on his way to Vrindavan at that time, so this is the Lord’s attempt to go to Vrindavan chapter so actually there are three chapters over there the Lord’s attempt to Vrindavan chapter 16 chapter 17 is the Lord travels to Vrindavan and chapter 18 is the Lord’s pastimes in Vrindavan so now Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is Radharani, is Krishna in the mood of Radharani so longing to be in Vrindavan constantly and finally when he is on his way to Vrindavan, what does he do? this is actually Chaitanya Mahaprabhu has two main preaching tours one to North India and one to South India so his South India tour is already over there he has flooded South India with love for Krishna and now his Vrindavan tour is also his preaching tour and while he is preaching, what does he do? he just wherever he goes he just floods people with ecstasy Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is like a he is like a live wire filled with the electric current of bhakti anybody who comes in contact with him they get completely captivated just get completely mesmerised and as Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is going to the forest of Jharikhand what happens over there? he is so much ecstasy ecstasy of Krishna love for Krishna is like a current and there are normal there are normal material laws but Krishna bhakti is transcendental it can transcend material laws Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is dancing in ecstasy and he is so much filled with love for Krishna that he desires that everybody should have love for Krishna sometimes people nowadays say that why do you preach to others? actually you have your belief you do your practises, don’t impose it on others see it’s not a matter of imposition it’s a matter of sharing Prabhupada gives the example that if somebody has been very sick with a disease for a long time and then finally they have found a cure that works and that cure is they feel so much relief by that cure and then they see others who are sick by the same disease they naturally want to share the cure with others so our purpose is not just to increase the numbers of the particular organisation our purpose is to raise people’s consciousness cure people of the petty desires that drag their consciousness down into distress and delusion so this desire in Prabhupada was infectious anybody who felt I should also love Krishna so Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s desire was so intense that normally wherever he would travel he would just radiate Krishna Bhakti to others but he was going through this forest and there was such a surge of ecstasy and there was no one to give Krishna Bhakti to because it was uninhabited forest now the word uninhabited is itself a very anthropocentric word it’s a very human centric word when we say uninhabited it just means there are no humans living there are so many other living beings which are there so Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is like at that time he was in such ecstasy he wanted to share the ecstasy with someone so there were no human beings the only creatures around there were animals and those animals when Chaitanya Mahaprabhu started singing and dancing in kirtans, there were lions and there were tigers and there were deer and there were elephants and they all started dancing in ecstasy and not only that not only was this extraordinary but even the animals they gave up their natural animosity the tigers and the deer started hugging each other now how does that happen? miracles are not against science they are above science they are above science what happens over here? somebody if they ask how could Krishna have lifted Govardhan Hill if the hill is so big even if Krishna is lifting on one finger how did he find the centre of gravity to put his finger on so that he could balance Govardhan Krishna doesn’t have to find the centre of gravity because he is the source of gravity so similarly Chaitanya Mahaprabhu he is present and super soon in the hearts of everyone so normally animals can’t perceive or relish spirituality but even in the animal body there is a soul who is just like us and normally the body and the mind obscure the spirituality of the soul but when the lord is present these normal obstacles he can remove and directly invoke the spirituality from anyone so as all these animals started dancing in ecstasy Chaitanya Mahaprabhu he was tired nowhere has it been seen like this animals lions and tigers and deers hugging each other and the deer having no fear of the tiger and the tiger having no desire to eat the tiger both of them are dancing in ecstasy so what happens by the power of spiritual ecstasy everything bodily gets forgotten everything bodily gets transcended so at a bodily level yes the tiger and deer are antagonists but at a spiritual level they are all souls who are partners relishing the ecstasy of Krishna Bhakti so the real miracle that Chaitanya Mahaprabhu did was not just that he made animals dance was that actually he demonstrated the universality of devotion and that is the potency which is available even today see miracles are extraordinary occurrences that are not repeatable but the point of the miracle is not to standardise the extraordinary but it is to strengthen our faith in the ordinary there is no point in arguing, did this really happen, what is the evidence that this happened and why is it not happening now if we chant Hare Krishna is it that a deer will start dancing and a deer will start hugging a tiger no, it may not happen the point of miracles is not to standardise the extraordinary it is to strengthen our faith in the ordinary that, strengthen our faith in the ordinary that if Chaitanya Mahaprabhu could give such ecstasy to people to even to animals then we are in human bodies even if we have animal consciousness still we are in human bodies surely the lord can enrich our hearts with devotion and that faith we can get by seeing Chaitanya Mahaprabhu extraordinary potency in sharing Krishna Bhakti so the whole of the Madhya Nila is large centred on sharing it goes to North India it goes to South India and he describes the Bhaktivata Thakura has written the Gauranga Shatana hundred names of Gauranga Mahaprabhu wherever he went he has delivered people and then first 24 years is his Adi Nila is his Adi Nila he manifested his scholarship at the age of 14 especially it was championship driven soon after that he manifested his devotion at 24 he took sanyas 24-30 he travelled and 30-48 for the next 18 years he stayed and that brings us to the stage of savouring so what was the first? surfacing second was sharing third is savouring savouring means just to sometimes we have some delicious sweet rice we are taking it and then we may be having prasad we are talking with someone but then the sweet rice is so delicious we say lets not talk now lets close our eyes savouring means no distraction I just want to experience this fully so like that undistracted absorption in remembrance of Krishna that is what Jagannath manifests in Jagannath Puri so savouring is where he is still preaching but how is he preaching? by entering not into the hearts of new people but entering into the hearts of the devotees all the Goswamis come to meet him over there, various other devotees they are there and they get inspiration from him the 6 fold loving exchanges between him and the Goswamis that make him his dedicated followers and then they all go and spread Krishna Bhakti across but he is there he is savouring so there are many ways in which he savours but the most dramatic incident in the Antya Leela is Chaitanya Mahaprabhu dancing in front of Jagannath in Jagannath’s Yatra so he was Jagantopi Vismita everybody was astounded by seeing how Chaitanya Mahaprabhu danced in ecstasy see dancing is itself an expression of exuberance that when we dance it is an expression of exuberance if somebody can dance beautifully it is very attractive and the Lord is the most attractive person and he is filled with the most attractive emotion pure love for Krishna when he dances he is captive in everyone there are many miracles over there that he manifested multiple forms, there were multiple Shankirtan parties and all of them Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu manifested over there so now in his ecstasy I conclude with this point his ecstasy manifested at multiple levels and what is that I will talk about perception transportation and transformation so what does it mean when we talk about ecstasy what do we actually mean by it and what is this whole idea of alternate reality or spiritual reality see we are souls who are situated in physical bodies right now so there are broadly four states of consciousness there is Swapna the soul is here around the soul there is a subtle body then there is a gross body so when the soul’s consciousness comes up to the subtle body but not into the gross body that is the state of Swapna when the soul’s consciousness comes from the subtle body to the gross body and outwards that is Jagruti that is the state in which we are hopefully sleeping and then there is Sushupti means the consciousness doesn’t come even in the subtle body just stays in a very deep dreamless sleep and beyond that there is Samadhi Samadhi is where the consciousness goes directly towards the spiritual so Chaitanya Mahaprabhu was in that Samadhi stage where he was completely absorbed in Krishna so sometimes you just be walking along normally and while walking along normally suddenly we are talking with someone and suddenly the devotee is disappeared he says run and he saw Krishna behind that tree and he disappeared so what has happened he is with us but he is not with us so it is perception he suddenly sees something extraordinary which we can’t see so his consciousness is going at another level that is perception another is transportation sometimes Chaitanya Mahaprabhu would just faint in ecstasy and then when devotees would chant loudly and they would finally come out of consciousness and say why did you chant so loudly why did you disturb me I was in Vrindavan and Radha and Krishna were performing beautiful pastimes I was observing those pastimes and why didn’t you interrupt me so he would not only get there is a transportation and the third is transformation transformation means what he would experience at the spiritual level would transform his body to his physical level sometimes Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s whole body would withdraw into himself and sometimes his whole body would expand so that his limbs would become much much bigger so the idea was that when Chaitanya Mahaprabhu was experiencing Krishna’s presence was hugging Krishna so his whole body was contracting I want to experience Krishna with my whole body but when you feel Krishna is going away from him his limbs would elongate Krishna please don’t go please be with me and he is stretching his limbs so that he would experience Krishna so especially the Anta Leela gives us very vivid descriptions of the reality of spirituality and how Chaitanya Mahaprabhu experienced extraordinary ecstasy and how that ecstasy is what he has come to gift all of us with so by practising bhakti in our own way and Prabhupada when he is describing commentaries to these ecstatic emotion Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is experiencing in remembrance of Krishna Prabhupada says the way to enter Radha Krishna Leela is by spreading the glories of Krishna all over the world so we don’t demand the right to ecstasy we take the responsibility for service so by that if we think why I am not feeling ecstatic why I am not feeling ecstatic that is not a mood of devotion ecstasy will come on its own but if we take up the responsibility for serving that’s what Srila Prabhupada did although he is old to fulfil the prophecy Chaitanya Mahaprabhu travelled across the world Prabhupada did not say oh this is Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s prophecy he will fulfil it he is God no he took Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s prophecy as his responsibility and by that he was able to attract people to millions and millions of people all over the world so Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s mercy manifested 500 years ago but it is available even now through Srila Prabhupada and through his followers through his legacy that is there with all of us so we can all pray to Chaitanya Mahaprabhu today that we all that devotion surface in our heart that we share devotion and then we savour devotion following in the illustrious example that he has demonstrated Sri Gauranga Mahaprabhu ki Sri Gaurapurnima Mahamahotsav ki Sri Prabhupada ki Gaurapatman ki Gaur Premanand