If our life is devoted to the service of Krishna, what’s wrong with praying for bodily protection?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
What is wrong with offering prayers for bodily protection, if we are using our body in the service of Krishna? No, there is nothing wrong, per se.
The point is not so much of wrong or it is a matter of more of focus. What is it that we are focusing on in our consciousness? So, we see that Kunti, that Draupadi offers prayers when she is about to be disrobed. We see that when the Brahmastra is charging toward Arjuna, at that time Arjuna offers prayers in the Bhagavatam.
And his prayers are primarily for understanding what is happening. So once he understands what is happening, what is this weapon? Why is it coming like this upon me? What should I do about it? So his prayer is not that blunt, but it’s profound, it’s permeated with philosophy about the Lord’s supreme position and about the nature of material existence. But essentially that is the context in which he is offering that prayer.
So, the key thing is, there are different levels of connecting with the Lord and we have to make sure that we don’t become habituated to connecting at the lowest level. The lowest level where we think of the Lord only when we have to, only when we have to, when we need something from him for our sake. So we could have self-centered devotion, we can have God-centered devotion and we can have something to the intersection of the two.
So at this stage, it is fine for us if we offer prayers in which we are seeking the help of the Lord by which we can become purified and elevated, by which we can serve him better. We can also check whether that is the only kind of prayer we are offering. Are we also doing our sadhana and offering prayers for seeking pure devotion? Then occasionally offering prayers for bodily protection, ours or those of our loved ones.
We have to see that there are precedents in our tradition for that. At the same time, there is some amount of de-emphasize, de-emphasis of that because that may become the standard way in which we start operating and then we never pray for pure devotion. It is often easy to settle for the lowest common denominator and we don’t want that to happen.
That’s why a certain amount of caution is advised when we offer prayers to the Lord that we don’t simply offer prayers that are mundane, but that we offer prayers that are spiritual in their consciousness. And in times of danger, if you offer prayer for bodily protection, we shouldn’t consider that as any deficiency in devotion. And we can try to basically make sure that we have consistent focus on Krishna during our overall life and during that consistent focus on Krishna.
When Krishna is the purpose of our life, then protecting that life is also a way in which we can serve to Him. So we say that we need to be cautious that we don’t become habituated to self-centered devotion and we want to go toward God-centered devotion and sometimes prayers for the self, if our life is centered on God, then they are not considered self-centered prayers. It’s more important that we pray rather than worry too much about how we are praying.
Because if we get too caught in that part, then we may end up never praying at all. We have to develop a relationship with Krishna and we have to become devotees before we can become pure devotees. And that’s why anything that connects our heart with Krishna is good.
If something is burdening our heart, then talking to Krishna through prayer about it can link, bring our heart closer to His heart, make us feel closer to Him. So in that context, such prayers are fine, but they are not to be the only or the major prayers. They can be periodic or occasional contextual prayers.
Thank you.