Lord Balarama is the best friend of Krishna – Chaitanya Charan

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
a friend is one who sticks with us through thick and thin a friend is one who we can share good and bad news with one who understands our heart and third is a friend is one who does for us what we can’t do for ourselves so Krishna and Balaram are actually God themselves in two separate forms the bhakti tradition reveals God to be not just one majestic person residing on top accepting worship and subordination from everyone else it describes that God is a person who enjoys the rich spectrum of relationships that we aspire to enjoy in life and that means that he arranges in his leela in his playful pastimes to have different people play different roles so there are devotees who may become his mother who may become his father there are devotees who may become his friends now in some of these relationships there are devotees who play very close roles for him and in some of these it is he himself who expands to play a particular role now when there is this expansion at that time this Krishna is God, Balaram is also God and yet although they are one person they are two personalities and each of, both of them have their own personality by which they interact with each other and Krishna’s personality charms Balaram and Balaram’s personality charms Krishna so if you look at the life of Krishna overall we can see what are the significant changes the dramatic points that happen in his life if we look at our own lives also, if we look at the past the past is not just like a flat territory that extends for years upon years till as long as we can remember the past is more like a territory that is filled with peaks and then flat that means we don’t remember everything about the past we remember certain incidents from the past when something significantly special, significantly different from the normal and usually that is the time when the people around us count the most if you are riding on a straight road then we can just go on our own but if we come to an intersection, should I go this way or that way then a true friend is one who tells us, ok go this way they show the right way for us so similarly if we look at the life of Krishna there are broadly three places where Krishna lived which are those three places does anyone know sorry yeah of course he knows but during his descended past times in this world Vrindavan, Mathura and then Dwaraka now if you look at the 10th canto of the Srimad Bhagavatam there are 90 chapters and this describes Krishna Leela in this the first 40 chapters describe Krishna’s presence in Vrindavan the next 10 chapters describe his presence in Dwaraka in Mathura and from the 50th chapter onwards it is describing Krishna’s base in Dwaraka although Krishna travels to various places and does various things so not much happens in Dwaraka but he is based in Dwaraka and from there he is ruling the world now actually speaking in all these three places there are only two people who are with Krishna in all three places sometimes we have friends, some friends are maybe 1 year old, some friends are 10 years old, some friends are 20 years old sometimes we meet somebody and then somebody, a third person say maybe these two people don’t know each other and they introduce, you know this person say oh we know each other, we go back a long time so Krishna and Balaram go back a long time practically to the birth and so it is who are the two characters who are with Krishna two people who are with Krishna throughout in Vrindavan, Mathura and Dwaraka who are they? Balaram is of course one and the other is Subhadra is not there in Vrindavan she is not manifest Uddhav is very close to the mood of Vrindavan and he is among the Dwarkavasis who understands Vraja Bhavam the most however Uddhava is not in Vrindavan, during Krishna’s Vrindavan pastimes Rohini, yes who said yeah thank you so Rohini is there with Krishna in all these three places however Rohini is again not there with Krishna when he travels, say for example Krishna goes to Gurukul and staying in the Gurukul at that time Rohini is not there at that time who is there with him? only Balaram so Krishna and Balaram right throughout they are there together and just if you know somebody for a long time and if that relationship itself goes on for a long time then that indicates there must be a certain level of proximity, not just proximity but even intimacy otherwise relationships are remarkably difficult to sustain so now Krishna and Balaram right from their childhood although technically Balaram is older than Krishna but in their upbringing they are almost together they are named together, they play together Krishna respects Balaram because he is the is the brother who is older in age to him but they are always together and mother Yashoda she also respects Balaram as the older brother that is why whenever Krishna goes out to the forest mother Yashoda is initially very anxious how you know Krishna my little boy, so many demons have been attacking him how will he be safe in the forest but then Nanda Maharaj says Balaram will be there if Balaram is there then we will take care so Yashoda, although Balaram is not her son, Balaram is nobody’s son but she feels Krishna is very naughty very restless but Balaram is mature so Balaram will take care of Krishna now Krishna shares the deepest secrets of his heart with Balaram