Pada-sevanam – Bhakti is a relationship of ecstatic inequality

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Jai! So, as I mentioned at the end of the drama, we are discussing about the nine processes of devotion service. And the drama was like a prelude to the class in the future weeks. In the future, we will be discussing about Sathya Nidhi.
Today, I will be discussing about Pada Sevanam. The word Pada Sevanam, in Sanskrit, we can do the Sanjivigraha. The splitting of the word.
It’s a compound word. Pada and Sevanam. So, we can split it in two ways.
And depending on the way it is split, we will have it in two classes. So, Pada Sevanam can mean serving the feet. And it can mean serving with the feet.
So, serving with the feet means Padau Harikshetra Padaanusarpani. In the ninth canto of Srimad Bhagavatam, where it is described how Ambrish Maharaj performed devotional service. So, it is said that Padau, with his feet, what did he do? Harikshetra Padaanusarpani.
He went to the various places of Lord Hari. So, Pada Sevanam, in that sentence, can mean going on pilgrimage. Or doing Dhama Seva.
So, we have my Godbrother and friend Baladev Prabhu, who is a Dham Specialist. He will be speaking next week on that aspect of Pada Sevanam. Of Dhama Seva.
Today, I will be speaking on Pada Sevanam in terms of serving the feet. So, the process of Bhakti is very special. In the sense that people normally think of love.
Normally we think of love as the romantic love that is talked about in movies or in novels. First of all, Bhakti tells us that emotions, which are normally thought of as obstacles in the spiritual path. Normally, people think if you become too emotional, if you become too sentimental, then you will get caught up in material things.
And even what is called material things? Even materially, if people become too emotional, then they can’t think clearly. In cricket matches, or in any sports for that matter. If a person becomes too passionate, if a person becomes too emotional, then they have a rush of blood.
And that person will be in a rash shot and gets out. Or steals something abusively. And then in football, they have red card.
In cricket, they have various ways in which the action can be taken. So, the basic point is that emotions are often thought of as obstacles for rational behaviour. And at the same time, this is happening not only in material life, but also in spiritual life.
In spiritual life, the general conception is be detached, be calm, be dispassionate. Now that is true at one level. But the process of Bhakti Yoga says that emotions don’t have to be obstacles to spiritual perception.
Far from being roadblocks to spiritual perception, emotions themselves can be the roadways to spiritual perception. The same way which emotions, which normally can be thought of as roadblocks, as obstacles. They can actually become the roadways, the pathways.
How is that? Because, let’s consider, say here there is a flower. Now I can, as a gardener, say there is one flower if I take. This flower can be approached from an analytical perspective or from an aesthetic perspective.
Now if I approach it from an analytical perspective, I will have the vision of a botanist. I will say, okay, this is a flower of a particular plant. And there is so many annotations, so many gynes.
This is the stalk. These are the sperm. These are the ways in which the pollination will take place.
So now this is a vision which is useful. But with such a vision, I cannot appreciate the artistry of the flower. If I am looking at the andrushyam and the gynushyam, then I am not looking at the colour composition and the shape and the fragrance and the artistry of it all.
So there is an analytical way of looking at things and that has its utility. But as contrasted with analytics, there is aesthetics. And aesthetics, it is not that there is no analysis, but the primary focus in athletics is to gain emotional proximity.
To gain comprehension through emotion. The more we can have emotional connect to the subject, the better we can appreciate it. So the Supreme Lord, on other paths, like the path of jnana or the path of yoga, is approached through the rejection of material emotions.
Which is important. Patanjali in the Yoga Sutra says, Yoga is chitta vritti nirodha. So he says, what is yoga? Chitta vritti, the movement of consciousness, nirodha, stop it.
So he says, stop all emotions and then one can approach the absolute truth. The bhakti path says, yes, that is okay, but there is only one part of it. The more important part of it is, activate one’s spiritual emotions.
And once the spiritual emotions are activated, then they not only show us the way, but they take us along the way. The emotions not only enable us to perceive the Lord, but emotions propel us along the way to the Lord. It’s like, if there is an engine, if there is a vehicle.
Now the vehicle has an engine and the vehicle has fuel. So the fuel propels the vehicle along. And the person who is travelling in that vehicle, that person gets to move along comfortably through the vehicle.
But at the same time that person does not have to expend any energy. Because the vehicle itself moves along. So similarly, in the process of bhakti, emotion is the vehicle as well as the fuel for the spiritual journey.
It shows us the way, it helps us move comfortably along the way. At the same time, it also enables us to get the energy to work. That means in the path of bhakti, the stronger our emotions become in relationship with Krishna, the sweeter and swifter becomes the progress on the path of bhakti.
Now, when we talk about emotions. So the first point which I made is that emotions are the means to progress on the path of bhakti. They are not obstacles, they are not roadblocks, but roadways.
But the second important point is, emotions have to be refined. Emotions need to be refined. It’s like in any field, sometimes people say just express yourself.
Nowadays, whatever is in your heart, express yourself. So people think bhakti also means just express whatever is in your heart. Now, yes, we want self-expression, which is true, we are at our core souls.
And as souls, we want to express our core self. But suppose a person wants to play some musical instrument, somebody wants to play a harmonium. And then that person has never practised harmonium, never seen anyone practise harmonium, and just comes and starts playing.
Yes, that will be self-expression. But that will be the expression of the worst self, not the best self. So even in ordinary people, when we talk about self-expression, there has to be training before that.
So a person who is going to play a harmonium. Now, what is training essentially? Training essentially means nourishing the right actions and suppressing the wrong actions. Now, if a person plays harmonium and plays the wrong key, then, oh, prove this.
We played the right key? No, please play this one. So essentially, there is nourishing the right and rejecting the wrong. That is what training is all about.
So similarly, in the process of bhakti, when we say we have to develop love for Krishna, the love is not something that just happens. Because of the excessive glamorisation of mundane romance in today’s world, often people have the idea of love at first sight. Now, yes, something may happen at first sight.
You may say, oh, when I touch someone, I feel electric current going through my body. Now, you may say that’s love at first sight, but actually, whether it is love or not, the important point is, if there is going to be a committed relationship, that will depend not on whether there was love at first sight or not, but it depends on what the people do after many sights. That is what is going to determine the relationship.
So quite often what happens at first sight is infatuation. And that sort of infatuation, whether it will sustain or not, that will be. So in any relationship, for it to be sustainable, there is emotions are not just something that happen.
Emotions are also something that can be made to happen. Made to happen means, not that we unnaturally force ourselves, but that there is a way by which emotions can be expressed and nourished. So just as in any relationship, there may be some initial attraction during infatuation or which may be the basis of a sustainable attraction, but there has to be a commitment.
And commitment essentially means that there is the subordination of the inappropriate emotions and there is the expression and the nourishment of the appropriate emotions. So similarly, in the process of bhakti, when we say that we want to become devoted to Krishna, devotion to Krishna may be something which we may feel when we first come to the temple and hear a kirtan or take darshan, we may feel some attraction to Krishna. And we feel that that’s wonderful.
But along with that, there is a process, central commitment, by which the relationship develops. By which the appropriate emotions in relationship with Krishna become stronger and sweeter. And this process, which is called as the process of bhakti yoga.
Now yoga often is equated with certain postures. So India recently celebrated, pioneered the celebration of the world yoga day. So actually there are two main conceptions or misconceptions.
Now there is either physical posturing, that means yoga means sitting in physical poses. And that’s what’s the predominant conception in the Western world. That people equate yoga as exercises for trimming the body.
Now in India, yoga, when this world yoga day was being celebrated, there was not so much physical posturing as there was political posturing. Political posturing means one group of people wanted to prove that India’s glory of yoga, the international acceptance of yoga proves the glory of India’s ethnic culture. And another group said we are secular country and we should not promote one particular religious group’s rituals as a national symbol.
So in both ways, when yoga is thought of simply as physical posturing, then there is misidentification with the world. Whereas when yoga is associated with political posturing, then there is misidentification with the greater national body, that is the nation. But the essence of yoga, as I said is yoga’s chitta vritti nirodha.
All the movements of consciousness, which are our conditioned consciousness, identify to negative extremes. It may be nationality or it may be our body. And the purpose of yoga is to take us beyond all such misidentifications.
Towards our spiritual essence and towards our souls. So yoga essentially, if you look at the word, there are several meanings of the word. But if you look at the original meaning of the dictionary, one of the central meanings is yoga means connection.
And bhakti yoga means establishing connection through devotion. So connection of what? Yoga is meant to connect the soul with the super soul. The jiva with the jagdish.
The manava with the manhava. So as was described very beautifully in the Sudama Krishna drama. So embrace of Sudama and Krishna, that is the visual representation of the essence of bhakti yoga.
That the devotee and the lord become united in love. Now in bhakti yoga, how does this union, how does this connection of love become established? There are various activities. And Prahlad Maharaj, in the 7th canto of Srimad Bhagavatam, divides these activities into nine.
And those activities which are described in Srimad Bhagavatam, were subsequently analysed and elaborated by Shri Rupa Goswami in Bhakti Rasamrithi. And he explains that for each of these activities, shravanam kirtanam vishnasmaranam padasevanam The fifth that he mentions in the list is padasevanam. So in that, he gives examples for each of these activities.
Now for shravanam, who is the example? Parikshit Maharaj. Shravanam kirtanam is Shri Rupa Goswami. Now there are many people who have done shravanam, there are many people who have done kirtanam.
But there are certain devotees who have done it in a similarly extraordinary way. And they represent, they are certainly the exemplars, the outstanding examples of that level of efficiency. Shravanam kirtanam vishnasmaranam padasevanam.
So smaranam is Prahlad Maharaj. So Prahlad Maharaj, when he was selected and when he was challenged, he just did not try to defend himself, just focused on remembering the Lord. And the Lord came to defend him, to protect him in all times.
And then we have, what is it, padasevanam. So who is the representation of padasevanam? Lakshmi Devi. Now in the standard depictions of Lakshmi Narayan, that is Lord Narayan is lying down in Ananta Shesha and Lakshmi Devi is massaging his feet.
So this imagery is having transcendental significance. And people sometimes try to reduce everything down to the material level. And when we try to reduce the transcendental down to the material level, then we often come up with various misunderstandings.
That means that it is not when Lakshmi Devi is serving Lord Narayan. What it represents is not necessarily a prototype of the male-female relationship in this world. It represents a transcendental relationship between the Lord and his devotee.
Lakshmi Devi is, as the name indicates, the Goddess of Fortune. And normally speaking, say, massaging someone’s feet, that is considered to be a menial service. So the same Lakshmi Devi, who is the reservoir of all fortune, she is the Goddess of all fortune, and she herself is the recipient of worship.
Lakshmi Puja is one of the biggest worships that happen. And why is that Goddess, who is herself the recipient of worship, who is the possessor of great opulence, not just great opulence, all opulence, all Lakshmi, all opulence comes from her, why is she serving the Lord? And not only is she serving the Lord, serving in such a menial thing where she is massaging Lord’s feet. That is because there is a relationship of transcendental affection between them.
Lakshmi Devi is not just at the feet of the Lord. On the Lord’s chest, Sri Vatsa, Sri Vatsa is a strip of hair on his chest, and that is Lakshmi Devi. So Lakshmi Devi is also on his chest, and that big on his chest represents that she is always there in his heart.
And of course, Lakshmi Devi is, there are other poses of the Lord, where Lakshmi Devi and Lord Narayan are sitting on throne together next to each other. But this particular depiction of Lakshmi Narayan indicates that no matter how much opulence we have in this world, still the greatest opulence is to serve the Lord our God. And Lakshmi Devi, although she has greater opulence than anyone can have in this world, still she is seeking the supreme opulence of loving service to her Lord.
So now in the Bhagavatam, in the third canto, where the description of the spiritual world is given. So there it is said that Lakshmi Devi, she herself cleans the palaces in Vaikuntha. Now, first of all, there are several paradoxes here.
In Vaikuntha, there is no air pollution to cause any dirt to come from here. So first of all, there is no dirt. Secondly, even if some dirt might be there, there are many other maidservants who can clean.
But still Lakshmi Devi herself cleans because for her, service to the Lord is so delicious. And she wants to taste the sweetness of service and she wants to relish that service and she wants to attract the Lord through that spirit of service. Now, this might seem that Krishna is always the recipient of service and the devotees are serving him all the time.
This is, in general, in material life, people say that we have a relationship, we should always have equality. If there is no equality, then one person will become the dominator of the other person. And therefore, there should be equal sharing of power or whatever in various relationships.
They say that if there is an inequality of power, then there can always be exploitation. Bhakti is the relationship of ecstatic inequality. Inequality means that the devotee never thinks that I am equal to the Lord.
At the end of the Sudama story, as Sudama spoke in English, the Sanskrit shloka I will just say this, क्वाहं दरिद्रपापिध्यां क्वाः क्रिष्णश्रिनिकेतनं ब्रह्मबंदोईतिस्माहं पाहुः ध्यां परिरंबिताः So, Sudama’s phrase after healing Dwaraka, leaving Krishna’s palace and going back to his home and he is thinking, क्वाहं दरिद्रपापिध्यां, he says, where am I? I am a dharidra, I am a poor person. Sudama is so humble that he is not thinking that my poverty is something. Brahmanas are not just poor because they can’t earn.
That is one kind of poverty where a person doesn’t have the capacity, the intelligence or just doesn’t want to work hard. So, there are some welfare countries in the world where people don’t work and the government provides for them. So, they are poor so that they can get free money from the government.
So, the brahmanas, they are poor not because they can’t earn but because they don’t want to waste their time in earning. They want to focus on higher spiritual pursuits and they want to cultivate spiritual knowledge and share spiritual knowledge. That’s why they are poor.
But Sudama is thinking, he is not thinking like I am a brahmana. He says, he is in a humble position and he is saying that I am poor because I am a sinner. So, because I was sinful in the past, so as a reaction to that my sinfulness, I have got poverty.
Now somebody says, you know what, you are a brahmana and for a brahmana to live simply is an opulence. It’s a voluntary choice, an austerity. He says, no.
He says, I am not even a brahmana. He says, I am a brahmana. I was born in a brahmana family but I don’t have any brahminical qualities.
Actually speaking, Sudama represents the summit of a brahmana. There are different kinds of brahmana but a brahmana who is devoted to the Supreme Lord, that is the topmost brahmana. And such is the kind of brahmana that is Sudama.
And yet, what does he say? He says, Brahmapandita is small. So, he gives three disqualifications of himself. I am poor, I am sinful and I am just a relative of Brahma, not even a real Brahma.
And in contrast, what does he say? Where is Krishna? Who is Shri Niketana? Who is the Lord of the Goddess of Fortune? And yet, what did he do? With his own arms, he embraced me. So, the devotee, when I said bhakti is a relationship of ecstatic inequality, what it means is that the devotee, more the devotees become aware of their smallness and the more they become aware of Krishna’s greatness and the greater is the ecstasy that comes from the love. Even in material life, when people talk about love, we talk about falling in love.
So, we talk about rising in love. What is the idea? When there is falling in love, that means the person becomes so captivated by the other person that the person is lost in the other person. That’s a falling.
So, the point is, that lack of self-consciousness, that not worrying about how big I am, how great I am, just becoming absorbed in one’s object of love, that is a characteristic of bhakti. That is a characteristic of love in any relationship. And of course, in most material relationships, when we get captivated by someone, it is quite often not that person, but our imagination of that person that captivates us.
And this is not a defect with that person necessarily. It is just that our heart longs for love and the perfect object for love is Krishna. So, we are looking in this world for substitutes for Krishna.
And no one can be a substitute. No one can be a substitute for Krishna. And that’s why the relationships in this world, for them to be sustainable, there has to be that initial phase where there is all the fantastic imagination of the mind.
When that weaves off, what remains after that, that will determine how sustainable the relationship is. But in the case of Krishna, the more we understand him, the more we go closer to him, the more our understanding of his glory increases. The more his glory becomes revealed to us.
How is that? Just like if a person is in complete darkness, say it’s night, and then suddenly the sun starts rising. So, initially there is dawn and then sometimes if you are early in the morning, in Brahma Murthu we are chanting, say we are walking outside and chanting, it’s dark all around and then suddenly we look, oh, it’s light now, it’s twilight now. And then we keep chanting and then we say, oh, it’s now morning.
So, now the rising of the sun is gradual. But our awareness that the sun has risen, that day has manifested, that is abrupt, it happens at certain moments. So, like that, as the sun rises more and more, we understand how much light it is, how much light comes from it.
Initially when there is complete darkness, light is twilight, that’s impressive. But as the sun rises more and more and more, then the light itself becomes more and more and more. And then we are impressed, oh, so much light coming through this one object.
In the Bhagavad Gita, in 15th chapter, 12th verse, Krishna says, One sun illuminates the whole of the sky. And that effulgence, Krishna says, comes from you. So, just as the more the sun rises, the more we become aware of the sun’s presence, the more our appreciation of the sun’s splendour increases.
Similarly, the more we go closer to Krishna through Bhakti, the more our awareness of Krishna’s greatness increases. Maharaj says in one lecture, we are all fallen. And if we don’t think we are fallen, then we are really fallen.
What that means is, suppose a person is a little intoxicated, then there is a little intoxication, person has come out of the bar and says, maybe I should not drive, I’ll look for some friend who can drop me home now. And there are big cases of driving under intoxication. So, now when a person is a little intoxicated, there is a little awareness also, I am drunk.
But when a person becomes heavily intoxicated, that person is so drunk that one doesn’t even realise I am drunk. So, when a person is very drunk, we should not drive now. Who says I am drunk? A person when speaking also can’t speak, who says I am drunk? Can’t even speak that properly.
But still that person is very arrogant, I am not drunk. So, when we are little in illusion, we understand, now I am getting drunk, now I am going to illusion. But when we are too deep into illusion, we don’t even realise that we are in illusion.
So like that, when we are far away from Krishna, we think God, He is so insignificant, He may be non-existent also. No, the ultimate minimisation of a person is to say that you don’t exist. It’s one thing that it works.
If a person exists, I will neglect. Neglecting is also one form of disrespect. But to say that somebody doesn’t exist, that’s the ultimate form of neglect.
So, when we are far away from God, we think, why do I need God? People have written that God is just a crutch that some people have invented. Because they were weak-minded. So, like that people think God doesn’t exist.
But as we start coming closer and closer to Krishna, then we start understanding not only does God exist, but my existence depends on God’s existence. Now, I could not exist if God did not exist. What do we mean by this? That sometimes, this is important to understand, I will leave this to Padaseghana, that when we come to a temple, and we see Krishna present as a deity.
Now, it’s wonderful to appreciate Krishna in a personal form. But if we do not have a philosophical understanding, then we may misunderstand. And sometimes, atheists ask this question, that can God create a stone that he cannot lift? So, can God make something, if you say God is all-powerful, can he make a stone which he cannot lift? Now, if you say yes, God can create such a stone that he cannot lift.
Then there is something he can’t do, that he can’t lift. And if you say no, then there is something he can’t do. He can’t create a stone.
So, now there are different ways in which this question can be answered. Prabhupada answered in a way, he said, that yes, God can create a stone which he cannot lift, and then he will lift it. Because his energy is infinite.
And infinitely, it keeps increasing. So, what he cannot do at one moment, he can do at the next moment. There is another philosophical way of understanding it, that when we ask this question, can God create a stone that he cannot lift? There is a fundamental misconception of God in asking these questions.
What is that misconception? That misconception is the thing, okay, stone is here, God is here, just as stone is one object in the creation, God is also another object in the creation. And then can this object create this object? And can this object create this object to be bigger than this object? So, this conception of God as one object within creation is a misconception. Krishna is not an object within creation.
Krishna is the sustenance of all creation. Without, when we want to understand God, God, there is a definition for God. And the definition of God is sarva-karma-karma, the cause of all causes.
So, nothing can exist without God. Neither the stone, nor the person asking the question about the stone. Nothing can exist without God.
In the Bhagavad Gita, in the 10th chapter towards the conclusion, after Krishna, he leaves the Vishwaroopa. The Vishwaroopa is a very fascinating vision. What initially was happening, just like the ordinary conception, yes, there is a whole world.
In that world, there is a place called Gurukshetra. On Gurukshetra, there is a chariot. On that chariot, there is one place, that one person.
And the chariot tells him, that is Krishna. So, this is Krishna, who is on one object, in one place, on one planet, within the universe. And then suddenly, what does Krishna do? Krishna says, He says, And then that person, who seems to be one object within the universe, that person reveals that the whole universe is inside him.
So, when we understand God, he is not just one object within the universe, whom we are asking, can he create another object? No, God is the source, the sustainer of everything in existence. So, the question, can God create an object, create a stone he can’t lift, this comes from his understanding about what God means. Now, God is not another object like a stone in this world.
God is the sustenance of the whole world. Without God, nothing can exist. Absolutely nothing can exist without God.
And in fact, the more we are studying science, the more science points towards the existence of God. This is a whole different subject. But simply, to make this point here, that actually, science has found the whole world is so well organised.
So, where does the organisation come from? Even if we say that all according to nature’s laws, how do nature’s laws come from? They come from God. So now, the point which I am making here is, God is not an explanatory alternative to logic. God is not an explanatory alternative to logic.
God is the explanatory foundation for explainability. That means, you have one logical explanation and you have another explanation which is not so logical. It’s not like that.
How did Krishna lift up Govardhan? How did he find out the centre of gravity of Govardhan? Why did he put a stringer over there? Now, if you believe that Krishna lifted up Govardhan, you are unscientific. You are unscientific. You don’t understand the law of gravity.
So, is it like science is one explanation and God is another explanation? This is the idea that many people have. And when people have this idea, they say, the more science advances, the more we will not need God. That is the idea.
So, what I am saying is, God is not an explanatory alternative to science. God or logic or whatever, whatever system of thought we humans might come up with, God is not an explanatory alternative to that. God is the explanatory foundation for explainability.
We may say that, oh, how can somebody have so much strength to lift up a huge mountain because its weight will be so much, the gravity will be so strong. Now, Krishna doesn’t have to find the centre of gravity because Krishna is the source of gravity. Krishna is the explanation for explainability.
Why do we have logical answers to questions in this world? Where did logic come from? Krishna is the basis of logic. So, why I am talking about this is, as we come closer to Krishna, both from an intellectual perspective as well as from an emotional perspective, our appreciation for Krishna increases. And that increased appreciation for Krishna we express through humble service.
So, when we say, paada sevanam, humble service to the Lord, a filial service, that is because there is a symbiotic connection between emotion and action. There is a symbiotic connection between emotion and action. The way we act, that affects our emotions.
Suppose, I want to feel humble and imagine I just lean my head back, put my hands behind this, raise my legs high up. I am feeling very humble now. Now, I am making a mockery of humility by saying this.
Actually, the way we act, it affects our emotions internally. So, the principle of paada sevanam, of rendering humble service, is that by acting in a humble way externally, humility is developed internally. As there is a symbiotic connection between action and emotion, symbiotic means that both nourish each other.
So, the action strengthens the emotion and the emotion strengthens the action. So, that’s why when we render humble service to the Lord, render humble service to His devotees, then that humility, the mood of humility is developed more and more. And when the mood of humility is developed more and more, the more we can appreciate Krishna’s glories.
We are so filled with ourselves, I am so great, I am so great, I am so great. Then we cannot understand Krishna’s greatness because we are filled with ourselves. But when we develop humility, then our heart becomes a place where Krishna’s glories can manifest and then we can relish those glories.
So, I’ll conclude this with one last point. Then we can have question and answers. That when we talk about paada sevanam, as I said that, bhakti is a relationship of ecstatic inequality where the more we understand our smallness and the more we understand Krishna’s greatness, the more we can relish the sweetness of bhakti.
The more we can relish Krishna prema. But this doesn’t mean that Krishna is like a boss, all of you bow down to me. The lower you bow down to me, the more favour I’ll give you.
Is Krishna that kind of boss? Not at all. Why not? Because if we see, first of all, in Vrindavan, Krishna does not act like God. Krishna, in Vrindavan, he conceals his Godhood so that love can reign supreme.
He doesn’t act as Mother Yashoda, as if he is God. No, he acts just as a small boy, a naughty boy so that Mother Yashoda’s love for him can overflow. So Krishna, although he is God, he is not interested in brandishing his Godhood to make all of us disavow him.
He simply wants the reciprocation of love. And for the reciprocation of love, he goes to the extent of concealing his Godhood so that devotees can love him with intensity. But then he realises that even that is not enough.
Krishna in Vrindavan, the Gopis, they simultaneously know and they don’t know that Krishna is God. In the Gopi Gita, the Gopis say that at one level they are saying, When the Gopis are separated from Krishna and they are searching for him frantically, they go deep into the forest, so deep that even moonlight can’t penetrate. It’s so pitch dark.
Realising that they can’t find Krishna now, they come back and they sit on the banks of the Yamuna and then they start composing the Gopi Gita. And Jiva Goswami describes in Gopalachandru that each of the verses of Gopi Gita is sung by one-one Gopi and each of them is expressing her heart. So here, in the Gopi Gita, at one level it is said, Krishna, your lotus feet, you offer to Kaliya.
That your lotus feet are so powerful that you crush the thousand-hooded serpent Kaliya. So here they are aware that Krishna’s lotus feet are so powerful that they can crush even the venomous serpent with dangerous finds such as Kaliya. But just a few verses later, what are they doing in Gopi Gita? They are saying, nayuna-sundaram nathate padam shiva-trunakure srida-tithi na kalilatamana kanta-gacchate They are praying that shiva-trunakure srida-tithi na Krishna You have left us and gone away.
You have gone deep into the forest. And in the forest, there are pebbles, there are thorns, there are brambles, and all of them will pierce your feet. And thinking that your tender feet will be pierced by the pebbles, that is ripping our heart apart.
Krishna, please come back. So now, here, the pebbles, whatever wound they can cause, that is insignificant as compared to the wound that Kaliya’s fangs can cause. And the same Gopis who know that Krishna is not his feet have crushed the fanged wounds of Kaliya.
They are in anxiety. What will happen by the piercing of the feet of Krishna by some thorns? So this is paada sevana at the level of smaran. What are the Gopis doing? They are serving Krishna’s lotus feet by remembering in love.
Oh, let Krishna’s lotus feet be protected. Let Krishna’s lotus feet not be hurt. So at one level, when they are remembering Krishna’s lotus feet crushed by Kaliya’s boots, they are remembering the glory, the greatness of those lotus feet.
And then they are thinking, Oh, these will be pierced by the thorns. They are thinking, Oh, these are objects of service for us. The same lotus feet can be the objects of protection when they are crushing a demon like Kaliya.
And the same lotus feet can be the object of service when the devotee wants to offer all comfort and doesn’t want the least of discomfort to the lotus feet. So now, the point is that here, the Gopis, for them, although they are aware that Krishna is God, Krishna, while normally relating with them, doesn’t act as if he is God. He conceals his Godhood so that there can be the intensity of love.
So that there can be a heightened intensity of love. But still, Krishna is not satisfied even when there is this intimate love. In the Chaitanya Chaitanya Amrit, it is described that आईश्वरे शीतिन प्रेम् नाईश्वरे भुजा He says that when there is opulence in love, Krishna is not satisfied with that.
Because he feels that the devotee’s love is not unhesitant. Oh, this is God, I cannot accept him. How can I love him? How can I treat him just like a friend? How can I treat him like an equal? So, Krishna, although he is God, the sweetness of bhakti, the sweetness of pavasevanam is so great that Krishna, as I said, bhakti is a relationship of ecstatic inequality.
So Krishna is here and the devotee is here. And the devotee wants to humble oneself to the lowest state of the law. But Krishna sees that the devotee is relishing so much nectar.
So what Krishna does is he shifts his position from here to here. And Krishna also becomes a devotee. And that is the manifestation as Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu.
And in this manifestation as Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, He is trying to relish the sweetness of his own lotus feet. Krishna does this earlier also in the Markandeya Rishi. It is described in Markandeya Purana as well as in Bhagav Purana.
Markandeya Rishi, at one time, he sees that what is Krishna doing? kararavindena pararavindam mukharavinde viniveshvayam viniveshvayantam patasyapatrasya puteshayanam balamukundam manasa usmarami So Krishna, he says that my devotees are relishing so much nectar in serving my feet. He wants to know what is the sweetness in my feet? Now if Krishna is sitting as Dwarakadheesh in his palace or in Dwarka or Krishna is sitting as Vaikunthana in Vaikuntha. Now at that time, he cannot suddenly pick up his feet and put into his mouth.
He wants to know what is the joy of palace living. So Krishna performs a leela and he manifests a form as a small baby. And the children of the children, they are in annamayakosh.
Annamayakosh means everything is potential food. For children, everything is unified as one object. It is potential food.
So they may drink milk from mother’s breast. They may drink milk from a bottle. They may suck their fingers.
Whatever they get, their way of perceiving it is through the tongue. So like the children have to take their foot also and put it into their mouth. So Krishna does that work.
kararvindena kararvindam This poetry where there is alliteration, repetition of the same word arvindam. So with his lotus hand kararvindena pararvindam He takes his lotus feet and then mukharvinde He puts it into his mouth and he is licking his toes. He says, what is this taste? What is the taste of my feet that my devotees praise their religion so much and I am missing it.
So, actually when we start practising bhakti, when we hear I have to become humble, I have to do my menial service, we have an idea that in this world the bigger I become, the more famous I become, the more influential I become, the happier I become. Because actually in the world when we live, especially when we live in crowded metropolises, the sheer number of people and the sheer velocity of the life threatens to reduce us into nobodies. We are just one cypher in the statistics of the city.
So we all want to have a sense of identity and often we think that the sense of identity will come by if I become more famous, more wealthy, more influential, then I will get a sense of self-identity and then I will delight in how famous I am. Now there are two problems with this. If you want to delight in our glories, first problem is we don’t have too much glories.
Maybe we might want to do one thing or two things, three things, something famous we will do. But how much? And secondly, whatever glories we have, they can go ahead any moment. Somebody might become very famous, but they end up loving someone else and become more famous.
And then one’s position is threatened and taken away. So rather than trying to seek a sense of identity by making ourselves bigger, a devotee tries to get a sense of identity by connecting with the biggest lord, by connecting with the biggest person. And when you connect with Krishna, then because Krishna’s glories are unlimited and because the connection with Krishna is eternal, there in comes everlasting happiness.
And that happiness is so great that Prahlad Maharaj says, He says that, O Lord, in reciting your glories, in relishing the taste of your lotus feet, there is such nectar that I feel I feel sad for all those people who are missing this nectar. Normally, when we start practising bhakti, we give up the gross material forms of enjoyment. And when we give up that enjoyment, our mind at the back always makes us think, you are missing something.
Maybe you would have enjoyed so much if you had done that. So, we feel when we are practising bhakti, we feel as if we are missing something because we have renounced material pleasures. That’s because right now we are not connected with Krishna fully.
But Prahlad Maharaj, who is connected with Krishna, who is relishing the taste of Krishna lotus feet, what does he feel? He doesn’t feel as if I am missing something. He feels those who are not having this, they are missing something. So, they are missing.
Let me share this with them. So, paad sevanam, the taste of the lotus feet of Krishna, which we can get by connecting with him in devotion, by rendering humble service to him, that is life’s greatest fulfilment. And that is what is available to us by the practise of bhakti yoga.
So, I’ll summarise. I started by talking about how love is not just something that happens. It can also be something that is made to happen.
So, in bhakti, emotion is not a roadblock to perception. It is the roadway to perception. But that emotion has to be developed.
It’s like a person cannot have self-expression, just arbitrary playing of harmonium. It has to train. So, like that, bhakti means training our emotions.
And then, we discussed about when we try to relate with the Lord, the bhakti is a relationship of ecstatic inclination. The more we can free ourselves from obsession with our greatness, the more our heart becomes free to relish Krishna’s greatness. And thus, we can relish the sweetness of bhakti more and more.
And there is a symbiotic relationship between action and moksha. So, the more we act in a humble way, the more the emotion of humility within us will develop. In both ways, through the action and the emotion of humility, our attraction to Krishna and our taste in our relationship with him will increase.
And service to Krishna, service to his lotus feet as mentioned in Pali Sriman, is so great a treasure that even the goddess of fortune considers that as her greatest treasure. And in the relationship of bhakti, not that Krishna is the boss and everyone has to serve him, Krishna himself conceals his godliness so that he can also taste the sweetness of love more and more. And further, he shifts himself from the position of God to the position of devotee to relish the sweetness of bhakti, the sweetness of bhakti.
So, we discussed about how Krishna manifests as a baby, Bala Buddha, as visualised by his father, and also how Krishna manifests as a Mahaprabhu to taste the sweetness of bhakti. And the more we can internalise the mood of humble service, the more we will relish the sweetness of bhakti. Thank you very much.