Radha Kunda Appearance – Bathe in the grateful remembrance of the supreme mercy of the supreme devotee

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Hare Krishna. Primly sacred occasion of Radha. Appearance of Radhakund.
Let us try to understand what is the significance of this place in our lives as Gauravishnu sadhakas. Radharani is not just the topmost devotee of Krishna. Actually, she is the source and the shelter of all devotion.
Whoever has any devotion, whether it be starting sadhakas like ours or exalted devotees like Yashodamayi, their devotion comes from Srimati Radharani. And Radhakund is the place where Radharani’s love for Krishna and Krishna’s love for Radharani are manifested in a liquid aqueous form. Love is an inner emotion and it is difficult to access.
But the glory and the beauty of bhakti is that it does not let the spiritual remain only in the realm of the intangible. Yes, spiritual is inaccessible to us with the material senses. But by the merciful arrangement of Krishna through the process of bhakti, the spiritual becomes manifested at a level where we can perceive even with our material senses.
So we may not with our material senses perceive the sacredness, the supreme spiritual potency of Radhakund. But still, even with our gross material senses, we can take the water, respectfully drink it with grace and gratitude. We can bathe in it.
And by this, we come in contact with the supreme love of Radharani for Krishna and in Shyamakund, similarly Radhakund and Shyamakund, Krishna’s love for Radharani and Radharani’s love for Krishna. And Radhakund is all the more significant because it was lost for many centuries, millennia in fact. And Shri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, who is Radharani coming in, who is Krishna coming in the mood of Radharani, rediscovered that place.
It was at that time when Chaitanya Mahaprabhu discovered just a, just a puddle, not a puddle, a pond, a very small pond. And it was almost like a puddle. And the local people were surprised, why is this effulgent, extraordinary sannyasi bathing in a puddle? But Chaitanya Mahaprabhu was in supreme ecstasy.
He was relishing the love of Radharani for Krishna, the love of the divine couple for each other. So the very manifestation of Radhakund is an expression of the mutual love of the divine couple. The manifestation of Radhakund in the material world is the expression of the divine couple’s love for all of us.
And the manifestation of Radha, re-manifestation of Radhakund by the arrangement of Shri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is also an expression of His mercy, full love for all living beings, especially in Kaliyuga, for whom He is the Yuga avatar. And it is that Radhakund which is made accessible to us by Shila Prabhupada. It is Shila Prabhupada who brought to us the glories of Radhakund and He brought to us the glories of Krishna consciousness in general, through which we understood as the culmination the supreme glory of Radharani’s love and of Radhakund.
So that which is exalted needs to be treated respectfully. Shila Prabhupada was distressed and disappointed when he saw devotees being frivolous in the sacred and holy waters of Radhakund. And at that time to inject an adequate level of gravity, he said that should not bathe in this.
But in his books, he has also said in the purport in Nectar of Instruction, Nectar of Instruction uses a hierarchy of transcendental cosmology. And therein after describing how the material world is superseded by the spiritual world and spiritual world is superseded the Brahman and Vaikuntha, then Dwaraka, then Mathura, then Vrindavan, Vrindavan, Govardhan, Rasamandal and Radhakund. Like that there is a hierarchy in which Radhakund is at the topmost.
And in the relevant purports over there, Shila Prabhupada mentions several times, not just once or twice, but several times the word bathe. So bathing in Radhakund is a supreme fortune. And if that can be done in Bahulashtami, then that is an even greater fortune.
Even bathing once is fortunate. But while bathing, what is equally if not more important is the consciousness. While externally the sacred water of Radhakund is touching us and purifying us physically, internally the remembrance of Krishna and the gratitude for the opportunity for devotional service in such an intimate and exalted way, this devotional gratitude, if that bathes our heart internally, then the benefit that we can get from Radhakund is unlimited.
And we can pray to Radharani to give us a drop of the oceanic devotion that she has and that will lead the supreme success for all. Thank you.