Saranga Thakura – The mercy of the Vaishnavas returns us from the dead to the living

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Hare Krishna let us contemplate briefly on his glories Chaitanya Mahaprabhu came to him to demonstrate the highest ecstasies of devotion and he demonstrated it himself by the way he would lose himself in trance and ecstasy but he also demonstrated it through his many female associates so one such associate is Saranga Thakur Saranga Thakur lived a life completely devoted to the service of the deities he lived in a place which is on the other side of the Ganga as compared to where Lord Chaitanya was living so he would very diligently bathe, dress, cook for the deities and serve the deities and then after his service he would pass time over there and the Chaitanya Mahaprabhu describes that Saranga Thakur had especially received the mercy of and by that he would sport with tigers and snakes he would go into trance and he would have no external consciousness in his trance and he would just not be afraid of the tiger as people in ordinary consciousness would be he would just be absorbed in ecstasy and he would sometimes ride in the back of the tiger being jubilant in ecstasy the tiger would also not do anything and sometimes he would take a python on his lap and play with the python so actually the lord is present in the heart of all the deities in the heart of the tiger and the lord is present in the heart of the animals also transforms their heart and they also cooperate in their devotees extraordinary ecstasies and Saranga Thakur he would sometimes go deep into the river and he would stay for 2-3 days in the river itself he would appear as if he is insentient completely inert but he was materially inert devotionally supremely alert and remembrance of his pastimes he is after all Nandimukhi Sakhi in Krishna Nila and he is a very intimate associate there also in Krishna Nila now he was so humble that he did not want to initiate anyone and Chaitanya Mahaprabhu would request him to initiate but still he was unwilling because he felt that I am not qualified enough to be a spiritual master I am not qualified enough the tree was very old the tree started drying up when it started drying up and it was on the verge of dying when Chaitanya Mahaprabhu came there and said oh this is the tree I am going to perform bhajan it is dying now what can be done so Saranga Thakur pleased his devotee and pleased by his devotee’s faith in him just touched the tree as soon as he touched the tree that tree which was insentient sorry on the verge of death almost as it sprang to life leaves and flowers and life emerged erupted from the tree and it became a wonderful tree and devotees for many generations will visit this tree and see it as a demonstration of God’s mercy on this intimate devotee and then if any branches have fallen off from that tree they take that and keep that as spiritual mementos so Chaitanya Mahaprabhu wanted him Saranga Thakur to give initiation so on one side he did not feel that I am qualified on other side he did not want to refuse what the Lord was asking him to do the next morning whoever I see first I will give initiation to that person next morning when he went to take bath as he was taking bath suddenly something touched against his body and he found actually it was a corpse it was a person he did not realize it was a corpse it was a person and he said may you get the mercy of the Lord and then he saw that it was a corpse so Lord Chaitanya was watching this and he was giving the mercy to someone and he said just chant the mantra in his ears so although it was a corpse Saranga Thakur did not hesitate he had faith in Lord Chaitanya faith in the potency of mantra and he chanted as soon as he chanted this person who had drowned just came to life and he fell at the feet of Saranga Thakur accepting him as not just material saviour but also as a spiritual saviour and there was a young person named Murari he had died because of a snake bite and it was a tradition at those times that if a person dies of snake bite that person’s body is not cremated but that body is sent into the Ganga that’s what the parents had done and when the parents came to know that oh our son Murari is alive has come back to life they came to take him but Murari refused to go and he said that Saranga Thakur he has brought me back to life my life had already ended but he has brought me back to life so my life will be this life which I have got by his grace will be for his service and he remained a very devoted and dedicated devotee servant of Saranga Thakur as well as the Vaishnavas and after this pastime Saranga Thakur came to be known as Saranga Murari Thakur and after this Murari had died back to life actually by the mercy of Vaishnavas extraordinary miracles can happen in our case corpses may not come back to life but the Bhagavatam described that those who are living without devotion to Krishna without any spiritual understanding they are like the living dead they are Atmanojana they are spiritually dead in fact they are pillars of their own soul by the mercy of Vaishnavas we also come back to life we are spiritually dead but when the Vaishnavas come and chant the mantra of Krishna chant the Katha of Krishna inspire Shraad Sarvam Krishna then our real life begins our real life is not living in this body which is filled with various kinds of germs and worms and give out abominable substances our real life is a life of spirit life of ecstasy life of bliss and that is what is bestowed to us by the great Vaishnava Acharyas so we can pray to Shraad Sarvam Thakur that he may bless us by which through the through Shraad Prabhupada through the Vaishnavas through our spiritual master through the Gauri Vaishya Sampradaya of which Shraad Sarvam Thakur is a illustrious member and in which we have got embraced by Krishna’s great mercy that we may also come back to spiritual life by the Vaishnavas mercy and live eternally in devotional service to Krishna Thank you very much