Should we follow our authorities even when they are imperfect and their instructions are very demanding-just as Radhanath Maharaj followed his authorities in New Vrindavan?

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Question? In the movie Mahavatar Narsimha, it is shown how Hiranyakashipu tortures the devotees for so long. And when Prahlad comes, the Lord comes and delivers him. But why did the Lord not do anything about the devotees who have been tortured so much for so long? Answer? In the first canto of the Bhagavatam, when Bhishma speaks to Yudhishthira, he says that the Lord’s plan is not knowable even to the greatest sages.
We can try to know and try to figure out with our intelligence as much as we can. But why the Lord does what he does is ultimately unknowable to us. So, I cannot give any definitive answer.
But I can give a few points. The world is a place of duality. While duality often is thought to mean as happiness and distress or heat or cold, duality also means the dual manifestations with regard to the Lord’s protection in the world.
While the Lord always protects at a spiritual level, at the material level, sometimes the protection manifests and sometimes it does not. So, we talk about how the Pandavas were protected again and again by Krishna and Kunti Maharani lists the incidents. But then there are incidents where that protection didn’t manifest.
For example, when Abhimanyu was killed or when the Pandavas’ sons were killed by Ashwathama. So, ultimately it’s a matter of our choice which incidents do we focus on. We can focus on the times when the Lord manifests in the protection or the times when the Lord is not manifesting the protection.
And whatever we focus on, accordingly either our faith will be strengthened or weakened. That may still let the question be persistent. We may say to the nature of the world but isn’t the Lord above the world? Doesn’t the Lord control the world? Does the Lord have to act according to the nature of the world? That’s a fair question.
The thing is, generally when the Lord works in the world, He works according to the broad nature and purpose of the world. So, the nature of the world is duality and the Lord also lets devotees be apparently affected by duality. But the difference between a devotee being affected by duality in terms of some distress being removed by the Lord’s intervention and some distress not being removed by the Lord’s intervention and a non-devotee going through dualities is that through both the positive and negative, the devotee is coming closer to Krishna.
So, if we consider that that ultimately is the purpose of the world and Krishna is expert enough to bring people closer through Him to all the torment of the world also. Now, we may say why doesn’t Krishna manifest His protection always at the material level? In some ways that would defeat the purpose of the material world. The material world is a place where souls are given free will to choose a life separate from Krishna.
Krishna manifests His omnipotence. Krishna manifests His all attractiveness. Krishna manifests His protective power.
Then, that evidence can become so overwhelming that it’s no longer a matter of choice. So, in this world, Krishna keeps His presence and power largely unmanifest so that the souls can play out their dreams of trying to play God and that brings me to the last point. Krishna spiritually protects everyone who is devoted to Him.
Those who were persecuted by Hiranyakashipu, their souls got more and more purified to the protection and they became more and more absorbed in Krishna. We could say Kamsa losing, Kamsa killing six of Devaki’s children is horrendous. Not only killing them but killing them in front of their eyes.
In some ways, aborting a baby is less painful because we don’t see the baby as a baby. Because the baby can’t be seen, it can be considered as more of a piece of flesh and it can be as tissue-removal is the euphemism used to let the baby be born after the pregnancy goes to the full term. And then when the baby is there right in front of the eyes of the mother and the father to kill the baby is probably the cruelest among forms of cruelty that parents can be subjected to.
So we could say, why did Krishna just not come as the first child? So, through those travails, through those immense pains, the great devotion of Devaki and Vasudev is manifested. And similarly, through the persecution and execution in terms of killing that the devotees are subjected to, their devotion is manifested. While such incidents are terrifying, terrible, but they also remind us that faith is tested and severely tested in such times.
While there are some celebrated heroes on the path of bhakti, there are many unsung heroes also who are grateful that we have such a path of bhakti with a great historical