The Monk’s Podcast 85 with Krishna Kshetra Maharaj – Dashavatara 4 – Narasimha

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This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Hare Krishna Maharaj.
Thank you very much for joining once again for the Monks Podcast. Hare Krishna Prabhu. The Monks Podcast.
Yes. Ki Jai. Thank you.
You know, this is probably the longest series that we have been doing and I had done various podcasts with different devotees. But I’m grateful that you have been giving your association regularly. And this has become a more and more relishable churning of the Bhagavatam.
Discussing the Shavataras. So I think today is one of the most beloved avataras in our tradition, apart from Krishna and maybe Ram. Yeah.
Discuss today about Narasimha. So did you have any structure in mind, Maharaj? Or should I suggest something and we take it forward? Well, one topic that may be interesting for viewers, listeners, is my own story, you could say, of worshipping Narasimhadev in Germany. And how we acquired this very special deity of Sri Sri Prahlad Narasimhadev, who is being worshipped very nicely in southeastern Germany.
Oh, yes, Maharaj. Please, would you like to share that? And is it okay if I make a few notes while you’re speaking? Please, you can make notes. Actually, maybe you could, I didn’t have time to do this, but if you go to the website of the German farms, singhachalam.de, singhachalam.de, they should have a gallery of pictures of Narasimhadev.
Narasimhadev, maybe you can show one or two. So this story goes back to 1979. The devotees in Germany had just acquired a property, a farm in the southeast part of Germany, about half hour from the city of Passau, and about 10 kilometers from the border to what is now Czech Republic.
At that time, it was Czechoslovakia. And that border was part of what came to be known as the Iron Curtain. It was the big divide between East and West Europe.
And more than that, it was the divide between the communist block of the USSR and the West. And it was that Iron Curtain which for decades was, you can say, politically dividing the whole world. Yes, I’ve heard about it.
Communication across the two parts was very, very difficult. Yeah, so then we acquired this property very close to that border. And we were thinking, so then there was some discussion.
So when we move there, we already were worshiping Shishirat Hamadan Mohan, very beautiful deities now worshipped in a place called Abenteuer in the west part of Germany, of West Germany. But there was a feeling that since we’re going to be in this particular place, we should have also a deity of Nrsingadev. Because of the dangerousness of the situation like we had in Mayapur after the bandit attacks and something like that? Something like, sort of like that, but on a different scale.
In Mayapur, it was just a few local people. But here, we were next to an international border, which was considered a kind of hot place. Not that, this was Cold War.
There was no war going on, but it was a Cold War. Yes. So the feeling was we should have Nrsingadev there.
And the conclusion was we’ll get a very large Nrsingadev deity. Okay. And so the head pujari at that time, Ashtaratha Prabhu, was sent to Germany.
Sorry. He was sent to India to make the arrangement to have this deity made, especially for Germany. Okay.
And so that was, yeah, that was 1979 when he was sent. So in those days, to get anything from India to buy something in India and have it shipped to the West was always, it was always, it was always difficult. And you always expected that it’s going to take a long time before anything you purchase and ship is going to actually arrive, if it will arrive at all.
Oh, okay. So that was, yeah, this is 1979, 1980. So Ashtaratha Prabhu made arrangement in South India, in Kerala, with one local devotee for the state handicrafts company of Kerala to make this deity.
So it was, it was not a ready-made deity. It was a deity to be made specifically for Germany and would be made of the local granite. So then he made the order, made all the arrangements, came back to Germany and continued with his service of the head pujari and everything was going on.
And then to our great surprise, 14 months after Ashtaratha left Germany to go to India, we had a large, a large box delivered to Singhajalam, to this place, to the farm. And we were all shocked because 14 months, the deity had not even been made yet. So first they had to make the deity.
So we were assuming this is going to take at least two years, maybe three years, who knows, maybe four years. And then maybe the deity will come. But he came in 14 months.
Amazing. It was nowhere nearly ready for worship. It was not built yet.
Oh, it’s amazing. So the deity was moved into one room, which, meanwhile, the devotees had asked me to become the pujari for Nrsingadev. So I was thinking, well, then here’s the deity.
We’re going to have to have some ornaments for him. So they moved him into one room, which I turned into a small workshop because as a child, I was making different things. I was kind of a handicrafts person.
So I made a little jewelry workshop, an ornaments workshop, and started making ornaments for Nrsingadev. Meanwhile, temple construction was going on, meaning renovation. The temple building was originally a barn for a farm that was built in 1917, and the roof was caving in.
So we had a good reason justifying to replace the roof. So we had permission for doing that. That was easy.
That’s another story. It’s kind of quite a story, the building of that temple. So while that was going on, I was making ornaments for the deity.
And also, I was thinking, but we don’t really know anything about how to worship Nrsingadev. He’s a very special deity. Certainly, there must be something different from worshiping Radha Krishna or Gaurani Tai.
So I got the blessings of the senior devotees to come to India, to South India, to visit Nrsinga temples, and try, if I could, interview some of the priests and try to get some specific information on how to worship. So I came first to Hyderabad, and in Hyderabad, I met the late Sampad Kumar Bhattacharya. Sampad Kumar Bhattacharya had been the head priest for the installation of Shri Shri Radha Madan Mohan in the ISKCON temple of Hyderabad.
And Srila Prabhupada, after the event, had written one thank you letter to Sampad Kumar Bhattacharya. So somehow I found his contact, and I was able to visit him. And he was very kind, very friendly, and he was also, in a nice way, he was quite proud of this letter which he had received from Srila Prabhupada.
So he got out the letter and he showed me. And I explained that I’m on a little mission to learn about Nrsinga worship. And he was very happy about that.
And he immediately started reciting the Sanskrit of some verses from Seventh Canto Bhagavatam. Just spontaneously, he immediately was reciting a few verses. So I could understand he is a good person to meet, to ask for blessings for this.
And I also showed him a photo of our deity with a question, because our deity in Germany is a bit non-standard in terms of standard Nrsinga iconography, because he has Prahlad on his lap, on his left knee. And standard iconography would say, oh no, this is not proper. There must be Lakshmi on Nrsinga Dev’s left knee.
Somehow or other, I don’t know how, it came, this deity with Prahlad on Nrsinga Dev’s left knee. And someone had raised, when we were still in Germany, someone had raised this question and there was some concern that, are we going to be worshiping a deity that the iconography is wrong, is not proper? So I had this photo, I showed to Sampad Kumar Bhattacharya. And I asked him, do you think this is a problem? And he looked and he was silent for a few moments and he said, unusual.
And then I said, so does this mean there’s a problem? And he said, no, no problem, just unusual. That’s interesting, okay. Maharaj, is this the same person you have mentioned in your book, the Bhagavatam, where you said that your essays on the Bhagavatam in the first book with Radhika Ramana Prabhu, where you have written the seventh canto, you said you stayed with him.
We stayed with a Sri Vaishnava scholar. Yes, that’s him. Oh, okay.
That’s one of the most beautiful essays on the seventh canto of Narasimha Leela that I have ever read. The way you have analyzed, the kind of insights that are there. So thank you for sharing this, Maharaj.
So I spent the next few weeks traveling around Andhra, Andhra Pradesh, because that’s where most of the Nrsingha deities are. Yes. And it’s an interesting question.
Maybe some historians could give answer. But why specifically Andhra is a place of Nrsingha? Yeah, that way. Somehow, you know, in Maharashtra, Ganesh worship has become very big.
Or in Bengal, Kali worship has become somewhat, Durga or Kali worship has become big. I don’t know. There could be transcendental reasons.
There could be historical reasons. Yeah, of course, Ahobilam is in Andhra. Yes, that is true.
And Singachalam, the original Singachalam is in Andhra. There’s quite a few temples. There’s one place just north of Hyderabad called Yadgiriguta.
It’s a Lakshmi Nrsingha temple. Yeah. Anyway, Nrsingha Dev is big in Andhra.
That we can say. Yes, Maharaj, that is true. No doubt.
So, I was thinking about Nrsingha Dev as compared to the other avataras. So, one of the things which struck me is that in, maybe not always, but say, usually whenever the Lord descends, the odds seem to be against him. Say, Ram is a mortal, at least he’s considered to be a mortal to ordinary vision.
And Ravan is a powerful Rakshasa with various generations on his part. But in physical size as well as form, Nrsingha Dev is usually seen to be much bigger than Hiranyakashipu. Though, of course, Nrsingha Dev’s devotee Prahalad is much smaller than Hiranyakashipu.
So, in that sense, Nrsingha Dev’s role as the protector. So, although all the avataras protect, protect, generally most of the avataras, they come to protect in particular ways. But Nrsingha Dev, in a very, you could say, visually vivid way, does look like a very reassuring protector.
Yes. Of course. Yeah, please.
Especially because Nrsingha, in terms of iconography, he takes several, there are several forms of Nrsingha. And it is, it’s said that the form of Nrsingha that we have in Sita Mayapur, I think they call him Stala Nrsingha, is the most fearsome, the most angry form. This is, he’s more angry in this form than his Ugra form, which is with Hiranyakashipu stretched across his lap and he’s, you know, tearing him apart.
And the opposite extreme we have in Germany is Prahlad Nrsingha. He’s completely passive, pacified, peaceful. And therefore, Prahlad is sitting peacefully on his lap.
And then there’s some other forms in between. Oh, OK. So, I’d always thought that the form in Mayapur which we have is Ugra, because we often chant that Ugram, Viram, Mahavishnu.
No, he’s even more angry than Ugra Nrsingha. Oh, OK. He’s just, he’s in the mood of, he’s just come out of the pillar.
Yeah. And he’s, I mean, we can’t say that the Lord becomes blind with anger, but it’s like he’s blind with anger. Where is that rascal? Whereas Ugra Nrsingha, he’s already caught.
He’s fought with him. He’s caught with him. He’s on his lap.
And now, and Hiranyakashipu has been, has just been killed or he’s being killed. So, of course, he’s also very angry then. But it’s, I don’t remember where this came from, but this Stalin Nrsingha is even more angry.
Oh, that’s amazing. And so if we consider almost all the avatars, their actions are quite dramatic, but Narsimha Dev’s whole appearance and pastime bursting out of a pillar and in a form like a form of a half man, half lion, that is very dramatic. Yes, indeed.
Yeah. So, you know, you mentioned about Andhra. I have seen that in the Telugu movies, they made some very beautiful movies of Narsimha.
But whereas Mahabharata and Ramayana have been depicted in English, in animation and various forms. I don’t think Narsimha Dev has been rendered like that so much in anything in the mainstream media till now. That I wouldn’t know.
But, of course, there’s another reason that Narsimha may not be appearing in the media, such media so much. And that is that Narsimha Dev himself appears for a very short time. Yes.
It’s sometimes said of all the avatars, his appearance is the most brief. He comes suddenly out of the pillar. He has a very short fight with Hiranyakashipu, in contrast with Varahadev, who fights for quite some time with Hiranyaksha, so much that the demigods complain, you know, to Varahadev, please finish him off.
It’s been too long now. But Narsimha Dev plays with Hiranyakashipu a little bit, but then fairly quickly he finishes him off. Then comes from the Bhagavatam version, the prayers of the demigods, then the prayers of Prahlad, and then he’s gone.
Yeah. But then we have a sort of epilogue, according to the understanding in Navadvipadam, that he visits Narsimha Pali. On his way back to Vaikuntha, he makes a stop in Narsimha Pali because the demigods have prayed to him, please, before you go, can we please worship you? So that’s the pastime in Narsimha Pali in Navadvipadam.
That’s true. Now, if I look at the Narsimha Puran version of the Narsimha Leela also and the Bhagavatam version, the Bhagavatam starts with a particular focus, that is, why is God equal or not? And in your essay, I got one of the most endearing explanations of this, how ultimately the Lord places both Prahlad and Hiranyakashipu on his lap. In that sense, he’s equal to both of them.
So their position, in a sense, is the same, but because their disposition is different, so the Lord’s disposition toward them also is different. Yes. There’s another element here, I think.
I don’t remember if I mentioned that in that article. As you said, the question is whether God is equal to all. And this whole episode, which takes, what, two-thirds of the seventh canto, is there to answer this question.
But I’ve always wondered, does it really answer the question? And I came to this conclusion that it does answer this question, but not in the way you would expect. And the way it answers is the one who is equal to everyone in the Bhagavatam’s version very much emphasized, who is being equal to everyone? It’s Prahlad. And Nrsingadev comes to protect the one who is equal to everyone.
And in that way, the Lord is equal to everyone. Does that make sense? Sorry. So you’re saying that the devotee Prahlad is equal to everyone and the Lord protects the one who is equal to everyone.
Right. That’s fascinating. And in that way, the Lord demonstrates his equality.
He is equal to everyone. But how he is equal to everyone is he protects those who are equal to everyone. Yes.
In this way, he is partial to those who protect. Sorry, he’s partial to those who are equal to everyone. Okay, that’s true.
So in a sense, we could say the equality is not so much like a literal equality as an equal reciprocity. He’s reciprocating with everyone equally. If somebody takes a step toward them, he takes a step toward them.
And yeah, that’s another way of understanding. Of course. Yes.
In a sense, if you really want to relate with a person, a stone like equality would not make them particularly attractive. We might just appreciate how stoic somebody is, but that doesn’t necessarily make them very lovable. It also doesn’t make for much of a story to tell.
Yeah, that is also true. But Prahlad being equal to everyone is a big disturbance for Hiranyakashipu. And then we have a story because Hiranyakashipu wants to destroy that spirit of equal vision and so we have the conflict which makes for drama, which makes for a story.
So we could also say that the Lord is equal because the Lord inspires Prahlad to stay equal, to have that equal disposition. It is because of his devotion that he is equal. Yes.
His basis for equal vision, of course, is his devotion to the Lord. And that devotion to the Lord, he has been infused in him from Narada, who has equal vision, such that he is able to give shelter to Hiranyakashipu’s wife, Kayadhu, because all the demigods are thinking, oh, you know, there’s a demon in her womb. But Narada saw otherwise.
And therefore, Prahlad was able to benefit from Narada’s association. That’s an amazing insight. So the spiritual master’s qualities come about in the disciple.
And I was thinking about Prahlad also. Both ways during his, it’s described about his equality. It is when he is receiving teachings from Shandamarka, it is said that he’s thinking internally that all this differentiation between these are demons and these are the demons are teaching him that these are the devatas, they are our enemies.
He doesn’t accept that. And then later on, when he is humbly giving some wisdom to Hiranyakashipu, at that time he says, the only reason you see, you see anybody as your enemy is because of your mind, which is actually your enemy. Yes.
So it’s amazing. So there is so many places, so many, what do you say, so many pieces are falling in place since you talk about this point about Prahlad being the actual, actually equal, actually equal to everyone. Yeah.
In many ways, if we think of the Bhagavatam version of the whole Leela, if we notice the dramatic aspect of it, then I think one could argue that the hero of this story is Prahlad. Yes. And in a sense, he is, well, his quality shines through everything.
And it’s that, or all of his qualities are shining through in such a way that they are highlighted or they’re put into sharp relief by Hiranyakashipu being so terrible. And by the way, speaking of Hiranyakashipu, in one of his writings, Shilabhakti Siddhanta Sarasvati Thakur says that we should appreciate Hiranyakashipu because without his appearance, there would be no appearance of Mrisinghadev. Yeah.
That’s beautiful. And his father, of course, Shilabhakti Anodha Thakur, as many know, installed a deity of Lakshmi Nrsingha, which is there at Yogapeeth. And devotees may wonder, why would he install Mrisinghadev? I think the answer comes in his poem, his Bengali poem, Navadvipa Bhava Taranga, in which he mentions Mrisinghadev that by worshiping Mrisingha, maybe he mentions Lakshmi Nrsingha, I don’t remember.
By worshiping Mrisinghadev, we worship Mrisinghadev to purify the heart so that Radha and Krishna can take their place in our heart. Oh, okay. So he gives a kind of, one might say, a functional identity or functional basis for the worship of Mrisinghadev.
We worship him to purify the heart. And of course, in the Bhagavatam, there’s this verse in the fifth canto, devotees like to chant, chapter 18, verse 8, I think it is. Yes.
Thank you. This is one of the beautiful verses. So this verse is saying, Please remove, if I remember, my desire for food of activity.
Yes. Demonic desires to be happy by material activities. Kindly vanquish these.
So devotees like to chant this because I understand it this way. This is realizing Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakur’s message. Why we worship Mrisinghadev is to purify the heart so that Radha and Krishna can take their place in the heart.
And the next verse, immediately after this, verse number nine is, it’s really my favorite. I think it describes. Yeah, let the whole universe be peaceful.
This is a beautiful verse. Yeah, this is the perfect, this is the attitude that we aspire for such that Sri Sri Radha Krishna will take place in our hearts. Swasthyastu vishwasya kalaprasiddhatam jayantubhutani shivam mitho dhyah manas chabadram baddhatah thathoksha jaya vaisyatam nao matir apy ahaituky If you can scroll down, we can read the translation.
Yes. May there be good fortune throughout the universe and may all envious persons be pacified. May all living entities become calm by practicing bhakti yoga for by accepting devotional service, they will think of each other’s, they will think of each other’s welfare.
Therefore, let us all engage in the service of the supreme transcendence, Lord Sri Krishna, and always remain absorbed in thought of Him. So this is such a powerful prayer of Prahlad. This is Prahlad’s offering prayers in, what is it? Kim Purusha Varsha or one of the, one of the Varshas.
Yeah. You know, I never thought of this word specifically in terms of making our heart receptive for Krishna. I used to think of this was more in terms of bringing peace in the world, bringing peace in the outer world.
But it’s at one level true that only when we have peace in the inner world and there will be peace in the outer world also. And then there’s peace in the inner world. We can have Krishna manifest there.
While you’re speaking this, I have been recently looking at the Bhagavad Gita and where all Krishna talks about virtues and in what context. So it struck me for the first time that in the 12th chapter, when Krishna talks about the qualities of a devotee, 12, 13 to 20. So he talks about a devotee having virtues and such a virtuous devotee is dear to me.
So that is, he’s not talking anything about a devotional activities over there. A person who chants my holy names or worships my deities or studies the scriptures that is there. What Krishna is saying is a devotee who is adveshta sarva bhutana, maitra karuna evache, who is non-envious friend of everyone, who is equipoised, who is not disturbed by others, who doesn’t disturb others, who is firm.
So those are all virtues which endear, endear a person to Krishna, endear a devotee to Krishna. So that can also be correlated here that when Lord Narasimhadev cleanses our hearts, then the soul’s virtue starts manifesting and that endears the devotee to Krishna. So in that sense, the heart is prepared for Krishna.
Because these devotees are dear to the Lord, because of their qualities, the Lord wants to reciprocate, he wants to fulfill the devotee’s desire. And the devotee’s desire is a very nice model of what a devotee desires, is this prayer of pralad. Let there be peace throughout the universe, however it goes.
Let everyone practice bhakti-yoga, for in this way everyone will become free from envy, something like that. So in other words, the Lord hears that prayer and because the devotee’s prayer is dear to the Lord, the Lord feels inclined to realize that prayer, to make it possible for that to happen. Okay, yeah.
I read once in a Vyasa Puja offering of Sri Prabhupada, where one of the devotees was saying that, because Prabhupada had such a great desire to share Krishna Consciousness all over the world. So this devotee of course was saying out of his humility that Prabhupada used all of us, Krishna used all of us, although we were not qualified, to spread Krishna Consciousness, so that Prabhupada’s desire could be fulfilled. So that’s something similar.
Yeah, now going back to this point of Pralad’s equality manifesting as the answer to that question. Now Pralad’s equality also is seen in the sense that he desires the deliverance of everyone, including his father. And then it is said that his father is delivered even without his asking.
That’s what Pralad tells him. So now that Trisapta Pitaputa, that 21 generations are delivered. Now often this question comes up, what does it, is it literal? Can somebody be delivered even if they don’t want to be delivered? Or is it like the doors to deliverance open for them and then it’s up to them to walk through? How do we understand that statement? That’s also something that has made me wonder.
So I’m not going to have the magic answer to that. One way to understand it, I believe is perhaps the most mundane way of understanding and that is in terms of reputation. We all have that sense that when someone does something extraordinary, we all have a sense that that person’s relatives are also somehow extraordinary or they must be extraordinary.
Certainly the parents are special for having had this particular child. Even in the most mundane sense, if some sports person does some outstanding sports performance, then they’ll go interview the person’s parents. And then if that person has children, somehow they are special also.
So this goes back to the importance, I think, in traditional culture of reputation. And this points us back to Krishna’s warning to Arjuna in the second chapter, that if you don’t fight in this war, avāca-vādaṅga-cābhauṇa-vadhiṣyanti, what are people going to say? That your reputation will be finished. And he says, to lose your reputation would be worse than death.
To lose your reputation would be worse than death. Yeah, of course, this is kind of a standard understanding in what we make of Kshatriya culture. And we see it also in ancient Greek literature, the Iliad, the War of Troy.
It was all about gaining glory. Glory meant that even getting killed on the battlefield can be a very good thing. Because then you will live forever in everyone’s memory as a glorious warrior.
Yeah, that’s true. I sometimes, initially when I read that, I found it a little strange, that so much impersonal reputation. But even in the Dhruva Maharaj’s pastime, when Narada Muni comes to know how Dhruva is left for the forest, he actually appreciates and he says, Ahok Kshatriya Tejasam, Maana Bhangam Amrushyatam.
Just see how great the Kshatriyas are, that they cannot tolerate dishonor. So this seemed radically in contrast with our idea that we should always be tolerant like a tree. But then it struck me that sometimes the sense of honor makes a person behave honorably.
So, and then I read a letter of Prabhupada, where it seemed that one devotee had failed in following some regulatory principles. And Prabhupada had written that letter, you know, you took vows in front of the deities, in front of the sacred fire. How can you break those vows? Don’t you have a sense of honor? So that was what struck me that a sense of honor is not necessarily something like ego or pride.
It is maybe the sense by which we ensure that we behave respectably, not just that we seek respect from others. So there are two different aspects to this, that one is pride could be more of craving respect from others, whereas a sense of honor could be more of we behaving honorably or respectably. Yes, and the sense of honor is, excuse me, it’s a very, it’s a very public virtue.
It has to do with reputation. And you can say what is the opposite of honor? It’s shame. And shame is, nobody is ashamed in isolation.
They’re ashamed in the context of how others will be seeing them. And in what are called shame cultures, and this gets back to the 21 generations, the opposite of honor and glory and maybe 21 generations of honor is perhaps 21 generations of shame for doing something shameful. That’s beautiful.
That’s so true that actually we don’t contrast honor with humility. So the opposite of pride or arrogance, we could say is humility. But the opposite of pride of honor is, if you could say dishonor, it’s more of shame then.
So that’s very different. I think by considering the antonyms of these two words, the difference between the two concepts also becomes much clearer. When you said shame is usually experienced in isolation.
Not in isolation. No, I’m saying the opposite. It’s not experienced in isolation.
Shame is usually not experienced in isolation. So can we say contrast shame with guilt? That if I do something wrong and my conscience tells me that it’s not wrong, then would you call that as guilt or is guilt also experienced in relation itself? Yeah, I think guilt is more of a private sense. And I mentioned shame cultures that one speaks, I don’t know, anthropologists, I guess, speak of shame cultures and guilt cultures.
And this sort of paradigmatic guilt culture is in the Abrahamic traditions, especially in Judaism, not following the command of God. One is guilty. But in shame cultures, which I think are generally Eastern, East Asian, South Asian, the concern is what is the effect of one’s behavior on one’s family? So that’s a shame.
That’s a very gross explanation. It’s probably much more refined. But it’s an important differentiation.
Yeah, interesting. You mentioned about Judaism. I thought it was Catholicism, which had more of an emphasis on shame or rather on guilt and original sin and confession.
Does Judaism also have, I don’t know, Judaism has the idea of weekly confession or anything like that. That’s true. I don’t know, the Jewish tradition, as contrasted with Christianity, it’s very much emphasizing rules, following of the injunctions.
We would say the vidhi of Shastra. They have what are called the mitzvot. There’s something over 600 different rules.
If one’s a very strict Orthodox Jew, one is following some 600 and something rules and regulations. And perhaps the idea of guilt has to do with not following those. But I think one of the bigger issues in ancient Israel was whether one was loyal or disloyal to the covenant of Yahweh.
In other words, there was always this problem. This is kind of the ongoing story in the Hebrew Bible of being obedient to God’s covenant, his set of rules. First, it was the 10 commandments, and then eventually 600.
One is turning to other gods. And this disloyalty was, I’m mentioning this in a book, which I’ve just finished, a manuscript about our deity worship tradition. The idea of idolatry in Judaism is, one of the ideas is, the oldest of them, is being not faithful to God by worshiping other gods, was considered to be similar to or the same or as bad as adultery.
And in ancient Israel, adultery could be punishable by death. Yes. It’s a very curious thing.
Yeah. So, in that sense, that sense of other gods, worshiping other gods is not just bad or wrong, but it’s as sinful as adultery. So, that sense is not there at all in the Bhagavad Gita when it talks about Anya Devata.
Krishna said a few of them, but it is a very different connotation. Krishna said this is for less intelligent people, he’s not saying for immoral people. Right.
Yeah. So, that brings in here how also that there are all the other devatas present in the Narasimha Leela also, and coming back to that topic, that they all, sometimes the other devatas may work at cross purposes with the Supreme Lord because of either their own illusion or because of, say, the pressure of the situation. Say like, sometimes Indra starts challenging Krishna as in Govardhan Leela, or in this case because of fear of the demons.
But it’s not that inherently they are against the Lord. So, that brings out also the contrast between Prahlad’s prayers and say Indra’s prayers. Indra’s prayers, if you paraphrase it, he’s saying that, my dear Lord, now you have freed us from the terror of Hiranyakashipu.
Now we can worship you, we can worship you properly. Our worship has been interrupted, now we can resume it. But Prahlad says, I was never afraid.
I’m not afraid of anything except forgetting your, except being caught in material existence and his worship was never interrupted. So, it’s more of pure worship and impure worship rather than say like, devotion being moral and devotion to some other gods being immoral. Yes, it’s interesting that in chapter two, seventh canto, chapter two, I think it is, the demigods are pressured into serving and also worshiping Hiranyakashipu.
Yeah. It says also Narada was drafted into this. That’s interesting.
My understanding of that is sometimes when the, I would like to hear your understanding also, but my understanding was that sometimes when the, when a particular Ila is meant to highlight the glory of a particular devotee, then all other characters are shown in a light which glorifies that devotee. Like even Lakshmi Devi, she’s afraid of Narasimha Dev, it is said, but Prahlad is not afraid. So, in that sense that pastime, could it be seen Narada Muni’s behavior also in that mood of highlighting Prahlad’s glory? Yeah, that’s I think a nice explanation, but it’s also, you know, I like to always point out the humor in the Bhagavatam and there’s some humor here as well.
When we picture the scene, you know, imagine you walk into the court of Hiranyakashipu and you see the various courtiers offering praise to Hiranyakashipu. And then you look over to one side and you see Narada Muni is there and he’s also offering praise. You’re going to think, what? What is going on? And then maybe in my mind, I see Narada looking back at you as you look at him, you know, in a surprised expression.
He looks back at you and gives you a quick wink to indicate that, you know, this is just, I just, I have to do this. Sorry. I’m not doing this seriously, but I have to.
Amazing. This aspect of the humor within scripture, I’ve never really been able to connect with that. But sometimes when some devotees narrate the pastimes in a very humorous way, I sometimes wonder whether they are actually accurately representing the pastime.
But the way you are bringing it out, it is, there is a certain amount of humor inherent there. Yeah, it’s certainly, there’s no tragedy in the Bhagavatam. What do you mean no tragedy? Well, tragedy requires that there be the finality of death.
As I see it, that is in classical terms, tragedy means there’s death, meaning somebody is really killed and that’s it, they’re finished. And we don’t find that in the, well, the Puranic literature at all. There’s some discussion, scholarly discussion about Mahabharata.
There’s one figure in the Mahabharata who is considered to be a tragic figure, and that is Karna. Karna, yes. Karna is, in a sort of classical way, he is, we can say tragic.
Although, of course, no one really dies, we understand. But in the Mahabharata, within the frame of the Mahabharata, you can say there is a kind of tragic sense. But as far as the whole Bhagavatam, of course, it’s very clear.
Excuse me, I just have to turn this off. It’s very clear that the soul is eternal. That’s one of the central messages.
And so when Hiranyakashipu is killed, we know he’s not actually killed. He’s just moving on to his next program, which is he’s going to become Ravana, and so on. And since there’s, I guess what I want to say is, since there’s no tragedy as such in literary terms, what are we left with? We’re left with comedy.
Oh, okay. Now, you could say, well, there’s also pathos. Pathos is, I don’t know, what is pathos? Sort of sad feelings, something like that.
But we don’t really find that in the Bhagavatam either. So even though Parishad Maharaj is cursed to die and eventually he dies, but the Bhagavatam’s thrust is that by the power of sound, he is elevated and he attains spiritual liberation. So in that sense, it’s not a tragedy.
Right. He’s a big success story. He’s the ideal listener to the Bhagavatam and he attains perfection.
It’s said that he attains perfection before his body is killed. Oh, okay. So then if death is not final, then is tragedy even conceptually possible? I don’t think so.
Okay. So we could say from this life’s perspective, at one level, everybody’s life is going to end in a tragedy. Well, is that tragedy or is it pathos? Looking at pathos, a quality that evokes pity or sadness.
That’s the straightforward meaning. And we have the English word pathetic. And there are descriptions in the Bhagavatam of different kinds of death.
There’s a kind of spectrum that runs from the most pathetic to the most heroic. I would say it’s not pathetic to dramatic or to tragic or anything, it’s pathetic to heroic. So Pariksit Maharaj’s death is heroic.
Bhishma Dev’s death is heroic. Sati’s death is heroic. And then Kapila describes the pathetic death in his instruction to Devahuti.
And Ajamila’s death is almost pathetic. And just at the last minute, inadvertently, it becomes, I don’t know if you can say heroic, but somehow he slips through and becomes a successful bhakta to glorify the holy name, of course. What’s glorious there is the holy name.
So we could say there in that case, the real tragedy would be if somebody deliberately turns away from the Lord and then their death becomes, again, it will not be tragic, it will be more pathetic. Because somebody’s wasting human life. We have Bhaktivinoda Thakur’s songs when he takes the role of a conditioned soul.
I wasted my life. So that’s more of pathos than tragedy. It’s pathos and the person is to be pitied.
We say, oh, this is very pitiful. If someone wastes the human form of life. So, yeah, now I can understand when you say tragedy, there is a sense of irreversible finality to it, which will never be there.
Yeah, Greek tragedy, Shakespearean tragedy. When you watch or hear them or read, you really get a sense. Oh, this is really, this is really tragic.
Even the romantic story, Romeo and Juliet, you know, it’s a romance, but it ends in tragedy. They both end up dead. Yeah, that’s true.
So, and if you see, I once saw a professional performance of Romeo and Juliet live in Stratford-on-Avon in the place in England. When you get real professional actors, it’s very powerful. And then you see, then you understand what is, you have a real sense of tragedy.
But then you step back and you think, well, actually, no, the soul is eternal. So they didn’t actually die. That kind of spoils the story.
So, is tragedy one of the 12 Rasa’s? I don’t think so. No, no. There is horror, there is fear, there is amazement, adbhuta.
So, yeah, that’s a beautiful point. There’s no tragedy at all. So, so in a sense, even if something bad happens.
Sorry? Well, that is interesting because somehow it’s certainly not one of the 12 Rasa’s of Shilarupa Goswami. And we don’t find it in any of the other analyses of Indian aesthetics. But we do see that to watch a dramatic performance is relishable.
I’m saying a dramatic, tragic performance. It’s very relishable. So why is that? That’s interesting.
Something to think about. Of course, you mentioned horror. Horror.
People like horror movies. You go to the movie, you know, it’s going to be scary. But you enjoy that.
You relish it. You enjoy it. What is going on there? One way to understand it is that, as you said, there is a, you know, the human heart experiences various emotions.
And whatever the heart is capable of experiencing, the originality of that will be in relationship with Krishna. So, Yashoda Mai, when say, for example, she sees Krishna being carried up high in the sky with Ranavartha. She experienced some kind of horror.
And there is a relish in any emotional relationship with Krishna. So we could say there is a relish in terms of, there is a drop of that experience in this world also whenever we experience something similar. Although it’s because it’s not connected with Krishna.
So it’s almost like a drop as compared to ocean. But it is, I mean, horror movies are also a big genre. And nowadays somehow they come like all these vampire movies come up and it’s like horror and romance are combined together at times.
Which is quite bewildering at times. At least it looks strange at times initially at least. Yes.
I’m just looking, I’m just looking at chapter eight of the Bhagavatam when Nrsingadeva appears. And there’s something interesting. Verse number 17 says, The form was neither that of a man nor that of a lion.
Stambe, savayam, na mrgam namanusham. Now, the first thing that is interesting is the word mrgam just means animal. And specifically, it means wild animal.
As opposed to tame or domesticated, which would be pashu. And then in the next verse, it says, Aho kim etan, nrigendra rupam. Okay.
Aho kim etan, nrigendra rupam. Okay. That’s the last line of the next verse.
That wonderful form. Oh, sorry. Going back to the third line.
Nayamrigo na api naraha vichitram. Could not discern is either a man or a lion emerging from the pillar. So this double negative, he’s not a man, he’s not a wild animal.
But then in the last line, aho kim etan, nrigendra rupam. He’s wondering, Hiranyakashipu wonders, what is this creature that is half man and half lion? And now it says, nriga indra, which would indicate a lion, the king of the beasts. Although technically you could say that indra applies both to nri and to nriga, but generally it would mean applying to nriga.
So he sees this form, which is neither a man nor an animal. And of course we can say, well, yeah, that’s because he isn’t either a man or an animal. He is the Supreme Lord.
So are you saying that this is an experience of a rasa? I mean, I’m not understanding. Well, the rasa here seems to, the dominant rasa seems to be, yes, chitra, wonder. And this is in the translation, Prabhupada says, Hiranyakashipu wondered.
Now there’s different sorts of wondering. There’s sort of, hmm, I wonder, what is this? And then there’s a deeper sort of astonishment and profound sort of existential wonder. Oh, OK.
You could say there’s wonder and wonderstruck. I wonder means I just think it’s like a curious question, but wonderstruck is more like overwhelmed by astonishment or overwhelmed by amazement. So the word adbhuta comes quite often in our literature, in Bhagavad Gita also.
Adbhuta comes in the relationship with the Virat Rupa and Sanjaya’s, both Arjuna’s contemplation, observation as well as Sanjaya’s contemplation. So in terms of, since we have gone in this direction, maybe we could conclude with this part of the rasic analysis of say, of Narasimhadeva’s Leela. So earlier you mentioned that he’s our protector on the path of our bhakti.
But so while we experience the rasa in terms of, in our relationship with Krishna, but there are various rasas we experience in the Narasimha Leela also. So there is maybe fear at the atrocity of Hiranyakashipu, but there is wonder at the fearlessness of Prahalad. And then there is again, here wonder as it is said in Narasimhadeva appears.
Probably this is, in movies they talk about dramatic entries. This is one of the most dramatic entries, coming up, bursting out of a pillar. Yes.
There’s another rasa, which I won’t be able to say where, which purport, but Prabhupada mentions in one purport in the Seventh Canto that Vatsalya rasa can be in two directions. We usually think of it as the devotee regarding the Lord as the dependent, as the child, but it can be the other way around as well. In this case, Prahalad is the child who is dependent on the Lord.
And that, Prabhupada said, can also be considered Vatsalya, Vatsalya rasa. That’s interesting. We usually talk about Vatsalya rasa in the version of say, the normal conception of God as the father and the worshipper as the child, like in the Christian tradition of father, the avat in heaven.
But it seems that, that is a relationship with like a significant level of distance. Whereas a Prahalad Narasimha seems to be a much more intimate kind of relationship. Yeah.
Yes. Even Arjuna says that, Piteva putrase sakheva sakhyu, priyam priyaya manasi deva sodhum. That just as a lover forgives a beloved, as a friend forgives a friend or as a father forgives a son.
You please forgive whatever inappropriate behavior I had. Yes, as I was hanging out with you and joking. That’s a bad word for that.
Normally we don’t use it with God, but that’s exactly what Arjuna was doing. Yeah, he was hanging out. So, Devatas, when they see Narasimhadev, there is adrishta purvam, like there is that mood that he has never been seen before.
So, there is, when we see that the Lord was never seen before, is Narasimhadev also an avatar who appears in every yuga, but the Devatas have no awareness of his appearance from previous yuga? Any idea how it is like that? Well, the term could also be used in a rhetorical sense. Okay. I would say never before, yeah, literally not seen form.
Doesn’t mean never at any time in the past, unless it says, does it say apurva adrishta? I don’t know which verse it is. Okay. Oh, adrishta purvam.
Adrishta, no, it is adrishta atyadbhutam rupam. There is no purvam. Adrishta purvam is in the description of the vishwarupa in the Bhagavad Gita.
I don’t think that’s here. Right. So, then we solved that.
Yes. Yes. But certainly he was a great shock, the appearance of Narasimhadev.
And that’s the other element of humor I wanted to mention, is that Hiranyakasipu really tried hard to get a contract with Lord Brahma without any loopholes so that he could be eternal, that he would be indestructible. And it really seemed that his contract was good. It covered everything.
No animal, no human, not the day or the night, not inside, not outside and so on. It seemed like it was covering everything. And then Narasimhadev’s humor is, his joke, so to say, is to honor all of those conditions and still appear and kill Hiranyakasipu without breaking any of the conditions.
That’s humorous, I think. Yeah. That’s his joking.
One of the major things when humor comes is when somebody outwits somebody else. So, person A thinks I’m very clever, and then person B shows how their cleverness still has holes. So, this is, yes, he tries all possible ways and the Lord outwits him.
And I find it also kind of humorous that after everything is over, isn’t it, Narasimhadev speaks to Lord Brahma and says something like, you know, just don’t be giving such benedictions, please. Troublesome benedictions, yeah. Stop giving such benedictions.
I have to work really hard to figure out how to get around them. That’s true. And it seems this Narasimhadev Leela is probably among the most prominent Leelas, but there are other demons also who make some certain conditions, and the Lord somehow creatively finds a way to overpower them.
Yeah, this is his fun. One way that he has fun. Yeah.
And of course, the Lord has made the whole arrangement in Vaikuntha because he wants to have some fun. He wants to fight. And in order to do that, he has to have some demons and to make it a little extra interesting because he could have made Hiranyakashipu just be similar to Hiranyaksha.
Hiranyaksha was very kind of straightforward, you know, looking for a good fight. And Varahadev gives him the good fight. With Hiranyakashipu, he was more clever in making all these conditions.
So that just added a little more spice for the Lord to give him opportunity to fulfill all of the conditions and still tear apart Hiranyakashipu. So you could say that the creativity or the effort in the case of Narasimhadeva is more in the form in which he appears than what he does in the form. Whereas in the case of Varahadev, he appears in an ordinary form, but then the excitement is more in the action that he does.
Whereas here the excitement is in the form in which he appears itself. Yes, but there’s one element of Narasimhadeva’s action which I find especially striking and one could say is also humorous in an ironic way. And that is he tears open Hiranyakashipu’s gut.
And what does he do? He tears out his intestines. And what does he do with the intestines? He makes it into a garland. He makes it into a garland and he garlands himself.
And it’s almost like, okay, Hiranyakashipu, you actually wanted to serve me by offering me a nice garland. So I’m going to help you. Oh God, you know, I never thought of that being like offering of Hiranyakashipu.
I thought of more, I’d heard that it is from this intestine that Prahlad came. So I’m garlanding myself. But we could also see it this way that the Lord accepted Putana’s service.
Although Swaraj is offering him poison. So that’s beautiful. So that means even within the, within the, so if once we get beyond the, like I was talking about this vampire romance peculiar combination.
So sometimes just the form of the vampire seems so ghastly that you cannot even appreciate the romance kind of thing. But similarly, in the case of Lord Narasimhadev, if one is too caught up in the form, there is that prayer of Sridhar Swami that, that, you know, for a lion baby, the lion’s form is very protective, the she-lion’s form. But for other being, it appears very intimidating.
So if we can get a, go beyond the intimidating appearance of the Lord, then we can appreciate a lot of, a lot of all these emotions and especially the humor. Otherwise, it’s just the form itself can seem quite intimidating and alienating. Yeah.
He’s, he is Adbhuta, which means ultimately wonderful in a positive sense, I would say. This is the, this is Prahlad’s mood. He is, he’s actually charmed by Narasimhadev.
He’s not, he’s not at all intimidated. He’s charmed. Yeah.
So what can appear intimidating to one can appear, appear charming. In fact, so is this, we could conclude on this. This is, is this requiring, like we say, So it’s not just the spiritual form that can be seen in the eyes of love.
But even when the form manifests in this world, to actually understand that form, we need to have some level of affection or appreciation. Otherwise, we will not, we will not perceive rightly. Yeah, exactly.
And this is, you could say this is coming back to the subject of deity worship. If we don’t have affection for the Lord, then the deity will appear, Prahlad says, as stone only. And we will not, will not recognize or appreciate that the Lord is present in his deity form.
So, as you said, The salve of love smearing the eyes is required. Yes, it is. And that’s all being done as we read the Bhagavatam and hear about the, the, the many different forms of the Lord and how they appear and how they, how they deal with the demons and how they protect the devotees.
Then our, this is all part of the process of preparing the salve, we can say the salve of prema, by which then we can, Prabhupada said, come to see the Lord face to face. Oh, beautiful. So, so it’s not just that some people have that salve and some don’t, but that salve is being prepared by our practice of bhakti.
So, yes, that’s true. I just, our practice of bhakti and specifically our hearing, hearing the Bhagavatam, in which the Lord is appearing in his many forms. Yeah.
Just this last week, I was a participant in the Annual American Academy of Religion Conference. This is a very large conference of scholars of religion from all over the world, mainly America. And I was part of a panel, the discussion, the theme of the panel, the general theme was religion in South Asia.
The more specific theme was earnestness in South Asian contexts. And I gave a presentation on earnestness in hearing and reading the Bhagavatam. Okay.
That’s nice. And so what I explained in that was one can speak of what is called religious reading in contrast to what is called consumer reading. So most people are doing, if they’re reading at all, they’re doing consumer reading.
But what we are interested in with our literature is religious reading, which means a certain, we wanna cultivate a, excuse me, a certain mood of receptivity, of humility, of freedom from envy, of persistence of, and of course, gradually becoming rasika as this second or third verse says of the Bhagavatam. That’s beautiful. Anyway, all of this is religious reading.
You know, I had put it in different terms, but I talked about being a spiritual shopper and being a spiritual seeker. It contrasts that. That is more generic terms.
But we could talk more in terms of this consumer. This is beautiful, Maharaj. So, you know, I hope that by your association, I can graduate more from a consumer kind of reading to religious reading.
So I think you opened a lot of vistas for appreciating the Bhagavatam in today’s discussion, especially Lord Narasimhadev. So should I try to summarize, Maharaj, or you want to add something concluding? That’s a beautiful note actually. No, please.
You’re the expert summarizer. I don’t know about that. So today we discussed about Narasimhadev and we started with the story of how Narasimhadev appeared as a protector so close to the iron curtain and since he miraculously expedited his appearance so that he could come and be with you.
And then since then you have been, you were worshipping the deities and then you also written the deities, deity worship book and talked about your experiences in Andhra where Narasimhadev’s worship seems to be prominent and there are places like Ahobilam and Simhachalam where Lord Narasimhadev has historically significant places for worship. Then with respect to Narasimhadev in the Bhagavatam, you had that brilliant insight that if you look at the Lord’s equality, it is seen more through how he empowers and protects a devotee with equal vision that is Prahlad. So both Prahlad in his response to the teachings of Shandamarka and his own teachings to Hiranyakashyapu manifest that equal disposition and the Lord’s equality, another ways in terms of his equal reciprocity and then we went in the direction of discussing about honour and reputation.
So the seven generations protection, one level of understanding it could also be in terms, one level is that it opens the door for liberation for seven generations. Another is that a devotee gets such a high reputation that others also get high reputation. Then in that connection I think we talked about honour is contrasted, not with say, honour is contrasted with shame.
Honour and shame both are public whereas pride and humility, they are two different virtues. So it’s a person who is concerned about honour is not necessarily proud and a sense of honour can inspire honourable action also. Then we discussed about the Rasas and this I think this is one of the best parts about humour in the Bhagavatam.
So humour in how Narad Muri you said he will wink at us if we saw him bowing down to offering respects to Hiranyakashipu. This is the role I have to play and then how the Lord outsmarts Hiranyakashipu despite all his conditions. So this humour is, this humour we need to go beyond the appearances.
So the Lord’s appearance can seem very fearsome and if you can go beyond that appearance then the whole world of Rasa emotions emerge and then you also mentioned how there is no tragedy in the Bhagavatam because there is no finality of death and although Parikshit Maharaj dies, he is liberated by the power of hearing even before his body falls. In that sense, he is a success story and there might be, whenever there is any distress, it’s more of pathos rather than tragedy and that pathos also, we could say, it churns the heart and it increases the Rasa in different ways. Then we discussed about how there are various Rasas in the Bhagavatam with respect to the Narsimha Leela.
There is wonder which even Hiranyakashipu feels and when he sees the form of Narsimhadev and of course there is fear and horror and there is, you talk about humor and there is love, there is affection and earlier you talked about how there is the form of Narsimhadev which is Ugra and this is Thala you said in the Mayapur which we have which is even more than Ugra and then what you have in Germany is more of a Saumya or gentle form with Prahalad. So you have Prahalad and Lakshmi both and then we also discussed toward the end about how when the Lord appears in our tradition there is more like a functional understanding of Lord Narsimhadev as he purifies our heart so that there is place for Radha Krishna and then in that connection you talked about the two verses from the Bhagavatam. One is like remove the worldly desires in my heart and the second verse is even more specific let everybody become pacified.
So through all these prayers the Lord’s presence in our heart can become manifested and then in the conclusion there is a superb point about the difference between consumer reading and religious reading. So we can develop that salve of love, Prema Anjana Churita Prema Anjana by which you can appreciate Narsimhadev’s Leela and ultimately Krishna’s Leela also by reading the Bhagavatam in a mood of devotion with humility, receptivity, freedom from envy and then the Lord will manifest in our heart. Exactly.
You are helping us to do that by your association and sharing your insights. Thank you very much Maharaj. Shall we conclude with one of Prahlad’s prayers to Narsimhadev? Yes Maharaj, please.
This is verse 15 of chapter 9 na ham vivemyajitate atibayanakasya jihvarkanetra-bhukhuti rabhaso grhadam strad antra-sraja-kshataja-keshara-shankhukarnam nihrad abhita-digibat aribhinna-kagrad My Lord, who are never conquered by anyone, I ask You, I am certainly not afraid of Your ferocious mouth and tongue, Your eyes bright like the sun, or Your frowning eyebrows. I do not fear Your sharp, pinching teeth, Your garland of intestines, Your mane soaked with blood, or Your high, wedge-like ears. Nor do I fear Your teeth, which flee to distant places, or Your nails, which are meant to kill Your enemies.
So that’s Prahlad’s mood. He is not afraid. It’s beautiful.
Thank you very much, Maharaj, for sharing your insights. It’s wonderful to have you. Look forward to it next month once again.
Thank you, Maharaj. Shila Prabhupada ki Jai.