Three levels of manifestation of Jagannatha Rath Yatra

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Right. Three levels of origination of Jagannath Rath Yatra. On the sacred occasion of Rath Yatra, we can contemplate on the glories of Lord Jagannath as are manifested through the Rath Yatra festival.
In today’s talk, I will focus not so much on how Jagannath is God coming to people, which is a standard and important theme in considering Lord Jagannath’s supreme mercy in coming out on the roads during the Rath Yatra festival. Today, however, we will focus on seeing the dynamic interplay between three levels of the manifestation of Jagannath Rath Yatra. So, now for the Rath Yatra to take place, you know, the particular form has to be manifested, the deity of that form has to be manifested and the desire to perform that kind of festival of pulling the Lord, of placing the Lord on a cockart and then pulling him has to manifest.
So, let’s see how these three manifested. So, how the particular form manifested. So, the Gopis felt afflicted by immense separation when Krishna left them and went out of Vrindavan to Mathura and then to Dwarka.
So, that intense separation is described in Chaitanjali’s Amritana verse, which Adharani speaks, Adharani speaks. Oh Lord, who are the master of the fallen and who is very merciful. Now, you have become Mathurana.
You are no longer Rajanath. You have left Vrindavan and gone to Mathura and because of that we are not able to see you. So, when oh Lord will we be able to see you? Our heart is afflicted, tormented, ripped to shreds.
It is in immense misery because of not seeing you. Oh lover, oh beloved, we don’t know what to do, what not to do and just going round and round in circles without coming to any solution. Brahmati, kin karo myaham, what oh Lord should I do now? So, the theme of the Gopis feeling intense separation from Krishna when Krishna went to Vrindavan is often talked about and equally if not more important theme is explained especially in Gopal Champu by Shilajiv Goswami that Krishna also felt immense separation from Vrindavan and he says the Gopis were remembering Krishna.
So, Krishna was also remembering Vrindavan, the Vrajivasis and especially the Gopis and among the Gopis especially Srimati Radharani. So, it was the separation of the Lord, the feelings of separation that affected the Lord and it was these feelings that led to his manifestation of the special form of Jagannath. So, when he was in Mathura and later on in Dwarka, the Yadavas out of their love for Krishna and out of their loving desire to want Krishna to stay with them they carefully avoided letting Krishna be exposed to any memories of Vrindavan, any stimuli that would revive his memories of Vrindavan.
They were fearful that if Krishna’s memories of Vrindavan get stimulated, get triggered, then the longing for Vrindavan will become so strong within him that he will not be able to resist going to Vrindavan. So, they never talked about Vrindavan and they never exposed Krishna to any stimuli related to Vrindavan. By never, it’s not absolutely never, but they tried to avoid as much as possible and Vasudeva and Devaki were also concerned that Krishna is our son but because we couldn’t take care of him in his childhood and because his childhood was with Nanda and Yashoda, so maybe he has more attachment to them than to us and because of that he may leave us and go back to them anytime.
So, they were especially fearful that he goes back and his loving relationship with them is further revived and further intensified, then he may never come back to us and they were feeling that we need Krishna because we love him and also because just recently the Yadu dynasty was subjected to the adharmic tyrant Kamsa’s rule and he had formed many alliances. So, after he had been overthrown, his allies wanted to take revenge against Krishna specifically for having killed Kamsa and also against the Yadus in general for having arranged to have their ally that is Kamsa killed. So, they needed Krishna out of love and also out of the need for protection.
Still, the devotees desire to hear about the Lord’s interaction with other devotees also because that also in a way intensifies their devotion and gives them various ideas and inspirations for how they can increase their service to the Lord. So, the Dwarkavasis once decided to hear about Krishna by asking about him to the one Dwarkavasi who had been both in Vrindavan and in Dwarka and Mathura Dwarka. Now, of course, there were three, Krishna himself and his brother Balram and Rohini.
Krishna and Balram had been in Vrindavan as the children of Yashodamayi. So, they did not want to ask him, ask either of them because they were fearful that they may go back to Vrindavan. So, they chose to ask Rohini.
And accordingly, when they asked Rohini, Rohini also had a desire for the Dwarkavas, for the Yadavas that they appreciate the Vrajavasis. Actually, one devotee appreciates another, but if a devotee feels one’s service threatened, then that may also affect the appreciation. So, therefore, the Yadus were a little concerned that if Krishna goes away from us, then we will not have his association and we will not be able to serve him.
It was not a selfish desire that we want Krishna for our protection. If Krishna is there with us, then we can serve him in various ways. Vasudev and Devaki felt that we weren’t able to do anything for Krishna in his childhood, in his babyhood, in his childhood.
So, now at least let us do something for him. So, it was that desire that kindled, motivated, that was underlined there. Concerned that Krishna not go away to Dwarka, go away from Dwarka to Vrindavan.
That’s why they didn’t want to expose Krishna to Vaja stimuli. But at the same time, while Devaki understood the concern of the Yadus, she had herself seen how intense, selfless and pleasing to Krishna was the love of the Vrajavasis. And therefore, she wanted to do what she could to help the Yadus gain greater appreciation of Krishna’s glories.
And so, she decided, she started speaking about Krishna and Krishna’s pastimes in Vrindavan. An important thing is that she did not speak directly. She, the other Dwarkavansis, they, in order to prevent any possibility of Krishna hearing it, they said that let us hear this when we are all alone, when Krishna has gone out and he is not anywhere in the proximity.
At that time, we will close the door and we will hear at that time. So, things were done according to plan. And the glories of Krishna’s pastimes in Vrindavan and the selfless love that was exhibited between Krishna and his Vraja devotees, that Romili started narrating.
When Krishna heard the Gopis, heard about the Gopis and about the Vrajavasis in general, he just couldn’t hold back his emotions. Now, interestingly, Krishna was not there initially when the Yadavas, Yadus, started hearing Krishna’s pastimes from Devaki. But in due course of time, they also appeared there.
Actually, Subhadra had been kept as a guard to alert the conversationists whenever Krishna returned. But she herself became so absorbed in the talk, in hearing Krishna’s pastimes, that she forgot to keep guard. And Krishna appeared along with Balram.
So, Krishna and Balram were outside. But at a transcendental level, they perceived that Vrindavan pastimes are being discussed. And they came there immediately.
And when they came there, at that time, they became filled with ecstasy. So, they were all standing at the door and all of them were hearing the ecstatic pastimes of Vraja. And in that ecstasy, their forms became transformed.
Because of absorption, their eyes became wide, their limbs became withdrawn into themselves. And thus, the form of Jagannath, Baladeva and Subhadra was manifested. Krishna became Jagannath, Balram became Baladeva and Subhadra, of course, she manifested as in the form that we see in the Jagannath, Vrindavan, Subhadra deities.
Now, going further, Krishna, so this is how the forms manifested for the first time. Another description is that Krishna, Jagannath, Krishna, Baladeva, Balram and Subhadra, they returned to Vrindavan. Balram came to Vrindavan and Krishna also came and Subhadra also came and they actually saw the Vrajavasis in ecstatic separation and that inspired such intense emotion in them that their forms became transformed.
So, essentially, these forms are the Lord manifesting ecstasy to such an extent that His very form became transformed. That is the first level of origination, of the first level of manifestation of this beautiful Dakshatra pastime. Second level is that the Lord has assumed a particular form and the Lord, second is that the Lord manifests that form as a deity.
So that happened with Maharaj Indradyumna. It’s a long story where he desired to have the darshan of the Lord but he couldn’t because he heard that Neelamadhav is a beautiful form of the Lord and he longed to have darshan of Neelamadhav but he found that Neelamadhav was no longer manifest. Then as he was very grief struck, Neelamadhav, it’s a very long story but we are focusing primarily on the manifestation and the interplay between these manifestations.
So, essentially, he got in a very mysterious way wooden form which was considered Daru Brahma and he was told that he should carve the deity from that and Vishwakarma himself came to carve the deity and thus the manifestation of the deity began. Vishwakarma had made a condition that he should not be disturbed till he himself comes out. Maharaj Indradyumna out of great anxiety desired to see the form very eagerly of the deities and when the sound in the architecture workshop room stopped at that time, he unable to restrain himself out of transcendental eagerness he rushed into the room and there he found that the forms were apparently half done and the sculptor true to his word had disappeared.
So, he was grief struck thinking that his impatience has caused the lord to manifest in an incomplete way but then at that time through celestial sources he was informed that actually this is a complete form because the lord has manifested himself as in this form in the past and now that very form which the lord had manifested in the past is now manifested again as the deity. So, thus normally when Krishna is depicted with a flute and in a particular way Jagannath, Baldev, Subhadra are depicted in a significantly different way. Going ahead and thereafter the third level of manifestation happened when the Gopis in Vrindavan when they were in Kurukshetra and they saw Krishna, they desired to have Krishna come back to Vrindavan and that longing was so intense that they envisioned placing Krishna on a chariot and then taking him out not by a horse but they themselves decided to take him by and draw him by the love of their hearts and the labour of their hands and thus Krishna manifested as Jagannath on the cart.
Thus Jagannath Rathyatra festival manifested through the meditation of the Gopis especially of Srimati Radharani. This is the Gopis pull Jagannath, envision pulling Krishna on the chariot back to Vrindavan. Their heart is with Krishna but their heart is also in Vrindavan.
That’s why they are not at all interested in leaving Vrindavan to be with Krishna. They want Krishna to be with them in Vrindavan and so just as they desired Krishna to bring Krishna into their heart similarly when we pull the Ratha cart at that time we are pulling the Lord back into our heart and this activity of beholding the Lord, pulling the Lord and taking the Lord home we are actually assisting the Gopis in their service and on one level we are taking the Lord home to Vrindavan and another level by pulling the Lord home we by taking the Lord home we also take ourselves home because for us this material world and whatever place we might be staying in that is not the ultimate home. Yes our present home may offer us some shelter but that is not going to last.
So when we perform devotional service by that we learn to love Krishna. We learn to redirect our love from this world to Krishna and the more we redirect our love the more we progress on the journey to Krishna and when we have the pure love for Krishna then nothing will hold us back in this world. We will march straight to him, to his eternal abode.
So by performing devotional service it can be performed in various ways and Jagannatha Yatra is a very culturally colourful, physically dynamic and emotionally intense way of performing devotional service and by rendering devotional service thus we can joyfully march onwards to attain Krishna such is the incredible mercy of Krishna manifesting as Jagannatha that he helps us to use our physical, emotional, cultural sensibilities in his service through this festival of pulling his card and by Srila Prabhupada’s mercy that same Yatra festival has now manifested all over the world.