Japa Retreat—Level 02 Day 01—Entering the Retreat

Giriraj Swami: It is guṇḍicā-mārjana day, the day before Ratha-yatra. When Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu observed guṇḍicā-mārjana day, He had King Prataparudra arrange for so many buckets and brooms to clean the Gundica temple. The Ratha-yatra begins at Nilacala and proceeds along the grand route to the Gundica temple at Sundaracala. And basically, during the year, the Sundaracala temple is unoccupied, and so, so much dirt and dust and pieces of straw accumulate there. So, the day before the Ratha-yatra, Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu and His associates clean the temple throwing buckets of water, sweeping with hundreds of brooms.

And Srila Prabhupada, in his commentary on this pastime, quoting extensively from his spiritual master, says that the Gundica temple is like the heart, and just as Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu and His associates cleans the Gundica temple to make it a fit place to receive the Lord, we should also clean the heart. And the process for cleaning the heart is offenseless chanting and hearing, ceto-darpaṇa-mārjanam. The Caitanya-caritāmṛta further describes that after cleaning the temple once, Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu ordered that the temple be cleaned a second time. The first time the most obvious dirt and refuse was cleansed, but there were finer particles of dust and sand that remained. And cleaning it the second time indicated that when we clean the heart, although we may initially remove some of the grosser dirt, there will be more subtle dirt that still has to be removed, and one should be very serious about cleaning the heart to get all the dirt out.

And Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta also describes that after cleansing the temple, they watered down the area outside the temple, so that dust and sand wouldn’t come back into the temple. So, in the same way, we also have to be very careful, that after taking so much trouble to cleanse the heart, that we don’t allow more dirt to come back in the heart. So, this pastime is most appropriate for us at the beginning of the retreat because we are undertaking the cleansing process, ceto-darpaṇa-mārjanam. Everyone here has attended at least a japa weekend, if not a full retreat, and so we already have some experience. And the present retreat is meant to take us further in the same process, it is like the second cleansing.

Of course, every day we are meant to cleanse the heart by chanting. In fact, the mood of the retreat of leaving everything behind and just spending the time with Krishna, with the holy name, under the most favorable circumstances, we want to have a retreat every day, at least for two hours, when we chant our sixteen rounds or for as much time as we can afford, to keep the dirt out and whatever dirt is there, whatever anarthas are there, whatever ignorance is there, keep working on cleaning it. But it is not just cleaning for the sake of cleaning. Of course, it is good to clean, we feel good when we are clean, but it is cleaning for a purpose, because we want to have a nice place for the Lord to reside. And that is our goal, to welcome the Lord into our hearts in the form of the holy name, and to enshrine Him there and worship Him there and serve Him there.

So, Level Two, we will begin with a review of some of the basic points from Level One; the body of chanting, the mind of chanting, sacred space, different things that we have already discussed, and a consideration of how we have done in those areas since the japa weekend or level one that we attended. And then we will go further in the heart of chanting; how to really go forward towards our goal of developing our relationship with Krishna and serving Him with love. It is a wonderful opportunity that we have. We know how much we benefit from both the association and the commitment to the process, and how hard it is when we go back to maintain the same level of commitment, and to progress, in maybe less favorable circumstances.

So, this is a very, very, very special opportunity. I know after I finished Level One two days ago, I was just so eager; I was so glad that there was going to be Level Two after Level One, so eager to resume the process. And especially the sixty-four-round days, I think every devotee who was here for Level One really had a very significant experience on the sixty-four round day. I did, in my own way, and I am looking forward to the next sixty-four-round day and the next one after that. Well, I hope I will be looking forward to it after the next one. [laughter] They can be pretty intense. But my mood is that, whatever it takes, let us go for it. We have this valuable human form of life; within this valuable human form of life, we have gotten the association of pure devotees, Srila Prabhupada and his sincere followers, which is not ordinary. We have our voice, we have our tongue, we have our ears, we have our mind in relatively sound condition. We may not always have those facilities.

We have everything we need; we have the instructions; here, we have the retreat facility; we have temples that we can go to; we have the association of devotees; we have the books, and we have the holy name, and the ability to chant and hear and remember, we have everything. And not to take full advantage would be the greatest crime or the greatest foolishness. Or like Narottama dasa Thakura and others have said, it would be like drinking poison knowingly, it would be like committing suicide. So yes, we have every opportunity, we should take full advantage. And even if there is some pain involved, sometimes they say ‘no pain, no gain,’ even if in that process of cleansing some dirt comes up that we didn’t know was there, we didn’t know so much of it was there, but it is good. It is part of the cleansing process. But it might be humbling to realize what was there, but that is also good to be humbled.

So, I think whatever it is we should be ready for it, we should embrace it as the Lord’s mercy, and just keep forging ahead, just keep forging ahead whatever it is. Because the goal is there, it is attainable, and we just have to keep going. Just a few hours ago, Ravindra Svarupa Prabhu was saying that sometimes devotees tell him he is a good writer and can he help them become better writers? And he feels that they could be good writers, anyone could be a good writer, but they stop too soon. If they keep working on their writing, if they keep refining it and improving it, they can be good writers, but they stop too soon. So, it is the same thing with the process of purification, it is the same thing with developing our love for Krishna; we shouldn’t stop too soon. If we keep at it, we will get the results we want. And we are in the most favorable circumstances, the best association with all facility. Not just the facility that we have here, which is wonderful, but the facility to be away from everything else and just take advantage of the wonderful opportunity that is been afforded to us.

So, you have all come with the best intentions. I am sure you will take advantage of the opportunity, and that we will all make progress together, and in the process come closer to each other and closer to the Godhead. Hare Krishna.

Ravindra Svarupa dasa: Krishna consciousness has always been full of real surprises for me, and one of the surprises is what an incredible adventure japa is. We think of adventure of people going off into the wilderness, climbing mountains, having hair breath escapes, Indiana Jones and all these kinds of things, it is our idea of an adventure. You don’t think of somebody sitting quietly in a room with beads, sitting quite still and chanting as undergoing anything very exciting. But it is an adventure, and it is a real adventure. It is the adventure of the inner life and of a life that is an arena that is much, much bigger than this material world, and just as exciting and thrilling and sometimes as terrifying as any adventure people undertake in the material world.

And so, it has always been really interesting to me, and I never know, like in any good adventure, exactly what is going to happen next. So, it is surprising. Here it is, it sounds so boring, you are a religious person, like a monk, and you chant sixteen rounds a day in a vow, and you sit there and you do them, and people think, That is just boring. But that is the last thing it is if we do anything or undertake it properly. So, Prabhupada said to us that of all the orders of the spiritual master, the order to chant a fixed number of rounds every day is the most important. And that is really, very interesting that he gives it this place of prominence in our lives. And I am very, very happy to see the gradually, the Krishna consciousness movement is giving this practice its due regard. Because for a long time, it was something we did, we had to do, we needed to do. It was like taking our medicine every day, castor oil or whatever that you need to take, and something you did, you got it over with, and then maybe went out to other more interesting things. It was treated like that.

And so, we are coming to a much higher platform, and to understand why this is central and why it is so important to us. So, Prabhupada gave it this central importance, and I really think of japa as the center support that holds up everything else. Just like a big circus tent may have one big pole in the middle. And there are other polls and guidelines and everything, but if the center pole goes, nothing else will work. And so, this japa, for everything else that we do, this is the central foundation and support. And it is really the place where we cultivate the holy name. The holy name is not just chanted but is cultivated; there is a process. In fact, the English word ‘process’ is translated into Sanskrit as ‘sadhana.’ There is a discipline, and there is a process for cultivating the holy name. In the beginning, anyone can chant, we don’t mind. If we are having hari-nāma on the street and some drunks jump up and down and chant, we pray. But if we really want to make progress in spiritual life, then we have to follow the process.

And in my mind, the essence of that process is to chant the holy name while trying to give up offenses. Because as we know, Krishna and Krishna’s name are the same. So therefore, when we say Krishna’s name, it should be equivalent to seeing Krishna face to face. Our hair should stand on edge and tears should spring out of our eyes, we should start shaking like this, that is what should happen when we just say the name Krishna. It is not happening, so that means there is something that needs to be done. We are not really experiencing the real holy name, or as people say, śuddha- nāma, the pure name. So, that is only because of offenses. So, sadhana means to chant while trying to give up these offenses. Of course, there is a stage called anartha-nivṛtti, in which a particular time for main concentration on giving up of offenses, but really the anartha-nivṛtti, the giving up of anarthas, unwanted things, especially offenses, continues almost all the way to the end. Of course, there is still more steps, anartha-nivṛtti is only the very beginning.

This sequence, that in the beginning, adau śraddhā, at first, there must be some preliminary interest and trust. And if that is fruitful, then there will be sādhu-saṅga, one will associate with more advanced devotees. And if that is fruitful, bhajana-kriyā, then one will take up the practices, discipline practices under guidance of the process of devotional service. If that is right, then anartha-nivṛtti, the unwanted things, sins and offenses, will start to disappear from the heart. When that is accomplished to a certain degree, then there will be the next thing, there will be niṣṭhā. We will become fixed in Krishna consciousness, our devotional service won’t look like the stock market going up and down and up and down on a bad week. Our practice will be steady and our advancement will be steady, this is niṣṭhā. And then, the next thing that will happen, we will develop a taste for the holy name.

It means that when I have an opportunity to perform a devotional service or chant and some other materially pleasant activity, I just rather do the devotional activity, I don’t even have to preach to myself, I just like it better. This is ruci, this is the taste. And ruci has as its object the activities of devotional service. And then, if ruci is fruitful, then the next stage is āsakti. Āsakti also means like a taste, attachment, but it is an intense attachment. Actually, it is an addiction, but it is an addiction to Krishna. Ruci has the activities of devotional service as its object, but āsakti has Krishna as its object. And as it turns out, not just an obsession with Krishna in a general way, but it turns out to be really specific at a certain age in the company of certain devotees, performing certain pastimes. And as that obsession develops, I will start to have strong feelings toward Krishna in this way, my feelings will come out. And those feelings, when they become strong, become known as bhāva. And that is the next stage, the symptoms of ecstasy appear on the body and so on.

And then, that bhāva becomes enriched and embellished by other kinds of emotions; that bhāva becomes a component in rasa and becomes the sthāyi-bhāva. But there are other bhāvas all together, and things are wrench, intensified. That is the sequence, the [Unintelligible 00:24:29], this is the chronological order of the stages of advancement in devotional service. I point this out because this is a science. Science means the jnana, it means applied knowledge. And so, our acharyas have gone through this process, they have begun from the beginning and gone to the end, and they have guided many people in this process, and they can say, “First this happens, first this happens, then this happens and this happens.” I remember hearing a lecture from Prabhupada in the early days, he says, “When you are performing devotional service, you should see that lust and greed are disappearing from the heart.” He said, “If they are not, you are doing something wrong.” And that was very reassuring because I can say, “Here is the process. Oh, lust and greed are not dwelling in the heart or disappearing from the heart, I can go to somebody. What am I doing wrong? There must be some something I am doing.” So, that is why we have people who can guide us, who have been there, have reported what happened, who has given us instructions what to do, so that we will continue on this program how to correct ourselves.

Because like any science, you go in the Chem Lab and you pour two things together and you should see a blue precipitate come out, and it doesn’t happen and the teacher says, “Well, you better start over again and clean your test tubes this time.” I did something wrong, and then do it again, and it comes out right. So, we should have complete confidence in this process. We should see that Lord Chaitanya gave it, it was spelled out and filled in by the Six Gosvamis, we have the experience of Visvanatha Cakravarti Thakura, Narottama dasa Thakura, Bhaktivinoda Thakura, so many people have given us the benefit of their experience. So, we should take this with the confidence that this is the process, and now we are going to enter deeper into this process, and we will see what happens.

So, the main thing, we are trying to chant the holy name while trying to become free from offenses. Now, of course, in japa, especially the offense we need to deal with particularly, is the one called pramādaha. Pramādaha literally means craziness, but sometimes in English when a person is crazy, we say they are distracted. They are not there, they are hearing voices, they are in another world, they are distracted. So similarly, Bhaktivinoda Thakura says in the Harināma-cintāmaṇi that this pramādaha is actually the offense, which is like the seed bed from which all the other offenses grow, and that if we are not trying to become free from this offense, then we will not be successful in becoming free from the other offenses. So, especially in japa, our main thing is to keep our mind on the holy name. Here is the holy name, we give it our attention and we discover it goes away, and then we bring it back, it goes away, we bring it back.

If we are trying to do this diligently, even as Prabhupada says mechanically; by mechanical he means that there may not be a real attraction for Krishna or for the holy name. Of course, if our mind keeps going away, it means when there is an attraction, it is just stuck on there. But I bring it back just by the force of my will. As soon as I notice my mind has gone somewhere else, I bring it back. That at least is chanting on the clearing stage, and on that clearing stage, the pure name is not visible but the nāma-ābhāsa, the dawning light of the holy name. And Haridasa Thakura just says that dawning twilight of the holy name destroys, this nāma-ābhāsa, destroys all sinful reactions, and its fruit is mukti. And then, when the pure name is manifest, then the fruit is prema. But the main thing about chanting is if in the beginning, the early stages, we do a few things right, correctly, then everything will go along. And in many ways, it becomes a self-guiding process. So, this is what we deal with. We try to fix the holy name on Krishna, our attention on Krishna. We do have our attention, it wanders, we bring it back. This is described by Krishna actually in the Sixth Chapter of the Bhagavad-gītā, “Wherever the mind wanders, bring it back under the control of the self.” Our attention should become like a candle flame in a windless place, he tells us this thing.

Of course, Arjuna points out our objection. Yes, the mind is restless and turbulent, it is like trying to control the wind, it is a hurricane in there, there is no candle in a windless place at all. And Krishna says, “No, it can be done.” Well, first he says like a good teacher, “I understand the problem.” [laughter] “I know what you are talking about. I sympathize.” He said, “But it can be done.” And he says two things, abhyāsa and vairāgya. Now, these are really interesting words. Vairāgya, of course, means detachment. In other words, if we are doing a lot of material activities that increase the wind, then it is going to be very hard. Otherwise, we are working against ourselves. So, the detachment is necessary. And the word abhyāsa means practice. And the meaning of practice in Sanskrit actually, abhyāsa, in English is ‘repetition.’

Bhakta Hari is very good at playing that instrument, and that is because he practices, he has been willing to sit down and do the same thing over and over again. When I was a kid, I was taking music lessons, violin lessons, and I used to stand there and go ‘da, da, da, da, da. . .’ And that was practice. And since my parents were paying for lessons, they said, “You have to practice one hour every day.” And my teacher said. . . And that is what is required, that is the practice, it is repetition, you just repeat. And that is why Prabhupada had us sixteen rounds a day, that is our practice. And if we are attentive with practice, pretty soon it becomes easier. Or again, if you are an actor, you are putting on a play, you also have to practice, your rehearsals are practices, and you do it over and over again.

And Krishna says, in the Eighth Chapter of Bhagavad-gītā, abhyāsa-yoga-yuktena cetasā nānya-gāminā paramaṁ, within your mind, not going anywhere else, then that person attains the Supreme Lord because of their determination to fix their mind on Krishna, abhyāsa-yoga-yuktena cetasā nānya-gāminā the mind not going anywhere else. So, that is what we do, we practice. And now, we are having a very important practice session, we are going to try to push the limits a little better and try some harder things than we ever done to challenge ourselves to get beyond our limits, and we will see that things will happen. Because it is a science, we know what will happen next, and what is the basic thing to do. Japa, especially dealing with attentiveness, because while you are chanting, life is simpler. You are probably not going to offend any devotees because you are not interacting that much with them. So, it is really simple.

I like japa because otherwise, life is complicated, so many things are going on, but when you chant japa, there is really, like, a stage or an arena where there are three actors; there is myself, there is the holy name, and there is my mind, nobody else is on stage. So, it is really simple, it is a golden opportunity to deal with my mind and fixing my mind at the lotus feet of the holy name. So, this is this opportunity. Now, as I said, that can be mechanical. We are fixing our attention on Krishna, but just by doing that, feelings will come. At least this is my own experience. What those feelings may be, may be quite unexpected. But because in one sense it is mechanical, but in another sense, we should understand that chanting the holy name is really about a relationship, really repairing a relationship, restoring a broken relationship with Krishna. And we know that Krishna Himself is extremely interested in having a relationship with us. In fact, unfortunately, much more so that we are with Him, but that interest is there. He has practically moved heaven and earth to bring us into relationship with Him. Why does He send somebody like Srila Prabhupada to do so much work to spread Krishna consciousness into foreign countries? Why have so many acharyas work so hard? It is because Krishna wants a relationship, and there is just no doubt about it.

So, when we at least even mechanically trying to pay attention, we are showing Krishna that we are also interested. We are proving to him that we are interested. The reason why inattentiveness is an offense is that in ordinary social relationships, it is an offense. Especially with the holy name, the words are in the vocative case, we are calling on Krishna, we are asking Him to come. So, it is like in a social relationship where I invite somebody really important to my house - my boss, a big politician, my spiritual master, whatever, somebody really, really important - and they agree to come. And so, at the appointed time, they show up at the front door and knock at the door, there is no answer, they open the door, looking, “Hello? Anybody home?” And I am out in the backyard, I am staking up the tomato plants, “Yes, come on in, I will be there in a minute!” Now, that is rude, that is not how you receive an important guest.

So, similarly, while we are chanting japa and we are calling on Krishna, we have to be there, we have to show them that we are interested. Now, our mind goes away, when it goes away, we should regret it, we should be sorry, we should put our mind back on Krishna and say, “Krishna, I am very sorry, I really want to have a relationship with you. Unfortunately, I have been away for a long time, my mind got bad habits. So, please forgive me, and I will. . .” So, as soon as Krishna understands we have this right attitude, we are paying attention to Him, He pays attention to us. And in one sense, He is always paying attention, but then we feel it. And then, a relationship develops and then deepens. And of course, it always keeps deepening, as far as we know, without any limit.

In my early days as a temple president, I knew the importance of japa, and I saw that during the japa period, that if the devotees didn’t stay in the temple room, they would fall asleep, they would go back to bed or they would do something else, or I would see them with the beads in their hands, looking at a newspaper or something, Hare Krishna Hare Krishna [inattentively chanting], or stirring a pot, Hare Krishna Hare Krishna [chanting inattentively]. So I said, “Okay. Now, for japa period, everyone has to stay in the temple room, absolutely everyone.” And I stood at the door, and I wouldn’t let anyone out. I am no longer up to that kind of behavior but I was young and I forced the devotees during japa period to stay in the temple room. If they wanted to leave to go to the bathroom, they had to come and see me first.

So, everybody stayed in the temple room, and then I watched people sit in the temple room, Hare Krishna…[inattentive chanting]. So, I got a squirt bottle, one of these things you water plants with or something, I could reach across the room. [laughter] And you could put on spray, and I would pass it around so people that got sleepy, they could wet their face, but other people, I sprayed them. [Unintelligible 00:41:04]. And then, some people, I made them chant standing up because they would fall asleep no matter how wet they were. [laughter] And I remember explaining to people that we had to pay attention, and the image of paying attention, I said, “Each mantra should come out perfectly.” I said, “Just like if you are in a factory and there is an assembly line, you watch every product that comes off the assembly line to make sure there are no defects.”

Well, that is okay, but you can see the metaphor was kind of mechanical and you are sort of, there is the mantra and you are in the back watching a new devotee. So, it took a while to develop this realization that, “No, this is about a personal relationship.” And although I have to say. . . And people, I had to force people to stay in the temple room and chant japa, although I think almost all those people are still devotees. There is some benefit to it. So, I understood the importance of japa but it took me quite a few years to really get into the deeper meaning of it. And of course, then also because of that I went through ups and downs, and ISKCON went through changes and I had some hard times. But then, at a certain point, I realized that even for the sake of the Hare Krishna movement, that japa isn’t just my own individual responsibility, it is a social responsibility, that a neglect of sadhana was at the heart of all our problems in the Hare Krishna movement. And so, I began to pursue it more and more, fixed it up again and became more serious about it, began to study more and more. And so, here we are today with this effort.

So, really, we owe it to ourselves, to do this for ourselves, we owe it to the Hare Krishna movement, to help improve our movement, and also, to the whole world, we have a duty toward everybody. And we can do all those things best by this cultivation of the holy name because we all see the relationship with Krishna develop, and then we will all become empowered. Prabhupada once said to us, he said, “I am one person, and see what I have done.” He said, “Now we are five hundred.” I think at the time that was the number of his initiated disciples. He says, “Now we are five hundred. Now each one of you become just like me and see what can be accomplished.” So, he didn’t say it was impossible. In fact, he wanted us to do that. And so, this is a core activity for actually pursuing this end.