BG 9.13

Giriraj Swami: 

oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya
oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya
oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya

We shall read from Bhagavad-gītā As It Is, Chapter Nine, “The Most Confidential Knowledge,”

TEXT 13

mahātmānas tu māṁ pārtha

daivīṁ prakṛtim āśritāḥ

bhajanty ananya-manaso

jñātvā bhūtādim avyayam

TRANSLATION

O son of Pṛthā, those who are not deluded, the great souls, are under the protection of the divine nature. They are fully engaged in devotional service because they know Me as the Supreme Personality of Godhead, original and inexhaustible.

PURPORT by Srila Prabhupada

In this verse the description of the mahātmā is clearly given. The first sign of the mahātmā is that he is already situated in the divine nature. He is not under the control of material nature. And how is this effected? That is explained in the Seventh Chapter: one who surrenders unto the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Śrī Kṛṣṇa, at once becomes freed from the control of material nature. That is the qualification. One can become free from the control of material nature as soon as he surrenders his soul to the Supreme Personality of Godhead. That is the preliminary formula. Being marginal potency, as soon as the living entity is freed from the control of material nature, he is put under the guidance of the spiritual nature. The guidance of the spiritual nature is called daivī prakṛti, divine nature. When one is promoted in that way – by surrendering to the Supreme Personality of Godhead – one attains to the stage of great soul, mahātmā.

The mahātmā does not divert his attention to anything outside Kṛṣṇa, because he knows perfectly well that Kṛṣṇa is the original Supreme Person, the cause of all causes. There is no doubt about it. Such a mahātmā, or great soul, develops through association with other mahātmās, pure devotees. Pure devotees are not even attracted by Kṛṣṇa’s other features, such as the four-armed Mahā-viṣṇu. They are simply attracted by the two-armed form of Kṛṣṇa. They are not attracted to other features of Kṛṣṇa, nor are they concerned with any form of a demigod or of a human being. They meditate only upon Kṛṣṇa in Kṛṣṇa consciousness. They are always engaged in the unswerving service of the Lord in Kṛṣṇa consciousness.

COMMENT

So, in Shyamasundara Prabhu’s brief introduction, he mentioned that by associating with great souls and serving great souls, one becomes great. As Srila Prabhupada said, by serving the great, one becomes great. Krishna is the greatest, and those who surrender to Him and serve Him in Krishna consciousness also become great.

Some years ago, I arranged a program for Srila Prabhupada at the home of the Birla family in Bombay. The Birla’s were the richest family in India then. Srila Prabhupada said no one can measure their wealth. And I prepared a list of topics, about twenty topics that I thought would be of interest, and I asked Mrs. Birla to choose one. So, she looked at the list, and she chose the topic, “How to be successful in life?” [laughter] They are already successful by everyone else’s standards, but they want to be more successful.

So, when Srila Prabhupada came, he gave a very interesting talk, in which first, he defined success. Now, we may have our ideas of success, but what is the best definition of success? And Srila Prabhupada explained, as he has explained in the verse and purport here, that there are two energies; the internal energy, or spiritual energy, and the external energy, or material energy. And we, living entities, are marginal. We are sometimes under the control of the spiritual energy, and sometimes under the control of the material energy. Most people are under the control of the material energy. So Srila Prabhupada said, “Success means to come out from the control of this material energy, and come under the control of the spiritual energy.” And he explained that the material energy is personified as Durga, and the spiritual energy is personified as Radharani. So, success in life means to become free from the control of maya or Durga, and be placed under the control of Srimati Radharani.

So, in the Seventh Chapter of the Bhagavad-gītā, Lord Krishna says daivī hy eṣā guṇa-mayī
mama māyā duratyayā,  that this material nature, which consists of the three modes, is very difficult to overcome, mām eva ye prapadyante māyām etāṁ taranti te, but one who surrenders to Krishna can easily overcome maya. Once, I asked Srila Prabhupada about chanting and hearing, and how hard it was to chant without being affected by maya, or distracted by maya. And he said to chant loudly. So, surrendering to Krishna to become free from maya for us can mean chanting the holy names in a way that our mind becomes fixed on the holy name, and thus, free from maya.

And Srila Prabhupada described that Durga rides on her carrier, and she holds a trident, or triśūla, with which she pierces the demons. And the trident, the three prongs of the trident represent the three-fold miseries of material existence; miseries caused by other living entities, miseries caused by nature, and miseries caused by our own bodies and minds. So, as long as we are under the material energy, we are always being pierced by these miseries, and that is not a happy life, that is not a successful life. A successful life is one in which we become free from these miseries. And that can be affected by surrendering to Krishna. And again, we can surrender to Krishna by surrendering to someone who has surrendered to Krishna, which means, practically, surrendering to someone who has surrendered to someone who has surrendered to someone who has surrendered to Krishna, that is the paramparā system.

Srila Prabhupada surrendered to his Guru Maharaja, Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura; he surrendered to his Guru Maharaja, Srila Gaura Kishore dasa Babaji; he surrendered to his spiritual master, Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura; he surrendered to his spiritual master, Srila Jagannatha dasa Babaji, and that way, all the way back to Lord Chaitanya, and further back to Lord Krishna. And Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam describes, syān mahat-sevayā viprāḥ, that by serving mahatmas, by serving great souls, vāsudeva-kathā-ruciḥ, one develops taste for the messages of Krishna. By serving someone, you develop the qualities of the person. And Srila Prabhupada explains that the main quality of a mahatma, or great soul, is attraction for chanting and hearing the messages of Krishna. And that is described in the next verse of the Bhagavad-gītā here, satataṁ kīrtayanto māṁ yatantaś ca dṛḍha-vratāḥ namasyantaś ca māṁ bhaktyā nitya-yuktā upāsate.

So, by serving mahatmas, we developed the qualities of mahatmas. And that is mentioned specifically in Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, vāsudeva-kathā-ruciḥ, we developed ruci, or taste, for kathā, Krishna. And śṛṇvatāṁ sva-kathāḥ kṛṣṇaḥ puṇya-śravaṇa-kīrtanaḥ hṛdy antaḥ stho hy abhadrāṇi vidhunoti suhṛt satām and just hearing kṛṣṇa-kathā itself is a pious activity, or it makes us pious, just hearing about Krishna. But then further, Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam explains naṣṭa-prāyeṣv abhadreṣu nityaṁ bhāgavata-sevayā bhagavaty uttama-śloke

that by serving the Bhāgavatas, and there is the book Bhāgavata, and the person bhāgavata, by serving the book Bhāgavata, in other words, by hearing Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, or by serving the person bhāgavata, all that is inauspicious in the heart becomes almost destroyed. And bhaktir bhavati naiṣṭhikī, and loving service to the Lord becomes established as an irrevocable fact. So, these three verses describe different stages in the development of Krishna consciousness; bhajana-kriyā, anartha-nivṛtti, and niṣṭhā. But they all depend on associating with great souls and serving great souls.

And therefore, Srila Prabhupada formed the International Society for Krishna Consciousness, to give people the chance to associate with mahatmas, with great souls. And all of us are meant to become great souls through that association, and in turn give our association to others so they also get the chance to engage in chanting and hearing and loving service to Krishna. Now, it is mentioned here, bhajanty ananya-manaso, that the great souls worship Krishna without deviation, without their minds being deviated. And it is very interesting. In the purport, Srila Prabhupada says, “They are not attracted to other features of Kṛṣṇa,” means they are not even attracted to the feature of Lord Narayana in Vaikuntha, or even Lord Rama in Ayodhya, “nor are they concerned with any form of a demigod or of a human being,” not concerned with any form of a demigod or of a human being.

Here, I call to mind a medical doctor in Bombay who came forward to associate with the devotees of 1978, just after Srila Prabhupada left. After placing Srila Prabhupada in samadhi in Vrindavan and then the flowers in his puṣpa-samādhi in Mayapur, Tamal Krishna Goswami and I returned to Juhu. We were staying together in a room, and this young doctor began to associate with the devotees. And eventually, we gave him a room to encourage him to just stay with the devotees. He was married but I think he was separated from his wife. Anyway, he moved in, and he placed on the wall a poster of Hema Malini. Hema Malini was a famous movie actress, originally a dancer, but she became a movie actress, and she was quite beautiful by material estimation. And I could not believe it, I could not believe that he came to the ashram and put up a picture of Hema Malini on the wall. So, when I read this line, “They are not attracted to other features of Kṛṣṇa, nor are they concerned with any form of a demigod or of a human being,” I thought of him. He was concerned with the form of a human being. And of course, that is a sort of extreme case, but we do meditate on other forms of demigods and human beings.

But mahatmas meditate only upon Krishna and Krishna consciousness. And by associating with them, it becomes easier for us also to focus our minds on Krishna. And we experience it. When we associate with devotees, especially more advanced devotees who have tastes, it is easier to think of Krishna, it is easier to fix the mind on Krishna. Last night, we chanted a round together at Krishna and Vijay Lakshmi’s home program, and it was very powerful, very powerful, chanting in the association of devotees, in the association of great souls, more powerful, for most people, than chanting alone. And in Harināma-cintāmaṇi, Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura recommends that one should chant the holy name, chant japa, in the association of more advanced devotees who have taste. Because by chanting in their association, you also experience some taste.

So, we have all the processes, the beauty of Krishna consciousness is you can engage in all the processes practically anywhere on your own. You can chant the holy names, you can read the Bhagavad-gītā and Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, you can worship the deity, you can pray. But everything comes to life, everything is easier and more vivid, in the association of devotees. And that is the great importance of the association of devotees, and that is the great importance of temples. People come to the temple, and in the temple, although it is the same deity they might have at home, it is the same Bhagavad-gītā they might have at home, it is the same holy name that they might chant at home, but in the association of more advanced devotees, it becomes more vivid and more real. And therefore, we have temples, both to show people how to practice Krishna consciousness at home if they can’t live in the temple or near the temple, but also to give them association that will encourage and inspire them in their Krishna consciousness the rest of the time, when they are away from the temple. So, we are all fortunate to be here.

Just a little note about the power of association. Many of the devotees have children, and they bring the children with them to the temple. And at the temple, the children also associate with devotees. And, we have Sunday school and they learn in the Sunday school. And the spiritual atmosphere in the temple, and I am sure the spiritual atmosphere at home to the degree that the parents create a spiritual atmosphere by their behavior and practices, has a powerful effect on the children. Last night, after the talk, some of the children sat around me and I asked one of the girls, what is her favorite part of her life. She said her favorite part of her life was coming to the temple on Sunday, and her favorite part of coming to the temple on Sunday was Sunday school, because in Sunday school, she got to learn about Prabhupada, Krishna, and the practice of devotional service. And then she told the story, story means an experience she had, in which she had a dream, in which Srila Prabhupada spoke to her. He began as a deity, and then he came to life and spoke to her. And then, a little while later, one of the other girls said, “You are so lucky, you knew Prabhupada, I wish I knew Prabhupada.” And then, after a while, the first girl said, “Yes, you are so fortunate. I wish I had met Srila Prabhupada.” But of course, then the parents said, “Well, you are fortunate that you met someone who met Prabhupada.” Anyway. But it is so powerful, so powerful.

And then, this afternoon, there was a program in Gauranga Hall. And at a certain stage, I left the hall, and I saw outside there were four children. So, as soon as I came out of the hall, they said, “There is Maharaja,” and offered obeisances. There were three girls and a boy. It turns out the youngest girl was six, and the next girl was seven, the next girl was eight, and the boy was nine. [laughter] So, I asked them what they were doing, and they said they were playing; that the boy was the guru, and the three younger ones, the girls, were his disciples. [laughter] So, even in their play, they are absorbed in Krishna consciousness. Instead of playing, whatever, people’s heroes are; cowboys or policemen or soldiers, they are playing devotees. They are devotees, but they are playing more senior devotees, which they desire to emulate. So, it is very important, the association it is very powerful, and we can see especially with these pure-hearted children how easily and naturally they take to Krishna consciousness. It is natural, the material life is artificial, that is really awkward, but spiritual life is natural.

And one of the adults was commenting today how people who don’t really know what Krishna consciousness is and who don’t really know what devotees are, when they actually spend time with them, they are astonished. Shyamasundara Prabhu mentioned how when he first met the devotees, he thought, Wow, they are so happy, so friendly, something he hadn’t experienced in his circle of friends outside Krishna consciousness. And just today, one of the adult ladies was speaking about her elderly mother, that her elderly mother didn’t really know what Krishna consciousness was, what devotees were. And when her mother came from India to spend time with her in America, she saw, Wow, this is a lot of fun, it is like they are always happy and they are always having fun together but it is all in relation to God or Krishna, so whatever they are doing is actually worship, but at the same time, it is fun. She was really impressed. So, it is natural. If we let go of our false ego and false attachments, it is natural and joyful and easy. Hare Krishna.

Devotees: Hare Krishna.

Giriraj Swami: Do we have time for questions? We have time for one or two questions, if you have. Oh yes, I thought of adding one more thing. I was talking about serving the book Bhāgavata, and the person bhāgavata, that the results are the same. So, once, a disciple asked Srila Prabhupada, “Yes, we talk about the book Bhāgavata and the person bhāgavata, that both are the same. But still, is one better than the other?” And Srila Prabhupada said, “Yes, the person bhāgavata is better because he can catch you by the ear.” [laughter] So, any questions or comments? Yes?

Devotee: Can you talk more about how Srila Prabhupada made this society?

Giriraj Swami: Well, they are mahatmas. bahūnāṁ janmanām ante
jñānavān māṁ prapadyate, after many births and deaths, when one becomes wise, he surrenders to Krishna, vāsudevaḥ sarvam iti sa mahātmā su-durlabhaḥ. So, if they have surrendered to Krishna and are chanting the holy name of Krishna, they are mahatmas. But even then, being in the material environment and in Kali-yuga, there is the tendency to be influenced by the modes of nature. Even though one is surrendered to Krishna and in principles free from the modes of nature, but still, one can be influenced by the modes of nature. But we should try to keep our activities on the platform of those of mahatma, chanting and hearing about Krishna.

Sometimes people want to talk to us about other devotees, complain about other devotees, complain about the management, complain about whatever it is, and they might feel that we should hear them, if we are their friend, we should hear them. But we can say, “I would like to help you, but I have to chant my rounds now.” [laughter] “So, you are welcome to chant with me.” Or, “I am really concerned about you, but I have to read my one hour daily of the Bhagavad-gītā or Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam. So, if you like, you are most welcome to stay with me, we can read together and discuss together,” and sort of elevate them to that platform. And if your concern is that someone is talking to someone else about you or your loved ones, well, that is not what you are concerned about. No, Yes. I think that is it, that is it.

Shyamasundara Prabhu: What about location, it is fine if you at the temple, you are staying with devotees…

Giriraj Swami: Yes.

Shyamasundara Prabhu: What about association then?

Giriraj Swami: Yes, that is a very good question, very relevant question. Well, one year, when Srila Prabhupada came to Bombay, there was a brahmachari I hadn’t seen before, carrying his bags up, just never seen him before. So I asked, “Who is that?” And he said, “Oh, that is Alfred Ford.” Alfred Ford was the great grandson of Henry Ford, the Ford Motor company. And he took initiation from Srila Prabhupada, Ambarish dasa, and Ambarish dasa stayed in Bombay for two or three weeks. And then, when he was leaving, he had a discussion with Srila Prabhupada about his future. And Srila Prabhupada told him that when he went back to Detroit, he should work. Because in those days, almost all the devotees in the movement were fully engaged in the saṅkīrtana movement, they didn’t have jobs or businesses. And Srila Prabhupada told Ambarish, “I want people to get the idea that devotees can also work, and still be devotees.”

So then, Ambarish said, “Well, what about my association? What will I do for association while I am working?” And Srila Prabhupada said, “While you are working, if you are thinking, “I am doing this for Krishna,” that will be your association.” So, that is the answer. However awkward it is, we have to have that consciousness, “I am doing this for Krishna.” And then, we won’t mind it because we are doing it for Krishna, we are not doing it for ourselves. But it is a hardship to associate with non-devotees, it is a hardship. So, if someone can do some work in the association of other devotees, that is a great blessing. And then, when you come home from work, absorb yourself in chanting and hearing and serving as much as possible to counteract the effects of the association at work. Anyway. If you are sincere, which you are, and pray to Krishna to help you and go out of your way to get good association and stay in good association, Krishna will show you the way, how to proceed. Yes, Shyamasundara Prabhu?

Shyamasundara Prabhu: [Unintelligible 00:42:35]

Giriraj Swami: Well, in a simple way, Srila Prabhupada introduced the reading of Kṛṣṇa book at night, and it is natural that what fills your mind at night will be in your mind when you sleep, and it will be in your mind when you awake in the morning. So, being absorbed in Krishna’s pastimes from Kṛṣṇa book or Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, or Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta, or similar scriptures, we will have those thoughts in our mind. Quite early in Krishna consciousness, I heard that Srila Prabhupada said that if you read the Kṛṣṇa book, then whatever you see, will remind you of Krishna. And for some time, I experienced that. Of course, we were living in a nice estate that had been Hanuman Prasad Poddar’s personal residence in Gorakhpur, so there were nice fields, and it was maybe easier, in a way, to think of Krishna and the cowherd boys and the calves.

But Prabhupada said that if you read the Kṛṣṇa book, then everything you see will remind you of Krishna. So, okay, we were at Sri Krishna Niketan in Gorakhpur, we were reminded of Krishna and the cowherd boys, but sometimes I walk down the street and I am reminded of Kamsa. [laughter] But it is all kṛṣṇa-līlā. [laughter] It is all kṛṣṇa-līlā. So, if we use that time, that precious time in the evening, when we come home from work, and before we take rest, and in the morning before we go to work and absorb ourselves in Krishna’s pastimes, Krishna’s name and form and qualities and pastimes, then we can think of them while we are at work. Sort of like advanced, what Krishna does at different times of the day, and then you see what time it is, and you think, “Oh, Krishna is doing this.”

So, it is possible. Krishna consciousness is transcendental, it cannot be checked by any material condition, even working. You just have to do it. The benefits of the practices of Krishna consciousness are experienced when we actually practice them, then we feel the result. Hare Krishna.

Devotees: Hare Krishna.