Vaishnava Compassion and Association

Giriraj Swami: Hare Krishna.

It was such a wonderful talk by His Holiness Niranjana Swami Maharaja, I felt we were being elevated to the spiritual world. He quoted some from Vishnujana Maharaja. Vishnujana Swami had a program where he would go on a boat on the Ganges River in Bengal and chant the holy name all day long on the boat and stop at villages on the way and speak about Krishna and distribute books about Krishna. Once when I happened to be staying in Los Angeles for a while because I became sick in India, Srila Prabhupada was also there and he received an issue of Back to Godhead with an article by Vishnujana Swami, and he remarked that Vishnujana Swami had such nice realizations because he spent so many hours every day chanting.

In our last talks on Srila Prabhupada’s Vyasa-puja, we ended up in Calcutta. My parents had come to Calcutta to try to get me to come back to Chicago. But as His Holiness Niranjana Swami Maharaja was speaking I thought of another incident that took place in Calcutta that is very instructive and relevant to what Niranjana Swami Maharaja was saying. Srila Prabhupada left Calcutta to go to other places and while he was away, the temple president became very preoccupied in a business that he had started to raise funds for the temple. But somehow in the course of his absorption in his business there was some neglect of the devotees in the temple and the temple really had almost no money. The devotees were just barely surviving. There was one big-bodied devotee named Sudama Vipra, he, I believe, had belonged to a motorcycle gang called The Hell’s Angels and he was a strong person, but he was practically starving. So he would take the remnants of the ghee wicks that had been burned in the ārati and he would squeeze out whatever little ghee was left just so that he could get a little more nutrition. 

So the devotees were just waiting for Srila Prabhupada to come back so they could explain the situation to him and get some help. Different devotees did meet him and speak with him. In India then there were not very many devotees and Srila Prabhupada allowed them to speak to him quite freely. So eventually Srila Prabhupada called a meeting of all the devotees to give them a chance to express their concerns. One by one they were speaking about their difficulties. At one stage Tamal Krishna Goswami who was the GBC felt that they were criticizing him and he said, “Srila Prabhupada, my only intention was to execute your will,” But in that context Srila Prabhupada replied a little sarcastically. Tamal Krishna Goswami said, “My only intention was to execute the will of Your Divine Grace.” Srila Prabhupada replied, “Is it the will of my divine grace that the devotees should be disturbed?” 

So Srila Prabhupada listened very patiently and sympathetically to what all the devotees had to say and he formed a management committee to improve the situation. He said that they should meet every week and discuss all the programs and problems and discuss how to do things in the best way and then they should write their resolutions in a book and sign the book and then follow what they decided together. But at a certain point Srila Prabhupada’s mood seemed to change. He didn’t want to hear the devotees complain too much and he told them that, “As long as we are in the material world, there will always be problems, but if we focus too much on the problems we will forget our real business which is to become Krishna consciousness and instead of talking about Krishna, we will be talking about all the problems.” And then Srila Prabhupada spoke about himself and he said how much he had suffered to spread Krishna consciousness. He suffered two heart attacks at sea on the way to America and in America he had a buzzing in his ears and he had terrible headaches and he said to us, “I do not even want to tell you how much I suffered but I never complained. My principle was always: everything for Krishna, nothing for me, and because that was my principle—everything for Krishna, nothing for me—I never had any complaint.”

Another time years later, Svarupa Damodara Prabhu who later became Bhakti Svarupa Damodara Swami Maharaja spoke to Srila Prabhupada and he told Prabhupada that, “I have just one program, the Bhaktivedanta Institute, and I am always struggling with so many problems, and you are managing the whole society, the whole mission. How do you deal with all the problems?” Srila Prabhupada replied, “Problems? I don’t see any problems. I only see service to my spiritual master.” So that was Srila Prabhupada’s mood and that was his vision and certainly if we maintain that spirit, we will not find faults with other devotees or with external arrangements.

Srila Prabhupada was very expert in accepting service from devotees or potential devotees. When he first began at 26 Second Avenue in New York, there was a bum who used to come and hear Prabhupada speak some time. After hearing Prabhupada for some days, he got the idea about devotional service and he was inspired to offer some service. So one day he came to the temple with some rolls of toilet paper and he came forward to the front of the temple where Srila Prabhupada sat and deposited the rolls of toilet paper and Srila Prabhupada said, “Just see, he has begun his devotional service.” 

As far as utilizing different things in devotional service, another time someone came and brought a bunch of Mayavadi leaflets, some pieces of paper advertising some Mayavadi program. Srila Prabhupada was very strong against the Mayavada philosophy. He often said, “Anyone who says that he is god, he is dog.” So we were wondering what action Srila Prabhupada would take in protest to these Mayavadi leaflets, but Srila Prabhupada found a way to engage them in Krishna’s service. At the end of the program, when the devotees were distributing prasāda to the guests, he had them hand out the Mayavadi leaflets for the people to use as plates to put their prasāda on just to engage even the Mayavadis in Krishna’s service.

An interesting event took place sometime later in Mayapur when Srila Prabhupada was there. Srila Prabhupada had taken prasāda and his servant had taken the plate with his remnants into the next room. Soon thereafter Srila Prabhupada heard the sounds of a major argument coming from the next room. So he asked his servant to find out what was happening. His servant returned and gave the report. Srila Prabhupada’s more senior secretary said that he was sick and he couldn’t digest the regular temple prasāda and so he wanted all the remnants from Srila Prabhupada’s plate because it was the only food he could digest and the more junior secretary was arguing that devotees don’t get Prabhupada’s remnants and they should be distributed equally amongst all the devotees. Some of Srila Prabhupada’s secretaries were very strong-willed and these two in particular were very strong-willed. So they were fighting.

Srila Prabhupada replied by saying that, “It is not enough just to be the servant of the spiritual master, but one should also be the servant of the other servants of the Srila Prabhupada.” And he gave the example of the culture in Bengal some years earlier at least that when a sadhu would visit a village, all the villagers would come forward and want to take the dust from his feet and invite him to their homes and serve him, and because of the humble mood of the villagers, thinking that they have to serve the sadhu and please him, they made wonderful advancement. The sadhu would think, “Why are they touching my feet? Why do they want to serve me? I am just an ordinary living entity, fallen soul.” And Srila Prabhupada said that because of the sadhu’s humble attitude, he also made wonderful advancement. They all made wonderful advancement together. So Srila Prabhupada said we should have this humble mood of being the servant of the servants of the spiritual master or Krishna. In that particular incident, Srila Prabhupada said that the more junior secretary should have let the more senior secretary have all the remnants because he was sick and couldn’t eat the regular prasāda.

Also on the subject of judging other devotees, there was a situation that arose, I believe in New York, where there was a lot of judging and criticizing and finding fault and Srila Prabhupada said that we should be very careful about judging other devotees because we never know what their actual consciousness is and we may not be able to properly assess their consciousness just on the basis of their external appearance and behavior. He told a story about a brahman and a prostitute who lived opposite each other on the same street. Some years later I heard the same story in South India from a brahman there so I imagine this story must come from the Puranas or some scripture. 

All day long the brahman would sit in front of the window to his room with the Bhagavad-gītā and across the street the prostitute would be doing her business. Her clients would come and she would entertain them. One day some calamity occurred and they both died. The Yamadutas and the Vishnudutas came, the Yamadutas to take the sinful to Yamaraja to be judged and punished, and the Vishnudutas to take the purified one to the abode of Lord Vishnu, Vaikuntha. So the Yamadutas came to take the soul of the brahman and the brahman protested. He said, “You are making a mistake. You are supposed to be coming for the prostitute and the Vishnudutas are supposed to be coming for me.” But the Yamadutas replied, “No, we are not making a mistake because all the time you were sitting with your Bhagavad-gītā, you were looking out your window at the prostitute, and you were thinking, ‘Oh, now the man has come. Now they are doing this. Now they are doing that,’ and your consciousness was absorbed in those activities. So by your consciousness you are fit to be taken to hell and punished. And the prostitute, all the time she was with her customers, she was looking out the window and thinking of you and she was thinking, “Om the pious brahman, he is so fortunate. The whole day and night he is absorbed in thoughts of Krishna, ‘Krishna is driving the chariot of Arjuna and speaking the philosophy of the Bhagavad-gītā to Arjuna,’ and in this way she was constantly absorbed in thoughts of Krishna’s teachings and activities with His devotee Arjuna. And so by her consciousness, she is fit to go back home, back to Godhead.”

So Srila Prabhupada told this story to make the point that we should be careful about judging devotees or anyone. We don’t know what their consciousness is.

On the subject of that type of situation in a temple where there is quarrelling and dissention, when Srila Prabhupada was asked on two different occasions, he gave two different answers which are very complimentary. In one case he said if each devotee considers that he is the servant of the servants then there will be no fighting amongst the devotees and in the other case he said that the way to overcome the dissention and dissatisfaction and fractions was for the devotees to engage in common activities together. As devotees our common activities are basically chanting and hearing about Krishna, engaging in kirtan together and taking prasāda together. He said if they engage in common activities together then they will come together.

In relation to both accepting service from a person and not causing distress to any living entity, there was an incident in Indore in the state of Madhya Pradesh in India, Srila Prabhupada had been invited with some disciples to have lunch at the home of a member of the royal family. The most senior devotee in the party didn’t come to the program because they were making life members. So we were served in a beautiful room with chandeliers and a big carved wood banquet table. Srila Prabhupada was at the head of the table and I ended sitting just at his right side. I was very nervous because they served a really opulent feast and I was trying to be very controlled because I didn’t want Srila Prabhupada to think that this brahmachari was a sense enjoyer. We were all quite prone to getting diarrhea so I was also afraid of that. It was really good prasāda but really rich. It seemed like it was drenched in ghee. 

Anyway, I got through the meal, and then the host’s grandfather, an old man, he was coming around with seconds of rasagullās. You notice how often rasagullās come up in my talks [laughter]. It happens spontaneously so you can just imagine what I am thinking about all the time [laughter]. So he was coming around with the rasagullās and everyone else was taking seconds, but I was refusing because I was a brahmachari, I was being staunch, and I was showing Srila Prabhupada. But the man was actually, he really wanted me to take it. He kept insisting that I should have one more and I kept refusing. Finally Srila Prabhupada glanced towards me with great love and compassion in his eyes and voice and he said, “You can take a sweet to make an old man happy.” [laughter] So I did and I took that as Srila Prabhupada wanted the old man who was serving the rasagullās to be happy although later another devotee to whom I mentioned the story said that it might have also applied to Srila Prabhupada that he would have been happy if I made the other old man happy by taking the sweet.

It was really instructive to be with Srila Prabhupada and to see how someone who was the world acharya, but at the same time a spontaneous devotee, responded in different situations. And on the subject of how Krishna or a devotee of Krishna magnifies the service of an aspiring devotee, there was another incident that took place in Bombay. At the time Srila Prabhupada was still struggling to get the Juhu Land and have a proper place to stay there. So in the meantime he was staying at different homes of different friends of his. One householder named Mr. P. L. Sethi was building a nice house in the Juhu Scheme not far from the Juhu temple and the house wasn’t completely finished but it was finished enough for Srila Prabhupada and some of his disciples to stay with him.

One morning Srila Prabhupada was sitting in his room discussing with his leading managers and even some guests from outside how to solve this problem of the land and how to get the land conveyed to ISKCON. Suddenly a very rough looking man appeared at the door to Prabhupada’s room which was upstairs on the first floor above the ground floor. So I looked at him and I saw he had a very dark complexion and he had a muscular, sinewy build. He was just wearing a little simple white cloth around his waist. He was obviously a laborer. So we looked at him and he walked in the room, he came right up to Srila Prabhupada’s desk—Prabhupada always sat behind a low desk on a cushion—and he placed on the table a bunch of flowers that he had collected from somewhere. He bowed his head down and he got up and walked out. 

Srila Prabhupada was so moved that he could not speak for some moments. He was just looking down and he actually became choked up and finally he spoke and he said that, “Just see this man, how did he even know I was here, but somehow he heard that there was a saintly person in the house and he went and he collected some flowers as best as he could and he came and gave them as an offering.” He said, “I am so much moved.” And then he said, “In the Bhagavad-gītā Krishna says, patraṁ puṣpaṁ phalaṁ toyaṁ yo me bhaktyā prayacchati, that if one offers Him even a leaf or a flower with devotion, He will accept it.” And he said, “Krishna is the Supreme Personality of Godhead and He is moved even by a simple offering of a flower or a leaf and I am just an insignificant living entity, so how much more I will feel overwhelmed.” So that is Krishna’s nature, that is Srila Prabhupada’s nature, to take the smallest service and magnify it. 

Srila Prabhupada said that there are different categories of devotees. He said in the lowest category someone will find a slight discrepancy in someone’s behavior and make a big thing out of it. In the next category he will see the good and the bad—both—but give more emphasis to the bad. Then, in the next category, he will see the good and the bad—both—and give equal consideration to both. And then the more advanced devotee, he will see the good and the bad, but he will give more importance to the good. And the highest devotee, he will see someone do a little service and make a big thing out of it. 

Of course we cannot artificially imitate someone on a higher platform but by associating with more advanced devotees, we can learn from them philosophically how devotees should think and feel and also see practically how they deal, and learn from them how to see the good in others and not to see the defects, and how not to demand anything for oneself.

The example that comes to mind is His Holiness Niranjana Swami Maharaja, but I am really torn here because I feel if I use him as an example, I will cause him distress, but at the same time if I do give the example, it will be very purifying for us and informative. And knowing that his mood is always to encourage the other devotees, he might be willing to tolerate that discomfort, but at the same time I said I don’t want to put him in distress, but I already have [laughter], so I better just finish it up quickly. 

I had the opportunity to host His Holiness Niranjana Swami and serve him along with a team of devotees in California. Because of being spontaneously inspired by his presence, we all really wanted to give him the best we could, but once it came out that we hadn’t provided him something that he could have used because we didn’t know that he needed it—two or three things came up like that—I asked him, “Maharaja, why didn’t you say anything? And not only didn’t you say anything, but you didn’t seem to be disturbed by it.” And he replied, “I don’t feel I deserve anything. That is why I don’t ask and that is why I am not disturbed.” That is really a Vaishnava. [applause]

So association, I get so much from the association of my godbrothers who are so exemplary in so many ways. We shouldn’t think that we can learn only from our guru. We can learn from any devotee who is exemplary in any way. Part of being the servant of the servant is that you learn from the other servants whom you are serving by their examples, by their behavior, by even small remarks that they make. It doesn’t have to be a discourse or a class. You can learn from just a few words or action or gesture. 

It is very purifying because we do come into the material world out of envy of Krishna. So envy is there and it can be very deep-rooted, continuing for countless lifetimes, but by serving devotees and appreciating devotees and learning from them, from their exemplary behavior and words, we can become purified of that longstanding envy. Glorifying devotees is extremely purifying. In a way it is easier to glorify Krishna because He is in a different category or Srila Prabhupada or our personal spiritual master, but to glorify our godbrothers or godsisters is very purifying because they are in a way in the same category. So it is in a way easier for us to fall into the bad ways of thinking and being envious and competing and wanting what they have and wishing we had it and so on. 

I really feel that after Srila Prabhupada’s departure, it’s really been the association of my godbrothers that had been very nourishing and encouraging and purifying for me. And here I recall an exchange I had with Tamal Krishna Goswami in Dallas after Srila Prabhupada had left. He confessed to me or admitted to me that even with all of his association with Srila Prabhupada and having gotten first initiation from him, second initiation from him, and third initiation (sannyasa initiation) from him, he still didn’t feel that his relationship with Srila Prabhupada alone was enough to sustain him in his spiritual life. He said that he feels the need to have śikṣā-gurus in his life, godbrothers whose instructions he takes very seriously. And then he named a number whom he considered to be his śikṣā-gurus. I don’t remember all but Sivarama Swami was one, Bhurijana Prabhu—some number, probably Govinda Maharaja. At that time I was in a different mood because I had put a lot of faith in a few godbrothers who had fallen down and left and after those incidents I practically vowed, “I am never going to put my faith in anyone else except Srila Prabhupada.” 

So I heard what Tamal Krishna Goswami said and I took it seriously, but it went against my firm resolution never to put my faith in anyone else except Srila Prabhupada. The next morning we went for the morning program and after maṅgala-ārati Tamal Krishna Goswami and all the other devotees chanted japa in the temple. It was very intense japa. And there were a lot of nice pictures of kṛṣṇa-līlā on the walls. I was chanting, chanting, chanting, going deeper, deeper, deeper, and this thought just became overpowering in my mind that what Tamal Krishna Goswami said is true, we can’t do it on our own. “I can’t do it on my own just on the basis of my relationship with Srila Prabhupada. I do need śikṣā-gurus in my life.” And then at that time it came to me almost equally clearly that he was meant to be my śikṣā-guru or one of my śikṣā-gurus. So I didn’t want to disturb him during his japa, but at the same time I felt I just had to tell him. So I told him, “I thought about what you said and I believe what you said is true, I also need śikṣā-gurus and I think you are meant to be one of them.” He gave this knowing glance and a little smile and we continued with our chanting.

I also told him the night before that I felt very isolated because at that time in the movement a number of leaders had actually had difficulties and left and there was a lot of chaos in major geographical areas of the movement. So I was trying to deal with things in Mauritius and South Africa and I wanted godbrothers to come there, but they were also dealing with similar situations—England, France, practically all of Europe, different parts of America—so I told Tamal Krishna Goswami, “I really feel isolated in Mauritius and South Africa. No one comes there. I don’t know where I am going to get this association.” He said, “You have to go out of your way to get it.” So if it has to be Kazakhstan, I will come to Kazakhstan, or Ukraine [applause], but you all are really blessed, Krishna does send senior devotees to visit you. [applause]

So now I will just come back to two more points from His Holiness Niranjana Swami’s beautiful discourse and relate them to some experiences with Srila Prabhupada. Although in general we don’t want to find fault in devotees, and Bhaktivinoda Thakura also says the same thing that sometimes in order to protect a dependent devotee from bad association, we have point out the faults of another person. In other words, because the association of devotees is so important and the service of devotees is so important, we have to be able to distinguish between who is a devotee and who is not a devotee. Someone might be regarded as a devotee in popular circles who may not actually be a devotee. He could be a pretender or a Mayavadi and so we might have to point out who is a devotee and who is not a devotee. Bhaktivinoda Thakura says that if a preacher points out who is not a devotee and if an ordinary person thinks that he, the preacher, is committing an offense, then the person who has that critical thought about the preacher, he is committing an offense, not the preacher.

So Srila Prabhupada had a friend in Bombay named Dr. Patel and Dr. Patel was from a Vaishnava family, but he talked like a Mayavadi sometimes, and when Prabhupada would accuse him of being a Mayavadi, he would protest, he would say, “No sir, I am a Vaishnava.” So one day Srila Prabhupada happened to criticize a famous religious figure in India that Dr. Patel revered and Dr. Patel became very upset. He was saying, “You cannot say this about that person!” And Srila Prabhupada replied, “I am not saying. Krishna is saying: na māṁ duṣkṛtino mūḍhāḥ prapadyante narādhamāḥ, that anyone who is not surrendered to Krishna is a fool, rascal, lowest of mankind. So I am not saying, Krishna is saying.” And Dr. Patel kept saying, “You cannot speak about him like that! He is a respected saint in India. You cannot talk about him like that!” 

So the argument escalated. It was a rare time, Srila Prabhupada was actually shouting at Dr. Patel and Dr. Patel was shouting at Srila Prabhupada. Dr. Patel, he was a leader amongst his friends because he was a little intelligent, he was educated in England, he was a doctor, but even his friends were catching a hold of his arm and saying, “Swamiji has a heart condition. Don’t upset him.” They tried to take him away. He was shouting, Prabhupada was shouting, and we were all very disturbed. They finally got Dr. Patel away from him.

And then back at Juhu Tamal Krishna Goswami asked Srila Prabhupada, “Why do you tolerate him? What is his actual position? Is he a devotee, is he a Mayavadi—what is he?” So Srila Prabhupada told a story about a man who could speak fluently in many different languages. He came to a place, but nobody could figure out where he was actually from because whatever language you spoke to him in, he would respond perfectly in the same language. So it was a big topic amongst the village people, “Where is he from?” Finally one man said, “I will find out.”

One day that man snuck up behind the man who spoke many languages and he gave him a very hard slap on the back and then that man began cursing in his original language [laughter]. So Srila Prabhupada said Dr. Patel was like that, “He could speak like a Vaishnava, he could speak like a Mayavadi, he could speak like a nationalist, he could speak like a Sanskritist—he could speak many different languages expertly—but when I hit him where it really hurt, his real language came out.” [laughter; applause] So then Tamal Krishna Goswami asked, “Well, then why do you tolerate him?” And Srila Prabhupada replied, “We have to engage everyone.” That is real compassion. 

Of course Srila Prabhupada accomplished many things in what he did. He also created a lot of interesting discussions for us to hear on his morning walks. I think he actually liked Dr. Patel and Dr. Patel actually him and respected him, but they just had that relationship.

 The last story I will tell also involves Dr. Patel. It showed how Prabhupada appreciated his disciples and protected them. When Dr. Patel first heard about the devotees, we had just come to Juhu and we were living in very simple tents. Devotees were getting bit by mosquitoes, they were getting malaria, jaundice—so many diseases. Dr. Patel was really impressed by their sacrifice and surrender and he wanted to take up a collection to give each devotee a thin mattress, a pillow, a mosquito net, and a blanket for the winter. He was a proud man but he went to the big cloth market in Bombay from stall to stall and he took up a collection and he presented eventually twelve sets to the devotees. They were maybe eight or ten devotees we were.

If you’ve ever lived in an ashram you know how it is. After a while one blanket went missing, two pillows disappeared, and gradually that hard earned gift that Dr. Patel had begged for the devotees was down to just a few remnants. Finally the last mosquito net, the last pillow, the last pillow, the last mattress disappeared. 

So Dr. Patel brought it up to Srila Prabhupada on a morning walk that with such difficulty he procured all the items and the devotees didn’t take care of them and now nothing was left. Srila Prabhupada said, “You know the reason? The reason is they don’t identify with the body [laughter]. They don’t care if they have a mattress or a pillow or a mosquito net or a blanket. As long as they can chant the holy name and serve their spiritual master, they are satisfied.” And then he said, “That mukti that you are so eager to get, they already have.” [laughter; applause] 

In a very skillful and intelligent way he expressed his appreciation for the devotees and he spoke in a way as to humble Dr. Patel and make him understand how exalted the devotees actually were. Of course, as we’ve matured, we’ve understood more about the principle of yukta-vairāgya, about taking care of Krishna’s property not for our sense gratification, but for Krishna’s service. But still, what Srila Prabhupada said was true. 

So he was merciful to us, his disciples, and he was merciful to Dr. Patel. He was merciful to everyone. He was an ocean of mercy and if we can come close to that ocean and have some waves from that ocean hit us and maybe eventually carry us into that ocean, our lives will be perfect and we will be able to splash others with some waves from that ocean and they will also benefit. Hare Krishna. [applause] So thank you very much.