NOD 1.1.11 – Pure Devotion—in Any Tradition

Giriraj Swami: Hare Krishna.

It is a great pleasure to be here again. Krishna consciousness is a great science and if properly understood and executed it can produce wonderful effects for the individual and even for the society. The basic book of transcendental knowledge is the Bhagavad-gītā and the best book in terms of advancement of the study of the science is the Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu or The Nectar of Devotion. In Sanskrit texts there is one verse in each work that is considered to be the verse that governs all other verses in the scripture called the paribhāṣā-sutra. Every verse within the work has to be understood in relation to the paribhāṣā-sutra. So I have chosen to speak today on the paribhāṣā-sutra of the Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu. 

The Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu is the complete science of devotional service, so in order to understand what is bhakti, we have to understand this definition. Bhakti now has become a very popular term. Yoga has become very popular and then within yoga, now kirtan has become popular, and the idea of bhakti has also become popular, but very little people know what bhakti actually is. So, I thought it is prudent to discuss what is bhakti, as defined by Srila Rupa Gosvami, with reference to earlier authorities and scriptures.

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

I will recite the verse:

anyābhilāṣitā-śūnyaṁ

jñāna-karmādy-anāvṛtam

ānukūlyena kṛṣṇānu-

śīlanaṁ bhaktir uttamā

Now I will recite each Sanskrit word or phrase and you can repeat after me and then the translation of that word or phrase and you can repeat that as well.

TRANSLATION

‘When first-class devotional service develops, one must be devoid of all material desires, knowledge obtained by monistic philosophy, and fruitive action. The devotee must constantly serve Kṛṣṇa favorably, as Kṛṣṇa desires.’

PURPORT by Srila Prabhupada

This verse is also found in Śrīla Rūpa Gosvāmī’s Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu (1.1.11). As we can understand from the Bhagavad-gītā (9.34 and 18.65), the Supreme Personality of Godhead wants everyone to think of Him always (man-manā bhava mad-bhaktaḥ). Everyone should become His devotee, not the devotee of a demigod. Everyone should engage in His devotional service, including arcana (Deity worship) in the temple. Man-manā bhava mad-bhakto mad-yājī māṁ namaskuru. Everyone should offer obeisances, from moment to moment, to the Supreme Personality of Godhead. These are the desires of the Supreme Lord, and one who fulfills His desires favorably is actually a pure devotee. 

The criterion is that a devotee must know what Kṛṣṇa wants him to do. This understanding can be achieved through the medium of a spiritual master who is a bona fide representative of Kṛṣṇa. Śrīla Rūpa Gosvāmī advises, ādau gurv-āśrayam. One who is serious in wanting to render pure devotional service to the Lord must take shelter of a spiritual master who comes in the disciplic succession from Kṛṣṇa. Evaṁ paramparā-prāptam imaṁ rājarṣayo viduḥ. Without accepting a bona fide spiritual master coming in the disciplic succession, one cannot find out the real purpose of devotional service. Therefore one has to accept the shelter of a bona fide spiritual master and agree to be directed by him. The first business of a pure devotee is to satisfy his spiritual master, whose only business is to spread Kṛṣṇa consciousness. And if one can satisfy the spiritual master, Kṛṣṇa is automatically satisfied — yasya prasādād bhagavat-prasādaḥ. This is the success of devotional service. This is the meaning of the word ānukūlyena — that is, favorable devotional service to the Lord. A pure devotee has no plans other than those for the Lord’s service. He is not interested in attaining success in mundane activities. He simply wants success in the progress of devotional service. For a devotee, there cannot be worship of others or demigod worship. A pure devotee does not engage himself in such pseudo devotional service. He is interested only in satisfying Kṛṣṇa. If one lives only for the satisfaction of Kṛṣṇa, it does not matter whether he belongs to this order of life or that order of life. One’s only business should be to satisfy Kṛṣṇa. This process is completely manifest in the activities of the Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement. It has been actually proved that the entire world can accept devotional service without failure. One simply has to follow the instructions of the representative of Kṛṣṇa.

COMMENT

For people born in the Vedic tradition, it may be natural or easy to accept the culture of Krishna consciousness, but why should someone not born in the Vedic culture do so? The answer is that the constitutional position of the living entity is that he is the eternal servant of God or Krishna. It doesn’t matter whether one’s body is black or white or yellow or male or female or old or young, or whether one by tradition or faith is Hindu or Christian or Muslim or agnostic or atheistic, but the nature of the pure soul is to love God and serve God. Every bona fide scripture of the world will teach that one should love God. 

When I grew up I became quite religious and I would regularly go to the Jewish temple on Friday nights. My favorite prayer says, “Thou shalt love the Lord, thy God, with all thy heart and all thy soul and all thy might.” And that one should always think of the commandments of the Lord while lying down, while rising up, and one should teach the commandments to one’s children. The original is much more beautiful than what I paraphrased but the idea is to love God and be fully conscious of Him and His commandments in all that you do. And that is the natural position of the living entity because God is great and we are very small and so our natural function is to serve Him. Like the hand or the finger is part of the body so the natural function of the part is to serve the whole. The natural function of the hand is to serve the whole body. If the hand is not serving the body it means it is diseased, there is something wrong, it is diseased, it is paralyzed. It is meant to serve the body.

So when we do not serve God, we are considered to be in a diseased condition. To the degree that human society does not serve God, which at the present time is to quite a large extent, the whole human society is in a diseased condition, and we can see the symptoms of the disease manifested—so much lying, cheating, corruption, violence—almost unlimited the litany of discrepancies. 

Given that every bona fide scripture will say that one should love God, what is the special feature of Krishna consciousness or the Bhagavad-gītā that would lead one to read it and follow it? The answer is very simple. The answer is that although every bona fide scripture will say that one should love God, we also need a practical process to develop our love for God because generally people love their bodies first and foremost and then they love the expansions of their bodies—husband, wife, parents, children—and then they love the paraphernalia that gives comfort and pleasure to the body—the home, the car, the heavenly dimension. So that all makes sense in a way but actually in another way it makes no sense; it is a very great blunder because we are not the body, but because we falsely identify with the body we think that by pleasing the senses of the body we will be happy, but we are not. Or we think that by pleasing the senses of other people’s bodies they will be happy and they also are not. Our politicians, they promise, “We will please the senses. We will please your senses. We will give you more sense gratification,” but they can never satisfy the voters. Therefore the voters kick them out and elect someone new, but the new party cannot satisfy the voters either by material means. So the voters throw them out and on and on.

Of course there can be relative distinctions within the material world but for now we are discussing in more absolute terms. So, we are actually the soul—not the body—and the soul which is really us can be satisfied only in relation to the Supreme Soul and the process by which the individual soul is connected to the Supreme Soul is yoga. The English word “yolk” which means to join together comes from the Sanskrit word yoga. So yoga really means the process by which the individual soul is linked or becomes connected to or reunited with the Supreme Soul. The specific process—there are different types of yoga—but the only process that can actually connect one fully to the Supreme Soul and satisfy the individual self is bhakti-yoga and that is why it is important to understand what bhakti-yoga is. 

There is a very nice verse in the First Canto of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam: sa vai puṁsāṁ paro dharmo yato bhaktir adhokṣaje ahaituky apratihatā yayātmā suprasīdati. Sa vai puṁsāṁ paro dharmo means the supreme occupation for the living entities. Yato bhaktir adhokṣaje is that by which one attains to bhakti or one develops love for God. But that bhakti—bhakti-yoga—that bhakti ahaituky, it should have no [cause?]. In other words, there should be no material motivation. And apratihata: there should be no interruption. Yayātmā suprasīdati: that can satisfy the self, that alone can satisfy the self. 

So, within every tradition—Hindu, Christian, Muslim, Jain, Jewish—there are pure practitioners and there are mixed practitioners. Pure means that their only desire is to purify their existence and serve God and please God. And mixed or impure means that they have material desires. They go to the church or the temple or the mosque to get something material from God. Even among religious people, the majority has material motives and that is in every tradition. Of course in bhakti, the worship of Krishna, Vishnu in principle is meant to be pure, but there are so many worshipers of demigods—Shiva, Durga, Ganesa—and the worshipers want to get something material in return for their worship. And we find it in every other tradition as well. Like, “Give us this day our daily bread.” Now that is good because they are acknowledging God’s supremacy, they are acknowledging their dependence on God but actually God is the Supreme Father, He is providing food for all of His children whether we ask or not. In a way it is very well meaning but if you think about it, it is an insult. It is like if a child were to tell his father in the morning, “You know you have to feed us. You really got to go to the office and make some money so there’ll be some bread on the table tonight,” that is not very nice. The father knows what his duty is. He doesn’t need his child to tell him. So the child, he doesn’t have to worry, he is under the protection of the father. He just has to be obedient. If he is obedient there is no question the father will take care of him in all respects.

Now sometimes—it happens—at the dinner table there will be something that a little child likes a lot and a good child, sweet child might say, “This tastes so good. You should taste this.” And the child might give a little of that preparation to the father. So that is the mood of offering food like prasāda. Everything that we offer to God, offer to the father is coming from Him, but it is out of love, like that small child who wants to offer something to the father. It is all coming from the father but out of love he wants to offer it to the father. So the father is happy he can share that happiness with the child.

So, our acharyas especially Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura has said that a pure devotee can appreciate any religious tradition. Say we are devotees of Krishna but we can go to a church or a temple or a synagogue and we can get spiritual inspiration. It happens on occasion that one does not find a temple or a house of worship within one’s tradition—chosen or otherwise—but still one wants to be in spiritual atmosphere. It happened sometimes I would visit my parents on the north shore of Chicago and I would want to chant some place and to get some spiritual inspiration so I would walk to Towell Road and I would walk out on the pier and on a clear day from that pier in the distance there was a very magnificent temple in [Ronat?] called the Baha’i temple. So I would walk out on the pier and I would look at the dome of the temple and I would get a little spiritual encouragement. There are so many examples. 

Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura says that it doesn’t really matter what the religious tradition is but there should be no materialistic desires. That is the critical factor. Where the worship is conducted in the mood of getting material benefits or accepting further if you want to say, with the idea of merging and becoming one with God with some light, some energy, then a pure devotee will not feel comfortable because he wants pure devotion. But if he finds a place in any tradition where the mood of worship is pure then he will feel very comfortable and happy in that association. He will see the object of the worship—of course the object of worship is God—but he will understand God in terms of his own worshipable Lord, that form of God.

Sometimes there is unnecessary controversy amongst followers of different traditions or worshipers of different deities. I myself have come embroiled in such needled controversy. One example that comes to mind is when I went to Madras in 1971. I was actually the first devotee from ISKCON to go to Madras. And in Madras generally they are very proud because they never came under the Muslim domination so they feel that their culture has been preserved in a more pure way. That is another thing, every tradition there are the jnanis and the bhaktas, even in Buddhism. There is the same thing in Buddhism. In Madras there are a lot of people who identify themselves as worshipers of Lord Shiva and then there are the intellectuals who think they are above all these different deities, that, “God has no name, He has no form, but He comes in the form of Shiva or Durga or Ganesa or Vishnu but ultimately behind the different forms is just this spiritual light, spiritual energy. So why this silly, childish, petty quarreling, Shiva is supreme, Vishnu is supreme. Actually I am supreme. That is what it comes to. Why worry about Him? You yourself can merge and become God.”

There was one man in Madras named Mr. Ramakrishna and I kept meeting people who would tell me, “Have you met Mr. Ramakrishna? He is very pious. He is very religious. You should meet him. He will certainly take interest in your activities.” So I met him and he came out that Shiva is supreme and I said Krishna is supreme and I had my evidence—that is the thing—I had actual evidence that Krishna is supreme. But he had his sentiment. He might have had his authorities and it ended being quite. . . he had a very volatile nature. He got really red in the face and very agitated. So, things did not end up in a very sweet note. That is how it happens. I thought, “Did I do something wrong? Should I present these things in a different way? What did I do that things ended up in such a conflict?”

So time passed, I kept meeting people and they would ask, “Have you met Mr. Ramakrishna? He is such a religious man. You must meet him.” And I imagined that he was getting the same thing, “Have you met the Hare Krishna devotee? They are doing very good work. You will definitely be happy to see what they are doing.” So I thought, “This is too much.” So I phoned him and he was very happy to arrange another appointment. I think he was getting the same thing. So this time we were careful, we didn’t want to end in another conflict. It started out in a friendly enough way, congenial enough way, and then he brought up this issue who is supreme. In the two weeks that we hadn’t met nothing had changed, Krishna was still supreme. [laughter] So God is not elected by popular votes, “Okay, Krishna is in for this term and if people don’t like Him then He gets voted out.” No, God is God. He is not subject to our votes or likes or dislikes.

So, anyway, gradually it escalated, he got a little hotter and I suppose I got a little hotter, but we didn’t want it to end the way the last argument ended, but it was definitely going in that direction. And then I had an idea, I said, “Look, you know I am just a student, my teacher is coming to Madras, and I can arrange for you to discuss with him. I think that will be much better.” He said, “Yes, yes, yes, I agree, that will be much better.”

Srila Prabhupada came and I invited Mr. Ramakrishna to meet him, and he said, “Swamiji, I have been meeting with your student Giriraj and we are having a controversy who is supreme, Krishna or Shiva.” Srila Prabhupada dealt with his question in such an intelligent way that he took it to another platform, he didn’t answer it within the categories that Mr. Ramakrishna had presented it. He said that, “There are two words in Sanskrit, puja and bhakti. In puja one worships the deity to get something in return and in bhakti one serves the deity only to please the deity without any expectation of personal gain.” And then Srila Prabhupada said, “But generally people approach Shiva in the mood of puja, to get something in return, and people approach Vishnu or Krishna in a mood of pure bhakti.” So Mr. Ramakrishna said, “Can’t there be exceptions?” And Prabhupada said, “Yes, of course, there can be. It may happen that someone goes to a liquor shop for some other purpose. Generally people go to a liquor shop to get liquor to drink but it could happen that one goes to a liquor shop for some other reason.”

I used to do that because in Boston in the evening we would go out on Boyleston Street and chant and the temple president was Satsvarupa dasa and he ordered that we should come back every night at eight-thirty. But sometimes it was so good I didn’t want to come back. And in those days there were no cellphones. You could never imagine such things then. At Boyleston Street where we would chant there weren’t any payphones on the street but there was a pub and so I would go in and ask the proprietor if I could make a phone call and phone Satsvarupa and ask if we could stay out a little longer. 

But generally if one goes to a liquor shop it is understood that he is going to drink. So then Mr. Ramakrishna asked Srila Prabhupada, “What if someone worships Shiva in the mood of bhakti not in the mood of puja to get something?” Prabhupada said, “That is fine.” And that was where Prabhupada left it. 

But something very mysterious or transcendental takes place if one worships Shiva without any desire for return, just because one is seeking absolute knowledge or absolute bliss. Shiva will bring that devotee to Krishna. I know two very vivid examples. It is a principle but one is Nityananda Prabhu, the temple president in Dallas, he was a Saivite, somehow he was a Saivite, but not the materialistic type like many, but he just happened to be a Saivite, and eventually Lord Shiva brought him to Krishna. And another is actually a professor at the University of California in Santa Barbara, she had been a student at [Vaser?] and they had a program where you would spend your junior year abroad and she went to Varanasi and there are many big temples of Shiva in Varanasi. By association she became a worshiper of Shiva but she didn’t want anything material; she was looking for knowledge, absolute knowledge. She was looking for liberation from the cycle of birth and death. 

Eventually—it is a long story—she came back, became a professor and started to meet devotees. First was Tamal Krishna Goswami and then she met me and she found she was becoming a devotee of Krishna. But she was thinking, “Well, what about my devotion to Shiva? Am I being unchaste? Am I being unfaithful?” And then I explained—it took a little time—but I explained that, “Actually Shiva himself is a devotee of Krishna—vaiṣṇavānāṁ yathā śambhuḥ—-Lord Shiva is considered the greatest of Vaishnavas and that to the contrary Lord Shiva would be pleased if you became a devotee of Krishna.” And then gradually she read Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam and she understood that that is actually the case.

Even in other traditions if one is sincerely seeking God, then God will help even if one gets that help from “outside” one’s own tradition. So you don’t have to give up being a Hindu or Christian or Muslim or whatever it is, but you can add this and become a better Hindu or Christian or Muslim or Buddhist. Of course when you are really spiritually enlivened you realize, “I am not a Hindu or a Christian or a Muslim or a man or a woman or human being.” You realize that you are the soul. But still, realizing that you are the soul, circumstantially it may be that you continue in your cultural tradition but you add the knowledge of the Bhagavad-gītā, you add the chanting of God’s name. That chanting of God’s name is in every tradition, practically every scripture. It is a big topic. But that is the truth.

I would have very nice discussions with the Jewish rabbi at the temple in Santa Barbara and I asked him, “If you meet a genuinely God conscious person who’s not Jewish, how do you feel? Within your heart, how do you feel when you meet him or her?” And he said, “I feel very happy. I feel that this person is a blessing to the world, a genuinely God conscious person.” So anyone who is genuinely God conscious—not materially motivated, not politically motivated—they will feel happy when they meet another pure devotee in whatever tradition. But because of this more detailed scientific approach, people can benefit in whatever their practice by adding if they wish and add the knowledge of the Bhagavad-gītā, add the chanting of God’s name, whether it is the Hare Krishna maha-mantra or the Jesus prayer or “Allah, Allah.” In Pakistan I came across a book called The Ninety-nine Names of Allah. Like in the Hindu tradition there is the Viṣṇu-sahasra-nāma, the thousand names of Vishnu, they had The Ninety-names of Allah. The book mentioned that the best thing that a pious Muslim can do at the time of death is to chant God’s name and the best that his family members and friends can do is to help him chant God’s name. It is exactly the same in the yoga tradition, Krishna consciousness, same in the Jewish tradition when the friends and family chant something like the maha-mantra of the Jewish traditions and it is very similar.

Both of my parents left their bodies in that circumstance with almost all of their family members around chanting that. There was something very special that happened in my mother’s case. You could see that the time was coming. You can see there are symptoms. At that time, His Holiness Radhanath Swami was in New York at the ISKCON temple in Brooklyn, and I phoned him, I wanted him to know. So he was just about to go to the temple room, big temple room, and lead kirtan and give the talk. I later found out that just at that time when my mother actually left her body and she was surrounded by almost all the family and chanting, he announced to the hundreds of devotees who had gathered there that, “Giriraj Swami’s mother is in the process of leaving her body so everyone should pray for her,” and he dedicated that kirtan to her. When I found out later I realized that she actually left her body—of course we were chanting around her in our own way—and all these hundreds of devotees in New York were also chanting for her at the same time. That is was very encouraging.

In a way all we really have is each other. We have God, we have Krishna, we have the holy name, we have the scriptures, we have the deities, we have the temples, but what really makes the difference is the association, and that is so precious and valuable. You never want to take it for granted. Like last night we discussed a little that Krishna disappeared from the gopīs in order to increase their love for Him, to increase their attachment for Him. And he gave the example that if someone is very poor and he suddenly comes into a lot of money and then he loses that money, he will be thinking of that money all the time. Like sometimes we have our chanting beads, very important, Srila Prabhupada said your beads are your link to Krishna. So we have our chanting beads but we might not always be so conscious of them and we put them somewhere and we forget where we put them and we think that someone might have taken them. Then we can do nothing but think of them, “Where are my beads? Where are my beads?” So it is like that, Krishna may remove Himself from you to increase your anxiety for Him.

Now to be bereft of the association of devotees—it means likeminded seekers of God or followers of God—is the worst situation that you could be in. So you don’t want to take that association for granted because otherwise you might lose it. Krishna might take it away to teach you the value of it so you don’t take it for granted in the future. 

I know of a very tragic case, a devotee—he is not initiated—it was one of those things, he is from India, he had a job in Information Technology, and he lost his job. Now when he had his job he was going to the temple every Sunday and many mornings. Many mornings he would go to the temple. When he lost his job he became depressed but more than that he lost the structure to his life. So instead of taking advantage of the opportunity, “Okay, I don’t have to go to work, I can go to the temple,” he started to sleep late in the morning. He just became very loose in his habits. And as he described it, he just sunk deeper and deeper into tama-guṇa, and under the influence of tama-guṇa (ignorance, the darkness), he did something that he should not have done, something against the law that he should not have done. As a result the temple banned him. So okay, he is facing the court case, but that is the small part to him. The big part is the association that he is being denied. Of course it is not as black and white as that but at least the facility of going to the temple to get association is denied to him. And it is also understandable because if you do something like that at the temple, the temple could be legally liable because they know that he did that, had that tendency. So he is lamenting day and night he can’t go to the temple, he can’t have the association of devotees.

So we don’t want to take for granted any gift that God has given us. If we take it for granted and become neglectful He might take it away from us and then we will really have to work hard to get it back and we don’t even know when or how we will get it back. So we should always be very humble and aware of our weakness and the need we have for each other, for the encouragement we get from each other, for the good advice we get from each other. [cellphone rings] Sometimes it happens a devotee forgets to turn off his cellphone. To err is human. We all make mistakes. To err is human and to forgive is divine. We shouldn’t think, “Oh! Maharaja is talking. He didn’t even turn off his cellphone.” We should be very forgiving. We should see the good and overlook little defects and then our association with each other will be very congenial and that will please Krishna.

There are many examples even from the common wisdom and folk law. Like there is the story of a father instructing his sons and he had some sticks, some small sticks. Say he had eight sons, so he had eight sticks and he gave each one a stick and asked them to break the sticks. Easily they could break the individual sticks. Then he put all the sticks together and bound them and then asked them to break it. They couldn’t do it. That is the idea that in unity there is strength. 

Another example that Srila Prabhupada gave was the contrary example that the father was very sick and the sons gathered together, say four sons gathered together, to massage the father. So one was massaging the right hand, one was massaging the left hand, one was massaging the right foot, one was doing the left foot or leg. And then the one on the left leg decided, “Why should I be doing the leg. I should be doing the arm.” So he starts with the other brother, “Look, I should be doing the arm. You do the leg. I should be doing the arm.” And the one doing the left arm thinks, “Why should I be doing the left arm. I should be doing the right arm.” And he tells the other one, “Hey look, I should be doing the right arm.” And then they started fighting. And while the sons are fighting over who should be massaging which part of the father’s body, the father died.

So we don’t want to be in that situation. We are here to serve the body of Krishna, Prabhupada, so we don’t want to be fighting over whom is doing which service. It doesn’t matter whether you are doing the leg or the arm or the neck or the head or the right side or the left side. What matters is that the father gets a good experience and he gets some healing and nurturing energy. That is what matters. It doesn’t matter who’s doing what. So that should be our mood. Like with the gopīs, the gopīs are not thinking, “I want to be with Krishna.” But the gopīs are thinking especially of Srimati Radharani that, “Srimati Radharani is the best of us, She should be with Krishna. That will make Krishna more happy.” And Radharani is thinking, “Oh, these other gopīs are so nice, Krishna should be with them.” So they want to arrange for Radharani to be with Krishna and Radharani wants to arrange for them to be with Krishna. So this is the mood of selfless service, devotion, and that is the mood we should cultivate among ourselves and that will be very pleasing to guru and Krishna.

I know Gauranga had his idea of what I should speak on. I will try to satisfy him. I have no choice. From the last installment we had come to Sea Palace Hotel, was that after going to Amritsar or Delhi and Surat? Okay. So in Surat one of my godbrothers, Rsi Kumar, he called me aside and in very hush tones, very confidential mood, he said that, “Srila Prabhupada is introducing a new program in India called Life Membership and anyone who enlists life members will please Srila Prabhupada very much.” So, like we read, the whole purpose of bhakti is to please Krishna but we don’t really know how to please Krishna. In a sense we have to know from the guru and if we please the guru then Krishna will be pleased. So that was, “Oh, wow, there is a chance to please Prabhupada.” So I said, “Okay, I will come.” 

At that time we didn’t have any center in Bombay, we were completely new in India, but we had a friend named Ramchand Chabria who had a hotel on Strand Road just where the Taj is, where the great gateway of India is. There is a row of hotels and he had one called the Sea Palace Hotel. But he was Vaishnava, he was a devotee, he knew devotees from England, very nice man, very pious man, and his whole hotel was vegetarian which I would say took some faith and conviction because you have to compete and no meat and no alcohol and he had to compete. It was a nice hotel and he was doing well enough so he gave us some rooms at the top. I think they were being renovated and the work wasn’t done. We had these rooms at the top. So Shyamasundara Prabhu, Prabhupada’s senior disciple, he was there, he was in charge. And Yadubara, at that time he was John, he was a photographer, he was on assignment in India to take photographs and he met Prabhupada. He was asking where he could get good things for his photography and Prabhupada said, “You can go to Vrindavan.” And so John went to Vrindavan to take photos and he fell in love with Vrindavan. We could all see that he was a devotee, that he was becoming one, but he couldn’t see it. But that was okay. So he came down to the Sea Palace Hotel, he was staying there, and he converted the bathroom into a darkroom. He would be hanging up his negatives. I don’t remember how that technical process works. So he was there, Rsi Kumar was there, and some ladies were there, Malati was there.

So Shyamasundara gave me a little advice how to enroll life members and then he gave me a piece of paper with a name and address on it and he said, “You go here and you make him a member and you tell me what happens. I will see how you do and then I will give you more.” So I went. He had a big office at Church Gate. His name was S. M. Nagpal, Nagpal of Body Petrol Refining Corporation. So I explained everything and at the end I asked him to become a life member. He said, “I have to consult my brother.” I said, “Okay, that is reasonable enough. So should I phone you or how should we do it?” He said, “I will phone you.” 

I went back and I told Shyamasundara and he said, “What! You didn’t make him a life member. I could have made him a life member.” I said, “Well, he wanted to consult his brother.” He said, “Oh that is just an excuse. It is just an excuse. He could have become a life member himself. He didn’t need to consult his brother.” I learned some very interesting things. He said if someone doesn’t agree, it means they have some doubt, but they don’t tell you what the doubt is. You have to be intelligent enough to figure out what the doubt is without even expressing it. And you have to speak and act in such a way that the doubt is removed and then voluntarily they will agree.

A little later he sent me out with Madhudvisa Prabhu to [?] and I saw that in action. The man had already agreed to become a life member. So Madhudvisa came to collect the check and give him the books and the man had changed his mind. He didn’t want to give the check. Madhudvisa Prabhu didn’t say, “You promised! We came all the way here. We can’t go back,” but just like what Shyamasundara said, he was thinking, “He has some doubt, he has some reservation, we have to understand what is his reservation and remove it.” It was a little above my head. I don’t know what the doubt was or how it all worked but without mentioning anything about life membership or having doubts or questions, it seemed like Madhudvisa was just talking to him, just discussing, and after a while, without Madhudvisa saying anything about life membership, the man said, “All right, I will become your life member.” And I thought, “That is how it is meant to work.”

Eventually Mr. Nagpal, he became a member. He actually spoke to his brother or whatever or maybe he spoke to some other people to find out more about us and then when his doubts were removed he became a life member. 

But there was another thing about me that I was always very afraid about maya. Like even in the Boston temple I wouldn’t want to go out on the street alone, walk on the sidewalk alone, because I thought I might get tempted to look at a billboard or something and that would be maya, that would be a distraction from my Krishna consciousness. I was always very fearful. So, I didn’t like the idea of going out like that. This was bothering. I was going out a little bit and coming back but it was bothering me. But eventually I learned how to deal with Indian people and how to make life members. This thing of going out in the city, with so many sites and sounds and smells and signs and just so many distractions, I was very fearful. 

So one day I got in an auto rickshaw to come from the Sea Palace Hotel to Old Hanuman Lane, near the small causes court, near Metro Cinema. I had an appointment with a cloth merchant around there. I was just sitting in the auto rickshaw chanting really intensely, really seriously, and suddenly I had this revelation that I could be back in the temple chanting and getting some benefit but I am chanting in the auto rickshaw, I am getting the same benefit from the chanting, but beyond the benefit of the chanting, I am meeting people and engaging them in Krishna’s service and helping to establish a mission. So this is better. I get the same benefit of the chanting but on top of it I get to meet people and engage people in Krishna’s service. That was a major breakthrough for me.

That is just the first few days at the Sea Palace Hotel but I think that is what our time allows. But it is very interesting—this won’t take long. It is just a short thing—that eventually Prabhupada came from Surat and the other devotees came from Surat including Yamuna devi. She was sitting in Prabhupada’s room at Sea Palace Hotel and there was the sound of a peacock in the distance and she said, “Srila Prabhupada, it is just like Vrindavan. Did you hear that? It is just like Vrindavan with the sound of the peacocks.” So I guess just being with Prabhupada was like being in Vrindavan. Hearing a peacock in the distance is just an added touch. 

We took walks in that whole area near the Gateway of India and we took some photographs of that. I am trying to avoid confronting the fact that the time is up and I am going to have to stop. Let us see do any of you have any questions or comments?

Devotee: In the Vedas it is said that God is one so why do we fight amongst different religions?

Giriraj Swami: That is a good question. He says according to the Vedas, God is one, but He is referred to by different names in different languages. So why do people fight? You made a good point. There are different levels of advancement of devotees. There is the kaniṣṭhās, they are actually still on the material platform, and then there are the advanced devotees, the madhyama-bhaktas, they are on the spiritual platform, and then there are the perfect devotees, the mahā-bhāgavatas, they are on the spiritual platform and they have realized God. So, on the material platform, people fight. It is just the nature of people in the bodily concept. Srila Prabhupada gave the example—he was talking about the United Nations—if you have a beautiful room with plush chairs and you fill the room with cats and dogs and you tell them to make peace, will they be able to make peace? So the answer is no. And why will they be unable to make peace? Because they are cats and dogs—they are animals. 

So, according to higher knowledge, according to Vedic literature, anyone who identifies with the body is an animal. As long as people identify with the body they will fight. This disease is everywhere. Everyone thinks they are better than others. They identify with the body and they think they are better. The Americans think, “We are Americans, we are the best,” and the Indians, “We are Indians, we are the best,” and the Chinese think, “We are Chinese, we are the best.” And they fight. And there is no limit. It is not just Hindus and Muslims or Muslims and Jews. Even within Christians they fight. Even within Muslims they fight.

People have to come to the spiritual platform and see only solutions. That requires education, it requires knowledge, and it requires some spiritual discipline. Because we might have spiritual knowledge—everyone in this room, many people in this room know in theory, “I am not the body.”—we have the theoretical knowledge “I am not the body,” but if someone steps on our toe, we become very angry, “You stepped on my toe!” “What are you getting so upset for, you are not the body.” “Who are you to tell me I am not the body. You are also not the body.” [laughter] 

We have the theoretical knowledge but we don’t have the actual realization and that realization comes from practice and spiritual discipline, from the chanting—ceto-darpaṇa-mārjanam—the chanting cleanses the dust from the mirror of the mind. If a mirror is covered with dust you can’t see yourself in the mirror. You don’t know who you are. You can’t see anything but if you wipe away the dust you can see who you are. So the mirror of the mind is covered with dust and dust means ignorance. The basic misconception is “I am the body” and so the chanting cleanses that dust and then we realize, “I am not the body; I am the soul within the body.” The soul cannot cut or wet or burned or withered. The soul is beyond all of that. So no one can really hurt you. They could hurt the body but they can’t really hurt you. But that is not a justification for hurting the body. It is also a principle of a devotee that he should not give pain to any living entity. But if it happens that someone accidentally or even purposely causes us some pain, we shouldn’t. . . it is a little complicated if someone does it on purpose but even if they do it on purpose, in a way they can’t help it, because they themselves are just being controlled by material nature. So at the end Jesus Christ said, “Forgive them Lord, they know not what they do.” So we should try to have that attitude if someone harms us. But if someone offends Krishna or a devotee, that is something different. So, ourselves, we should be meek and humble but for the sake of others we should be prepared to defend them.

Just to give an example, humorous example, but one of my good friends in devotional service is Ṛtadhvaja Swami and when he was young he and another devotee would go to the Florida Welcome Center and when people would drive into the Florida Welcome Center he would greet them, give them a flower, give them a book, ask for a donation. Sometimes people just didn’t like us. They had some prejudice. So anyway this big guy started to pick on him. He was five foot-six and at that time he probably weighed one hundred and twenty pounds. He was a little guy. This big guy starts picking on him, “What are you doing here? Why are you bothering people? Just leave us alone. Just go away!” And the other devotee he was distributing with was a big black devotee who was six feet-six tall. So while this guy was picking on Ṛtadhvaja Swami, Vaninatha comes over and taps the guy on his shoulder and he is looking down at him and he says, “You have a problem with my friend? You have a problem with me.” [laughter] 

So the idea is that personally we can be meek and humble but we should protect the deity, we should protect the devotees.

What the devotees did in the early days was amazing. He told me another story that you know how it is, there are always friends and enemies in the material world. Somehow this guy came out of the Welcome Center, maybe someone had spoken to him inside and said, you don’t even know what they say, like, “They eat small babies,” or whatever. When he came out he was so angry just based on what he heard about us. So this guy approached Ṛtadhvaja Swami again, five foot-six, hundred and twenty pounds, real little guy, and Vaninatha wasn’t there, and this guy, this big, burly guy comes up to him and he starts pushing him. Krishna just gave him the intelligence and he took off his book bag, put it on the ground, he said, “You want to fight with me. I am ready. I didn’t spend six years in the Marines in the Green Beret to get pushed around by someone like you.” And he stamped his foot on the ground and he said, “Come on, you want to fight, I am ready to fight with you right here and now!” And the man’s wife grabbed hold of his arm and said, “Honey, he has been in the Marines, you don’t want to mess with him. Let us get out of here! Just leave him alone. Let us just get out of here.” And it was like Krishna’s mercy. Had he taken him up on that challenge, we don’t know what would have happened. [laughter]

Krishna empowers devotees, inspires devotees. There were a lot of good stories from the Florida Guest Reception Center. I hope you can get Ṛtadhvaja Swami to come and tell you the stories. I couldn’t stop laughing. It was so funny. He would give people flowers but one day they ran out of flowers but what they would do is they would buy flowers on long stems. So they’d given away all the flowers and all they had left was the stems. So they started approaching people with the stems. [laughter] “Welcome to Florida, Sir. Take one of these.” “What do I do with it?” “Whatever you like.” And people were taking them and giving donations. They would give them a book. So then after a while the neighbor, she is like the lady inside the guest reception, a heavyset lady, she comes storming out with her hands on her hips and she said, “What are you guys doing? What you all doing? You giving them these useless stems. They come into my guest center and they drop them stems on the floor. I have to pick them up. You stop this!” [laughter] 

So many adventures. There were many encounters. Sometimes the police would come. The final encounter was on Christmas they came dressed as Santa Claus and the sheriff came. The devotees knew the sheriff because someone filed a completely false case against them. It was very interesting, they filed a completely false case against them. I could tell you that too. So the judge, he could immediately see through it and not only did he dismiss the case but he chided the sheriff and he said, “Don’t ever bring these kinds of cases to me again. These people are innocent. And that was a completely false case. Don’t insult me and this courtroom by bringing these people in on these false charges.” So even though he was chided by the judge you know how it is, he just didn’t like the devotees. So he came, he approached Ṛtadhvaja Swami dressed as Santa Claus, and he said, “You can’t do this. You can’t do this. You have to take that costume off. You have to leave this place. I am not allowing you to do that here.” So Ṛtadhvaja Swami said, “Well, what law am I violating?” So the sheriff said, “You are impersonating Santa Claus.” [laughter] So Ṛtadhvaja Swami said, “Okay, you bring the real Santa Claus and I will take it off.” 

I guess the idea is that devotees went through a lot to pioneer this movement and they faced a lot of opposition, a lot of awkward situations, but Krishna gave them the intelligence. The same in Juhu, the same in so many parts of the world. So that spirit of being ready to do anything to please guru and Krishna, that was the spirit that prevailed in the early days of ISKCON and that should be the spirit now. Of course we are more established now so we wouldn’t have to do some of the things we did in the early days to begin things but we should have that mood of being ready to take risks for guru and Krishna.

Question: Sometimes in different circles we come across different opinions, different understandings, or different levels of consciousness. How should one approach such situations to serve better, serve the mission in the association of devotees?

Giriraj Swami: We are all individual. It is natural to have different opinions. It is not a problem if we have different opinions. If it is a matter of what is the best way to serve Krishna, you can discuss, but the main thing is that it is very rare that any differences are worth disrupting the relations. Generally it is better, if it is all for Krishna. I remember very early I was driving and there was a question which way to go. So one devotee said, “Turn right,” and another devotee said, “Turn left,” and the senior devotee who was in the car said that, “The devotee who said turn right was correct and that the devotee who said turn left was also correct.” So I said, “How can they both be correct?” And she said, “Because the devotee who said to turn right was thinking how to serve Krishna in the best way and the devotee who said to turn left was also thinking how to serve Krishna in the best way. So they are both right and probably we will ultimately get to the destination anyway whether you turn right first and then left or left first and then right.”

You have to adjust.

I will end with one story on that theme. Once at the Ardha-kumbha-melā there was a little dispute between Yamuna devi and Madhudvisa Prabhu. Madhudvisa said that there is no different between Krishna and Balarama except that Krishna is blackish and Balarama is whitish. And Yamuna devi said there is a difference because only Krishna is the enjoyer of Radharani. So they were arguing back and forth and Tamal Krishna Goswami decided to take the matter to Srila Prabhupada. And he said, “Madhudvisa Prabhu said there is no difference between Krishna and Balarama except that Krishna is blackish in complexion and Balarama is whitish in complexion.” And Prabhupada said, “Yes, he is right.” And then Tamal Krishna Goswami said, “But Yamuna devi says there is another difference which is that Krishna is the only enjoyer of Radharani.” And Srila Prabhupada said, “Yes, she is right.” And Tamal Krishna Goswami said, “But they both are saying different things. They can’t both be right.” And Prabhupada said, “Yes, you are right.” [laughter] And then Tamal Krishna Goswami said, “Well then, which is right?” And Srila Prabhupada said, “You decide.”

Srila Prabhupada ki jaya!

Nitai-Gaura premānande Hari Haribol!