Diwali—Lord Rama’s Return to Ayodhya

Giriraj Swami: Hare Krishna. So, we welcome you to the discussion of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam on the auspicious occasion of Dipavali, which is the day on which the pastime of Mother Yasoda binding baby Krishna with ropes took place. So, I will read a few verses from that Chapter. Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, Canto Ten, Chapter Nine: “Mother Yaśodā Binds Lord Kṛṣṇa,” Texts One and Two.

TEXT 1–2

Śrī Śukadeva Gosvāmī continued: One day when mother Yaśodā saw that all the maidservants were engaged in other household affairs, she personally began to churn the yogurt. While churning, she remembered the childish activities of Kṛṣṇa, and in her own way she composed songs and enjoyed singing to herself about all those activities.

PURPORT by Srila Prabhupada

Śrīla Viśvanātha Cakravartī Ṭhākura, quoting from the Vaiṣṇava-toṣaṇī of Śrīla Sanātana Gosvāmī, says that the incident of Kṛṣṇa’s breaking the pot of yogurt and being bound by mother Yaśodā took place on the Dīpāvalī Day, or Dīpa-mālikā. Even today in India, this festival is generally celebrated very gorgeously in the month of Kārtika by fireworks and lights, especially in Bombay.

COMMENT

While doing research recently about Srila Prabhupada and Juhu, I came across a story told by one of the children of the tenants on the Juhu Land. Now, of course, she’s a grown woman, but at that time, she and her two brothers were probably eight, ten, twelve. And she said how on Dipavali night, her brothers wanted to set up fireworks, firecrackers, which were making noise. And at that time, the ladies had one floor above the building in which that particular family lived. And one of the ladies was very strict and regulated in her daily practices, and she had already gone to take rest when they began to set off the fireworks, firecrackers.

So, she came out and reprimanded them, “You can’t do this.” So, her brothers got very upset, and they went running across the garden to Srila Prabhupada’s apartment to complain that they were stopped from doing the fireworks. And by then, it was already nine o’clock, and Srila Prabhupada said, “It’s too late. You should take rest.” And of course, they couldn’t argue with Srila Prabhupada, but they were really attached to the idea of setting off the fireworks. So, they stood silently in Srila Prabhupada’s room and didn’t move, and Srila Prabhupada understood what was in their heart. So, he said, “Okay, you can do it but not past ten o’clock.” So, then they were happy and they had their festival.

PURPORT (continued)

It is to be understood that among all the cows of Nanda Mahārāja, several of mother Yaśodā’s cows ate only grasses so flavorful that the grasses would automatically flavor the milk. Mother Yaśodā wanted to collect the milk from these cows, make it into yogurt and churn it into butter personally, because she thought that this child Kṛṣṇa was going to the houses of neighborhood gopas and gopīs to steal butter because He did not like the milk and yogurt ordinarily prepared.

COMMENT

So, now, this is a very important principle, that if we don’t want people to go elsewhere, we have to give them something that’s so good that whatever they could get elsewhere would be inferior. So, Mother Yasoda was thinking, “Oh, Krishna, He’s going into the neighbors’ houses and stealing butter. Maybe He doesn’t like our butter. So, we have to make our butter better so that He doesn’t leave the house and go elsewhere.”

PURPORT (continued)

While churning the butter, mother Yaśodā was singing about the childhood activities of Kṛṣṇa. It was formerly a custom that if one wanted to remember something constantly, he would transform it into poetry or have this done by a professional poet. It appears that mother Yaśodā did not want to forget Kṛṣṇa’s activities at any time. Therefore she poeticized all of Kṛṣṇa’s childhood activities, such as the killing of Pūtanā, Aghāsura, Śakaṭāsura and Tṛṇāvarta, and while churning the butter, she sang about these activities in poetical form. This should be the practice of persons eager to remain Kṛṣṇa conscious twenty-four hours a day. This incident shows how Kṛṣṇa conscious mother Yaśodā was. To stay in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, we should follow such persons.

TEXT 3

Dressed in a saffron-yellow sari, with a belt tied about her full hips, mother Yaśodā pulled on the churning rope, laboring considerably, her bangles and earrings moving and vibrating and her whole body shaking. Because of her intense love for her child, her breasts were wet with milk. Her face, with its very beautiful eyebrows, was wet with perspiration, and mālatī flowers were falling from her hair.

PURPORT by Srila Prabhupada

Anyone who desires to be Kṛṣṇa conscious in motherly affection or parental affection should contemplate the bodily features of mother Yaśodā. It is not that one should desire to become like Yaśodā, for this is Māyāvāda. Either in parental affection or conjugal love, friendship or servitorship — in any way — we must follow in the footsteps of the inhabitants of Vṛndāvana, not try to become like them. Therefore this description is provided here.

COMMENT

So, there are two Sanskrit words, anukaraṇam and anusaraṇam. One means to follow in the footsteps, and the other means to imitate. So, we should not try to imitate the residents of Vrindavan, but we should try to follow in their footsteps. One may have the desire to serve Krishna in maternal affection or parental affection, but one cannot become Mother Yasoda. To desire to become Mother Yasoda is Mayavada, to want to take the place of Mother Yasoda. But we can be an assistant to Mother Yasoda. She’s the leader of all devotees in parental affection or maternal affection. So, if we want to serve Krishna in motherly affection, we should contemplate Mother Yasoda, because she is our leader, and we should aspire to assist her in her service to Krishna in motherly affection.

PURPORT (continued)

Advanced devotees must cherish this description, always thinking of mother Yaśodā’s features — how she was dressed, how she was working and perspiring, how beautifully the flowers were arranged in her hair, and so on. One should take advantage of the full description provided here by thinking of mother Yaśodā in maternal affection for Kṛṣṇa.

TEXT 4

While mother Yaśodā was churning butter, Lord Kṛṣṇa, desiring to drink the milk of her breast, appeared before her, and in order to increase her transcendental pleasure, He caught hold of the churning rod and began to prevent her from churning.

PURPORT by Srila Prabhupada

Kṛṣṇa was sleeping within the room, and as soon as He got up, He became hungry and went to His mother. Wanting to stop her from churning and drink the milk of her breasts, He stopped her from moving the churning rod.

COMMENT

Now, the pastimes of Krishna in the Tenth Canto are very mysterious and confidential. And therefore, devotees are advised to progress step by step. First, to read the Īśopaniṣad, then the Bhagavad-gītā, then The Nectar of Devotion, and then the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, beginning from the First Canto, and gradually progressing to the Tenth Canto.

Now, by understanding properly, we will know that Krishna is the cause of all causes, janma-ādi asya yataḥ, He is completely independent, sva-rāṭ, and He is completely satisfied with Himself, independent, being satisfied within Himself. He doesn’t need to get anything from anyone. So, how is it that He felt hungry and tried to stop Mother Yasoda from churning the butter so that she would feed Him? The answer is that advanced devotees serve Krishna in different moods or mellows; the mood of passive adoration, śānta-rasa, active service, dāsya-rasa, and friendship with reverence, part of sākhya-rasa. And those relationships can be had with Krishna in Vaikuntha, and Krishna lives in one of His forms in Vaikuntha. But there’s always awe and reverence.

But in Vrindavan, there are more intimate relationships in which the devotees, in order to reciprocate in their mood of service with Krishna, they forget that He’s God. And in the case of Mother Yasoda, she just loves Him as her child. And in her mood of service, she wants to feed Krishna. Children are always dependent on their Mothers. And Krishna, to reciprocate her mood, feels hungry. Now, her breast milk is actually her love in liquid form. And Krishna’s hunger is actually His desire to taste her pure ecstatic love for Him. So, He actually feels hungry, but it’s not material hunger for material food, but it’s His hunger to taste His devotee’s love for Him.

TEXT 5

Mother Yaśodā then embraced Kṛṣṇa, allowed Him to sit down on her lap, and began to look upon the face of the Lord with great love and affection. Because of her intense affection, milk was flowing from her breast. But when she saw that the milk pan on the oven was boiling over, she immediately left her son to take care of the overflowing milk, although the child was not yet fully satisfied with drinking the milk of His mother’s breast.

PURPORT by Srila Prabhupada

Everything in the household affairs of mother Yaśodā was meant for Kṛṣṇa. Although Kṛṣṇa was drinking the breast milk of mother Yaśodā, when she saw that the milk pan in the kitchen was overflowing, she had to take care of it immediately, and thus she left her son, who then became very angry, not having been fully satisfied with drinking the milk of her breast. Sometimes one must take care of more than one item of important business for the same purpose. Therefore mother Yaśodā was not unjust when she left her son to take care of the overflowing milk. On the platform of love and affection, it is the duty of the devotee to do one thing first and other things later. The proper intuition by which to do this is given by Kṛṣṇa.

teṣāṁ satata-yuktānāṁ

bhajatāṁ prīti-pūrvakam

dadāmi buddhi-yogaṁ taṁ

yena mām upayānti te

(Gītā 10.10)

In Kṛṣṇa consciousness, everything is dynamic. Kṛṣṇa guides the devotee in what to do first and what to do next on the platform of absolute truth.

COMMENT

So, this incident is also very mysterious, because Mother Yasoda was feeding baby Krishna her breast milk, and then, the milk on the fire began to overflow, and she set baby Krishna aside. So, someone might think, Well, why did she do that? I mean, she thought that the milk on the fire was more important than Krishna? But the milk on the fire was also meant for Krishna’s service. And therefore, on the platform of Absolute Truth, it was as important as feeding Krishna, because it was also meant for feeding Krishna. So, sometimes we are faced with this question.

And one incident from Calcutta comes to mind, in which an important man came to the temple when the devotee was doing ārati. And there were not many devotees in the Calcutta temple in general, and they were out, preaching when the person came in the afternoon. So, the person came, and there was no devotee to attend to him, and he stayed a few minutes and left. And when Srila Prabhupada found out, he was very upset and he quoted a verse from the Eleventh Canto of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, mad-bhakta-pūjābhyadhikā, “The worship of the devotee takes precedence over the worship of Krishna.” Now, of course, it would have been better, from a certain point of view, if the devotee had stopped the ārati and received that devotee, that visitor, but he or she was not aware of that principle.

But here, Mother Yasoda set aside her direct service to Krishna to attend to another servant of Krishna. Because in the spiritual world, everything is conscious. So, that milk is also conscious, that milk also wanted to serve Krishna. And so, Mother Yasoda went to serve that servant of Krishna.

TEXT 6

Being very angry and biting His reddish lips with His teeth, Kṛṣṇa, with false tears in His eyes, broke the container of yogurt with a piece of stone. Then He entered a room and began to eat the freshly churned butter in a solitary place.

PURPORT by Srila Prabhupada

It is natural that when a child becomes angry he can begin crying with false tears in his eyes. So Kṛṣṇa did this, and biting His reddish lips with His teeth, He broke the pot with a stone, entered a room and began to eat the freshly churned butter.

COMMENT

So, this is an extraordinary pastime. And therefore, the author of the Dāmodarāṣṭakam prays that this pastime may always be in his mind and heart.

TEXT 7

Mother Yaśodā, after taking down the milk from the oven, returned to the churning spot, and when she saw that the container of yogurt was broken and that Kṛṣṇa was not there , she concluded that the breaking of the pot was the work of Kṛṣṇa.

COMMENT

And she also saw Krishna’s footprints, because this is just a small child. So, in that whole process, He got butter on His feet, so she could see the footprints from His buttery feet and follow the footprints. Then, she found Him upside down on the grinding mortar, feeding the monkeys. And she looked, she saw a stick, she picked up the stick just to threaten Krishna, and then Krishna became so frightened that she thought He might have a trauma if He kept seeing her with the stick. So, she set aside the stick, and she thought she’ll just bind Him with ropes to that grinding mortar, just to keep Him out of trouble. So, when He understood that she wanted to contain Him, He started to flee and she was chasing Him. And because He was small and running for His life, He was actually running faster than she was, and she couldn’t catch Him.

It’s a little different, but there’s a story in Aesop’s Fables that a slower animal was chasing a faster animal to catch it and eat it, but the slower animal escaped. So, the other animals asked the faster animal, “What happened? You’re the faster animal, how could he get away?” And then, the faster animal replied. “I was just running for my dinner, but he was running for his life. His motivation was stronger.” So, anyway, Krishna was running for dear life, and Mother Yasoda could not catch Him.

Devotee: [Unintelligible: 00:29:36] [laughter]

Giriraj Swami: Yes, the Bhāgavatam does say that she had broad hips and hard breasts. But Krishna, aware of her sincere desire to contain Him as a good mother so that He would not cause any more mischief, allowed Himself to be caught by her. He, whom great yogis cannot catch even running at the speed of mind, He allowed Himself to be caught by Mother Yasoda.

So then, she wanted to bind Him with ropes, which she did every morning. When she helped Krishna get dressed, she would tie a belt around His waist. So, she had experience, but even then, somehow, she apparently misjudged, and the rope was too short by the width of two fingers. So, she got some more rope and added it, but it was still too short by two fingers. So, she kept getting more and more ropes, (and they were a cowherd community, so they had a lot of ropes for binding the cows and calves), and it was still too short. And then, the neighboring friends, they brought their ropes, miles and miles of ropes, and it was still too short by the width of two fingers.

So, finally, her lady friends said, “You should give up. No matter what you do, you’re not going to be able to fulfill your objective. So, you should just give up, just accept it.” But Mother Yasoda did not heed their advice, she didn’t give up. And there’s an important lesson in that too. So now, we come to this verse. This is the critical verse in Mother Yasoda’s binding, or attempts to bind Lord Krishna. So, please repeat.

oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya

oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya

oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya

We read from Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, Canto Ten, Chapter Nine: “Mother Yaśodā Binds Lord Kṛṣṇa,” Text Eighteen.

TEXT 18

sva-mātuḥ svinna-gātrāyā

visrasta-kabara-srajaḥ

dṛṣṭvā pariśramaṁ kṛṣṇaḥ

kṛpayāsīt sva-bandhane

TRANSLATION

Because of mother Yaśodā’s hard labor, her whole body became covered with perspiration, and the flowers and comb were falling from her hair. When child Kṛṣṇa saw His mother thus fatigued, He became merciful to her and agreed to be bound.

PURPORT by Srila Prabhupada

When mother Yaśodā and the other ladies finally saw that Kṛṣṇa, although decorated with many bangles and other jeweled ornaments, could not be bound with all the ropes available in the house, they decided that Kṛṣṇa was so fortunate that He could not be bound by any material condition.

COMMENT

The significance of, “Being decorated with many bangles and other jeweled ornaments,” is that bangles are not very big, especially for the wrist of a child, but He was encircled by those bangles. But He couldn’t be bound by hundreds of feet of rope, miles of rope.

PURPORT (continued)

Thus they gave up the idea of binding Him. But in competition between Kṛṣṇa and His devotee, Kṛṣṇa sometimes agrees to be defeated. Thus Kṛṣṇa’s internal energy, yoga-māyā, was brought to work, and Kṛṣṇa agreed to be bound by mother Yaśodā.

COMMENT

So, our acharyas have taken this verse as an instruction on how Krishna can be bound. However much rope Mother Yasoda tied together to bind Krishna, it was always the width of two fingers too short. And at this moment, when Krishna agrees to be bound, there were two elements at work. One is pariśrama, which means very hard labor. In fact, materialistic people are criticized for pariśrama, for over endeavor for material achievements. In fact, that’s part of the life of the materialistic people, unfortunate or unhappy life of the materialists, that they’re engaged in pariśrama. But here, that hard labor is for Krishna, and when Krishna saw that hard labor, He gave her mercy, kṛpā.

So, the acharyas say that the distance of one finger was covered by Mother Yasoda’s hard labor, and the distance of the other finger was closed by Krishna’s mercy. And by that combination, Krishna was bound. And that is our goal, to bind Krishna within our minds, within our hearts. When we chant japa, we know how hard it is to bind Krishna. He keeps running away like Krishna was running away from Mother Yasoda. Of course, He’s not really running away, our minds are running away, but we have to maintain our effort. That is the difference between offensive chanting, nāma-aparādha, and the clearing stage of chanting. In the clearing stage of chanting, one makes the effort to bring the mind back to Krishna when the mind goes elsewhere. So, that’s our effort, and when Krishna sees our effort, and that effort can be very demanding, it can be excruciating.

I remember one devotee came to a japa retreat for the first time, and after the morning session, she came out and she said, “I thought this was going to be fun and easy and blissful,” and I could just see how fatigued she was, I said, “Yeah, I know, it’s like a battlefield.” [laughter] So, that’s what we have to do from our side, we have to make our best effort, and then Krishna, from His side, will bestow His mercy. And He does. He may not do it immediately, but He will do it enough to encourage us. He’s aware of our hard labor and our sincere desire, and He is reciprocating. But one must be patient.

In the six items that are favorable for devotional service, one of them is dhairyā, mentioned by Rupa Gosvami, utsāhān niścayād dhairyāt, one must be patient. And Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura explains that if one lacks the quality of patience, he will not be able to do any work. Now, in Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura’s essay, he says that these instructions are meant for sadhakas, people who are trying to practice bhakti-yoga. So, when he says, “Without the quality of patience, one cannot do any work,” it doesn’t mean that one can’t go to the office without patience. I mean, one might get stuck in traffic on the way to the office. So, one might not be patient; one might be grumbling, cursing, honking the horn. But he can do work, he can show up and get his pay. So that’s not the kind of work that Bhaktivinoda Thakura is referring to. He is referring to internal work. If one does not have the quality of patience, one cannot do any internal work. Because to do internal work and be successful takes time. Rome wasn’t built in a day.

And therefore, one must have the equality of dhairyāt, or patience. Otherwise, Bhaktivinoda Thakura says, someone may give up. They may think, Oh, I’ve been chanting for so many years and I’ve been doing service for so many years, and my hairs are not standing on end, and tears are not flowing from my eyes, and my body’s not trembling. It’s not working. And then, they’ll give up. And so, Bhaktivinoda Thakura says, “That’s the problem if you don’t have patience. If you don’t get the immediate result that you want, you may give up the effort.” And he says that the mood of the devotee is that whether Krishna gives His mercy now or in a year or in ten years or in a hundred years, or another lifetime, I will not stop serving Krishna. So, that is what it means to be patient in the devotional sense, “I will never stop serving Krishna. Whether He’s merciful today or tomorrow or in another lifetime, I will not stop serving Krishna.” And that is the quality of patience that we require.

So, Mother Yasoda had that quality, and we have to have that quality. Otherwise, we will not be able to do our inner work. And that inner work of purifying our heart will allow us to actually please Krishna and get Krishna’s mercy. So, maybe we’ll stop here, it’s nine o’clock. I don’t want to test your quality of patience too much. [laughter] It’s the first day. But do you have any comments or questions? Yes, Amarendra Prabhu?

Amarendra Prabhu: Maharaja, in general in life, anything you want to achieve, you have to pay the price.

Giriraj Swami: Yes.

Amarendra Prabhu: [Unintelligible 00:50:14]

Giriraj Swami: Well, everything that Krishna does is to increase the pleasure of His devotees, we read earlier, to increase the pleasure of His devotees. And everything the devotees do is to increase the pleasure of Krishna. So, from a material perspective, we can see that He was causing her to be frustrated, but actually, it was all transcendental bliss. I didn’t read it, but in the previous verse, “Thus Mother Yaśodā joined whatever ropes were available in the household, but still she failed in her attempt to bind Kṛṣṇa. Mother Yaśodā’s friends, the elderly gopīs in the neighborhood, were smiling and enjoying the fun.” Well, okay, that we can understand, that they were smiling and enjoying the fun. We might also have that. A mother is struggling with her child, so we’re smiling and enjoying the fun, it’s not our problem. [laughter] It’s her problem. But similarly, Mother Yasoda, although laboring in that way, was also smiling. That means she was enjoying transcendental pleasure. So, on the absolute platform, on the platform of absolute truth, all the varieties of emotion are varieties of transcendental bliss. So, she wasn’t suffering.

And that’s why Srila Prabhupada said, “If you want a perfect child, you should have Krishna as your child.” Because in the material world, if a child goes against the parents, it can be very heartbreaking for the parents. But in the case of Krishna, everything was transcendental ecstasy, on His side and on their side. Yes?

Devotee: [Unintelligible 00:53:30]

Giriraj Swami: That’s true, we have to surrender. And, it’s a generally gradual process, but ultimately, we have to give up our false ego, gopī-bhartuḥ pada-kamalayor dāsa-dāsānudāsaḥ, “I am not this, I am not that. I am not this, I am not that. I am only the servant of the servant of the servant of Krishna.” And that false ego is what keeps us, what separates us from Krishna. It’s the only thing that separates us from Krishna. And the mind acts as the agent of the false ego. For us to chant properly, we have to surrender, we have to give up our false ego. But the false ego doesn’t want to leave us, or we don’t want to leave it. And so, the mind will go here and there to protect the false ego from being dismantled. But yeah, the false ego is really what comes in our way. And because of the false ego. . . For the residents of Vrindavan Krishna is the center, everything is about Krishna. And for us, who’s the center? We’re the center. So, that’s false ego. Na te viduḥ svārtha-gatiṁ hi viṣṇum, we’re not seeing that our real interest is to serve Krishna.

It’s natural to think of your self-interest, but you can’t really think of your self-interest unless you know what your real self is, jīvera svarūpa haya kṛṣṇera nitya-dāsa. So, that’s why it’s so important to hear. By hearing, we can gradually understand and appreciate that it is in our self-interest to surrender to Krishna. By hearing of Krishna’s loving reciprocation with His devotees, we think, I could have the same relationship with Krishna. It’s not that He wants to have relationships with some and not with others, He’s inviting all of us. But it’s we who don’t come forward.

And so, by hearing again and again and again and again about Krishna’s merciful pastimes with His devotees, we gradually start to realize, “Yeah, I could have that too. There’s no reason why I can’t have the same relationship with Krishna. I just have to surrender, just give up my false ego and surrender, and I could have the same.”

I’ll tell one story, which may seem unrelated, but it is relevant to the topic of surrender and the Lord’s loving reciprocation. After Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu took sannyasa, He came back to Bengal, and He decided that He would walk along the Ganges and visit the homes of His devotees and fulfill their desires. Their desires were to serve Him. So, He came to the house of Advaita Acharya, and then from there, He went to Kumara Hatha, to the home of Srivasa Pandita. And Srivasa Pandita was fully absorbed in ecstatic meditation on Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. And so, when he saw that Chaitanya Mahaprabhu had come in person, his joy knew no bounds. So, they received the Lord, a person brought his best asana on his head for the Lord to sit on.

So, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu stayed for about a week or so. And after some time, He spoke to Srivasa Pandita privately, and He said, “I see that you never go out to earn your livelihood. How can you expect to feed your family or yourself if you don’t go out?” And Srivasa Pandita replied, “My Lord, I have no desire to go out.” And then, Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu said, “Well, then what happens if no food comes? What will happen to you and your family?” And Srivasa Pandita replied, “Whatever is destined to happen, will happen.” Then, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu said, “Well, then you should take sannyasa.” And Srivasa Pandita replied, “Lord, it is not in my power to take sannyasa.” Then, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu said, “Well, then what will you do? What if no food comes? Then what will you do?” And Srivasa Pandita clapped his hands three times and said, “One, two, three,” and said, “That is my answer.” And Chaitanya Mahaprabhu said, “Well, what does one, two, three mean?” And Srivasa Pandita said, “If three times food does not come and I have to fast for three meals, I will take a water pot and tie it around my neck and fill it with rocks, and drown myself in the Ganges.”

So, when Chaitanya Mahaprabhu heard that, He began to roar, “Srivasa Pandita, what are you saying? Do you not know My promise in the Bhagavad-gītā? Yoga-kṣemaṁ vahāmy aham, that one who is fixed in exclusive meditation on Me, serving Me fully, I will personally bring him out whatever he needs.” He said, “Even if one day the goddess of fortune, Lakshmi, becomes poverty-stricken and has to beg for alms, but you and your family members will never know poverty.” And then, He said, “Everything will come to you,” and He gave him many blessings.

And so, we might think, Well, if I did that, I could have that. But it’s more than the blessings, it’s the extraordinary love between Lord Chaitanya and His devotees. Then, He called Srivasa Pandita’s younger brother, Ramai Pandit, and He said, “You are very dear to Me. You are more dear to Me than My life. And I tell you, you should always serve Srivasa Pandita. Never give up serving Srivasa Pandita. If Srivasa Pandita is pleased, then I am pleased.”

There are so many of those instances that we can think, I could have this relationship. I mean, it’s the same, but culturally, it’s a little different. But Chaitanya Mahaprabhu said, “This is just within our culture, Gaudiya Vaishnava culture.” So, I could have it. Later on that trip, or maybe it was in Kumara Hatha, I think it was further down, Vasudeva Datta came. And it’s described that he was wild with love for Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, he had offered to take the sinful reactions of every living entity upon himself, so that all the living entities in the universe could be delivered. It’s described that he was wild with love for Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, and Chaitanya Mahaprabhu was wild with love for him. And He said, “Anyone who’s touched by the breeze that has touched the body of Vasudeva Datta will be liberated.”

And that’s amazing, and it’s possible for any of us if we give up our false ego. So, by hearing, hearing, hearing, hearing about the Lord’s merciful pastimes with His devotees, you can develop faith, I can do this and I want to do this. And there’s no material qualification or disqualification or condition. Whatever you have or don’t have, it doesn’t matter. Because whatever you have, it’s not going to please Krishna. And whatever you don’t have, it’s not going to displease Krishna. The only thing is your surrender. Very important to keep hearing with faith.

Devotee: [Unintelligible 01:09:23]

Giriraj Swami: Do we have that traveling microphone? You can speak louder.

Devotee: [Unintelligible: 01:09:39]

Giriraj Swami: Amarendra Prabhu says, “Krishna is telling everyone to surrender right away. So, why didn't he surrender to His Mother right away?” Well, He was surrendered to His Mother.

Devotee: [Unintelligible 01:10:13]

Giriraj Swami: But that was to increase her pleasure. In her perspiring, she was enjoying.

Devotee: Some people think it is pariśrama to [Unintelligible 01:10:52] 

Giriraj Swami: That’s true. Three days ago, I was walking at White Rock Lake, and Maha Hari came by on his bicycle, and he was really sweating. He was so blissful. But yeah, he stopped and we spoke. You have people to sweat for you. That’s why you don’t know the pleasures of sweating. [laughter] All right. So, thank you very much.