BG 9.14 – Practical Samadhi

Giriraj swami: So we will read a verse from the Bhagavad-gītā Chapter Nine: “The Most Confidential Knowledge.” Text Fourteen. I will read the Sanskrit and then when I come to the English, I will ask you to recite a few of the phrases and it will go deeper that way.

satataṁ kīrtayanto māṁ

yatantaś ca dṛḍha-vratāḥ

namasyantaś ca māṁ bhaktyā

nitya-yuktā upāsate

COMMENT

Now the Bhagavad-gītā is spoken by Krishna, who is accepted as the Supreme Personality of Godhead. And so when the verse says “Always chanting my glories.” it means the glories of God, Krishna; bowing down before me means bowing down before God, Krishna and so on.

TRANSLATION

Always chanting My glories, endeavoring with great determination, bowing down before Me, these great souls perpetually worship Me with devotion.

COMMENT

The previous verse used the word mahatma which means literally great soul. 

PURPORT by Srila Prabhupada

The mahātmā cannot be manufactured by rubber-stamping an ordinary man. His symptoms are described here: a mahātmā is always engaged in chanting the glories of the Supreme Lord Kṛṣṇa, the Personality of Godhead. He has no other business. He is always engaged in the glorification of the Lord. In other words, he is not an impersonalist.

COMMENT

So this is a very important point because there are traditions in which the philosophy says that you can merge and become one with God or you can give up your individual identity and enter into some void. And those philosophies are opposed to the conclusions of the Bhagavad-gītā. And if we were to pursue those philosophies and those goals, we would end up nowhere. We would sacrifice our personal relationship with God. So the other side of this verse, this verse is the positive side, the negative side is that we are not impersonalists.

PURPORT (continued)

When the question of glorification is there, one has to glorify the Supreme Lord, praising His holy name, His eternal form, His transcendental qualities and His uncommon pastimes. One has to glorify all these things; therefore a mahātmā is attached to the Supreme Personality of Godhead.

One who is attached to the impersonal feature of the Supreme Lord, the brahma-jyotir, is not described as mahātmā in the Bhagavad-gītā. He is described in a different way in the next verse. The mahātmā is always engaged in different activities of devotional service, as described in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, hearing and chanting about Viṣṇu, not a demigod or human being. That is devotion: śravaṇaṁ kīrtanaṁ viṣṇoḥ and smaraṇam, remembering Him. Such a mahātmā has firm determination to achieve at the ultimate end the association of the Supreme Lord in any one of the five transcendental rasas. To achieve that success, he engages all activities – mental, bodily and vocal, everything – in the service of the Supreme Lord, Śrī Kṛṣṇa. That is called full Kṛṣṇa consciousness.

In devotional service there are certain activities which are called determined, such as fasting on certain days, like the eleventh day of the moon, Ekādaśī, and on the appearance day of the Lord. All these rules and regulations are offered by the great ācāryas for those who are actually interested in getting admission into the association of the Supreme Personality of Godhead in the transcendental world. The mahātmās, great souls, strictly observe all these rules and regulations, and therefore they are sure to achieve the desired result.

As described in the second verse of this chapter, not only is this devotional service easy, but it can be performed in a happy mood. One does not need to undergo any severe penance and austerity. He can live this life in devotional service, guided by an expert spiritual master, and in any position, either as a householder or a sannyāsī or a brahmacārī; in any position and anywhere in the world, he can perform this devotional service to the Supreme Personality of Godhead and thus become actually mahātmā, a great soul.

COMMENT

So in this one verse Lord Krishna tells us how to enter into our relationship with Him, satataṁ kīrtayanto māṁ. You should always be chanting his glories; that means his names, his forms, his qualities, his pastimes, his entourage, and so on. Now from a certain point of view it may seem impossible to always engage in kirtan. Of course there are some liberated souls in Vrindavan who almost literally chant all the time, and that is a very advanced stage, but for most of us to actually chant always is not practical. But we can do things that, in a broader sense, are glorification of the Lord, if those activities further the glorification of the Lord. And therefore Srila Prabhupada called this process of bhakti-yoga or devotional service practical samadhi. One engages in various activities but the purpose of all the activities is to please Krishna. And in order to please Krishna we have to know what Krishna wants, and therefore we must read books like the Bhagavad-gītā that tell us what Krishna wants, and take advice from experienced devotees who know from scripture and from paramparā, from their spiritual masters, what Krishna wants. And when Krishna is pleased the devotee feels pleasure. 

In fact, every living entity is part and parcel of Krishna, very intimately connected with Krishna. And when we desire to enjoy apart from Krishna, separately from Krishna, we come into the material world and suffer. But when we realize our eternal relationship with Krishna and at for His pleasure, we experience pleasure. One example is the hand and the body; the hand is part of the body and the hand is meant to serve the body. So you could say the hand is meant to give food to the stomach and when the food goes to the stomach all the nutrition is distributed throughout the body automatically. So if there is some nice food, prasāda, I  don’t know what tonight’s menu is but there will be some nice prasāda, but let us say for example sweet rice. If the hand thinks, Why should I put all the food in the stomach, I want to enjoy independently. I am doing all the work and the stomach is getting all the benefit. So if the hand thinks, Okay I am going to absorb this sweet rice or halva directly, what will happen? The hand will not get any benefit because that is not the process. The same idea but once all the limbs of the body decided to go on strike because they felt, We are doing all the work and the stomach is getting all the benefit, so they decided to go on strike. But again what happened? They all became weak because stomach wasn’t getting food; that meant they were not getting any nutrition and then they decided, We were better off when we were cooperating and giving food to the stomach. So we come into material existence when we have that envy of God that, “Why should He be the enjoyer? We want to enjoy independently.” But we can’t enjoy independently because it is not the process. So it is better to cooperate for the pleasure of the Lord and when we do that we experience pleasure. And this fundamental truth is the basis of Krishna consciousness. 

Srila Prabhupada told a story about his guru Maharaja, Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura, that once on a very hot day one of Srila Bhaktisiddhanta’s disciples was fanning him and Srila Bhaktisiddhanta asked the disciple, “Don’t you feel hot, don’t you feel tired?” And he said, “No, by fanning you I feel refreshed.” And there was a somewhat similar incident that took place at Juhu beach in Bombay when one of the devotees named Jagatpurush Prabhu, he was working in the kitchen and it was very hot. And when I say kitchen it is nothing like what you might think of when we say kitchen in America. We are basically talking about a dirt area with maybe, at least in that context, might have been some polls and maybe a tarpaulin covering, and the fire, it was just fire because literally he would build a fire and so it was really hot. And not only that but there was very little food to cook. In those days it was pretty much just boiling dal and rice and if we were lucky maybe a few vegetables. 

So this devotee who had just come from Detroit was feeling extremely hot and weak, and so that kitchen area was attached to the devotees’ residence which was also very hot. It was very crude, you could say, and it had brick up to a certain level and then chatai which is like straw, and then it had that tarpaulin roof. So he was feeling weak and tired and hot and dizzy, he came into the ashram and he saw picture of Krishna. And according to the philosophy of Krishna consciousness or that the science of bhakti-yoga, the form of Krishna is Krishna Himself. Probably all of you have been into the temple room and you have seen what could be taken as statues of Krishna but they are actually Krishna. And according to the science, the image of Krishna, who is Krishna, can be made of different elements including stone, metal, wood, and one is paint. Even a painting of Krishna is Krishna. So Jagatpurush came in and he saw this painting of Krishna and he condemned himself that, “Here is Krishna; He is in the same hot place that I am in and I am just thinking of myself, my body and my mind, and I am not even thinking of Krishna.” So he picked up a, I don’t know if it is even really a fan or just a piece of cardboard or something that he could use as a fan, and he started to fan Krishna, fan the painting of Krishna. And when he did, all his fatigue went away. It just it just went away. So this is our mistake that we think that if we try to take care of ourselves, our bodies, our minds, our paraphernalia, we will be happy. This is our mistake and everyone is trying to do that but they are not happy. 

Sometimes I give the example of John Paul Getty who some years ago was considered the richest man in the world, because he was the richest man in the world, and a reporter asked him, “You are the richest man in the world, you can have anything that money can buy, so can you tell us in one word what is your philosophy?” And he said, “Yes I can. More.” That was his philosophy – more. That means he was feeling he didn’t have enough, he needed more. That means he was dissatisfied; that means he was poor, he didn’t have enough. And the reporter also asked him, “When you are all alone and there is no one there and you don’t have anything that you have to do, what do you think about?” And he replied, “I think about how to pay the bills.” Just like any ordinary person, he might be thinking how to get two billion dollars to take over some huge multinational company, but it is the same thing that any ordinary person thinks, how to pay the bills. And that also means that it is the same thing more; he wants more so he has to come up with more to get more and he is in anxiety because he doesn’t know where he is going to get the more to pay for the more. 

So but a devotee is satisfied because his satisfaction doesn’t come from external arrangements but his satisfaction comes from satisfying Krishna. And Krishna ultimately is satisfied just by the mood of devotion. Krishna is not satisfied by anything material because He is the source of everything. There is a saying in India that “You can’t please a sweet manufacturer by giving him sweets.” How are you going to please him by giving him sweets? He is manufacturing them. So how can we please Krishna by giving Him anything material? He has created this whole material existence. So the only thing that Krishna really appreciates is love, the mood of devotion. And Srila Prabhupada gave the example that if you approach a very rich man, in those days he used the name of Rockefeller, what can you give him? He has so much more than you have, you can’t really give him anything that would make him happy. But if you give a little sweet to his grandson and his grandson becomes happy, then he will be happy. So we can’t really give Krishna anything because He already possesses everything but if we please His devotee, if we please His representative, then Krishna will be pleased—yasya prasādād bhagavat-prasādo. And his representative is pleased when he sees that we are trying to please Krishna, so simple.

Once a disciple asks Srila Prabhupada, “How can I please you?” And Srila Prabhupada reply, “Just by your desire to please me you are pleasing me.” Because nothing external can really please Krishna, although the effort to please Him by doing the things He wants us to do, will please Him. On the subject of Rockefeller, this just came to mind, so I used to go to a small island in the Indian ocean called Mauritius, which is generally speaking, between India and Africa. And on that island the economy was basically based on sugar plantations, so there were eleven sugar plantations and nine were owned by French, (they used to be a French colony) and one was owned by British, and one was owned by an Indian. So the majority of the population were Indian, Hindu, and so he would be the representative of Mauritius to all these world conferences. So there was a conference in New Delhi, some economic summit with representatives from every country, so he went and he was entering the hall where the conference was taking place near, I guess, Nelson Rockefeller. And on the way up a young man approached Mr. Rockefeller and said, “You have so much money, you have billions of dollars and you don’t need it all, so why don’t you divide up your wealth amongst everyone else on the planet, share your wealth; you don’t need that much.” So Mr. Rockefeller said, “I will think about it.” So he went into the conference, the morning session and during the lunch break he came out, or maybe at the end of the day he came out, and that same young man was waiting for him. He said, “Mr. Rockefeller, have you thought about my proposal?” He said, “Yes I did.” And he gave him two dollars and he said, “This is your share.”

Now other than being related to Srila Prabhupada citing pleasing Mr. Rockefeller’s grandson, there is some basic principles here. One is, Mr. Rockefeller or John Paul Getty or any materialistic person, they always want more. They are not going to give away their wealth. There are examples in Vedic civilization of kings who left their opulence but materialistic people won’t. And that fellow who got his two dollars or whatever he got, he is also not going to be happy. Even if he got the whole however many billion Mr. Rockefeller had, he wouldn’t be happy because it is not the process for becoming happy. So I would just like to conclude, from as long as I can remember I always had the idea of doing good for people and as I grew older my idea of how to help people changed. 

When I was in high school I thought the way to help people was to treat their bodies, so I was like the president of the future doctors association and then in college I saw there were people who were really suffering mentally, even if they were healthy physically they were anguished mentally. So then I entered the field of psychology, became a psychology major. My professor was quite an authority named Abraham Maslow but then I saw that the psychologists themselves, they had the same types of problems that regular people had, and then I started hearing things like the suicide rate among psychologists is the highest of any professional group. So then I started thinking, This isn’t the solution either. So then I started seeking spiritual perfection, spiritual happiness, and eventually I met Srila Prabhupada and I realized he was the teacher I was looking for. So after attending some of his talks, I understood the importance of serving God, like what we were discussing.

Another example is Krishna is the root of all existence, so if you pour water on the root of the tree then all the branches and twigs and leaves will all be nourished. But I still have that idea from before about serving humanity so I asked him, “Now I have understood the importance of serving God but how does that relate to serving man?” And he replied, in fact in his lecture he had quoted a verse, spoken a verse that basically said that. “Only by unmotivated and uninterrupted service to Krishna will satisfy the self.” So he was saying that an ordinary person is not satisfied, so if you give someone something that will make him satisfied, is that not service? And he told the story of Dhruva who was born as the son of a king but who was told that he could not inherit the kingdom due to some palace intrigue. So he went to the forest and he engaged in severe austerities and chanting and eventually, because of his sincere chanting and severe austerities, God came to him and said, “What would you like?” And Dhruva replied, svāmin kṛtārtho ‘smi varaṁ na yāce, that, “Seeing you, I am completely satisfied. I don’t want anything else. That kingdom that I wanted was like a piece of broken glass and now I found you who are like the most precious jewels, so I am millions of times satisfied. I have no more desire.” 

So Srila Prabhupada said to give someone something that makes him so satisfied that he doesn’t want anything else, is that not service to humanity? And he told the story of when Alexander the Great was coming to invade India, and he came across a transcendentalist, a yogi or devotee, a yogi, who was sitting in the hot midday sun in meditation. And when Alexander the Great saw this yogi, he was very impressed. So he got down from his horse or his chariot and he said, “I see you are sitting here motionless in this blazing hot sun without any possessions and you are just in meditation, I want to give you something. I have never seen anyone like you. What can I do for you?” And the yogi said, “Please move aside because you are blocking the sun.” In other words, his austerity was to sit in the sun and he didn’t want Alexander the Great to stand in the way of his austerity, which is meant to purify the heart and liberate one from material bondage. And when Alexander the great heard that reply, he sent a letter back to the troops who were following him to India saying, (because that was the first person he met when he got to the precincts of India) so he wrote back, “These people here are very special, don’t mess with them.”

So Srila Prabhupada again was making the point that if you give someone something that makes him so satisfied that he doesn’t want anything else, is that not service? So this is service and it will make us satisfied and those who accept this gift will also become satisfied. And the other approach of trying to enjoy apart from God and trying to accumulate this and that, what it really is that we feel incomplete. We feel incomplete because our relationship with God has been broken. It is there actually, it is not really broken in any permanent sense or maybe we could say we have forgotten our relationship with God. And because of being disconnected from our relationship with God we feel a sense of incompleteness and we try to fill up that incompleteness with all sorts of material things. It could be money, it could be sex, it could be intoxication, it could be work. There are so many things that we try to do to make us feel complete, but again they don’t work ultimately because that the sense of incompleteness comes from our broken relationship with God and we can feel complete only when our relationship with God is restored. So that is the key to our happiness, individually and collectively, and that is the best service.

And when Srila Prabhupada was answering my question, somehow in the midst of his answer he said when someone gets Krishna consciousness he is fully satisfied; no more pick pocketing. Now I prided myself on being honest and moral but I did have one little vice. One of my friends told me about pick pocketing, not exactly pick pocketing actually I think the exact word would be shoplifting, now I think they have evolved their methods to prevent shoplifting but back then it was relatively easy. You just take something from the shelf and put it in your pocket. So Prabhupada said, “You will be fully satisfied, no more pick pocketing,” I thought, Oh my God, he really knows where I am at, and I took it that he detected that flaw in me, that showed the same point, I wasn’t satisfied, so I was pick pocketing, shoplifting. But when you take the Krishna consciousness, no more pick pocketing.

Hare Krishna.