SB 2.1.11 – Offenseless Chanting—The Doubtless and Fearless Way of Success for All

Giriraj Swami: Hare Krishna.

Devotees: Hare Krishna.

Giriraj Swami: We welcome you to our Sunday festival and feast. I will read a verse from Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, Canto Two, Chapter One, The First Step in God Realization, Text Eleven. Please repeat after me.

oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya

oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya

oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya

Please repeat.

TEXT 11

etan nirvidyamānānām

icchatām akuto-bhayam

yogināṁ nṛpa nirṇītaṁ

harer nāmānukīrtanam

TRANSLATION

O King, constant chanting of the holy name of the Lord after the ways of the great authorities is the doubtless and fearless way of success for all, including those who are free from all material desires, those who are desirous of all material enjoyment, and also those who are self-satisfied by dint of transcendental knowledge.

COMMENT

Purport by Srila Prabhupada. Srila Prabhupada ki jaya!

PURPORT by Srila Prabhupada

In the previous verse, the great necessity for attaining attachment to Mukunda has been accredited.

COMMENT

Who is Mukunda?

Devotees: Krishna.

Giriraj Swami: Krishna.

PURPORT (continued)

In the previous verse, the great necessity for attaining attachment to Mukunda has been accredited. There are different types of persons who desire to attain success in different varieties of pursuits. Generally the persons are materialists who desire to enjoy the fullest extent of material gratification. Next to them are the transcendentalists, who have attained perfect knowledge about the nature of material enjoyment and thus are aloof from such an illusory way of life. More or less, they are satisfied in themselves by self-realization. Above them are the devotees of the Lord, who neither aspire to enjoy the material world nor desire to get out of it. They are after the satisfaction of the Lord, Śrī Kṛṣṇa. In other words, the devotees of the Lord do not want anything on their personal account. If the Lord desires, the devotees can accept all sorts of material facilities, and if the Lord does not desire this, the devotees can leave aside all sorts of facilities, even up to the limit of salvation. Nor are they self-satisfied, because they want the satisfaction of the Lord only.

COMMENT

So, if we examine the different categories, we will find that they cover all of us. Every single person in this room falls in one of those categories, or more than one. We may be mixed; we may have some desire for material enjoyment, we may have some desire for liberation, and we may have some desire to serve and please Krishna. But in any case, we are covered by this verse. In other words, this verse is addressing us, all of us, every single one of us.

PURPORT (continued)

In this verse, Śrī Śukadeva Gosvāmī recommends the transcendental chanting of the holy name of the Lord. By offenseless chanting and hearing of the holy name of the Lord, one becomes acquainted with the transcendental form of the Lord, and then with the attributes of the Lord, and then with the transcendental nature of His pastimes, etc.

COMMENT

So, the Lord is realized in different aspects: nāma, rūpa, guṇa, and līlā, that means His name, His forms, His qualities, and His pastimes. And by offenseless chanting of the holy name, the other aspects of the divine become revealed - His qualities, His forms, His pastimes, His associates, they all become revealed by offenseless chanting and hearing.

PURPORT (continued)

Here it is mentioned that one should constantly chant the holy name of the Lord after hearing it from authorities.

COMMENT

So, this word, aṇu, ānukīrtanam, it has two meanings. One meaning is to follow. For example, we are followers of Rupa Gosvami, so we are called rūpānugas. So, in our chanting, we should follow the ways of the great acharyas. And aṇu also means continuous, so we should chant continuously. And Srila Prabhupada has rendered this verse so beautifully in English, combining these different meanings very seamlessly.

TRANSLATION

O King, constant chanting of the holy name of the Lord after the ways of the great authorities.

COMMENT

It covers both meanings of aṇu.

TRANSLATION

Is the doubtless and fearless way of success for all.

PURPORT (continued)

Here it is mentioned that one should constantly chant the holy name of the Lord after hearing it from authorities. This means that hearing from the authorities is the first essential. Hearing of the holy name gradually promotes one to the stage of hearing about His form, His attributes, His pastimes, and so on, and thus the necessity of the chanting of His glories develops successively.

COMMENT

Yes, it’s the same idea. In the Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu, The Nectar of Devotion, which is the manual of bhakti-yoga, the law book, Srila Rupa Gosvami enumerates sixty-four items of devotional service. So, there are nine principal ones:

TEXT 23

śravaṇaṁ kīrtanaṁ viṣṇoḥ
smaraṇaṁ pāda-sevanam
arcanaṁ vandanaṁ dāsyaṁ
sakhyam ātma-nivedanam

COMMENT

But within those, there are different subdivisions; śravaṇam, hearing, kīrtanam, repeating, or chanting, or glorifying. So, there is nāma-kīrtana, chanting the holy name, and there is rūpa-kīrtana, glorifying the forms, guṇa-kīrtana, glorifying the qualities, and līlā-kīrtana, glorifying the pastimes. So, there is hearing in those categories, and chanting in those categories.

PURPORT (continued)

This process is recommended not only for the successful execution of devotional service, but also even for those who are materially attached.

COMMENT

I won’t ask who is who, but you are one of them, so it’s recommended for you.

PURPORT (continued)

According to Śrī Śukadeva Gosvāmī, this way of attaining success is an established fact.

COMMENT

Nirṇītaṁ.

PURPORT (continued)

Concluded not only by him but also by all other previous ācāryas. Therefore, there is no need of further evidence. The process is recommended not only for the progressive students in different departments of ideological success, but also for those who are already successful in their achievement as fruitive workers, as philosophers or as devotees of the Lord.

COMMENT

So, this process is so perfect that it’s beneficial for people who are trying to make progress in different pursuits; material enjoyment or liberation or devotional service, but it’s beneficial for those who are already successful. So, it’s completely beneficial for everybody.

PURPORT (continued)

Śrīla Jīva Gosvāmī instructs that chanting of the holy name of the Lord should be loudly done, and it should be performed offenselessly as well, as recommended in the Padma Purāṇa.

COMMENT

So, now we come to the method of chanting. This is anukīrtanam, following the ways of the great authorities, this is how the great authorities have instructed us to chant offenselessly.

PURPORT (continued)

One can deliver himself from the effects of all sins by surrendering himself unto the Lord.

COMMENT

Krishna says in the Bhagavad-gītā,

TEXT 66

sarva-dharmān parityajya

mām ekaṁ śaraṇaṁ vraja

ahaṁ tvāṁ sarva-pāpebhyo

mokṣayiṣyāmi mā śucaḥ

PURPORT (continued)

One can deliver himself from the effects of all sins by surrendering himself unto the Lord. One can deliver himself from all offenses at the feet of the Lord by taking shelter of His holy name.

COMMENT

Good news.

PURPORT (continued)

But one cannot protect himself if one commits an offense at the feet of the holy name.

COMMENT

We have to be very careful about offenses at the feet of the holy name. Did you know that the holy name had feet? It has, because it’s a person, it’s Krishna.

PURPORT (continued)

Such offenses are mentioned in the Padma Purāṇa as being ten in number.

The first offense is to vilify the great devotees who have preached about the glories of the Lord.

COMMENT

Yes, or as stated in The Nectar of Devotion, to blaspheme the devotees who have dedicated their lives for preaching the holy name of the Lord. So, it’s the first offense, and in some places, Srila Prabhupada has said it is the worst offense, sādhu-nindā, to blaspheme or criticize devotees. So, we should be very careful of this.

I mentioned this the other day, but only a few of you were present when I did, so I will tell the story again. But our godbrother, Bhurijana dasa, frequently conducts japa retreats and seminars, and in one of them, he gave his students some homework, and the assignments were to chant attentively, to monitor themselves how attentively they were chanting, and the other was to avoid criticizing devotees.

The reason attentiveness is so important is, as one of our previous acharyas says, Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura, that if one chants with attention, all the other offenses will be eradicated, and if one chants without attention, inattentively, or negligently, all the other offenses can flourish.

So, Bhurijana Prabhu gave these two assignments, and then the next morning, he asked for reports.

So, one lady in the class said that she had been determined not to criticize devotees, but the company she was with engaged in criticism, and so she couldn’t help it, it was in the environment. So, Bhurijana Prabhu said, “You have two choices. One is you can try to change the environment. And if you want to change the environment, good luck because the environment doesn’t want to change, the environment wants to criticize. So, the other alternative is that you remove yourself from that environment and do what you need to do. And it’s also an offense, it’s very subtle, hearing blasphemy is also an offense, one should not speak it or hear it.”

So, we should avoid that and we should be careful about that. Sometimes devotees raise the question, “Well, someone might be criticizing another devotee, and if we tell the devotee who’s doing the criticism that we don’t want to hear this, he might take offense,” but you could say, “You are very strong in devotional service so you might be able to do this without being affected, but I’m weak and I will be affected, so it’s better for me not to hear this.”

PURPORT (continued)

The second offense is to see the holy names of the Lord in terms of worldly distinction. The Lord is the proprietor of all the universes, and therefore He may be known in different places by different names, but that does not in any way qualify the fullness of the Lord. Any nomenclature which is meant for the Supreme Lord is as holy as the others because they are all meant for the Lord. Such holy names are as powerful as the Lord, and there is no bar for anyone in any part of the creation to chant and glorify the Lord by the particular name of the Lord as it is locally understood.

COMMENT

In other words, we are not sectarian, anyone who chants the holy name of the Lord in whatever language or culture or tradition is appreciated. Srila Prabhupada had a disciple named Atreya Rishi dasa, he was from Iran, and he was very brilliant, very highly educated. His surname was Athar, previously Framerose Athar. Prabhupada, from that, gave him the name Atreya Rishi.

So, Atreya Rishi joined in the United States and he served Srila Prabhupada there, but then later, he went back to Iran to spread the movement there, and Srila Prabhupada eventually visited. And while there, Atreya Rishi sort of waxed eloquent and said that he was waiting for the day when all the Muslims would chant Hare Krishna, and Srila Prabhupada replied, “Why do you want them to chant only Hare Krishna? They can also chant Allah Allah. We are not sectarian.”

So, that’s the philosophy. And Srila Prabhupada was also very practical, he could have foreseen that if Atreya Rishi tried to get the Muslims to chant Hare Krishna, he could have gotten into difficulty. So, we are not sectarian and we are not that stupid, we hope.

PURPORT (continued)

Such holy names are as powerful as the Lord, and there is no bar for anyone in any part of the creation to chant and glorify the Lord by the particular name of the Lord as it is locally understood. They are all auspicious, and one should not distinguish such names of the Lord as material commodities.

The third offense is to neglect the orders of the authorized ācāryas or spiritual masters.

COMMENT

So, this offense is called guror avajñā, to disobey the orders of the spiritual master, and sometimes it is translated or rendered to consider the spiritual master as an ordinary human being or to envy his exalted position. Because what is the psychology of someone who disobeys the orders of the spiritual master? The psychology is, “He is just an ordinary human being like me, why do I have to do what he says? In fact, I might be a little more intelligent.” So, that is an offense.

PURPORT (continued)

The fourth offense is to vilify scriptures or Vedic knowledge.

COMMENT

As it is said to blaspheme the Vedic literatures or literatures in pursuance of the Vedic version. And here, I should mention that there are different types of offense, different degrees of offense, you could say, and these different degrees of offense were demonstrated in one incident related in Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam when Bhṛgu Muni went to test Lord Brahma, Lord Shiva, and Lord Vishnu, who is Supreme, or who is most transcendentally situated.

So, first he went to Lord Brahma, who was his father, and he did not offer respect, which was an offense, a more subtle offense. He didn’t blaspheme him, he didn’t attack him physically, but he did not offer due respect, that was considered an offense, it was an offense, and Lord Brahma became angry. But with his great intelligence, he controlled himself, but he became angry.

Next, Bhṛgu Muni went to Lord Shiva, who was his brother, they are both sons of Lord Brahma. And as a brother, he should have embraced, as we embrace as godbrothers. And when Lord Shiva came forward to embrace him, Bhṛgu Muni said, “Oh, get away from me, you are dirty, you are covered with ashes, and you hang out with very low-class people, ghosts, and hobgoblins. Don’t touch me, get away from me.” So, that was a more serious offense. The first was an offense by omission, but this second offense to Lord Shiva was more serious, he was blaspheming Lord Shiva.

And then, third he went to Lord Vishnu. And Lord Vishnu was reclining, His lotus feet were being massaged by Lakshmidevi, and Bhṛgu Muni engaged in the most severe type of offense, he physically in a way you could say attacked Lord Vishnu. Not exactly attacked, but he kicked His chest. And Lord Vishnu was so sublime, He said, “Bhṛgu Muni, you are a brahman, please forgive Me, I did not receive you properly, and I hope that My chest was not too hard, I hope that you didn’t hurt your foot by kicking Me.” And so, Lord Vishnu established, I mean, clearly, that He was the Supreme, completely fixed in the mode of goodness, beyond the mode of goodness, transcendental.

But the general point here is that there are different degrees of offense. One is you don’t do anything actively negative but you don’t do anything positive, just like an error or omission. So, I’m applying this to the fourth offense, to vilify scriptures of Vedic knowledge. So, yes, that would be the second degree, to blaspheme the Vedic literatures, but it’s also a subtle offense not to read them, not to attend the discussions, and not to read them.

Srila Prabhupada translated these books, he would hardly sleep at night, he would retire around ten o’clock and get up at midnight, and he would translate. While we were all sleeping, he would translate. And he said that his purports were his personal ecstasies, so we should read them.

Can someone turn off this fan?

And to not read them is a subtle offense.

PURPORT (continued)

The fifth offense is to define the holy name of the Lord in terms of one’s mundane calculation. The holy name of the Lord is identical with the Lord Himself, and one should understand the holy name of the Lord to be nondifferent from Him.

The sixth offense is to interpret the holy name. The Lord is not imaginary, nor is His holy name. There are persons with a poor fund of knowledge who think the Lord to be an imagination of the worshiper and therefore think His holy name to be imaginary. Such a chanter of the name of the Lord cannot achieve the desired success in the matter of chanting the holy name.

COMMENT

So, these offenses, it’s the same idea to consider the glories of chanting Hare Krishna to be imagination or exaggeration. And our godbrother, His Holiness Sacinandana Swami, has taken this very seriously. As he described it with his beautiful German accent, some devotees suffer something like schizophrenia, they have a split personality. Our motto is ‘chant and be happy,’ but sometimes devotees are not happy. The reason they are not happy is because they don’t chant properly. And so, he took up the cause in japa retreats, and in the japa retreats, he helped devotees to chant properly, so they were happy.

And one of the exercises the devotees did is they wrote down all the bad ways of chanting and how they felt afterwards, after chanting like that, and they all felt miserable. And then they wrote down all the good ways of chanting and how they felt after that, and they felt happy. So, ‘chant and be happy’ is a good motto, but to be happy, to get the result, we have to chant properly without offenses.

PURPORT (continued)

The seventh offense is to commit sins intentionally on the strength of the holy name. In the scriptures it is said that one can be liberated from the effects of all sinful actions simply by chanting the holy name of the Lord. One who takes advantage of this transcendental method and continues to commit sins on the expectation of neutralizing the effects of sins by chanting the holy name of the Lord is the greatest offender at the feet of the holy name. Such an offender cannot purify himself by any recommended method of purification. In other words, one may be a sinful man before chanting the holy name of the Lord, but after taking shelter in the holy name of the Lord and becoming immune, one should strictly restrain oneself from committing sinful acts with a hope that his method of chanting the holy name will give him protection.

COMMENT

So, this is committing sin on the strength of chanting. It’s a fact, as stated in shastra, that by chanting the holy name, one can destroy the effects of more sins than he is able to commit, that’s a fact. But if one becomes cunning and calculating and thinks, Well, that’s great, I’ll just commit sins, and then I’ll chant, and I’ll get free from the reaction, and then I can commit some more sins, and then I can chant and become free again. So, not only is that an offense against the holy name, but it doesn’t work.

Srila Visvanatha Cakravarti Thakura, one of our other great acharyas, says that even in, you could say, karma-kāṇḍa, even in ritualistic processes of atonement, if you undergo the ritual atonement to become free from the sinful reactions and then again engage in sinful activities in the expectation that you can perform this ritualistic atonement and become free, it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work like that. So, it’s doubly bad. It’s bad because it doesn’t work, in a way that’s good that it doesn’t work. And it’s bad that it’s an offense. On top of it all, you are committing an offense against the holy name.

PURPORT (continued)

The eighth offense is to consider the holy name of the Lord and His chanting method to be equal to some material auspicious activity. There are various kinds of good works for material benefits, but the holy name and His chanting are not mere auspicious holy services. Undoubtedly the holy name is holy service, but He should never be utilized for such purposes. Since the holy name and the Lord are of one and the same identity, one should not try to bring the holy name into the service of mankind. The idea is that the Supreme Lord is the supreme enjoyer. He is no one’s servant or order supplier. Similarly, since the holy name of the Lord is identical with the Lord, one should not try to utilize the holy name for one’s personal service.

COMMENT

This is a very important principle, that God is not our servant, He is not meant to serve our senses, but we are His servants and we are meant to serve His senses.

In 1973, there was a meeting at the Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan in Bombay under the leadership of Mrs. Lilavati Munshi. And the theme of the conference was how the Bhagavad-gītā could solve all the world’s problems. And before the first session, she invited the different sadhus and political and social leaders to meet together with her in her library, and Srila Prabhupada went. I was there and Shyamasundara Prabhu was there, a couple of us were there with him, and there were many sadhus and leaders.

So, one of them, I don’t remember his name, had a long beard and he would have big meetings, gather people together and tell them to chant, and that by chanting, their material diseases could be cured. So, he said to Srila Prabhupada, “You are gathering people together and I’m gathering people together, you are getting them to chant the holy names and I’m getting them to chant the holy names, so we should cooperate.” And Srila Prabhupada said, “No, what you are doing is against our principles,” and then he said the same thing, that the holy name is the Lord Himself and we are meant to serve Him, we are not meant to try to bring Him into our service to cure us of our physical diseases.

PURPORT (continued)

The ninth offense is to instruct those who are not interested in chanting the holy name of the Lord about the transcendental nature of the holy name. If such instruction is imparted to an unwilling audience, the act is considered to be an offense at the feet of the holy name.

COMMENT

So, sometimes it’s rendered to preach the glories of the holy name to the faithless. So, if someone doesn’t have faith in the Vedic scriptures, then we should not preach to them about the glories of the holy name because they won’t believe it, and they may think that we are deluded or we are imagining or we are exaggerating, and that makes them offensive. So, it’s offensive for us to preach the glories of the holy name to the faithless, because it makes them offensive. So, we can always get them to chant or do service, take prasāda, but we shouldn’t preach the glories of the holy name unless they have faith.

And there was one incident, very vivid, when Srila Prabhupada was preaching to a professor in Sweden, and one of the disciples started to preach about the glories of the holy name, and Srila Prabhupada stopped him. He said, “That’s an offense. He doesn’t have faith yet in our authorities, so first, we have to develop faith in him by reason and logic, then when he has faith, we can speak like this.” Prabhupada actually stopped him.

PURPORT (continued)

The tenth offense is to become uninterested in the holy name of the Lord even after hearing of the transcendental nature of the holy name. The effect of chanting the holy name of the Lord is perceived by the chanter as liberation from the conception of false egoism. False egoism is exhibited by thinking oneself to be the enjoyer of the world and thinking everything in the world to be meant for the enjoyment of one’s self only. The whole materialistic world is moving under such false egoism of “I” and “mine,” but the factual effect of chanting the holy name is to become free from such misconceptions.

COMMENT

So, when we chant and our mind wanders, if we consider the underlying psychology of the wanderings of the mind, we will find that it comes back to wanting to be the enjoyer, wanting to be the proprietor, wanting to be the controller, or in other words, wanting to be God.

Again, Bhurijana Prabhu gave a very nice description. He said that everyone is walking around with the mentality, I mean, probably wouldn’t say it, but with the mentality, “Excuse me, please, I have an important announcement to make. I am the center of the universe, and all of you should do exactly what I want, the way I want, and when I want.” And he said everyone goes through life as if their life was a drama in which they are the hero or heroine, and they want everyone else to be the supporting cast to support them in their heroic adventures.

So, the real effect of chanting, offenseless chanting, is to become free from that false ego, and be free from this “I,” “me,” and “mine.” And sometimes this tenth offense is rendered to not have complete faith in the chanting of the holy name in spite of hearing so many instructions in the matter and to maintain material attachments.

And we should have faith that all of our desires can only be fulfilled really by Krishna, and will be fulfilled by Krishna. And so, we should give ourselves to Krishna, give ourselves to the chanting while we are in the process of chanting, and be liberated from this false egoism, which binds us into the material world and prevents us from relishing the real sweet taste of chanting the holy name.

So, one last statement in the same vein. Srila Prabhupada gave a talk in Detroit, in the Detroit temple, and he was saying that the more you become the servant of the servant of the servant of the servant, the sweeter and sweeter and sweeter and sweeter Krishna consciousness becomes. So, material concept is, “I want to be the master of the master, I want to be the supreme master,” but devotional means, “Let me be the servant of the servant of the servant, I’ll be the last in the line, and I’ll have the most masters, I’ll be the richest person.” That should be our aspiration, and that can be achieved by the offenseless chanting of

Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare

Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare

So, are there any questions or comments? Yes?

Devotee: So, in this formulation of the eighth offense, it says one should not try to bring the holy name into the service of mankind, while at the same time, it is said in The Nectar of Instruction that the over-endeavor destroys bhakti. So, sometimes at least I find that I want to do things in maybe an easy way, and I am hoping that Krishna will help this easy way to work, that’s easier than what everybody else does.

So, it seems to me that that desire of mine is a kind of a desire for maybe a kind of a mystical perfection that things will work the way I want, when I want them to, but at the same time, we are not supposed to over endeavor and [Unintelligible 01:05:40]. So, how can we balance these two things?

Giriraj Swami: It is true, it’s an item that can destroy our bhakti, over endeavoring for material achievements. And so, we can try, whatever it is, try to make money. I mean, there are so many material things we can try for, but we should not over-endeavor, because that will take us away from Krishna, and it will affect our practice of bhakti-yoga. So, I wish you all the best.

We have a godbrother named Vaisesika dasa, a wonderful devotee, fantastic devotee, and he came up with a way of making a lot of money with very little endeavor, this multi-level marketing of a water purifying device. And he was very successful in that, he got good income from it, and he was free to distribute books. He bought a house near the San Francisco airport because that was the best place to distribute books in the area, and he would just go to the airport and distribute books. I mean, seriously, if you can do it, all power to you. Yes?

Devotee: So, sometimes we see that this chanting for world peace, some captions like, “We are chanting for having world peace and a better situation, and we should all join in this chanting,” is that bringing holy name into the service of mankind?

Giriraj Swami: No. I mean, we want peace, and the Bhagavad-gītā gives the formula for peace,

TEXT 29

bhoktāraṁ yajña-tapasāṁ

sarva-loka-maheśvaram

suhṛdaṁ sarva-bhūtānāṁ

jñātvā māṁ śāntim ṛcchati

COMMENT

So, that’s okay. This is referring to chanting. So, just like Christians have meetings like that, although I’ve heard that they are staged, some of them are staged, but they have meetings, “You just accept Jesus in your life and you can throw away your crutches and you’ll be cured of your diseases.” But it’s not particular to the Christian tradition, but it’s a mentality of using the Lord for our physical service. So, that’s an offense.

But to chant for peace, which can be achieved by removing our misconceptions and accepting Krishna as the Supreme, as mentioned in that verse, that’s okay. I mean, when people chant, you never know what mentality they have. Even here, when people chant, we don’t know what they are thinking when they are chanting, what their desires are. But from our side, we chant purely without any material motivation, and that will affect others, that will help them to also chant in that mood.

I mean, there was one incident in Hyderabad. There was a drought for a long time, and we had a Hare Krishna festival there with Srila Prabhupada, and maybe midway through the festival, it started to rain. So, people were saying, it was in the newspapers that because of our chanting, they got rain. So, we weren’t chanting to get rain, but the rain did come. And it’s in the Bhagavad-gītā that all living entities subsist on food grains, and food grains depend on the rain, and rain is produced by sacrifice, by yajña. So, by saṅkīrtana-yajña, we got rain. But that wasn’t the purpose of the Hare Krishna festival, the purpose was to make people Krishna conscious.

Devotee: It worked?

Giriraj Swami: Yeah, yeah, they became Krishna conscious, and it rained at the same time.

Yes, sir?

Devotee: You mentioned that the inattentiveness is the breeding ground for offenses in the chanting of the holy name.

Giriraj Swami: Yes.

Devotee: Can you give some hints of some of the causes of inattentiveness?

Giriraj Swami: Well, the cause is false ego. I thought you were going to ask for some remedies, so I’ll go for that. Well, one thing, as far as possible, is to get up early in the morning. Our godbrother in Gainesville, Kalakanta Prabhu, he says the best advice he gives to any spiritual aspirant is to take rest early, because then he can get up early and he can do his practices early in the morning. And so, chanting early in the morning, all of the factors make it more effective.

The value of the chanting is multiplied when you chant in front of the Deities, in front of Tulasi-devi. And the chanting is also improved by chanting with other sincere chanters who have taste. And Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura says if you can’t avoid getting distracted, you should put a towel over your head so you can’t see anything and get distracted. And some great devotees in the past, some hundreds of years ago, they would have caves or tunnels under the ground, and they would go into their tunnels and chant so there wouldn’t be any distractions.

And it’s good to chant with others because if you are tempted to check your phone, your email, your messages, and if there are other people around, you might feel a little embarrassed. But if you are all alone, because we don’t really think that Krishna’s there, Oh, well. And that’s another thing Bhurijana Prabhu says, and it’s true, that the mind will always tell us that there are more important things to do than chant Hare Krishna. So, we can’t give in to the mind like that.

Yes?

Devotee: Hare Krishna, Maharaja. This is related to the fourth offense against Vedic literature. Are the two texts, the Quran and the Bible, considered to be the standard of Vedic literature? Is offending the two texts and their followers considered an offense to the holy name? For example, both the texts say, “Thou shalt not kill or do not harm anyone,” but some of the followers do take meat. So, is offending or judging those followers for their impious acts against the Vedic literature considered an offense to the holy name?

Giriraj Swami: No. I mean, we shouldn’t distinguish material commodities between different holy names. But Srila Prabhupada would often comment that the Bible says, “Thou shalt not kill,” but the Christians are very expert at killing. So, everything that Srila Prabhupada said and did was meant to uplift people. It might seem like criticism, in a way it was criticism, but it was meant to help them come to a higher standard, and also meant to educate us in the difference between pure devotional service and other things. So, he would point those things out so that we could get a clear idea, but yeah, like Srila Prabhupada wrote, to call a thief a thief is not an offense.

Yes?

Devotee: [Unintelligible 01:16:21].

Giriraj Swami: Yeah.

Devotee: [Unintelligible 01:16:55].

Giriraj Swami: Can you make an arrangement by which your husband looks after the kids for some of the time? No, seriously, I’ve heard of couples with this problem, and that’s how they deal with it.

Devotee: He told me do it [Unintelligible 01:17:20] he told me to do something but I don’t know what.

Giriraj Swami: Maybe today will be the day. But it’s good you do them anyway. I mean, it’s better if you are going to do them attentively, but it’s good you are keeping your vow. There is a value to it even if the quality is not the best, but of course, the better is to do with attention.

Yes, Lalita devi?

Devotee: Maharaja, a lot of times, our conditioning and over endeavor may be just part of who we are, and trying to balance it may be such a foreign thing to capture the mind and be aware. We may dovetail it in Krishna’s service, but still, it is over endeavor.

Giriraj Swami: Well, this over endeavor is a subtle point. I mean, there is a saying that you should act as if everything depended on your effort, and you should pray as if everything depended on God. So, everything is a combination of that.

The example of Mother Yasoda binding Lord Krishna, it was a combination of pariśrama, her endeavor, hard labor, and kṛṣṇa-kṛpā, Krishna’s mercy. By that combination, the two inches or two fingers length by which the ropes were too short was overcome. So, we need to do both, and the main thing is not to forget Krishna.

And we always have to be thinking, Does Krishna want this? Because we might endeavor for something, and then it doesn’t happen, and then it may be very well that Krishna didn’t want it. So, I guess one should not eat too much or eat too little, sleep too much or sleep too little, someone shouldn’t endeavor too much or too little.

And it reminds me, some of Srila Prabhupada’s godbrothers came to visit him, and Srila Prabhupada had made some adjustments to spread Krishna consciousness, especially, he was mentioning how he engaged the boys and girls together in preaching and how that had had great results, and that his godbrothers, for all their strictness, they couldn’t really spread Krishna consciousness. I mean, he was just making that point.

So, after these particular godbrothers who were favorable to Srila Prabhupada met with him and left, Srutakirti Prabhu, who was Srila Prabhupada’s servant, said, “Srila Prabhupada, we have faith in you, we know that you kept the basic principles and you only adjusted the details, but how do we know what is a basic principle and what is a detail?” And Srila Prabhupada closed his eyes and paused for a moment, and he said, “That requires a little intelligence.” So, a lot of our questions can be solved with a little intelligence.

Yeah, all right, well, thank you.

Devotee: Just one quick question.

Giriraj Swami: Okay, one quick question.

Devotee: So, how do we bring up kids in the Krishna consciousness? With more interesting and more appealing for them? Because most of the kids, because of the parents, they come and sit, which they are not interested in, they just want to play and they just want to meet their friends. But how do we make them more appealing for Krishna consciousness? Make them interested.

Giriraj Swami: That as a very good question, very important question. Well, it’s good to have activities for the children. When the adults are sitting in satsaṅga, it’s good to have some activities for them, and those activities can be fun.

In Juhu, Srila Prabhupada instructed us to make a school for the children, and he gave ways to make it fun, that they should put on plays about Krishna and somebody plays a cow and somebody plays Krishna. It will require some adult or more than one to maybe sacrifice sitting in the satsaṅga to keep them occupied.

And another point is they should have good experiences and good memories. We don’t want them to feel that Krishna consciousness is getting in the way of their fun. And of course, it’s very important that they have devotee friends of the same age, that’s really important.

Do any parents here have any tips? Yes?

Devotee: I’ve raised particularly three of my children, as well as all the things that went on during the time when they were growing up, they are older now, but because of the fact that I always kept Krishna at the center, I explained to them that they are going to deal with the dualities of material life and it’s not easy, but if they just remember Krishna regardless, sooner or later, they’ll be okay. And now, all of them are favorable, they don’t not like Krishna.

Because if you push too far to the right or too far to the left, I’ve seen the negativities jump up in some children unfortunately, and they just go away because they’ve seen, “Oh, what the heck? I don’t get anything out of this, so much nonsense.” But if they just have enough to be able to understand the primary responsibility in life is to become Krishna conscious. And at the end, I’ll give you an example. I told my one son, Mark, one day, “You were born to be able to read Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam to me at the time of death, it’s your only job.”

So, therefore, I don’t have to worry whether they like Krishna or don’t like Krishna, they’ll always have Him in their heart. And then now, my daughter, she has two children, and those children, by nature, because they’ve come out of her as being a devotee, they are very wonderful devotee children, and because of previous life, this lifetime, they have a chance to finish up.

Giriraj Swami: Nice. Well, this did remind me, we had some parents and children visit my ashram in California, and the children were devotees. And we asked the children and we also asked the parents, “What was the magic charm that worked so well?”

So, one couple live in Alachua, Sesha Prabhu and his wife Madhumati, and their two daughters are both devotees, I think they are initiated, I know at least one is initiated, both are initiated. And what Sesha Prabhu and his wife said was that they never told their daughters to do anything, but they themselves did everything. They would host devotees, they would serve devotees, they would go to the temple for maṅgala-ārati in the morning program. They did everything, but they never told their daughters to do anything. But just by seeing their parents, they wanted to do it.

And then we asked a young couple, both the wife’s parents and the husband’s parents were devotees. And they both said similar things, that they really appreciated that their parents didn’t force them, but at the same time, their parents were very strong and exemplary devotees.

And then I’ve heard it said, but it’s a little awkward because there are children here, I have to think about this. Well, I’ll say it. I’ve heard it said that if a child has a desire to experience something that’s not strictly Krishna conscious, such as going to a concert or something, rather than deny them, it’s better to go with them because if you don’t go with them and you deny them, in the end, they may do it anyway without you, but with a sort of furtive mentality, secretive mentality, which is not good for your relationship. And if you go with them, you can add your own Krishna conscious perspective to what you all just experienced together.

I mean, I discussed some of these points with this school in Dallas, a very good school, and they started introducing field trips and things that are fun that can be educational, so they don’t feel like they are too cloistered, or too restricted, too limited.

Devotee: If they want to have some of these experiences, they are going to experiment anyway, just like we do.

Giriraj Swami: Okay, all glories to the future generation and the parents who are raising them. All right. So, next, standing kirtan. Okay, thank you very much. All glories to Srila Prabhupada. Sri Harinama Prabhu ki jaya!