BG 3.10

Giriraj Swami: Hare Krishna. So, as Nityananda prabhu said, and as you may already know, we are in the auspicious month of Kartik. In the cycle of the day, there is a period called brāhma-muhūrta, which is approximately two hours before sunrise. One’s spiritual practices are more effective during that time of day. As I mentioned it, even in other traditions, the esoteric sections of other traditions, they appreciate the value of spiritual practices in those hours before sunrise.

I had some Muslim friends in Bombay- I was based in Bombay for many years and they used to come to our temple in Juhu beach before maṅgala-ārati. Maṅgala-ārati is at four thirty in the morning and they used to come before maṅgala-ārati to pray. And they said that in their tradition, Allah hears the prayers more when they are offered before sunrise. So that is a very important principle.

One of Srila Prabhupada’s disciples in Gainesville, Florida says that the most important advice he can give anyone for their spiritual life is to go to sleep early-the purport being that if you go to sleep early, you’ll wake up early and then if you chant and sing prayers and offer service before sunrise and after that also before you begin your regular days’ activities, you get extra benefit and make more advancement.

So just as within the twenty-four hours of the day- those two hours are most auspicious for spiritual advancement, so within the twelve months of the year, the month of Kartik is most auspicious for spiritual advancement. Our spiritual master, Srila Prabhupada has compared the month of Kartik to a sale in a store. When a store opens it will have a grand opening sale and so by paying a less amount of money you can get a commodity of greater value. So, in the month of Kartik by making a relatively small effort you get a great result. So, we should take advantage of this month but of course when a store opens and has a sale, they hope that you’ll come back. And so yes, Kartik is like a sale but it’s really meant to attract people and engage people in the devotional service of the Lord—bhakti-yoga, so they become regular customers and become regular practitioners. 

During the month of Kartik, devotees remember the pastime of Mother Yasoda binding Lord Krishna with ropes. The name Damodara—- dāma means rope and udara means abdomen—so Damodara means Krishna, Who is bound around His abdomen with ropes. And on the altar, you can see the picture of Mother Yasoda binding Lord Krishna. Now Krishna, according to Vedic literature, is the Supreme Personality of Godhead. He has no beginning and no end. He has no mother or father but He is the father of every living entity. But in the spiritual world one can have a relationship with Krishna in different mellows or rasas. In fact, the material world is described in the Bhagavad-gītā as the inverted reflection of the spiritual world, so everything that exists in the material world exists in its original pure blissful form in the spiritual world.

So just as we have different relationships in the material world, so there are different relationships in the spiritual world. In fact, those relationships are the origin of the relationships here and there are five primary and seven secondary rasas and the primary rasas are the main relationships that one can have with the Lord—with Krishna. And the most basic is called śānta-rasa which is passive appreciation, then dāsya-rasa, which is a servant to master then sākhya-rasa, which is friend to friend, then vātsalya-rasa, which is parent to child. So, Mother Yasoda was in vātsalya-rasa. She wanted to serve Krishna as a mother and Krishna although He is the unborn Personality of Godhead—the father of all living entities, He agreed to play the part of her son. Srila Prabhupada makes the point, which is completely valid, that if we want to find a master, we should make Krishna our master, He will be the perfect master. If we want a friend; we should make Krishna our friend—He will be the perfect friend. If we want a son, make Krishna our son and He’ll be the perfect son and even if we want a lover or a husband, Krishna will be the perfect one. So, Krishna plays the part of the son of Mother Yasoda and due to the influence of the yoga-māyā potency, the residents of Vrindavan, that’s now—this is also very important point. Sri Sri Radha-Kalachandji ki jaya.

Just as in this material sky there are different planets, so in the spiritual sky there are different planets and many of them are called Vaikuntha planets where the presiding deity is Lord Vishnu with four hands, but higher than these Vaikuntha planets is Krishnaloka or Goloka Vrindavan planet. On the Goloka Vrindavan planet, the special feature is that the residents forget that Krishna is God and by the influence of yoga-māyā, Krishna also for the most part, forgets that He is God and thus there is an exchange of love between the devotees in Vrindavan and Krishna-that is full of intimacy. It is called pure love. Of course, even on the Vaikuntha planets, there is pure love – in the sense that there is no material taint. But this is called pure love in the sense that there is no awareness of Krishna’s supreme opulences, it’s just spontaneous love—without consideration that He is God. “That oh, He is God, I will love Him, if He is not God, I won’t love Him.” They loved Him regardless of whether He is God or not. Of course, He is God but that’s not a consideration for them.

So, in this pastime that we celebrate during the month of Kartik, Mother Yasoda was feeding Krishna her breast milk, but before He was satisfied, she noticed that some milk on the fire was boiling over and so she set Krishna aside to attend to the overflowing milk before He was satisfied. He became angry and He broke some pots of butter and began to eat it and distribute it to His friends. When mother Yasoda returned to the scene, Krishna fled because He knew that He had done mischief, and she began to pursue Him. Although even the greatest yogis cannot approach Krishna, eventually Krishna allowed Himself to be caught by Mother Yasoda and when she caught Him, she wanted to tie Him with ropes- not to punish Him, maybe to some extent to punish Him, but really to prevent Him from further mischief. When she went to tie the rope around His waist, she found that it was short by the width of two fingers. So, she got some more rope and it was still two fingers too short, and she got even more rope and they had a lot of rope because they had cows and they needed rope for the cows, but no matter how much rope she joined together, it was always two fingers too short. In a way Mother Yasoda and her friends, the other elderly ladies of the community were amused by this astonishing fact.

Every morning mother Yasoda would dress Krishna and she would tie a belt around His waist, there was never any problem or complication, but suddenly she couldn’t tie the ropes around His waist. So that brings us to the verse that’s written on the board, and it brings us close to the conclusion of our discussion, so please repeat after me.

oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya

oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya

oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya

Please repeat. Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 10.9.18.

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. 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, there are two significant words here in the Sanskrit: one is pariśrama, which means hard labour and the other is kṛṣṇa-kṛpā which means Krishna’s mercy. So, our acharyas or learned devotional scholars have explained that the two fingers—the distance of the two fingers was overcome by the combination of the two items—pariśrama, personal endeavour and kṛṣṇa-kṛpā, Krishna’s mercy. That when our own strong endeavour and Krishna’s mercy are combined, Krishna can be bound and that is our goal—to bind Krishna in our hearts, in our minds. Bind ourselves to Krishna. So, this is the combination that works in every sphere of devotional service. When we chant the Hare Krishna maha-mantra, we are trying to bind Krishna—the sound of Krishna in our ear and in our mind. But that’s not so easy, but if we continue our own endeavour, pariśrama—to focus our mind on the sound of Krishna, the sound of the holy name of Krishna, and at the same time pray for Krishna’s mercy, He can in a way, agree to be bound. And the same would apply to any endeavour in devotional service. We need both—our own effort and Krishna’s mercy.

So, during this month and we’ll be doing it at eight o’clock, we sing a prayer called Dāmodarāṣṭakam—eight verses of glorification of Lord Damodara and we offer lamps to Lord Damodara and that is recommended for the entire month of Kartik and it’s a very beautiful ceremony and a wonderful prayer. It is said that Lord Damodara is very pleased with and attracted to that prayer, but our most essential process, is the chanting of the holy names of Krishna: Hare Krishna Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna Hare Hare / Hare Rama Hare Rama, Rama Rama Hare Hare. That cleanses the heart—ceto-darpaṇa-mārjanam—cleanses the dirty things from the heart. Dirty things begin with false identification with the body and so whatever we do, Srila Jiva Gosvami, one of the great authorities in the line of great scholars, he says, that in all of our activities—Deity worship and all of our activities should be accompanied by the chanting of the holy names, especially—Hare Krishna Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna Hare Hare / Hare Rama Hare Rama, Rama Rama Hare Hare. Thank you very much. Are there any questions or comments?

Devotee: Thank you, Maharaja, for a really nice class. When we offer the ghee lamp to Lord Damodara, what should we be praying? What should we be thinking? What should we be asking? What should be our mood of consciousness?

Giriraj Swami: I mean the mood of the author of the Dāmodarāṣṭakam, Satyavrata Muni is nice. In effect, he is praying only for devotional service. He is not praying for any material opulence or even liberation from the material world. So, in general a devotee prays only for bhakti—for service and much of the mood of the Dāmodarāṣṭakam is just appreciating the charming pastimes of Mother Yasoda and child Krishna. So, you can just remember those pastimes and worship those pastimes. I mean it’s in the last verse of the Dāmodarāṣṭakam – “I offer my obeisances under your dear most beloved Srimati Radharani and unto You, who displays unlimited pastimes.” So yeah, we are worshiping Krishna, we are worshiping Mother Yasoda, we are worshiping His pastimes, and praying to always remember them.

Devotee: Why in the month of Kartik so much more devotional mood than in the month of Sravana, the month of Lord Balarama, Lord Krishna, Radharani, all of Them have appeared and so I feel both of Them are equally genuine, but somehow the month of Kartik is in a very different mood?

Giriraj Swami: Well yeah, I mean many wonderful events took place in the month of Sravana and in other months also. But the month of Kartik as I mentioned—it’s different. I mean this is a little esoteric, but the demigods, their year has twelve months, and in their year they go to sleep at night. And during that period, in the Hindu tradition we don’t do any social or religious performances, which you know. And then when the demigods awaken, that corresponds to the month of Kartik—that’s that whole month. Because one of their days—one day of the demigods, is equal to one year of us human beings. So, their brāhma-muhūrta corresponds to our month of Kartik and then yeah, all the performances begin. So, it’s special existentially, not just because of what happened in the month, because like you said many wonderful things happened in the month of Sravana and other months, but existentially it’s different, it’s the brāhma-muhūrta period of the demigods. Good question. Yes?

Devotee: Hare Krishna Maharaja, you said that to gain Krishna we need the two things—Krishna’s mercy and our own personal endeavor and you extended that by saying that if there is something positive you want to gain improved chanting, it’s the same formula. But if you want to work on your weaknesses and anarthas, are those the two same ingredients that follow through as well—Krishna’s mercy and our personal endeavor?

Giriraj Swami: What do you think? Yes, it’s the same, it’s the same. In logic there is a principle of necessary but not sufficient. So, our personal effort is necessary but it’s not sufficient, we also need Krishna’s mercy. Thank you. Good question.