Remembering Krishna Dasa Swami

Host 1: 

Jaya Sri Nṛsiṁhadeva Bhagavān!
Jaya Sri Prahlada Maharaja!
Jaya Sri Guru Maharaja!
Jaya Srila Prabhupada!
Giriraj Maharaja ki jaya!

Jaya Maharaja! Thank you for joining us. We really appreciate you coming on the line, sparing your very valuable time. I see you on Zoom calls every day probably twice- three times a day. So, I really do appreciate you coming online. Maharaja, my name is Nabi Nandan and this is my Dharam patni, Jayanti devi and we warmly welcome you on behalf of the disciples of my godbrothers and godsisters, disciples of HH, Giriraj Maharaja. We pay our humble obeisances onto your lotus feet.

[Prayers]

Maharaja, we generally have etiquette of introducing our guest speakers. Would you mind if we do that? There are a few congregation members who will not have seen you in the UK.

Giriraj Swami: Yeah, you can introduce me.

Host 1: So, I’m very-very fortunate to have HH, Giriraj Maharaja with us. Giriraj Maharaja is an initiating guru in the Hare Krishna movement. He joined the movement, please correct me if I’m wrong, over fifty years ago and has been disciple of Srila Prabhupada and has taken to the sannyasa, order of life, the renounced order of life. So, he has given up all material associations. Member of the GBC, the governing body commission of ISKCON and he had been serving for many, many, many years from the beginning in Juhu temple and this was one of the real great achievements of Srila Prabhupada to establish this temple and Giriraj Maharaja played a huge role in getting that established.

Currently Maharaja is in Carpentaria in California and he is author of many books and one of my favorite books is, Watering the Seed and in relation to HH, Krishna dasa Swami Maharaja, they had a wonderful relationship and I remember in the 80’s, I can’t remember exactly the date but I remember Giriraj Maharaja you coming to the UK, meeting Maharaja at Bhaktivedanta Manor, I think the room right at the top in the ashram and presenting Maharaja with a ticket and I think he was shocked as anybody else. But I will leave the details for you to share with us, Maharaja Giriraj Maharaja. So, I’d like to say thank you again, Maharaja.

Giriraj Maharaja ki jaya!

Giriraj Swami: So, it’s a great honor and pleasure and privilege for me to be with all of you today for this wonderful occasion of remembering HH, Krishna dasa Swami Maharaja. I could be speaking about him for hours but I’ll focus on a few aspects of his life and service. I think, I’ll begin. . . Of course, it’s true I first met Maharaja upstairs in Bhaktivedanta Manor. We would share a room that had several beds for brahmacharis and sannyasis. And I was intrigued by this elderly sadhu who actually had another guru before he met Srila Prabhupada, who was a Vaishnava and then who came to Srila Prabhupada’s lotus feet.

So, Krishna dasa visited the. . . he was intrigued by the devotees. He would see them on hari-nāma and so, he visited their temple residence at Bury Place to see for himself and after seeing the poor austere conditions in which they lived, the way they toiled to promote knowledge of Krishna consciousness and their sincerity in following the pillars of dharma—no meat eating, intoxication, gambling, illicit sex—he became convinced that this was a genuine spiritual movement that could transform the world.

So, he had accepted the invitation of the temple president which was Vicittravirya Prabhu. He was actually, also a good friend of Krishna dasa Swami, who helped promote him in Krishna consciousness. So, yeah, he accepted the temple president’s invitation to give weekly classes on Vedic philosophy in Hindi to Indian audiences and each day his desire grew to meet the person responsible for all of this. He wanted to congratulate Srila Prabhupada for achieving what no other missionary of sanātana-dharma had accomplished.

Krishna dasa saw Srila Prabhupada emerge like a golden light from the crowd. This is at the Ratha-yatra. He was captivated by Prabhupada’s dancing throughout the parade and could not see any sign of fatigue in Srila Prabhupada’s frail sick body. The young devotees could not even keep up with him. Krishna dasa was then convinced that Srila Prabhupada could not be ordinary. When he saw Srila Prabhupada encircled by western people from different faiths and backgrounds who did not know anything about Vedic religious principles or culture, but who are now embracing the highest form of God consciousness, he was convinced that there was no preacher of dharma like Srila Prabhupada.

Days passed and Krishna dasa could not stop thinking of meeting Srila Prabhupada. He had gone to Prabhupada’s door at the Bhaktivedanta Manor only to be turned away by two strict guards. Krishna dasa teased them—“You look as if you are the guards of the doors to Vaikuntha. Are you Jaya and Vijay? But you are very fortunate that I am not one of the Kumaras. So, I will not curse you.” Still feeling dejected and heartbroken, Krishna dasa wrote a letter to Srila Prabhupada telling him how he had come to meet the devotees, how he had been giving classes at the Bury Place temple, how he had seen Srila Prabhupada dance at the Ratha-yatra and how since he had read the front-page headlines of the Guardian newspaper – “Challenge to Nelson.”

And Srila Prabhupada mentions that in one of his purports in Caitanya-caritāmṛta which glorified the Ratha-yatra festival and his desire to meet Srila Prabhupada was increasing. Srila Prabhupada wrote back and humbly apologized for his disciple’s behavior, welcoming him to visit him at any time. Krishna dasa eagerly returned to Srila Prabhupada’s door only to be confronted by similar guards. But this time, Srila Prabhupada himself intervened and invited him into his room.

Krishna dasa did not know that meeting Srila Prabhupada face to face would change his life dramatically. Referring to the places of his and Srila Prabhupada’s birth, he said, “Srila Prabhupada, you are uniting the east and west of this world and so, I think our meeting is between the east and west of Bharata.” When Srila Prabhupada heard about Krishna dasa’s life and activities to promote sanātana-dharma, his face lit up and Srila Prabhupada became serious and said, “You should join this movement and preach.” Srila Prabhupada’s request startled Krishna dasa. He had come only to offer his respects and congratulate Srila Prabhupada for his achievements but now he was being challenged. “But I am already initiated and preaching,” Krishna dasa replied. “I have been brought up as a missionary of sanātana-dharma, so how can I join you and give that up?”

“We are both preaching sanātana-dharma,” Srila Prabhupada answered, “and we both belong to the Brahma sampradāya, so why are we doing this separately? Here you will have all facility to preach. You simply come and join us.”

“But how can I give up my Guru Maharaja?” Krishna dasa asked.

“When did I ask you to do that? Can a Vaishnava ask another Vaishnava to give up his Vaishnava guru? I only asked you to please join me in spreading sanātana-dharma, which you are already doing.”

Krishna dasa was drawn to this dynamic personality and he surrendered, “I accept you as my śikṣā-guru. But if I come and join you, there must be some kind of spiritual relationship established.”

“Yes, I accept,” Srila Prabhupada said. A serious discussion followed, and eventually Srila Prabhupada suggested that Krishna dasa leave his family and other responsibilities, and take sannyasa. Srila Prabhupada said that in time he would give him sannyasa initiation.

As Krishna dasa was leaving, he said to Srila Prabhupada, “I accept you as my sannyasa guru.”

Srila Prabhupada replied, “I accept you as my sannyasa disciple.”

“But there is one more hitch Srila Prabhupada. The scriptures say that before accepting someone as a śikṣā-guru, one must ask permission from the dīkṣā.”

Srila Prabhupada agreed and asked Krishna dasa to write his dīkṣā-guru right away. Krishna dasa felt that he had come as a householder with a different intention but was now leaving as a sannyasi ready to give his life to his new guru.

He later recalled, “In 1966, one year after Prabhupada left for the United States, I left to the UK as a missionary of sanātana-dharma and did not know about Srila Prabhupada’s activities.”

Krishna dasa received the permission of his dīkṣā-guru who supported Krishna dasa in joining Srila Prabhupada and I remember Krishna dasa Swami marveling at the greatness of Vaishnavas that his dīkṣā-guru without any sense of false proprietorship or sectarianism, gave him permission to join Srila Prabhupada. So, with the combined blessings of Srila Prabhupada and his dīkṣā-guru, Krishna dasa felt ready to execute the mission with renewed zeal. He quickly arranged for his family’s care and moved into the Bury Place temple in April 1974. What followed was four decades of selfless service.

Now, I had many. . . So, yeah, I invited Krishna dasa Swami to come to South Africa and Mauritius and he became a very powerful preaching force in both places. I remember the way he would preach against meat eating. He would use these phrases, “sucking bones and drinking blood,” to startle his audience to understand what they were actually doing. And yeah, he was very effective and I mean, I’m jumping ahead of myself a little but towards the end his health was weak and he told me that something miraculous would happen every time that he preached, every time he gave a talk and that is that he would be infused by some tremendous power and he wouldn’t feel any physical weakness or ailment. And then as soon as the preaching was over, he would again feel how sick his body actually was.

But I would like to recall a very special meeting that I had with HH Krishna dasa Swami Maharaja. In December 2009, at the home of his disciple, Atri Rishi dasa in Durban. I arrived at around eight in the evening and considering Maharaja’s week health, we imagined that the visit would last about forty-five minutes. But it went on for five hours till past one, the next morning. Maharaja, a gracious host, directed his disciples to bathe my feet and greet me with the Vedic etiquette for receiving a saintly guest. We sat next to each other on large chairs near the entrance to the house. We could see the families alter to our left.

So, during this, this is also very instructive. So, he had disciples there and I had disciples there. So, when they were coming forward to offer flower petals, there is a question to whom the devotee should offer the flower petals first. And Krishna dasa Swami said they should offer them to me first and because that was his order, so everyone followed. And afterwards I asked him on what basis did you say that they should offer to me first and then he quoted the Vedic aphorism: athiti deva baho, that one should receive a guest like a God. And I was so impressed by Krishna dasa Swami’s culture that I suggested that he write a book about Vaishnava etiquette for ISKCON because I felt that our devotees had so much to learn about Vaishnava culture and etiquette from him. And I also suggested that he write a book about his own life so devotees could learn about him and be inspired by his example. But he was too humble, he said that it is not necessary.

So, yeah, coming back to our historic and memorable meeting at Atri Rishi Prabhu’s home, Maharaja asked about my health, how I was managing and about my service. Then he described his own bodily challenges in detail. Beginning with his cardiac bypass surgery in the late 80’s. I remember when I would meet him at the Manor, he would talk about it and he would say that these things are a result of mahā-pap—great sins created in one’s past life. But I don’t know if I accept that to be the case with him. He was a surrendered soul and I think it was Krishna’s mercy perhaps.

And so, coming back to Atri Rishi Prabhu’s home, Maharaja recollected how I had invited him to preach in South Africa and Mauritius, which was the beginning of his relationship with the projects and devotees in the southern hemisphere. He also spoke about his life in Krishna consciousness when he was a child being trained by his maternal grandfather and he used to say how his guru and he himself also, would think that Kali-yuga is very bad, Kali-yuga is so bad. And that was way back, I think in the 1930’s and he would say, “We had no idea how bad Kali-yuga was going to get.” I mean, we were saying – Kali-yuga is so bad, Kali-yuga is so bad but we had no idea how bad it would become.

So, after about two hours, he asked to speak with me privately and all the devotees left to other parts of the house. Maharaja shared with me some of the difficulties he was facing with some of his disciples and praised the good work of others. I mean, I don’t want to embarrass anyone but one disciple whom he always praised was Abhinandan Prabhu. Yeah, this point is coming here, he also told me how sick he felt but added that when he preached, he felt energy or power that was beyond him which continued as long as he was speaking and then afterwards, he would go back to feeling weakened, sick.

We also discussed his view of Bharat because this was an issue in some people’s minds. So, I brought it up. So, we also discussed his view of Bharata, commonly known as India, a word that he rejected always insisting that people say Bharata. Because of Maharaja’s emphasis on Bharata, some devotees thought that he was an Indian nationalist and sometimes that thought also crossed my mind until this meeting. But he explained that by Bharata he did not mean the land of India, rather he meant the ideal of what Bharata was meant to be, perfectly following Vedic culture and perfectly Krishna conscious. That explanation clarified much for me. Our private meeting lasted for two hours, then after we honored prasāda together, excuse me. Yeah, then after midnight we honored prasāda together. And Swarupa Damodara Prabhu, my disciple who is a leader in Durban, who had accompanied me, later told me that Maharaja was very inspired by my visit and would often refer to it when they met.

HH Krishna dasa Maharaja was one of the greatest men, greatest devotees I have ever met. He used all his energy, every ounce up till the end to glorify Lord Krishna and the Vaishnava principles and preach Krishna consciousness and Vedic culture to encourage devotees and serve Srila Prabhupada’s mission in far-flung parts of the world. Although while preaching, he could be ferocious. He, otherwise, had a fatherly or grandfatherly way about him. Thus, he reminded me of Lord Nṛsiṁhadeva and when I joined, you were singing the Nṛsiṁhadeva prayers and so those prayers actually remind me of Krishna dasa Swami in a way.

So, he reminded me specifically of a verse written by the great Bhāgavatam commentator, Śrīdhara Swami, which was Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam (7.91) which is the story of Prahlada and Hiranyakasipu and Nṛsiṁhadeva and that verse goes:

ugro ‘py anugra evāyaṁ sva-bhaktānāṁ nṛ-keśarī keśarīva sva-potānām   anyeṣām ugra-vikramaḥ 

“Although very ferocious, the lioness is very kind to her cubs. Similarly, although very ferocious to non-devotees like Hiranyakasipu, Lord Nṛsiṁhadeva is very, very soft and kind to devotees like Prahlada Maharaja.”

So, that verse reminded me of HH Krishna dasa Swami Maharaja, because he could be so ferocious as a preacher, but so soft and kind to his devotees, to Prabhupada’s devotees.

It was appropriate that Maharaja left his body in the precincts of Vrindavan. I remember he was in New Delhi taking treatment but then it became apparent that he wasn’t going to recover and so the devotees rushed him in a car so that he could be in Vrindavan for the end and he just reached. He just reached. So, it was appropriate that he left his body in the precincts of Vrindavan from where he could easily join Srila Prabhupada and Lord Krishna and Their devotees in his next life. We miss him. He was a lion among preachers but we are confident that he is with us when we remember him. Like now, on this occasion. We are confident that he is with us when we remember him and try to serve his instructions, his mission, his devotees, his projects, and all that was dear to him.

And so, my prayer to Maharaja on this occasion is—please put in a good word for me with Srila Prabhupada and Lord Krishna so that when I finish my service to them here, I can join you all there.

So, after my meeting with Krishna dasa Swami at Atri Rishi prabhu’s place, I recalled his emphasis on the phrase dṛḍha-vrata, which means very determined, which he was. And so, when we met, he spoke about his long glorious life as a devotee and a preacher and said that with all the obstacles and opposition one faces, unless one is very determined, dṛḍha-vrata. . . This is an instruction for all of us. Unless one is very-very determined, dṛḍha-vrata, one cannot advance in Krishna consciousness. And in the end, he looked at me with such love in his eyes that I will never forget.

So, yeah, I’m not sure what to do here. I mean, I could speak about Maharaja’s achievements. Yeah, he did a lot of wonderful things in Mauritius. He got the area where the ISKCON Vedic farm is. He got that officially renamed to Vrindavan and yeah, it was so good. It was so good working with him. I remember once, in a way it might have been an odd compliment, but he was sitting with the elderly Gujarati sannyasi Maha Vishnu Goswami in Durban. I think that maybe, I mean, they were at a table and so, Krishna dasa Swami said to Maha Vishnu Goswami referring to me, “He is not like the others.” I guess meaning, I was more Indian or more cultured but it was a compliment and I still remember it after all these years.

So, I guess we could, as I said of course, I could speak more but maybe we can open it up because I’m sure other devotees have remembrances and reflections that they might like to share or questions that they would like to ask. Is that okay?

Host 1: Yes, Maharaja. Really wonderful. You actually brought him right in front of us. Sometimes we don’t see him all the time but you have brought him right in front of us today. So, I really appreciate your contribution I think, yes, if devotees would like to ask Maharaja questions that would be really nice.

Giriraj Swami: There is a nice photo. I actually should get it. I should get it printed but we called it the Six Gosvamis of South Africa and it was Krishna dasa Swami and it was Bhakti Charu Maharaja, Indradyumna Swami, me and I think, Bhakti Chaitanya Swami. Okay. So, I guess if someone wants to say something they can raise their hands or something like that, and as a request to the devotees who have joined this Zoom, please, if possible, put on your videos so we can see you live and it’ll be more personal.

Host 1: It’s so strange Maharaja, whenever we have these Zoom calls nobody puts their picture on and we are supposed to be preaching personalism, totally against impersonalism. We never see anyone.

Giriraj Swami: Yeah.

Host 1: Everybody is worried they look ugly but there is nobody uglier than I am. At least my body anyway.

Giriraj Swami: Here, you are not ugly. None of them are ugly.

Host 1: No, they are not. They are beautiful.

Giriraj Swami: Yeah. We should be able to see their moon-like faces.

Host 2: Vasudev Prabhu, you have something for Maharaja.

Devotee: Yes, Hare Krishna Giriraj Maharaja. Please accept our humble obeisances. All glories to Srila Prabhupada. Thank you very much for that wonderful talk and remembrances of Srila Krishna dasa Maharaja. It’s quite a confidential question and I don’t know if you will feel happy to answer it but on the departure of Srila Krishna dasa Maharaja, Bhakti Chaitanya Maharaja, he wrote a very nice glorification where he mentioned you were with himself, Krishna dasa Maharaja and Krishna dasa Maharaja revealed a special pastime that happened when he was very young in Vrindavan where he had darshan of Krishna. I just wondered if you are able to elaborate on that wonderful story. So, we could hear it from your lips because you were there, you heard it directly from him.

Giriraj Swami: Oh! Well, I’m glad you brought that up because I was thinking of mentioning Krishna dasa Swami’s visit to Vrindavan. Although, I don’t think I could elaborate on the darshan part but as a youth his guru brought a group of devotees to Vrindavan and Krishna dasa Swami loved it and one little thing I remember, which he mentioned to me, was that the people riding bicycles or rickshaws in Vrindavan instead of whatever ringing the bell or tooting the horn. They would say Radhe-Radhe.

Host 2: Radhe-Radhe.

Giriraj Swami: And he loved that, he loved that, but that as I said, that to alert people that there was a bicycle or a rickshaw coming, they wouldn’t ring the bell like usual or toot the horn but they’d just say Radhe-Radhe. So, yeah, he loved Vrindavan. Yeah. Well, I can’t say more about the darshan of Krishna but I don’t doubt it in the least.

Devotee: Thank you. Hare Krishna.

Giriraj Swami: Hare Krishna.

Host 1: Maharaja, were there any pastimes of. . . I know you mentioned that in terms of his seriousness of his preaching, but were there any humorous pastimes that you can share with us, with Maharaja?

Giriraj Swami: What do you mean by humorous?

Host 1: I know whenever I was with him there would always be something that would happen which he would find funny me doing, or I would find funny him doing and. . .

Giriraj Swami: Why don’t you tell us one or two of those?

Host 1: Okay. One time. . . This I haven’t shared actually with many devotees. I don’t think I even shared it with Jayanti. One time we were going to South London temple and it so happened that we were stuck in a traffic jam and the car before us had stalled, the battery wasn’t working. So, I was saying to Maharaja that we’ll just have to sit here and he was making funny remarks that, “You want to sit here, we’ve got a temple full of devotees and you want to sit here?” I thought, “What should we do Maharaja. We are stuck.” So, he got out of the car, he indicated to me get out of the car and he said, “Let’s go and talk to the driver and let’s give him a push.” Can you believe this?

Giriraj Swami: Wow, when was this?

Host 1: This was probably about coming on to twenty years ago but he. . . And literally the driver said, “Okay, give me a hand. Let’s see if we can get this car going.” And funny thing was, we both were behind this car, it was quite a big car. He was a lot stronger than I was, right. And then he would tease me afterwards that you need to eat some paneer. He pushed, I pushed, got the car started and now on time for the temple pravachan. It was extraordinary. I haven’t shared that with many devotees because it’s just confidential between me and him. But seeing you speak I felt inspired to share this but. . .

Giriraj Swami: Yeah, I’m glad you did. That’s a very historic incident. How determined he was and how ingenious. Yeah, yeah. That was wonderful. How about one more?

Host 1: Oh! there is so many. I remember one train journey. Oh yes, from Punjab to New Delhi. So, every time we have a train journey, we always meet some interesting characters and he loved to preach. He would love to preach on train journeys. He would sit with the people and they would absolutely fall in love with him. Invariably, we would meet people who believed in the impersonal form of the Lord, “I am going to become God.” And one time, I was preaching and he was watching me preach and he was giving me hints what to say. But this Mayavadi personality was very fixed in his determination that I am going to become God. So, I snapped. I said to him, “Okay, you want to become God. I’m going to become more than God,” and Maharaja, he laughed and he laughed and I could hear him laughing, I said, “Maharaja, I’m serious. I’m going to become more than God.” So, then the Mayavadi asked, “How are you going to do that?” So, then we had the picture of Mother Yasoda chasing after Krishna. So, I showed it to him and I said, “Who is the God in this picture?” “Oh, Krishna.” “Really?” “So, how come He is running scared of His mother? Who’s more than God? Who’s more, stronger? Mother or Krishna?” He had to concede, it’s the mother because Krishna is running away. So, in that, Maharaja would laugh and laugh on that one. He would laugh at me for being so stupid and in bringing up such an argument like that but. . .

Giriraj Swami: Oh! that was brilliant. I mean, Srila Prabhupada said the same thing, that we can become more than God. Exactly. Nice. If I might, I would like to call on Nikunja Vilasani, if she wants because she wrote a whole article about HH Krishna dasa Swami for Back to Godhead magazine. It was a wonderful article and her mother Ananda Manjari devi dasi is a very devoted disciple of HH Krishna dasa Swami Maharaja. So, if you feel you can contribute something to the discussion. We will be happy.

Nikunj Vilasani: Hare Krishna. Thank you. Oh! I have so many wonderful-wonderful memories of Maharaja. Even with writing that article, there were so many, not obstacles but it was difficult to do, to encapsulate such an amazing personality in a few pages and when I approached Nagaraj prabhu about doing an article for Back to Godhead, he first said that we cannot just do, run memorials on every devotee that passes away and then when I explained to him about and he did acknowledge that Maharaja was such a great personality and then eventually, he did agree and then when I wrote so many, so many pages more than or so many words more than I was supposed to and then he said “okay, you can cut it down a bit. And then I tried, I tried to and I pleaded with him to please allow with another thousand words and so it was going back and forth. And so, many even devotees were trying to help and send information and I was trying to do research and it was a whole big project and at every moment, I felt that Maharaja was behind me, not just to glorify himself but I felt that he just didn’t want himself to be glorified but he wanted devotees to see. . . for me he was coming and how broad-minded Srila Prabhupada was to accept him and to embrace him in the family of ISKCON.

And how he surrendered his life as an example to us, and also to serve and preach amid all kinds of obstacles which I tried to relate in the article. How Maharaja was so, amidst all kinds of obstacles even within ISKCON and externally as well, that he never deterred in his efforts to preach Krishna consciousness and to give himself fully to Prabhupada’s mission. And always in the front of his mind, he would always even encourage all his disciples never to leave ISKCON, no matter how much the boat of ISKCON may rock or be faced with so many different obstacles or external problems, challenges, but to just remain on the boat of Srila Prabhupada.

And even after I wrote the article, I felt his presence a lot, and that’s how his mood was. He always reciprocated with everything. Anything small that we did, he would make it very big. Even when Sundarananda was serving him many-many years ago and you actually gave him to Maharaja’s service and Maharaja was always very-very grateful for that service that he did and every time that we would go to hear one of his pravachans and Sundarananda would enter, he would stop in the middle of any lecture and just welcome us and welcome Sundarananda and then he would give another lecture of how he used to serve him so, so wonderfully in those days and he would recall different things and different nice pastimes of Sundarananda serving him. So, he was always very grateful whatever little we did for him.

And even for that article, even after he left, I felt that he was pleased because he even tried to reciprocate with me in a dream and in the dream, I was listening over a radio and he was speaking on the radio and he was saying. . . and somebody was speaking about the. . . first someone was speaking about the article and Maharaja was on the radio as well and he was saying Jaya Nikunja, he used to call me Nikunja. So, even for that small service that I did which is for my eternal benefit, he was so kind and so magnanimous in accepting that service and reciprocating as he always did.

I’m remembering also the last time that I was with him was in his Vyasa-puja and I think in 2016 or 2015 and I sang some verses from the Rāmāyaṇa for him. He loved to hear the Rāmāyaṇa and pastimes of Rama and with different bhajans that we would like to sing for him because he really appreciated the deep beautiful meanings of these songs that we could not even translate into English and I recited some, a few verses and at that time Maharaja was very, he was quite ill and quite weak. He had gone very-very very weak and as he said when he spoke on the vyāsāsana, he became like a lion. So, when I recited one verse and then I also gave the meaning of that verse, Maharaja stopped me and he corrected something from that verse. It was just a small, a word or something, but he made sure to correct me so that it would be perfect and I was so amazed that he picked up such a thing. I thought he was ill and weak and he wasn’t so, so present at that moment. But actually, he was so conscious of every single thing, even right at the end, so conscious of the details of everything, every Krishna conscious mantra and anything that from the scriptures, verses, he knew everything and was fully conscious.

So, I was just so amazed that he was able to inspire us and engage us and correct us even right till the end and was really a loving grandfather to us all. So, we also really miss him.

Giriraj Swami: Yeah, yeah. I would like to add a few more things. I mean, technically our time is up. So, I don’t know if we have any leeway but I would like a few more minutes.

Host 1: Absolutely Maharaja. No, there is no time limit.

Giriraj Swami: Okay. All right. So, yeah, I also remember his talks on the Rāmāyaṇa because I didn’t know much about the Rāmāyaṇa and I was enthralled when he would give lectures at the Radha Radhanath temple about the Rāmāyaṇa and how he would say Rāmāyaṇa is full of ideals, but another thing that I wanted to mention, was that even though he had surrendered fully to Srila Prabhupada and service to ISKCON, he continued to do service for his guru’s ashram which I thought was very good. It showed his loyalty and his gratitude towards his guru and as I recall, he made contributions to serve the cows at his guru’s ashram and cows, HH Krishna dasa Swami Maharaja was such a loyal follower and advocate of sanātana-dharma and cows are so important in sanātana-dharma. So, he also did service for the cows at his guru’s ashram which I thought was wonderful.

Host 1: I was just listening a couple of days ago to a lecture by Bhakti Raghava Swami. He must have given that lecture some time ago because it’s on YouTube. But he was saying, and this very much reminded me of Guru Maharaja, he was saying, “Krishna loves cows. Krishna sees cows in the morning, in the afternoon, in the evening. Krishna can’t live without cows.” He was making this very strong point that how if we love Krishna but we don’t think about cows, then how can we say we are lovers of Krishna because Krishna can’t live without cows and when he was speaking like this, tears were coming from his eyes.

I remember, one time when this whole horrible thing was going on with gomata in Bharata, they would put chilies in the eye, chili powder in the eyes and so many horrible things they were doing to gomata and Guru Maharaja would similarly have these tears. I would be quite amazed to see these tears because hardly you would see. . . you never see him cry but when gomata, when somebody was doing this with gomata, he’d just become a baby and start crying. So, Bhakti Raghava Swami Maharaja was giving this amazing class and I was thinking you are absolutely right, we are not, we hardly think of gomata and Krishna always thinking of gomata.

And Guru Maharaja, you are absolutely right, he has done an amazing service to his Guru Maharaja by looking after gomatas. Thank you for sharing that.

Giriraj Swami: Yeah, nice. Thank you for your contribution on the subject.

Host 1: Madhu mangal. Sorry, Madhu Sudan prabhu.

Madhu Sudan: Hare Krishna. Haribol! Hare Krishna.

Giriraj Swami: Hare Krishna.

Madhu Sudan: Please accept my obeisances. Srila Prabhupada ki jaya! Guru Maharaja ki jaya!

Host 1: Madhu Sudan prabhu is probably the most senior disciple of Guru Maharaja.

Giriraj Swami: Oh!

Madhu Sudan: I wouldn’t say senior. There are a lot of people, a lot of other disciples and devotees have given wonderful service to Guru Maharaja and to Prabhupada. I’ve just had a wonderful opportunity just to associate with Krishna dasa Maharaja and him taking someone worthless, someone like me, under his shelter in Coventry and in Coventry, we did a lot of service. Guru Maharaja played a very big role and what I would like to say is that in Coventry, there is one wonderful Mataji and before we even knew Krishna dasa is coming, he wasn’t an initiating guru at that time, but this Mataji, she had two children. They were very young, her husband passed away but she had gone to the Manor and in this, I’m talking about, must be in the 1970’s. When the manor was just beginning to open up and was being established and Maharaja was giving classes there.

And this Mataji met guru Maharaja had invited him to Coventry, to her place and did a program. I didn’t know Krishna dasa Maharaja then. But Mataji once met Krishna dasa Maharaja at the Manor. She came back and she changed her life completely, stopped all the meat eating, all that sort of thing that went on in the family. But she surrendered completely and taken shelter of Krishna dasa Maharaja and he came, it was later on I don’t know exactly when but at some point, a few months later, she asked Krishna Maharaja to install deities at her place. They were the first deities installed. They are still there. Not very far from where I lived. Mataji, her name was Vishnu Priya, she took initiation and, in the temple, where we established the temple, we named the kitchen after her name Vishnu Priya’s kitchen because she was a wonderful cook and we used to do nāma-haṭṭa programs every Saturday in different people’s houses. That’s how we started in Coventry.

And I had taken initiation from Bhagavān early and then when he left then I associated taking shelter of Krishna dasa Maharaja. So, that was my initial kind of meeting with Maharaja. But I had even met him before at the Manor. He used to give classes on Sunday. So, I listened to a few of his classes. But what I wanted to say that how he had so much compassion and so much mood to preach sanātana-dharma that in Coventry that was the first kind of temple and the deities installed by Maharaja and They are still there and that her daughter is taking care. She got initiated as well by Krishna dasa Maharaja. She looks after the deities and she serves Them and it’s a shame that we don’t actually appreciate that and associate and have darshan now and then. But that’s what Maharaja did and actually when Krishna dasa Maharaja used to come and we used to invite and do programs. Vishnu Priya’s house was always open whenever we stopped for a venue. So, she would allow any time for the program to go ahead and allow her kitchen to be made with prasādam and everything. So, we used to love that.

And once we had established a little center here, all of a sudden, she passed away at one point. And I remember Maharaja present and did all the ceremony of passing away when the body comes home and all that and then Maharaja was present there. He did all that for her and we obviously. . . I can remember her cremation time and we went to, doing kirtan at the crematorium and everything. But Maharaja did all that for that family and was so forgiving and so understanding and so much with the Bharatiya culture and he always told us never to say you are going to India, you are going to Bharata. You never say you are an Indian, you are a Bharatiya. He told us from the very-very beginning, even this is going back, I’m talking about twenty to thirty years ago, he would never allow us to say India at all.

And then the one thing is definite that when we heard about him being invited to South Africa, we were so pleased when he used to come back to Coventry and tell us about what’s going on in South Africa and how he had met Giriraj Maharaja and we used to really appreciate it. And it was so motivating and enthusiastic for us to listen to the progress being made in South Africa and how what a wonderful service, Maharaja used to love you, and then all the other devotees.

I know there are pictures of him with Nelson Mandela and? in Mauritius and so, Maharaja, he would come and stay at my house a few times and then one night, when you say humorous event, he, I mean, he was so humble, Maharaja, I just put a mattress on the floor and he would just say he is happy with it. He said, “No, I want to sleep here. I don’t want to go into the bedroom or I’m going to bed. Just put me a mattress here,” and he would just sit there chatting away for a long time into the night and then one night, I don’t know, we were just talking about different devotees and how things happen in, and Prahlada Maharaja as the devotee of Krishna and other devotees. So, I made a comment, “I suppose Maharaja, Krishna has to have His līlā. So, this is devotee līlā as well,” and he started laughing that I came out with a comment, “devotee līlā.”

Yeah, the devotees have to have their līlā in different ways. So, he started laughing so much. I’ve never seen him laugh like that, like a child, such a simple personality. But so, yeah, it’s been wonderful.

Now I’ve read your book “Watering the Seed” and I’ve followed your progress, I’ve been to Juhu beach temple and I always knew and, in the biography, how it’s mentioned of how Prabhupada struggled very much to establish the Juhu beach temple and you played a very big role and then, with mosquito ridden area, whole area and you would live in your simple tents and putting up with all the hardships and that was the foundations of the Juhu beach temple. And then when I read the biography, I always wanted to visit that temple and walk on the same beach as Prabhupada walked. So, that was my inspiration from the biography. But it’s been wonderful to see you serving Srila Prabhupada in a big way and being so closely associated with Krishna dasa Maharaja. This is my dharma patni. So, yeah, thank you very much for allowing me to say this.

But we’ve had wonderful time and Maharaja, when we set up the center here, there is a picture ingrained in my head, in my mind about how Guru Maharaja was holding a hammer and helping us chip away at the brickwork. He said I would never hold another hammer but this is the only time when he is serving Krishna, I would pick up a hammer. So, there was some moments like that that we spent in Coventry.

He also installed the Gaura-Nitai deities in the Coventry along with Shivarama Maharaja. Thank you. Thank you, Nabi. Thank you for allowing me to say a few words.

Host 1: Thank you.

Host 2: Hare Krishna.

Giriraj Swami: Thank you. That was a stream of nectar and I also visited Coventry, mainly because of Krishna dasa Swami. Although, he wasn’t there when I went but I knew it was an important place for him. So, I also visited and I forget the names of that couple. The husband used to work for Rolls-royce.

Madhu Sudan: Yeah, Haridasa and Prema Manjari.

Giriraj Swami: Yeah.

Madhu Sudan: And Prem Manjari his wife. Maharaja always used to stay at his abode, his residence, and they served Guru Maharaja. He was a very close friend of mine, Haridasa, we both went to school together in Africa. We knew each other a lot and then we started serving in Coventry and established the center. So, we used to knock on doors and hold the hari-nāma programs every Saturday. Eventually, we managed to buy that building and turn it into a center,  a temple, and did all the hard materialistic work on it, brick work and putting tiles and new windows and this and that everything. But Maharaja was always there.

I’ve got some pictures and there must be a lot of pictures of so many devotees who came forward to give us support and we did dramas, my son was only very young and Maharaja would love watching the children do drama, Rāmāyaṇa dramas, and on Diwali days or Janmashtami days. So, yeah. Thank you.

Host 1: See the picture you were referring to.

Giriraj Swami: Yes, that’s it, that’s it.

Madhu Sudan: This is the Six Gosvamis picture

Giriraj Swami: Yeah, that’s nice.

Host 1: That’s an amazing picture, amazing picture. [Laughter] You both look so amazing.

Madhu Sudan: Yeah, thank you. Haribol.

Host 2: Hare Krishna.

Madhu Sudan: All glories to Giriraj Swami.

Host 1: Maharaja ki jaya!

Madhu Sudan: All glories to Srila Prabhupada. Maharaja ki jaya!

Host 1: Thank you very-very much, Maharaja, for taking out this time and being with us and bringing Maharaja with you to us.

Giriraj Swami: Yeah, my heart is filled with joy with all these nice remembrances of HH Krishna dasa Swami Maharaja and yeah, I feel he is smiling and beaming down upon us. Yeah, thank you for organizing this.

Host 1: Thank you Maharaja for joining us because I know you have a very busy schedule. So, I’m actually amazed that you spared us this time. Thank you. Thank you.

Giriraj Swami: Pleasure.

Host 1: Hare Krishna.

Host 2: Hare Krishna.

Giriraj Swami: So, if we are going to end now, I would suggest that we conclude with Vaishnava praṇām.

Host 1: Yes.

Giriraj Swami: Let’s offer our respectful obeisances unto all the Vaishnava devotees of the Lord who are just like desire trees who can fulfill the desires of everyone and are full of compassion for the fallen conditioned souls.

[Prayers]

Hare Krishna.

Host 1: I will send you an email Maharaja.

Giriraj Swami: Okay.

Host 1: Thank you. Yeah, we’ve got another program now because of the Puruṣottama month, we do evening Zoom calls to different homes, different satsaṅgas every night. It’s actually much. . . I was just saying to Jayanti, normally we would spend one, one and a half hours traveling to a place, do a satsaṅga and come back another hour, hour and a half, three hours gone like that. But now on Zoom, we spend two minutes connecting, two minutes disconnecting, for the rest of the time, no traveling, it’s just satsaṅga. We are saving so much time.

Giriraj Swami: Wonderful.

Host 1: Just the Lord’s mercy. So, I don’t know devotees may just continue little bit with Nṛsiṁha prayers and Nṛsiṁha [Unintelligible 01:15:10]. So. . .

Giriraj Swami: Okay.

Host 1: Okay. Will you stay Maharaja?

Giriraj Swami: I could stay for the Nṛsiṁha prayers.

Host 1: Okay. Very good. Thank you, Maharaja. Atma, would you like to lead the prayers? Great and I’ve got a better version of Mayapur than you. Just to let you know. It’s the more built up one. Atma Darshani Maharaja is probably one of the best kirtanias in the world, in my estimation because she is so glorious. You are muted by the way. Is she?

Host 1: No, she is not saying anything. You just don’t say anything.

[Prayers]

There is a very nice comment from Ananga Manjari maharaja which says, “I really felt emotional when Giriraj Maharaja spoke. I felt Guru Maharaja’s presence. It was beautiful.” I think that sums it up absolutely, everybody feeling exactly the same.

Giriraj Swami: Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful.

Host 1: You made a very special evening for us; Maharaja and I’d like to thank you again and our heartfelt happiness that we are feeling is due to your kindness.

Giriraj Swami: Guru Maharaja’s mercy.

Host 1: Thank you very much, Maharaja. Hare Krishna. Hate to end the call with fifty-two people, devotees. We usually wait until the last person goes and even then, we don’t end the call. So, I suspect we are going to be here for a while. Actually, the time now we are getting so much association of devotees from all around the world. It’s the most exhilarating experience we are having during this, I dare to say, wonderful pandemic and quietness going on. Maharaja, has a matter of interest, how many Zoom calls have you done over the last six months?

Giriraj Swami: Oh! I haven’t kept count. This was definitely one of the best.

Host 1: I bet you say that on every Zoom call, Maharaja.

Giriraj Swami: No, it’s the first time I’ve said it.

Host 1: Oh really, thank you, Maharaja. Wow, thank you very-very much, it’s very-very sweet, very-very sweet.

Giriraj Swami: Okay, I will have to move along now.

Host 1: Thank you very much, Maharaja. Hare Krishna Maharaja.

[Hare Krishna Greetings]

Devotee: Maharaja, we would love to see you again. Haribol.

Giriraj Swami: Yeah, everything is virtual. Hare Krishna.