SB 7.5.12 – Be Friendly for the Service of the Lord

Giriraj Swami: Before reading today’s verse and purport from Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, I will read to you the six core values of Govardhana Eco Village. I have chosen a verse and purport, which support these six values.

1. Respect—Cultivating and exercising the humility to honor a devotee, even when there are differences in perspective and opinions.
2. Quality—creating a culture of excellence by providing consistent experiences which fully satisfy the guests, pilgrims, and community members.
3. Love—inspiring unmotivated and uninterrupted love for Krishna, by serving and caring for one another with compassion and sensitivity, while selflessly accommodating other’s shortcomings, for the pleasure of our gurus.
4. Responsibility—making a commitment to, and being accountable for one’s service and persevering to achieve the desired goals.
5. Maturity—balancing the courage and enthusiasm to take up goals with sensitivity towards people involved.
6. Empowerment—entrusting devotees with opportunities, appropriate independence, and resources to execute their services happily and proficiently.

Jaya! So, when I read this verse and purport, you will see how many of the values that are core to the Govardhana Eco Village are supported by this verse and purport.

oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya

oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya

oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya

Reading from Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, Canto Seven, Chapter Five, “Prahlāda Mahārāja, the Saintly Son of Hiraṇyakaśipu,” Text Twelve. Please repeat.

TEXT 12

sa yadānuvrataḥ puṁsāṁ
paśu-buddhir vibhidyate
anya eṣa tathānyo ’ham
iti bheda-gatāsatī

TRANSLATION

When the Supreme Personality of Godhead is pleased with the living entity because of his devotional service, one becomes a paṇḍita and does not make distinctions between enemies, friends and himself. Intelligently, he then thinks, “Every one of us is an eternal servant of God, and therefore we are not different from one another.”

PURPORT by Srila Prabhupada

When Prahlāda Mahārāja’s teachers and demoniac father asked him how his intelligence had been polluted, Prahlāda Mahārāja said, “As far as I am concerned, my intelligence has not been polluted. Rather, by the grace of my spiritual master and by the grace of my Lord, Kṛṣṇa, I have now learned that no one is my enemy and no one is my friend. We are all actually eternal servants of Kṛṣṇa, but under the influence of the external energy we think that we are separately situated from the Supreme Personality of Godhead as friends and enemies of one another. This mistaken idea has now been corrected, and therefore, unlike ordinary human beings, I no longer think that I am God and that others are my friends and enemies.

COMMENT

So, there is much more to the purport, but I will just pause here to comment. We may not have the conception, “I am God,” in avert or explicit way, but generally, our underline psychology is like that. As my dear godbrother Bhurijana Prabhu says, “It is as if everyone wants to clear his throat and say, ‘Excuse me, I have a very important announcement to make—I am the center of the universe, and everyone should cooperate with me.’” He says that most people envision people as a movie or a drama, in which he or she is the hero or the heroine, and everyone else is the supporting cast. So, you can imagine the conflict that will arise, because I am thinking, I am the hero, you are supposed to support me. You think, No, no, no. I am the hero, you are supposed to support me. So, this mentality is referred to herein the purport. So, yes, if someone cooperates and supports us, we think they are our friends, and if someone doesn’t, we think they are our enemies.

PURPORT (continued)

We are all actually eternal servants of Kṛṣṇa, but under the influence of the external energy we think that we are separately situated from the Supreme Personality of Godhead as friends and enemies of one another. This mistaken idea has now been corrected, and therefore, unlike ordinary human beings, I no longer think that I am God and that others are my friends and enemies. Now I am rightly thinking that everyone is an eternal servant of God and that our duty is to serve the supreme master, for then we shall stand on the platform of oneness as servants.”

Demons think of everyone as a friend or enemy, but Vaiṣṇavas say that since everyone is a servant of the Lord, everyone is on the same platform. Therefore a Vaiṣṇava treats other living entities neither as friends nor as enemies, but instead tries to spread Kṛṣṇa consciousness, teaching everyone that we are all one as servants of the Supreme Lord but are uselessly wasting our valuable lives by creating nations, communities and other groups of friends and enemies.

COMMENT

As Srila Prabhupada said, we want brotherhood. Everyone proclaims that we need universal brotherhood, but as Srila Prabhupada says, we cannot be brothers unless we have the same father. So, universal brotherhood begins by accepting the common fatherhood of the Supreme Father, Krishna.

PURPORT (continued)

Everyone should come to the platform of Kṛṣṇa consciousness and thus feel oneness as a servant of the Lord. Although there are 8,400,000 species of life, a Vaiṣṇava feels this oneness. The Īśopaniṣad advises, ekatvam anupaśyataḥ. A devotee should see the Supreme Personality of Godhead to be situated in everyone’s heart and should also see every living entity as an eternal servant of the Lord. This vision is called ekatvam, oneness. Although there is a relationship of master and servant, both master and servant are one because of their spiritual identity. This is also ekatvam. 

COMMENT

So, Prabhupada explains the sublime philosophy of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu of acintya-bhedābheda-tattva—inconceivable simultaneous oneness and difference. The living entities and the Supreme Lord are one in quality because they are spiritual, but different in quantity because the Lord is infinite and the living entities are, as Prabhupada pronounced it, infinitesimal, or we would say infinitesimal. So, because we are one in quality, we can have a relationship, and because we are different in quantity, the relationship is defined as one of master and servant.

PURPORT (continued)

This is also ekatvam. Thus the conception of ekatvam for the Vaiṣṇava is different from that of the Māyāvādī.

COMMENT

We don’t need to discuss that, we know that.

PURPORT (continued)

Hiraṇyakaśipu asked Prahlāda Mahārāja how he had become antagonistic to his family. When a family member is killed by an enemy, all the members of the family would naturally be inimical to the murderer, but Hiraṇyakaśipu saw that Prahlāda had become friendly with the murderer.

COMMENT

So, the history is that Hiraṇyakaśipu had a brother named Hiraṇyakṣa, who was killed by Vishnu in the form of Varahadeva. So, Hiraṇyakṣa was Prahlada’s uncle, and Hiraṇyakaśipu was thinking, Vishnu killed my brother, killed your uncle. So, you should be inimical towards Him, but instead, you are friendly with Him. You are friendly with the murderer of my brother and your uncle. How is that?

PURPORT (continued)

When a family member is killed by an enemy, all the members of the family would naturally be inimical to the murderer, but Hiraṇyakaśipu saw that Prahlāda had become friendly with the murderer. Therefore he asked, “Who has created this kind of intelligence in you? Have you developed this consciousness by yourself? Since you are a small boy, someone must have induced you to think this way.” Prahlāda Mahārāja wanted to reply that an attitude favorable toward Viṣṇu can develop only when the Lord is favorable (sa yadānuvrataḥ). As stated in Bhagavad-gītā, Kṛṣṇa is the friend of everyone (suhṛdaṁ sarva-bhūtānāṁ jñātvā māṁ śāntim ṛcchati).

COMMENT

This refers to the last verse of the Fifth Chapter of the Bhagavad-gītā, Text Twenty-Nine, and Srila Prabhupada refers to this verse as the peace formula. Sri Krishna says bhoktāraṁ yajña-tapasāṁ, that He is the proprietor of all the planetary systems. He is the beneficiary of the results of all austerities. Bhoktāraṁ, sacrifices and austerities. Bhoktāraṁ yajña-tapasāṁ, sarva-loka-maheśvaram. And He is the proprietor of all the planetary systems. Jñātvā māṁ śāntim ṛcchati, one who understand these facts attains peace from the pangs of material existence. So, the part of the formula is suhṛdaṁ sarva-bhūtānāṁ.

PURPORT (continued)

As stated in Bhagavad-gītā, Kṛṣṇa is the friend of everyone (suhṛdaṁ sarva-bhūtānāṁ jñātvā māṁ śāntim ṛcchati). The Lord is never an enemy to any of the millions of living entities, but is always a friend to everyone. This is true understanding. If one thinks that the Lord is an enemy, his intelligence is paśu-buddhi, the intelligence of an animal. He falsely thinks, “I am different from my enemy, and my enemy is different from me. The enemy has done this, and therefore my duty is to kill him.”

COMMENT

That was Hiraṇyakaśipu’s mentality.

PURPORT (continued)

This misconception is described in this verse as bheda-gatāsatī. The actual fact is that everyone is a servant of the Lord, as confirmed in Caitanya-caritāmṛta by Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu.

COMMENT

Who knows the verse? You know the verse.

PURPORT (continued)

(jīvera ‘svarūpa’ haya — kṛṣṇera ‘nitya-dāsa’). As servants of the Lord, we are one, and there can be no questions of enmity or friendship. If one actually understands that every one of us is a servant of the Lord, where is the question of enemy or friend?

COMMENT

Now, we come to the last paragraph. It is very important.

PURPORT (continued)

Everyone should be friendly for the service of the Lord.

COMMENT

I will repeat.

PURPORT (continued)

Everyone should be friendly for the service of the Lord. Everyone should praise another’s service to the Lord and not be proud of his own service. This is the way of Vaiṣṇava thinking, Vaikuṇṭha thinking. There may be rivalries and apparent competition between servants in performing service, but in the Vaikuṇṭha planets the service of another servant is appreciated, not condemned. This is Vaikuṇṭha competition.

COMMENT

So, sometimes Srila Prabhupada would also encourage competition, in book distribution for example, but he would explain the difference between transcendental competition and mundane competition. In transcendental competition, one acknowledges the good qualities or the good service of the other person, but still, one wants to excel the other person to give more pleasure to guru and Krishna. That is transcendental competition. But in mundane competition, there is envy, and one does not recognize the good qualities or the good service of the other person, and one tries to make oneself bigger or better by making the other person smaller or lesser. So, that mentality should be avoided, for sure. But the other mentality in which one recognizes the good qualities and service of the other persons and still wants to excel it, that is welcome.

PURPORT (continued)

There may be rivalries and apparent competition between servants in performing service, but in the Vaikuṇṭha planets the service of another servant is appreciated, not condemned. This is Vaikuṇṭha competition. There is no question of enmity between servants. Everyone should be allowed to render service to the Lord to the best of his ability.

COMMENT

This is part of empowerment.

PURPORT (continued)

Everyone should be allowed to render service to the Lord to the best of his ability, and everyone should appreciate the service of others. Such are the activities of Vaikuṇṭha. Since everyone is a servant, everyone is on the same platform and is allowed to serve the Lord according to his ability. As confirmed in Bhagavad-gītā (15.15), sarvasya cāhaṁ hṛdi sanniviṣṭo mattaḥ smṛtir jñānam apohanaṁ ca: the Lord is situated in everyone’s heart, giving dictation according to the attitude of the servant.

COMMENT

So, we all have individual natures, and ways of wanting to serve the Lord. And the Lord within the heart gives us the intelligence on how to serve Him in accordance with our desire and will. Here I think of the principle of unity in diversity. We are one because we are all servants of Krishna, or in the case of ISKCON, of Srila Prabhupada, but we are different because we are individuals. And this concept of unity and diversity is so important that Srila Prabhupada said that the GBC in their annual meetings should discuss how the principle of unity in diversity can be applied in ISKCON. It is very important—university in diversity.

PURPORT (continued)

As confirmed in Bhagavad-gītā (15.15), sarvasya cāhaṁ hṛdi sanniviṣṭo mattaḥ smṛtir jñānam apohanaṁ ca: the Lord is situated in everyone’s heart, giving dictation according to the attitude of the servant. However, the Lord gives different dictation to the nondevotees and devotees. The nondevotees challenge the authority of the Supreme Lord, and therefore the Lord dictates in such a way that the nondevotees forget the Lord’s service, life after life, and are punished by the laws of nature. But when a devotee very sincerely wants to render service to the Lord, the Lord dictates in a different way. As the Lord says in Bhagavad-gītā (10.10):

teṣāṁ satata-yuktānāṁ
bhajatāṁ prīti-pūrvakam
dadāmi buddhi-yogaṁ taṁ
yena mām upayānti te

“To those who are constantly devoted and worship Me with love, I give the understanding by which they can come to Me.” Everyone is actually a servant, not an enemy or friend, and everyone is working under different directions from the Lord, who directs each living entity according to his mentality.

COMMENT

So, the Lord dictates to different devotees in different ways to enable them to serve Him according to their particular natures or desires, and that is our individuality. But the goal is the same, which is to serve the Lord and please the Lord. Sometimes Srila Prabhupada gave the example of political parties, that they may have different policies. I mean, it is a sort of idealized version of what a political party is, but they have different programs or platforms on which they stand, but ultimately, the goal is the same, which is to serve the nation, to do what is best for the nation.

So, the conclusion is that we should all cooperate. Everyone should be friendly for the service of the Lord. Everyone should appreciate the service of other devotees and not be proud of his own service, and in this way, our relationships with one another can be very harmonious, and we will have such a nice society that people will want to join and become one of us. Such a nice family atmosphere that people will want to become part of this family, under Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu and Srila Prabhupada and their devotees. And in addition to the philosophical understanding that we should have in order to conduct ourselves properly, we also undertake the process of cleansing the heart, ceto-darpaṇa-mārjanam, by chanting the holy names.

Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare / Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare

So, Srila Prabhupada said in one lecture in Los Angeles, “If you have time, chant Hare Krishna. Don’t speak nonsense, chant Hare Krishna.” So, my dear devotees, thank you for listening so patiently and so attentively. Now, if any of you want to ask any questions or share any reflections, you can raise your hand. Do you have a traveling microphone? There is one over here.

Devotee: I have a question. Can you adjust the microphone there, closer to Maharaja? You mentioned unity in diversity, and I also heard you say in another place unity in variety. Is there a difference or variegatedness?

Giriraj Swami: It sounds like the same idea, although the usual phrasing is unity in diversity, but it sounds like the same idea. Another example of diversity.

All right, so what is next? Oh, sorry.

Devotee: Hare Krishna, Maharaja. This principle of wanting to or ideal principle of appreciating others and recognizing appreciation and then looking around and self-introspecting or whatever, this is easier said than done.

Sometimes we think that I guess I have reached that platform, I am not so disturbed when I see my godbrothers or somebody else perform exceedingly well, but when it tends to happen at a very distant place where I am not related, something happens in America or different parts of the world. But when it happens in my temple, in the community where I live, someone who I am seeing day in and day out and he does exceedingly better than me, then I have this bitter truth that I have not gone too far in this acceptance. So, when it happens within the community, within the family, within the place, it tends to affect us a lot more. How do we actually deal with it?

Giriraj Swami: Well, once, I heard a beautiful class in Mayapur, some decades ago, in which the speaker was saying that if someone is higher than you, and if you try to push him up, say you hold his feet and try to push him up, then you go up. And if you try to pull him down, then you go down. So, you don’t really benefit in any way by minimizing the value of another person’s service or being envious, but to the contrary, you suffer. And if you appreciate the other’s service and glorify him, you will benefit, and that will cleanse your heart of that envy. And we are here in the material world because of envy, ultimately, envy of Krishna. So, we need to get free from envy. Although I can say something interesting about envy.

When I was with Srila Prabhupada in Surat, I was thinking about the question of envy, and I thought of so many reasons not to be envious. First of all, Krishna’s service is unlimited, so there are unlimited opportunities for me to do service. So, there is no point of me being envious of someone else because that person has some service. And I also thought that being envious is bad because it will adversely affect my relationships with the other devotees if I am envious of them. But still, it was not going away; I perceived that it was not going away.

So, I approached Srila Prabhupada and I brought up the question of envy. And first he said, “Can you think of any reasons why you should not be envious?” And I had already thought of many reasons. So, I replied, “Yes.” Then he said, “So, being envious means that you don’t like someone, and that not liking should not be directed towards devotees, but it can be directed towards the non-devotees or the demons who are creating havoc for the devotees and the world.” So, that’s another approach, if you have that feeling that you don’t like someone, direct that towards the demons, not towards the devotees.

Devotee: Thank you, Maharaja.

Giriraj Swami: Yes?

Devotee: Hare Krishna, Guru Maharaja. Regarding the last paragraph of the purport, which is a really wonderful purport, the point about transcendental competition between devotees, especially book distribution, as you mentioned, I just wanted to find out. We had something like this sort of similar competition at the [Unintelligible 00:59:04] Ratha-yatra in the book stores some years ago. And what we had was a raffle for Back to Godhead subscription. And the prize was Caitanya-caritāmṛta, and we had many people signing up, including devotees, that’s why it was quite a fierce competition to win the CC set.

But in retrospect, I think the authorities thought maybe it sort of could be constituted as gambling, so to speak, because you got to pick the winner from the box. I just wanted your opinion on it. Because sometimes as devotees we think of innovative ways of preaching, but sometimes it may be a bit far out, so to speak, and we just want some guidance on that.

Giriraj Swami: You are asking whether having a raffle is a type of gambling?

Devotee: Yes, yes, Guru Maharaja.

Giriraj Swami: Well, it is gambling for the people who take part in the raffle, but it is not gambling for the organizers, because they are going to come out ahead, no matter what. I don’t know, I don’t think I would prefer having raffles as a part of a Krishna conscious event.

Devotee: Thank you very much, Guru Maharaja.

Giriraj Swami: Yes, behind you.

Devotee: Hare Krishna. Maharaja, once a devotee, we were talking about envy, and then the conversation went to the difference between envy and jealousy, and I wanted your opinion, if you could comment. The discussion that we were having led to the opinion that envy is when you see someone successful and you want to pull him down, whereas jealousy is when you see someone successful and you would like what they have, but it doesn’t become sour. Could you comment on that?

Giriraj Swami: I think that’s okay. You are jealous because someone has something you want and don’t have, but you are not against the person for having it, but you just wish you had it. That’s okay, but envy is not good, of course. You envy them and you want to take away what they have or bring them down, that’s not good. Everyone should be friendly for the service of the Lord. One should appreciate the service of others and not be proud of one’s own service, that should be our motto.

Yes?

Devotee: In this Mumbai Juhu episode, when all of you were trying to sincerely serve and follow these principles and there was a lot of opposition, which you mentioned beautifully in the book, amongst all the different episodes which happened, which was that one particular episode which gave you the maximum anxiety or fear? Because service brings all kinds of experiences. How did you deal with that situation?

Giriraj Swami: Well, what comes to mind is quite odd because it was not fear of any of the enemies, or demons, or municipality, or Nair, or Mhatre, but it was fear of His Holiness Tamal Krishna Goswami. The history is that the temple had been demolished illegally. I guess I could give a little of a background of its history.

One day, the demolition crew from the Bombay municipal corporation came to the Hare Krishna Land, supported by a police paddy wagon. And they said falsely, “Your temple is illegal, and we will demolish it,” and I had renewed the permission for it.

I ran and I brought the file and I showed them we had the permission renewed, but they were not at all interested. I think they were paid off. And they began to demolish the temple. And if any devotee came forward to try to stop them, and many of us did, we were apprehended by the police and thrown into the paddy wagon. And one great hero, Maithali devi dasi, she is in England now, she was a pretty big bodied woman, and she just stood in front of the doors to the Deity room, and because she was a woman, they were hesitant to touch her. But anyway, they dragged her away too.

So, there was one devotee who wasn’t as courageous as we were, or not as fool-hardy as we were. He was a Gujarati devotee named Manasvi, but while all this was happening, he was sort of hiding in the bushes watching it all happen, and then he put the phone call through one of our friends who had relation with Bal Thackeray, and Bal Thackeray informed the municipal commissioner, M.W. Desai. And he said, “This is happening, a Hindu temple is being demolished, and you have to stop it.” And the commissioner said falsely, “They don’t have permission.” And Bal Thackeray said, “Don’t forget who owns the city.” So then, the commissioner said, “All right, Bal Sahab.” So then, the commissioner phoned the ward officer, the K ward officer, and he came personally running to the spot to stop the demolition.

So then, it came to the point to rebuild the temple, and first, we were trying to get permission to rebuild it, but then we realized we don’t need to get permission to rebuild it, we already had permission for the structure. So, Mrs. Nair, on Friday, she got wind of the fact that we were going to rebuild the temple. So, she went to the high court and appealed to Justice [Unintelligible 01:08:29], who at some stage was a chief guest at one of our pandal programs, and asked him to grant an injunction preventing us from rebuilding the temple. And he said, “No, I won’t grant any injunction without hearing the other side.” And she said, “Well, just grant a temporary injunction.” He said, “No, I will not grant any injunction, without hearing the other side.”

So, we knew we had until Monday to rebuild the temple. And one of the heroes, Mr. P. L. Shetty came, and he was a builder; he got some construction materials and some laborers. It was raining very heavily, but he was intent on rebuilding the temple. And Satsvarupa, who was my first temple president at Boston and was really appreciated, admired, and respected, he had just passed through Bombay. Tamal Krishna Goswami was there, sort of overseeing it. Somehow, I said to him, “I would really appreciate Satsvarupa, he is so humble.” And he looked at me and he said, “Your humility would be to stay up all night and make sure that this temple gets rebuilt.”

And I thought about it, and I had to agree, that where was the humility if I wasn’t ready to do the needful for the service of Srila Prabhupada and Radha-Rasabihari? And meanwhile, Śrīdhara Swami, our dear godbrother, was sitting nearby in one of our Jeeps. And so, maybe Mr. Shetty’s son, Brijmohan Shetty, asked what he is doing there, and Śrīdhara Swami joked, “Well, if there is any trouble, I want to make sure I can make a quick escape.” But actually, he was not like that, he was very staunch. So, that was the story of how I was afraid of Tamal Krishna Goswami.

But meanwhile, Mhatre was the local municipal corporator, and he was [Unintelligible 01:11:32] with Nair. And he said, “You can rebuild the temple, but I am going to come with fifty guṇḍās and tear it down.” Then, Mr. Shetty said to his son, Brijmohan, “Bring my rifle and revolver.” And then he said, “How many cartridges do I have?” He used the word cartouche. “How many cartouches do I have?” And Brajmohan said, “250.” So, Mr. Shetty told Nair, “Fifty guṇḍās are not enough. I will kill them all. You need to bring at least 251, because I have 250 bullets.”

So, it was rebuilt, and then the next morning, we went into the court and we said that the temple had been rebuilt. And the judge said, “If it’s there, it’s there. It can be taken down. Now, you have to fight it out in court.” So, that was exciting.

Any other questions or comments. Yes? You have a microphone back?

Devotee: I was thinking about the idea that we feel bad in any way or not so happy if somebody else is successful. If the same thing was happening with my own brother, let’s say, if I really treat him like my brother, then I probably would not be feeling bad. If I see very closely that here is my father, this person is also mine in that sense. So, what he is getting is success is the same as we getting, because he is mine and I am his. So, if the reason that I am feeling not so happy, if not feeling bad, but not feeling happy because I just did not get that realization in my own heart for anybody, because that’s what the purport is saying, “Everybody is a brother.”

Giriraj Swami: Yeah, that’s a beautiful thought, beautiful thought. If we see everyone as our brother, as our dear and near relative, then if they are successful, you will be happy, as part of the family, a close member, that’s wonderful.

Devotee: So, we have to cultivate that.

Giriraj Swami: Yeah. So, two more. There was a lady at the back, and then Prananath.

Devotee: Is it working now? Okay. Hare Krishna, Guru Maharaja. I think I was saying [Unintelligible 01:15:40], so it wasn’t working. So, gender has been a really intrinsic part of the way I have just grown up, because we are three sisters and a brother. So, when we were talking about this topic of envy, one thing that I have been really envious of is just anybody, especially devotees in the male body, because they get to do certain services that as women we cannot do. But in the story that you were just narrating, Mother Malati was one of the heroes of the story because being in a woman’s body actually helped her protect the Deities. She saved the day in so many ways, so it really helped me, and I was able to connect the dots in so many ways that being in a woman’s body actually in so many ways is a blessing in disguise. Just wanted to share that.

Giriraj Swami: Yeah, wonderful. Beautiful!

Devotee: Hare Krishna, Guru Maharaja. I remembered Yamuna Mataji when she said female and male bodies. She did human service for Prabhupada. My realization was about Tamal Krishna Maharaja meeting you for the first time. I recollected that you were doing some service, and there was an interaction between you and him for the first time. I wanted to recollect that incident with you.

Giriraj Swami: What do you remember of it?

Devotee: You were doing some service and Maharaja happened to come and instruct you, “This is not the way you should do things,” and you continued, and then he went back to Srila Prabhupada about the same, and Srila Prabhupada said, “Giriraj will be listening to just whatever I say, he will not budge in whatever I have instructed.” That’s my vague remembrance of the incident.

Giriraj Swami: Well, it sounds like you might be talking about in Juhu when Tamal Krishna Goswami was the GBC and I was the temple president. And he thought I wasn’t a good manager, and so he tried bringing different devotees who he thought were better managers. But they all left after some time. And then, Tamal Krishna Goswami approached Srila Prabhupada and said, “Now I understand why you kept Giriraj as the temple president, because whatever happens, he will never leave.” And Srila Prabhupada said, “Yes, you have understood.”

Devotee: Thank you, Guru Maharaja.

Devotee: Hare Krishna, Guru Maharaja.

Giriraj Swami: Hare Krishna.

Devotee: I understood that we should have the goat mentality instead of the frog mentality. Is that right?

Giriraj Swami: The what mentality?

Devotee: The goat mentality instead of the frog mentality?

Giriraj Swami: Could you elucidate what is the goat mentality and what is the frog mentality?

Devotee: When a frog tries to come out of the well; the other frog pulls its leg. And the goat mentality is the goat allows the other goat to stand on the goat and eat the higher grass and they help support each other.

Giriraj Swami: Well, that’s nice. We should. It reminds me there was a joke. So, there was a competition of selling frogs. So, one entrepreneur, his quote was much less than all the others because his quote was for boxes without a top on them. So, the potential customer asked, “How can you put them in a box without a top on it?” And he replied, this has a context, I mean, nobody should take it personally, but he replied, “These are Bihari frogs. So, if one starts to jump up, the others will pull them down. So, we don’t need to put a lid on the box.”

Anyways, I hope I did not say anything wrong. I thought you were going to say bees and flies, which was the example that Srila Prabhupada often used, that the bees look for the honey, and the flies look for the source. So, we should be like bees and not like flies.

Any other questions or comments?

Devotee: Hare Krishna, Maharaja. Daṇḍavat-praṇāmās. Maharaja, listening to the lecture, I realized that if somebody is doing better than you, there is always an opportunity for you to learn from them and appreciate them for sure. And if you are doing better than somebody else, then it is an opportunity for you to teach them and make them better.

Giriraj Swami: Yeah, beautiful, exactly. If someone is doing better, you can learn from them, you can improve. And if you are doing better, you can also teach others so that they can also improve and do better.

Devotee: And another thing, Maharaja, that I wanted to share, was that whenever I see you with your godbrothers and sisters, there is so much love and affection for each other that you all have. What is the secret mantra that Srila Prabhupada has taught you all?

Giriraj Swami: Well, we love Srila Prabhupada, and we see one another as servants of Srila Prabhupada, devotees of Srila Prabhupada, representatives of Srila Prabhupada. So, it is wonderful to have the association of godbrothers, and as time passes, there will be fewer of us, so you want to take advantage and get the association and the opportunities to serve the ones who are with us now.

Devotee: Thank you so much, Maharaja.

Giriraj Swami: Yes? Microphone.

Devotee: Hare Krishna. So, it is said that it takes a village to raise a child. And me and my son here, Giriraj, I have struggled to impart an important lesson to him, so I was hoping you could shed some light on it.

When you are young or even when you are older, there is this competitive spirit that you are talking about. So, he very much likes to play to win, be it football, or chess, or anything. And we are trying to encourage him just to play for the sake of playing and having fun, but he wants to add points and competition to everything, like who eats first, who gets ready first. Everything is a competition. And so, that could easily spill into devotee relationship and service in due course of time. So, could you please inspire him and us on how to be able to just accept having fun, and that competition is a secondary thing, not the other way around?

Giriraj Swami: Is he here?

Devotee: He is here. He is hiding. You met him when he was one week old. Now he is big.

Giriraj Swami: Can you give him the microphone? What do you think of what your father just said?

Devotee: Well, I don’t like [Unintelligible 01:25:42]. I like to win. [Unintelligible 01:25:54].

Giriraj Swami: And how old are you?

Devotee: Seven.

Giriraj Swami: Seven, I wouldn’t worry about it. I mean, as he ages and matures, he will make whatever adjustments are necessary. Nothing to worry about. Giriraj, do you think that your father should worry that you will carry that competitive spirit of wanting to win into your relationships with devotees?

Devotee: No.

Giriraj Swami: Okay, all is well. Any other questions or comments.

Devotee: Hare Krishna, Guru Maharaja. So, I understand that we should not be envious, but what should we do in a situation when someone else is envious of us? And we might admire them or want to have a good relationship with them, but in this situation that they are getting envious or they are developing some negative feelings towards us. So, in a situation of service maybe, should we step back from what we are doing and not have this whole situation of negativity and rivalry, or should we just continue and let it be?

Giriraj Swami: Well, it will depend on whether you are needed for the service. If you are not needed and your presence is not appreciated, then you can leave it. But if you are needed, then you may have to continue and tolerate, maybe approach the person and make things better. In Juhu, we had a situation in which the head of the construction department didn’t like my checking on the spending in the construction department. And I mentioned to Srila Prabhupada that my presence was not appreciated, and Srila Prabhupada said, “But your presence is required.” So, sometimes we have to do that for the sake of service.

Yes?

Devotee: Hare Krishna, Maharaja. My question was something you already spoke about, that at one point of time, you were asked to replace and move away from the position of being the president of the temple. So, how did you feel during that time and dealt with that situation? Did you still act confidently, “My intentions are right,” and you stayed firm in what you wanted to do, or you acted with humility, “Okay, I will take up whatever is being decided by everyone else.” Because this situation is pretty common in the outside world when other people suggest something. So, how did you?

Giriraj Swami: When other people what?

Devotee: When other people suggest that you are not doing the right thing or you are not capable of doing that thing. So, how did you act in that situation?

Giriraj Swami: Oh. Well, I wasn’t there because I thought I was capable or not capable. I was there because Srila Prabhupada wanted me there. And so, I did my best. I mean, speaking about Tamal Krishna Goswami and Srila Prabhupada reminds me of something else not related to this, except it involved Tamal Krishna Goswami and Srila Prabhupada.

Anyway, I will tell it because I started. So, Srila Prabhupada had a friend named Dr. C.P. Patel, who would walk with him on Juhu beach every morning. And sometimes Dr. Patel would speak like a Mayavadi, and Srila Prabhupada would say, “You are a Mayavadi.” And Dr. Patel would say, “No, sir. I am a Vaishnava. I am a pure Vaishnava.” So, Dr. Patel would bring up these different so called holy people of India, and one day, he brought up someone, and as usual, Srila Prabhupada would compare their philosophy to that of the Bhagavad-gītā, and if they were not up to the standard, he would say so.

So, one day, when Dr. Patel brought up one revered saintly person, Srila Prabhupada criticized him, and Dr. Patel became very angry, and he started to raise his voice with Srila Prabhupada, and Srila Prabhupada raised his voice, and they were shouting at each other. And Dr. Patel had his cronies, his group of friends. But even they were saying, “Don’t upset Swamiji. He has a heart condition. That’s not good.” But they were shouting at each other. Then finally, Dr. Patel’s friends pulled him away.

So afterwards, Tamal Krishna Goswami approached Srila Prabhupada in his quarters and asked him, “What is Dr. Patel’s position? I mean, is he a devotee or is he a Mayavadi?” And Srila Prabhupada told the story of a man who could speak fluently in many languages. He was so fluent that nobody could determine where he was from originally, what was his mother tongue. So, there was some discussion. Then, one of the villagers said, “I will find out.” So, one day, when the man was not paying attention, that villager came up behind him and gave him a big whack. And then the man started to curse in his own language, and so his real language came out. So, Srila Prabhupada said, “Dr. Patel was like that. He could speak in many languages, but when I gave him a slap where it really hurt, his real language came out.”

So then, for the first time in years, Dr. Patel did not come to accompany Srila Prabhupada on the morning walk, and Srila Prabhupada said, “Okay, now no more discussion on the morning walk. We will just read from Kṛṣṇa book.” But then, after a few days, as Dr. Patel describes it, Prabhupada was walking on one side of the beach in one direction, and he was walking on the other side, in the opposite direction, but something in his heart impelled him to go to Srila Prabhupada. And he went to Srila Prabhupada and sort of not really bowed down, sort of put his hands down near Prabhupada’s feat and said, “Prabhupada, I am sorry, but I have been taught to respect all the accredited saints of India.” And Srila Prabhupada replied, “Yes, and my business is to say who is a saint and who is not.”

But anyway, they reconciled, and after Srila Prabhupada left, Dr. Patel wrote a beautiful article about his association with Srila Prabhupada that was published in Back to Godhead. The title was, My life’s most precious moments. And the subtitle was, Bombay doctor wins the title Big Fool and loves it. As Prabhupada would always say, he would always quote na māṁ duṣkṛtino mūḍhāḥ, whoever does not surrender to Krishna is a big fool.

Devotee: Hare Krishna. Thank you, Guru Maharaja, for wonderful insights about Prabhupada’s mood. I just felt very inclined that you are very, very inclined with Srila Prabhupada’s purport, and you read again from the back Prabhupada’s purport. I was really touched. and I have one request and one question.

The question is that several times, we heard Prabhupada was asking you how ISKCON will run in ten thousand years. So then, you answered so many, but Prabhupada said, “No, ISKCON will run on two things. One is [Unintelligible 01:37:49], management and intelligence. And I want to know about some details in that regard.

And the request is, please visit Bangladesh also because all the Bangladeshi devotees actually don’t get your association. Prabhupada also did not go to Bangladesh. So, I am just requesting, and from higher authority also, I can request you, if you just make some. Hare Krishna, Guru Maharaja. Thank you.

Giriraj Swami: So, regarding that incident, it is not that Srila Prabhupada said no, but it was like this. I was taking rest on a terrace of the gurukula building, and in the middle of the night, a devotee woke me up and said that Srila Prabhupada wants to see me. So, I went to Srila Prabhupada’s room, this was three days before he departed. And he was lying on his bed very weak. He couldn’t speak, only with great difficulty. And he said, “So, what do you think? Will this movement go on after I leave?” And I replied, “If the devotees are sincere and they chant the rounds and follow the regulative principles, it will go on.” And then, Srila Prabhupada said, “Organization. Intelligence and organization.”

And I thought about it afterwards, that yes, for our own Krishna consciousness, we have to be sincere, and chant our rounds, and follow the regulative principles. But to spread Krishna consciousness, we need organization. Intelligence and organization. And so, that was the message I got from the exchange with Srila Prabhupada.

Devotee: Thank you.