The Appearance Day of Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakura

This is a song written by His Divine Grace Srila Bahaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakur:

O wicked mind! What kind of vaisnava do you think you are? Your pretentious show of chanting Lord Hari's holy name in a solitary place is only for the sake of attaining false prestige of a worldly reputation- it is nothing but pure hypocrisy.

Such materialistic prestige is as disgusting as the stool of a hog. Do you not know that it is only a mere illusion cast by the potency of Maya? What is the value of contemplating day and night your plans for enjoying wealth and women? All these things are only temporary.

When you claim wealth as your own, it creates in you ever-increasing desires for material enjoyment. Your riches should be used for serving Madhava, the Lord of all wealth. Neither is it your proper place to indulge in lust for women, whose only true proprietor is Lord Yadva.

The demon Ravana (lust-incarnate) fought with Lord Ramacandra (love-incarnate) in order to gain the tree of worldly reputation- but that oasis turned out to be a mirage cast in the desert wasteland of the Lord's illusoory material potency. Please cultivate fixed determination to attain only the steady and solid platform whereupon a Vaisnava ever stands. If you neglect worshiping the Lord from this position, then you will ultimately attain a hellish existence.

Why do you needlessly suffer the torment of blaspheming the devotees of Lord Hari, attempting to achieve their eminence, thereby only proving your own fruitless foolishness? The desire for spiritual eminence is easily fulfilled when one becomes a devotee of the Lord, for eternal fame automatically follows the heels of a Vaisnava. And that fame is never to be considered a temporary worldly opulence.

The relationship between a devotee and Lord Hari is devoid of even a trace of worldly illusion; it has nothing to do with the materialistic cheating propensity. The prestige of so-called popularity in the material realm is compared to a treacherous dog-eating witch, and the attempt to live in solitude to supposedly engage in unalloyed bhajan is compared to an entangling network of distraction. Please know that anyone striving in either of these ways verily lives in the hell of Maya's illusion.

"I shall give up chanting the Lord's name publicly in kirtan and retire to solitude, thus smearing myself with worldly honor." Dear mind, what is the good of seeking such so-called glory? I will always remind you that the great soul Madhavendra Puri never deceived himself in that regard by committing theft in his own storehouse of perception the way you do.

Your cheap reputation is equal to the stool of a hog. An ordinary ambitious man like you can never be equated with a devotee of Madhavendra Puri's eminence. Under the sway of envy, you have drowned yourself in the filthy waters of material enjoyment after having abandoned the excellent perfection of congregational kirtan.

Truly, O wicked mind, the glories of so-called solitary worship are propagated only by false yogis using unscrupulous means to deceive others. To save yourself from these pitfalls, please contemplate the instructions that the Supreme Lord Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu kindly gave us while addressing Srila Sanatana Goswami with the utmost care.

Do not forget for a moment the two most valuable concepts that He taught: 19 the principle of dry, apparent renunciation as opposed to real, appropriate renunciation; and 20 the principle of a soul being trapped in the bondage of matter as opposed to a soul who is liberated. Don't ever make the mistake of thinking that these conflicting concepts are on the same level. Please remember this while engaging yourself in chanting the Lord's holy names as loud as you possibly can.

One is truly a Vaisnava who has given up the habit of falling victim to the ferocious tigress of wealth, beauty, and fame. Such a soul is factually detached from material life, and is known as a pure devotee. Someone with this consciousness of detachment has thereby become victorious over the mundane world of birth and death.

One is indeed detached who moderately partakes of worldly things that are deemed necessary for living in devotional service; a devotee acting in that manner does not fall prey to the disease of material infatuation. Thus devoid of selfish attachment, and endowed with the ability to see things in relation to the Lord, all sense objects are then directly perceived as being Lord Madhava Himself.

This is the standard of befitting renunciation, and one who realizes this is most fortunate indeed.Everything involved in such a devotee's life represents Lord Hari's personal spiritual opulence as manifest in the world of matter. On the other hand, one who engages in chanting the Lord's name with hopes of enhancing his own material reputation finds that all his activities and paraphernalia represent only the riches of hypocrisy.

O mind, please reject the company of two types of persons- those desiring impersonal liberation from the material world, and those who desire to enjoy the pleasure of material sense objects. Both of these are equally non-devotees. The things that are used in relation to Lord Krishna are objects belonging directly to the transcendental realm, and thus having nothing to do with matter they cannot be either owned or forsaken by persons interested in mundane enjoyment or renunciation.

An impersonal philosopher is opposed to thinking of Krishna as an object of devotion, and thus being puffed up with the false pride of imaginary liberation he dares to criticize the true devotees of the Lord. O mind, you are the servant of the Vaisnavas, and you should always hope for attaining devotion. Why then do you make such a loud commotion by calling to me and trying to prove the supposed supremecy of your practice of solitary worship?

One who falsely gives up things that could actually be used in the Lord's service proudly calls himself a 'renunciate' but unfortunately he can never become a Vaisnava by such an attitude. Abandoning his servitorship to the lotus feet of Lord Hari, and resigning himself to his solitary home- whatever is gained by that exercise can only be the worthless treasure of deception.

Ever engage yourself in the service of Sri Radha, and keep allof from the vicious snake of materialistic sense gratification. The glory of participating in the Lord's kirtan is not meant to bolster anyone's ambitions for personal recognition. O mind, why then have you abandoned the identity of being Radha's eternal servant in favor of retiring to a solitary place to practice the cheating process of so-called bhajan?

The most valuable treasures amongst the Lord's preachers are the eternal personalities residing in Vraja-dham. They never occupy themselves with begging for worthless material reputation, which is cherished only by the living dead. The Vraja-vasis are truly infused with life, and therefore they preach in order to give life to the walking corpses of the mundane world. All the songs that the Vraja-vasis sing about the glories of Lord Krishna are devoid of any tinge desire for fame.

This humble servant of Radha and Her beloved Krishna always hopes for kirtan, and he begs all to loudly sing the names of Lord hari. The transcendental power of congregational chanting automatically awakens remembrance of the Lord and His divine pastimes in relation to one's own eternal spiritual form. Only at that time does ti become possible to go off to a solitary place and engage in the confidential worship of Their Lordships.

Sri-Caitanya-Caritamrita Adi Lila, Chapter 2, Text 5 Purport

The compilers of the Upaniṣads speak very highly of the impersonal Brahman. The Upaniṣads, which are considered the most elevated portion of the Vedic literatures, are meant for persons who desire to get free from material association and who therefore approach a bona fide spiritual master for enlightenment. The prefix upa- indicates that one must receive knowledge about the Absolute Truth from a spiritual master. One who has faith in his spiritual master actually receives transcendental instruction, and as his attachment for material life slackens, he is able to advance on the spiritual path. Knowledge of the transcendental science of the Upaniṣads can free one from the entanglement of existence in the material world, and when thus liberated, one can be elevated to the spiritual kingdom of the Supreme Personality of Godhead by advancement in spiritual life.

The beginning of spiritual enlightenment is realization of impersonal Brahman. Such realization is effected by gradual negation of material variegatedness. Impersonal Brahman realization is the partial, distant experience of the Absolute Truth that one achieves through the rational approach. It is compared to one's seeing a hill from a distance and taking it to be a smoky cloud. A hill is not a smoky cloud, but it appears to be one from a distance because of our imperfect vision. In imperfect or smoky realization of the Absolute Truth, spiritual variegatedness is conspicuous by its absence. This experience is therefore called advaita-vāda, or realization of the oneness of the Absolute.

The impersonal glowing effulgence of Brahman consists only of the personal bodily rays of the Supreme Godhead, Śrī Kṛṣṇa. Since Śrī Gaurasundara, or Lord Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu, is identical with Śrī Kṛṣṇa Himself, the Brahman effulgence consists of the rays of His transcendental body.

Similarly, the Supersoul, which is called the Paramātmā, is a plenary representation of Caitanya Mahāprabhu. The antar-yāmī, the Supersoul in everyone's heart, is the controller of all living entities. This is confirmed in the Bhagavad-gītā (15.15), wherein Lord Kṛṣṇa says, sarvasya cāhaḿ hṛdi sanniviṣṭaḥ: "I am situated in everyone's heart." The Bhagavad-gītā (5.29) also states, bhoktāraḿ yajña-tapasāḿ sarva-loka-maheśvaram, indicating that the Supreme Lord, acting in His expansion as the Supersoul, is the proprietor of everything. Similarly, the Brahma-saḿhitā (5.35) states, aṇḍāntara-stha-paramāṇu-cayāntara-stham. The Lord is present everywhere, within the heart of every living entity and within each and every atom as well. Thus by this Supersoul feature the Lord is all-pervading.

Furthermore, Lord Caitanya is also the master of all wealth, strength, fame, beauty, knowledge and renunciation because He is Śrī Kṛṣṇa Himself. He is described as pūrṇa, or complete. In the feature of Lord Caitanya, the Lord is an ideal renouncer, just as Śrī Rāma was an ideal king. Lord Caitanya accepted the order of sannyāsa and exemplified exceedingly wonderful principles in His own life. No one can compare to Him in the order of sannyāsa. Although in Kali-yuga acceptance of the sannyāsa order is generally forbidden, Lord Caitanya accepted it because He is complete in renunciation. Others cannot imitate Him but can only follow in His footsteps as far as possible. Those who are unfit for this order of life are strictly forbidden by the injunctions of the śāstras to accept it. Lord Caitanya, however, is complete in renunciation as well as all other opulences. He is therefore the highest principle of the Absolute Truth.

By an analytical study of the truth of Lord Caitanya, one will find that He is not different from the Supreme Personality of Godhead Kṛṣṇa; no one is greater than or even equal to Him. In the Bhagavad-gītā (7.7) Lord Kṛṣṇa says to Arjuna, mattaḥ parataraḿ nānyat kiñcid asti dhanañjaya: "O conqueror of wealth [Arjuna], there is no truth superior to Me." Thus it is here confirmed that there is no truth higher than Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa Caitanya.

The impersonal Brahman is the goal of those who cultivate the study of books of transcendental knowledge, and the Supersoul is the goal of those who perform the yoga practices. One who knows the Supreme Personality of Godhead surpasses realization of both Brahman and Paramātmā because Bhagavān is the ultimate platform of absolute knowledge.
The Personality of Godhead is the complete form of sac-cid-ānanda (full life, knowledge and bliss). By realization of the sat portion of the Complete Whole (unlimited existence), one realizes the impersonal Brahman aspect of the Lord. By realization of the cit portion of the Complete Whole (unlimited knowledge), one can realize the localized aspect of the Lord, the Paramātmā.

But neither of these partial realizations of the Complete Whole can help one realize ānanda, or complete bliss. Without such realization of ānanda, knowledge of the Absolute Truth is incomplete.
This verse of the Caitanya-caritāmṛta by Kṛṣṇadāsa Kavirāja Gosvāmī is confirmed by a parallel statement in the Tattva-sandarbha, by Śrīla Jīva Gosvāmī. In the Ninth Part of the Tattva-sandarbha it is said that the Absolute Truth is sometimes approached as impersonal Brahman, which, although spiritual, is only a partial representation of the Absolute Truth. Nārāyaṇa, the predominating Deity in Vaikuṇṭha, is to be known as an expansion of Śrī Kṛṣṇa, but Śrī Kṛṣṇa is the Supreme Absolute Truth, the object of the transcendental love of all living entities.

HAHAHAHA

Spiritual Love

"There are different states of God realization. The idea of merging into God or entering into the all-pervading oneness, beyond this temporary existence, is a very preliminary partial understanding of God realization. That type of mukti, or salvation, or nirvana, is to be completely free from the sufferings of this world, and to enter a state of total peace. You're really non-existent as far as a personality. You're simply resting in an atmosphere of utter peace. Yes?

But a higher realization of the Absolute is love. What is higher peace or love? To some people they may want peace. But actually peace is the negation of all disturbances. Just like when you fall asleep, you're peaceful because you forget everything. When you have a nightmare it's different, but when you're just sleeping it's very peaceful because everything is forgotten. When you go into a deep state of meditation you enter a state where you're oblivious to the world. There's peace. And this is a spiritual realization that type of peace.

But a more complete and full spiritual realization is love or prema. Prema is ecstatic. It's actually a higher ecstasy to suffer for your beloved than to be in peace. Because even in suffering for, on a spiritual platform, suffering for God is an expression of very, very deep love. And it transcends and goes beyond even the peace of oneness.

So yes, we should understand that the real craving of the heart is for this love. Spiritual love."

-His Holiness Radhanath Swami Maharaja

Whew

The last couple of days have been interesting. Interesting in the sense that I've been having to do a lot of reflection. Last week we visited my friend John in the hospital. He's been battling cancer. In this war he is winning and hopes to recover fully and quickly. He told us of his realizations. A person who is facing possible death has many realizations that a person who is comfortable might never have. But, we are all battling death. Each day is closer to death. I'm not trying to be negative, I'm pointing out the truth. How much time we have is limited in this body. Anyway, whenever someone becomes sick around you it really makes you analyze the valuable time that you're wasting.

It's also Christmas time when everyone is getting together trying to enjoy the holiday spirit. It's that time of the year we meditate on the birth and life of Lord Jesus Christ. Srila Prabhupada stated that Jesus Christ is our guru. I've been hearing lectures on Jesus and reading the Bible. Jesus was such a compassionate and powerful devotee of the Lord. His life is amazing and his teachings are very instructive. And yet, Christmas is another commercialized holiday that focuses more on our capitalism than trying to re-spiritualize our mundane lives. I could go on but this dead horse has been flogged and flogged by numerous scholars, transcendentalists and many others over the years.

I have many more thoughts to write down, but I feel the other thoughts will be blog topics in themselves rather than bombarding whoever reads this with many ideas scrunched together. It's been a while since the last blog due to so many things going on so, I hope to get back into a writing schedule for the new year. Hare Krishna, please forgive my offenses.

Oh I Luv Conspiracies

Begging For Compassion

I woke up today with a very clouded feeling. I laid on the couch with my daughter while she played around me. The phone suddenly rang. We usually don't get any calls at that time in the morning so I felt something was going to be wrong. The machine picked up and my mother in a distraught voice told me to call her back. I jumped and got the phone. My mother informed me that my grandmother had passed away last night. She had been there to see her last breath.

Honestly, what does one say at that moment? My mother was crying and I wanted to say something comforting. I closed my eyes and internally started praying for my grandmother's soul. I hung up and my mind started downloading a million thoughts at once.

This last week has been one of those trying weeks that force you to hold your ground. First, my wife had complications with her health that required serious medical attention. Now she's slowly getting better. Then my friend John found out he has lung cancer. He is currently going through chemotherapy treatments.

As I pray I think about the nature of this material world. It is a place of suffering. Why? Because everything is temporary. We want to enjoy and be happy by exploiting the material elements. Our mind contemplates the objects of the senses. We become attached. This attachment turns to lust. The senses want something new. Basically, happiness means keeping ourselves distracted from the suffering around us. We become frustrated when our senses fail us. The comforts we build around the body suddenly slip away.

Everything in this world is temporary. The body will die, our cars will break down, natural resources are running out, we have to work hard just so we have money, and now the economy is failing. We want a permanent, comfortable atmosphere but that is not found here.

We are eternal, full of knowledge and full of bliss, but we are now thinking that we are these material designations. In this material atmosphere we are constantly plagued by miseries because that is the nature of this world. This is not our home. We are dreaming away.

In the Bhagavad-gita, the Lord continuously explains these points to Arjuna, who has become full of doubts. He has become overtaken by lamentation and dualities. In chapter five there is a great quote that can help us lighten the burden of the material world: "Before giving up this present body, if one is able to tolerate the urges of the material senses and check the force of desire and anger, he is well situated and is happy in this world. One whose happiness is within, who is active and rejoices within, and whose aim is inward is actually the perfect mystic. He is liberated in the Supreme, and ultimately he attains the Supreme."

One problem may arise. One's heart may become very hard because of renunciation and diving into analytical study of the world. At that point, one becomes desensitized from others sufferings. This is a major stumbling block in spiritual life. One who loves Krishna loves every aspect of Krishna's creation. The sufferings of others becomes that devotees sufferings. The devotee's only suffering is others' suffering, and their happiness is the happiness of others.

One great saint who lived more than 500 years ago, displayed the ultimate compassion. His name was Vasudeva Datta. In Caitanya-caritamrta, it is stated that the Lord glorified Vasudeva as if He had a thousand mouths. Vasudeva Datta very sincerely stated: "My Lord, my heart breaks to see the suffering of all the conditioned souls; therefore I request You to transfer the karma of their sinful lives upon my head. My dear Lord, let me suffer perpetually in a hellish condition, accepting all the sinful reactions of all living entities. Please finish their diseased material life."

"When Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu heard Vasudeva Datta's statement, His heart became very soft. Tears flowed from His eyes, and He began to tremble."

I read the news, I hear the sirens, I witness so much pain and suffering in this world but because my heart is still filled with envy and lust, I fail to develop compassion. I pray and I beg for mercy, but because of my offenses I remain very far the ocean of devotional service unto that Divine Couple Who enjoy pastimes in the eternal groves of Vraja.

Sitting here I look at the beautiful face of the Lord and pray to give strength and hope to others. I pray for my Grandmother who always had a smile on her face.