Four Qualities

" Sri caitanya Mahaprabhu destroyed the pride of Kandarpa when He stayed in the house of Ramananda. He exhibited His neutrality in the house of Damodara. He taught patience during His stay at the house of Haridas, and He taught humility through Rupa and Sanatana. Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu taught all people the four Qualities of a devotee- continence, neutrality, patience, and humility."
                            - From Bhakti-Ratnakara

Mountain Air

Clouds in arms length
Sheds my heart of all fear
In the distance is God's breath
Inhale love... Inhale wisdom


Sunbeams warming
Snow seeks it's shelter in the shade
Chanting in the cool air

The mountain silence makes it easier to concentrate

Christ Mass

By Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakur Prabhupada

From Krishna Kathamrita Bindu issue 241 (The entire issue can be read or downloaded here: http://www.gopaljiu.org/bindu )

Question: If Jesus Christ was a jagad-guru and his instructions are capable of bringing us deliverance, why do we need a spiritual master?

Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Prabhupada: We accept both the universal spiritual master and the initiating spiritual master. By accepting only the jagad-guru, we may face many anarthas. If at present we want to follow Christ’s orders by accepting him as jagad-guru and we think we do not require an initiating spiritual master, we will certainly face doubt about how well we can follow Christ’s orders. The Supreme Lord or universal jagad-guru delivers his instructions about the absolute truth only through the disciplic succession. As I sit on the bank of the Ganga in Nabadwip, far from the Himalayas where the Ganga originates, and am able to touch her water here, the initiating spiritual master similarly brings the Ganga of pure devotional service, which emanates from the lord’s lotus feet, and places it in my hand and on my head. Because I am an ordinary, powerless, poor person, I am not able to climb the Himalayas to touch her water there. Similarly, if the flow of the Ganga from the Himalayas is interrupted on the way, I would have to face the danger of accepting a polluted flow instead of the pure Ganga. If the instructions Jesus Christ gave two thousand years ago do not come to us through disciplic succession, or if we have to sort them out from books, then perhaps we may create a blunder and accept a perversion of the truth taught in the name of Christianity. We may even come to accept something opposite from what he taught, thinking it his actual philosophy.

The initiating spiritual master is also jagad-guru because he is a manifestation of the original jagad-guru. Out of his causeless mercy he delivers the message of the original jagad-guru through the disciplic succession. He does not cheat or flatter the disciple, nor does he yearn for any material gain. He is simply a messenger of the absolute truth.

— Amrta Vani, p. 44. Touchstone Media. Mumbai. 2004.

Moving Water

A beautiful poem by Rumi:

"When you do things from your soul, you feel a moving in you, a joy.


When actions come from another section, the feeling disappears. Don't let others lead you.


They may be blind or, worse, vultures. Reach for the rope of God.


And what is that? Putting aside self-will. 
Because of willfulness people sit in jail, the trapped bird's wings are tied, fish sizzle in the skillet.


The anger of police is willfulness. You've seen a magistrate inflict visible punishment. 


Now see the invisible. If you could leave your selfishness, you would see how you've been torturing your soul. 


We are born and live inside black water in a well.


How could we know what an open field of sunlight is? Don't insist on going where you think you want to go. 


Ask the way to the spring. Your living pieces will form a harmony.


There is a moving palace that floats in the air with balconies and clear water flowing through, infinity everywhere, yet contained under a single tent."

Revelation of Desires

Srila Raghunath das Gosvami's Abhista-sucanam from the book Stavavali:

Text 1

I pray that the wild horse of my heart may become like the cintamani jewel horse Srila Rupa Gosvami, which carries as its rider the desire to serve the gopa prince's beloved.

Text 2

Because of Srila Rupa Gosvami's efforts, my heart is now peaceful, controlled, able to know the nature of spirit, fixed in yoga, and attached to the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Now that I have attained Srila Rupa's smiling, nectarean, compassionate glance, my heart has become wild by remembering the transcendental pastimes of Lord Hari.

Text 3

O doe playing in the forest, you are all very fortunate because with your eyes you always drink the nectar of Lord Krishna's face. As for myself, I am simply an unlucky dog wandering in Vraja trying to fill my belly. I never see Lord Krishna for even a moment.

Text 4

O friend, when you serve Vraja's king and queen, who many times have met in my heart, please give the remnants of Their betel nuts to me.

Text 5

O friend, I see you serving Sri Radha who, languid from many passionate amorous pastimes, and Her cheeks wet with perspiration, rests on the couch of Lord Krishna's chest.

Text 6

May the splendid moon of Lord Krishna, which tirelessly dispels the great darkness of the demons, showers the nectar of pure love on the devotees, cools the white lotus of Sri Radha, and makes the flowers of Her breasts blossom with happiness, protect us.

Text 7

At what very auspicious time will I directly see Sri Sri Radha-Krishna enjoying the sweet rasa-lila, arguing over some yogurt at the base of a hill, and playing with Their friends in waves of joking words pushed by breezes of amorous desire?

Text 8

May Krishna, the leader of the cowherd boys who, as He walks on the path with His friends and surabhi cows, with happiness and concern offers hundreds of blessings to Rohini-devi and the other devotees, and who, as the concerned queen of Vraja tearfully glances at His friends and at the lion-like Balarama, is gazed at with love and pride by the people of Vraja and with words of praise by Radha and His other gopi beloveds, protect us.

Text 9

"Friend who is this girl We have never seen before?"

"She is a vraja-gopi." 

"From where has she come? Why has she come?"

"She has come from Mathura-pura to worship You."

When She heard the playful words "Now You may enjoy with the incomparable Lord Hari" Radha understood thath the girl was Krishna in disguise and at once burst into a smile.

Text 10

O tongue tortured by thirst, please mix the delicious nectar of the name Radha with the wonderfully sweet condensed milk of the name Krishna, ass the fragrant ice of pure love and drink this charming drink at every moment.

Text 11

O moon of Lord Caitanya, please make the lotus of my heart bloom! Please make that lotus beautiful with swarms of dancing bumblebees of meditation upon You! Please shake away the dense darkness of my offenses! o kind Lord, please make sinful me drink the nectar of your lotus feet!

Text 12

I pray that I may fan the two young dancers of Vraja who have become fatigued by happily dancing in Cupid's arena in an incomparable forest grove filled with the instrumental music of the expert cuckoos and the humming songs of the bees.

Text 13

On the strength of the service I have done to the pollen of his lotus feet, I am able to always reside, even times of trouble, by the shore of Radha-kunda at the base of Govardhana Hill. Protected by his friends, I chant and hear Sri Sri Radha-Mukunda's holy names, which defeat the sweetest nectar. I pray that Srila Rupa Gosvami may always protect me.

Radha and Durga

Radhastami is this Wednesday so I've been reading about and meditating on Srimati Radharani. 


In Srila Jiva Gosvami's commentary on Sri Brahma-samhita, verse 3,there is an interesting section talking about Durga and Radha:




"Sometimes Goddess Durga is also described as the supreme controller. This is also correct because there is no difference between the potencies and Lord Krishna, the master of the potencies. This is confirmed by the following words of the Gautamiya Tantra:



'Krishna is Durga. Durga is Krishna. One who sees that They are different will not become liberated from the cycle of repeated birth and death.'


Durga is the personal potency of Lord Krishna, and therefore She is Lord Krishna Himself. For this reason Durga should not be considered manifested from a portion of the Lord's illusory potency, Maya. This fact is confirmed by the following statement of the Nirukti:

'Even if one continually worships Her, Durga is still difficult to understand.'



Durga is also described in Narada-pancaratra, in the following conversation of Sruti and Vidya:


' Durga is the supreme goddess. She is an incarnation of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. She is the transcendental potency of the Lord. She is manifested from the form of Lord Maha-Vishnu.

' Simply by understanding Her one immediately attains the Supreme Personality of Godhead. It is not otherwise.

' She is identical with Gokul's queen Sri Radha, who possesses a great treasure of love for Krishna. By Her grace, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, the master of all living entities, is easily understood.

' She is the potency of personified devotional service. She worships Her beloved Supreme Lord. Because She is understood only with great difficulty, the saintly devotees call Her Durga, (difficult to understand.) She is the personal potency of the Supreme Personality of Godhead and She is always filled with the nectar of love for Him.

' From Her is manifested the mah-maya potency, the controller of all conditioned souls, who covers them with illusion. By this maha-maya potency the residents of the entire world are bewildered into thinking themselves identical with their external material bodies."


In the Sammohana Tantra, Durga Herself declares:

'I am Durga. I possess all virtues. I am not different from Sri Radha, the eternal, supreme goddess of fortune.'"

Three Kinds Of Bhakti

A wonderful purport from Sri-Caitanya-caritamrta, Adi Lila, Chapter 4, texts 21-22 that I was studying:

In the Caitanya-caritāmṛta three kinds of devotional service are described — namely, bhakti (ordinary devotional service), śuddha-bhakti (pure devotional service) and viddha-bhakti (mixed devotional service).

When devotional service is executed with some material purpose, involving fruitive activities, mental speculations or mystic yoga, it is called mixed or adulterated devotional service. Besides bhakti-yoga, the Bhagavad-gītā also describeskarma-yoga, jñāna-yoga and dhyāna-yoga. Yoga means linking with the Supreme Lord, which is possible only through devotion. Fruitive activities ending in devotional service, philosophical speculation ending in devotional service, and the practice of mysticism ending in devotional service are known respectively as karma-yoga, jñāna-yoga and dhyāna-yoga. But such devotional service is adulterated by the three kinds of material activities.

For those grossly engaged in identifying the body as the self, pious activity, orkarma-yoga, is recommended. For those who identify the mind with the self, philosophical speculation, or jñāna-yoga, is recommended. But devotees standing on the spiritual platform have no need of such material conceptions of adulterated devotion. Adulterated devotional service does not directly aim for love of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Therefore service performed strictly in conformity with the revealed scriptures is better than such viddha-bhakti because it is free from all kinds of material contamination. It is executed in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, solely to please the Supreme Personality of Godhead.

Those who are spontaneously devoted to the Lord and have no aims for material gain are called attracted devotees. They are spontaneously attracted to the service of the Lord, and they follow in the footsteps of self-realized souls. Their pure devotion (śuddha-bhakti), manifested from pure love of Godhead, surpasses the regulative principles of the authoritative scriptures. Sometimes loving ecstasy transcends regulative principles; such ecstasy, however, is completely on the spiritual platform and cannot be imitated. The regulative principles help ordinary devotees rise to the stage of perfect love of Godhead. Pure love for Kṛṣṇa is the perfection of pure devotion, and pure devotional service is identical with spontaneous devotional service.

Flawless execution of regulative principles is exhibited in the Vaikuṇṭha planets. By strictly executing these principles one can be elevated to the Vaikuṇṭha planets. But spontaneous pure loving service is found in Kṛṣṇaloka alone.