Unconditional Service

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
4 July 2013, Sri Nabadwip Dham, part 3

Question: Why is Raghunath Das Goswami considered the prayojana-tattva acharya?

There is sambandha, abhidheya, prayojan. Sambandha-tattva is the relation. Abhidheya-tattva (the means to the end) is sravan and kirtan. And prayojana-tattva is the goal. There are also three Deities in Vrindavan—Madan Mohan, Govinda, and Gopinath. Gopinath is the prayojana-tattva Deity, and the other two Deities is sambandha and abhidheya. "Tina thakura gaudiyake kariyachena atmasat—these three Deities of Vrndavan have absorbed the heart and soul of the Gaudiya Vaisnavs." (Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, 1.1.19)

Govinda is served by Srila Rupa Goswami, Madan Mohan is served by Srila Sanatan Goswami, and Gopinath is served by Sri Madhu Pandit. Radha-Gopinath is prayojana-tattva because Svarup Damodar is actually an exclusive servitor of Gopinath service, and Raghunath Das Goswanmi got that service directly from Mahaprabhu—Mahaprabhu gave him a gunja-mala and a Govardhan sila. He got the service to Srimati Radahrani directly from Sriman Mahaprabhu—nobody can get that service, but he did. The gunja mala means Srimati Radharani, and the Govardhan means Krishna. Therefore, who got the exclusive (antaranga-lila) service to Radha-Krishna? Srila Raghunath Das Goswami. That is why we can accept him as the prayojan-tattva acharya.

Question: You spoke about conditional surrender and unconditional surrender. How one can increase their surrender?

I have told many times about conditional surrender. It means having some sarta (condition). Gurudev gave the example of a grocery shop. Suppose you go to a grocery shop to buy something—you will give the shopkeeper some money and he will give you something (sugar, potato, oil, rice, or garam masala) in return. If you do not give him money, he will not give you anything. This is what conditional dealing means. Suppose you go to a shop to buy a sari—when you come in, the shopkeeper treats you with so much love, he gives you a bottle of thumbsup, 7up, or sprite, gives you a tea, maybe a bottle of coca-cola; and you start thinking that he loves you not only for your money. The truth is you are going to buy something from him, so the shopkeeper is happy that he will tell you a high price and can cheat you properly! He is not giving you tea, coffee or coca-cola using his money—he is actually using your money because he knows can cheat you properly after that. This is the relationship between a shopkeeper and a customer. This happens every day.

As for Gurudev, a proper guru does not behave like this. Gurudev thinks about the disciple, "How can I increase his spiritual life?", "How can I increase his spiritual activities?" Guru will not think that he will get more money or something else from the disciple—a guru who thinks like this is a bogus guru, not a bona fide guru. A proper disciple will only think, "How can I serve my guru?" If the disciple thinks, "If I serve the guru, I can get something from him," "I take initiation from him and in lieu of that I will get something"—this is conditional surrender. Unconditional service means I understand that I had made a promise (bhajibo boli esechhile) when I was in my mother's womb, but I had forgotten about it—Gurudev came and gave me the consciousness that I must serve the Lord; that is why I came to him, took initiation from him, and he will not engage me in the service of the Lord. That is called unconditional service. I promised to the Lord to serve Him, but I had forgotten about it because of the illusory environment, but my guru has come to me, he reminded me of it—I must surrender to him and he will engage me in the service of the Lord.

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