Sanatan-Siksa: Full Faith

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
23 June 2015

[His Divine Grace is reading from Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Madhya-lila, chapter 22:]

We always come and go in a cyclic order—we are like a piece of wood floating in an ocean. Just as the piece of wood is washed to the shore by some favourable wind, we too have finally reached the shore of the ocean—we have got the lotus feet of Gurudev, the lotus feet of Krishna.

The soul thinks, "I do not want to go to any more family life." What does a family life (samsar) mean? There are many kinds of family lives in this world: a cow family, a dog family, a cat family, a beast family, a tree family, pig family, and so on. So, the soul realises this and their family (samsar) gradually finishes, they get good association and begin to think about Krishna.

There are two gurus, the chaitya guru and the mahanta guru. When Krishna gives His mercy to a fortunate soul, the chaitya guru, the Guru in your heart, takes the soul to the mahanta guru (he tells the soul, "Please go to this Guru"). The mahanta guru is the bona fide Guru in this world.

In good association, you can get devotion to Krishna and good faith. At first there is some little faith, then slowly that faith increases.

There are different kinds faith and different kinds of devotion. Everybody's devotion is not the same because everybody's faith is not the same: "শ্রদ্ধা-অনুসারী ভক্তি-অধিকারী, sraddha-anusari bhakti-adhikari, the quality of devotion depends upon faith." (CC, 2.22.64) Everybody does not have the right, the capacity, to be a Guru, to become the acharya in this mission. Why not? Because everybody's devotion is not the same, everybody's faith is not the same. If everybody had the same faith, everybody could become an acharya.

There are four types of faith: kamala sraddha, taranga sraddha, drdha sraddha, and sudrdha sraddha.

Kamala sraddha is little faith. For example, somebody asks you, "Why do you wear tilak?" and you wipe it off; or somebody asks you, "Why do you wear the Tulasi beads?" and you become shy of Tulasi beads and take them off. You do have a strong answer, tell them, "What is your problem? This is my religion. You are not giving me food—Tulasi does. She gives me property, she gives me wealth, happiness, joy. She gives me everything, why do you need to tell me what to do? It is not your business."

Some devotees say, "I go to college, I go to university, I have to take off the tilak, I cannot wear the Tulasi beads," but why? If anybody asks you, you can say, "You think you do everything yourself, but this is your ego—the Lord does everything, the Lord provides everything. Do you think you are doing everything? But I believe that Krishna is doing everything. Tulasi is Krishna's servitor: I want to make Krishna happy, that is why I wear Tulasi."

Then, there is taranga sraddha. 'Taranga' means 'a wave.' When some wind comes, there comes a wave, but once the wind is gone, the wave is gone too. In the same way, at the festival time some devotees come, do parikrama, chant, "Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna," but after that they go home and leave everything. That is taranga sraddha, little faith.

Some do not practise properly every day, but you eat every day, you go to the toilet every day, so you must chant for the Lord every day, you must practise Krishna consciousness every day, then it will be bhakti-yoga—it is necessary to practise every day, not only chanting, "Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna" today, and after that not.

There is a very nice sloka in Srimad Bhagavatam:

Krishna says, "If you believe what a sadhu says, if you have faith in it, if you always think about Me, you will quickly come to Me. If, however, somebody does not have faith in Me, does not have any relation or attachment to Me, they will not get Me so quickly." Sadhus speak Krishna-katha, speak about Bhagavatam, and if somebody has faith in those talks about the Lord, believes what the sadhus say, then, Krishna says, "I give devotion to them."

Krishna told many things in Srimad Bhagavad-gita (to follow Veda-dharma, karma, jnana, etc.), but,

"Until they get faith in My talks (katha), I will not give devotion to them." Srimad Bhagavatam says that if you do not have faith in Krishna, you will always be bound by karma. Birds, beasts, trees, cats, dogs cannot hear and they do not know, but you have got a human body, you have consciousness, so if you hear Krishna-katha but have no faith in what you hear, you will not be able to get out of maya, you will not be able to get relief from the bondage of karma.

You must have a strongest faith. 'Sraddha' means 'faith,' or 'visvas,' it means you understand that if you have devotion to Krishna, you do everything thereby and it is not necessary to do anything else separately. If you have full faith in Krishna, you do not have to go to the church, go to the mosque, go here and there—chastity and a strongest faith in your Guru are necessary. It is said about Nityananda Prabhu,

yadyapi nityananda sura-badi yaya
tathapio haya nityananda-raya

"If Nityananda Prabhu, My Guru, goes to the prostitutes' quarter, He is still My Guru."

Full faith is necessary...

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Rupa and Sanatan
• First Encounter
• Running Away
• On the way to
Mahaprabhu
• Finishing Visaya

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• Meeting Mahaprabhu
• Empowering Srila Rupa Goswami
• Rare, Rarer, the Rarest
• The Ultimate Gardening Guide
• Pure Devotion

Santan-sikha:
Sambandha:
• Supreme Personality of Godhead
• The Three Worlds
• Brahmas' Realm
• Krishna's Beauty
Abhidheya:
• Maya's Family
• The Cry of a Surrendered Soul
• Breaking Free
• Delusion of Liberation
• Leaving Ulterior Motive
• When Krishna Gives Mercy
• Awakening Taste for Service
• Full Faith
• Power Transmission
• Surrender in Good Association
• Six Limbs of Surrender
• Sixty-Four Devotional Practices
• Spontaneous Loving Devotion
Prayojan:
• The Path to the Supreme Goal
• Hero and Heroine
• "You Are Mine!"
• The All-Attractive Lord