(13/22) Turn Home

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
Bolpur, noon, 20 January 2019, part 13
Translated from Bengali

Wake up early for mangal-arati every day, offer arati to the Lord. Observe mornings. Even if you are alone, you can wake up early and chant kirtan, 'Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare / Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare.' What is the problem? If you do it, then you both observe the morning and chant the Holy Name of Krishna. You must practise this. This is how sadhus and Vaishnavs live. When I cannot go outside, I run on a treadmill twelve–fifteen minutes and chant the Holy Name loudly. When I went to Nepal recently, it was very cold there – sometimes I had to bath with ice cold water. What to do? I just chanted 'Hare Krishna' and threw the water on my head, thinking, 'Whatever will be will be.' And nothing happened, but it was very cold there.

You must always chant, 'Krishna, Krishna' and always follow the four regulative principles I have told you about just now. We can give up everything. We can give up our greed for money, we can give up our greedy for women, but there is one thing that we cannot give up – ahankar (ego, pride), or pratistha (name and fame). 'I will be big and wear a garland on my neck' – this is the mood we cannot give up. Other than that, I see that the main thing that people cannot give up, especially here in Bengal, is fish and meat. Because of this trifle desire that people harbour, we cannot bring them to this line. That is why so few people actually come to this line. Still, there are some people who used to eat cow's meat and even raw cow's meat and who have now come to this line. You can see foreign devotees sitting with us here – somebody is from Venezuela, somebody is from Colombia, somebody is from Malaysia, a Muslim country. There is also a Mauritian boy whom I have sent to Bangladesh to build a temple there, he can also drive. His father is the pujari in Nrisingha Palli. Both son and father left the mother and came to India. The son drives my car and the father does puja now. They left everything and came here to serve. They have a temple in Mauritius, so when I told them that I need people here and invited them to stay here, they came. This boy here also have come from Jharkhand. I told him, 'Your father has taken initiation, so what are you doing there sitting at home? Serving your mother? Come here and preach, and your father can stay in Ekachakra.' He is very fortunate to be staying in Birbhum, the place where Nityananda Prabhu appeared.

Nityananda Prabhu is the Lord Himself: Krishna is one, but He manifests Himself in two forms, as Krishna and Balaram or Gaura and Nitai (eka-i dehe dui rupa). So, it is the Lord Himself who appeared in Birbhum. You are so fortunate to live nearby, but the problem is that you are all intellectualists who follow brahma-jnana (knowledge about the impersonal aspect of God) and nirakar-mayavada (impersonalism and the formless conception of God). But please chant the glories of the Lord! You worship the impersonal, formless aspect of the Lord, aspiring to merge with Him and lose your existence, but please have some faith in the Lord. If you can chant the Lord's glories and Names, I will be extremely happy.

This is why the host of this programme has called me to come here. She told me, 'One–two hundred people will come, please come to speak some Hari-katha.' So, taking a lot of trouble, I have come. Tomorrow I am going to Amadpur. A devotee who lived there has left his body, so I am going there after quite a long time to observe his disappearance. The day after tomorrow, I am going to Ekachakra. You know that we have a big temple there. Many people go to Tarapith for excursions, walks or on pilgrimage, but there, those whom you call 'sadhus' take dead people's skulls and eat from them! They also take drugs... Those are not sadhus. We tell to those who are going to Tarapith, 'Instead of going there, you can stay in Ekachakra. We have forty–forty-five rooms at the temple, so you can stay here, take prasad, do the parikrama of Nitai's holy dham and get great benefit.' We cannot worship all gods. You worship Kali today and Durga tomorrow, but if you do not worship Kali, she will be unhappy. If you worship Parvati, Siva will be unhappy because you are not worshipping him. If you worship Laksmi or Kartik, Ganesh will be unhappy because you are not worshipping him. But if you worship Krishna, then all other gods will be automatically worshipped. We are tangled in illusion, so we cannot understand it.

Maya (illusion) is very strong. Remember this. It is said in Gita:

দৈবী হ্যেষা গুণময়ী মম মায়া দুরত্যয়া ।
মামেব যে প্রপদ্যন্তে মায়ামেতাং তরন্তি তে ॥

daivi hy esa gunamayi, mama maya duratyaya
mam eva ye prapadyante, mayam etam taranti te

'My supramundane trimodal illusory potency (alluring those who are averse to Me) is extremely difficult to overcome. However, this insurmountable potency of Mine can be overcome by those who exclusively surrender to Me.'

(Srimad Bhagavad-gita, 7.14)

The Lord says, 'I have created Maya.' So, why is Maya so strong? Because she has got her power from the Lord. But when a surrendered devotee takes refuge in Krishna, Maya Devi will see, 'This soul has surrendered to my Master's holy feet,' and will gradually go away. The Lord says, 'I have created Maya, so you cannot defeat her. There is only one way to do it. Those who surrender to Me become released from her influence.' We are in her bondage now – our souls are covered by the illusory environment. If you surrender to the guru, sadhu and the Lord, then illusion will gradually leave you.

You must understand that you are not this body. Your body is composed of five material elements: earth (ksiti, ক্ষিতি), water (apa, অপ), fire (teja, তেজ), air (marut, মরুৎ) and ether (vyoma, ব্যোম). When this body dies, it will be burnt and turn into ashes or buried and get mixed with soil. For example, if you throw fish or some meat outside and leave it there, it will rot and decay in one–two weeks and then get mixed with the soil. All bodies are made of five elements, and when they are destroyed, they again become mixed with those elements. But the soul is indestructible. Here, souls get a body, leave it and then get another body. But all souls have their own place also, in Krishna's world. If we can go to the eternal abode of Krishna (the place where Krishna resides eternally), then we will never have to suffer from birth, death, old age and disease again. Even when you go to heaven or hell, you have to return from there one day, but if you reach your own home, you will not have to go to any hell, heaven or earth again. There is only way to get out of this cycle of repeated births and deaths. The religion of Kali-yuga is very beautiful – there are no hard rules and regulations, no hard practices, all you need to do is to engage in Harinama-sankirtan. 'Niraparadhe Nama laile pabe Krsna-prema-dhana (নিরপরাধে নাম লৈলে পায় প্রেমধন). If you chant the Holy Name without offences, you will get the wealth of divine love for Krishna' (Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, 3.4.71).

We must chant the Holy Name without offences. Even if you practise sravan (hearing about the Lord) and kirtan (chanting the Lord's glories and Names) for a million of lifetimes, you will come to the Lord. Why? Because of offences. You must leave all offences, then only can you chant the Holy Name.

অপরাধশূন্য হয়ে লহ কৃষ্ণ-নাম ।
অচিরাৎ তুমি পাবে কৃষ্ণ-প্রেম-ধন ॥

aparadha-sunya haye laha krsna-nama
achirat tumi pabe krsna-prema-dhana

'Chant the Holy Name of Krishna without offence and you will quickly get the treasure of divine love to Krishna.'

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Length: 168 min
Language: Bengali

READ OTHER PARTS:

1) Course of Life
2) Special Arrangement for Kali-Yuga
3) Beyond Religious Bigotry
4) Innermost Desires
5) Fortune, Faith and Frauds
6) Think about Your Real Self
7) Come to Krishna's Family
8) Seek Out Eternal Shelter
9) Proper Surrender
10) Misdirected Worship
11) Deepest Faith
12) Beyond Illusory World
13) Turn Home
14) Gross and Subtle Cheating
15) Watch for Milestones
16) Come Home with Me
17) All That Glitters Is Not Gold
18) Do Not Cheat Yourself
19) Soul's Plight
20) Eternal Transformations
21) Origin of Hinduism
22) Pig's Life, God's Life, Devotee's Life