(7/12) Do Not Cheat Yourself

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
Kadigachha, Festival anniversary,
4 March 2019, evening, part 7
Translated from Bengali

We suffer in this world from three kinds of sufferings: (adhibhautik, adhidaivik, adhyatmik: the miseries caused by other souls, by the nature and by our minds). The adhibhautik suffering is the suffering caused by other living entities created by the Lord. For example, a cow eats grass – that grass also has a soul, so it suffers from the cow biting it. Everybody is eating each other in this world. Even among people, children beat their parents, parents beat their children, husbands beat their wives, wives beat their husbands, and so on. Everybody lives running behind their own interests, pursuing money, women and fame. People fight for money, for women or to prove who is bigger (for example, somebody kills a bigger person and then takes their position). These are the three causes of all fights in this world. We must think about this. What is the point running behind all that?

You wake up in the morning – do think about the Lord? Do you chant the Lord's Name? You go to work, and when you get back in the evening, you go to a tea stall and sit there gossiping about politics, about all kinds of village talks, about voting, about who will become the minister, and so on. This is not good. You can stay at home and chant the Holy Name instead – take karatals or a mridanga and chant the Lord's Names – this will give you benefit. But what do you do instead? You hire kirtan singers. This is not chanting the Holy Name – it is chanting offences to the Holy Name. It is called 'nama-bale papachara': sinning and relying on the purifying potency of the Holy Name. There are such people among us, too. We say, 'Oh, I chant the Holy Name,' but we will talk nonsense the whole day, engage in all kinds of other works, commit all kinds of wrongs, all kinds of sins, and in the evening we just chant the Holy Name thinking that this will remove all our sins. This is what is called 'nama-bale papachara'.

You arrange asta-prahar kirtans (twenty-four-hour kirtan) at your homes. You think that you can do wrong 364 days a year, and one day you will host kirtan and all your sins will be gone. You are wrong! Those hired people will come, take one or two thousand rupees from you and enjoy with it (drink liquor and spend it on their wives and children), but what benefit does it give to you? When I come and chant kirtan here, I tell you all the time that I do not come to chant kirtan here – I come to make you chant kirtan. You are the ones who should do arati at home and worship the Lord. You can take a photograph of Deities, keep it at home, offer Tulasi at the Deities' feet, offer flowers, do arati and chant the Hare Krishna maha-mantra. If you do all this, who will get benefit, you or me? You. So, you are the ones who should practise all this. That is my duty when I come here.

মহান্ত-স্বভাব এই তারিতে পামর ।
নিজ-কার্য্য নাহি তবু যান তার ঘর ॥

mahanta-svabhava ei tarite pamara
nija karya nahi tabu yana tara ghara

'The innate nature of great souls is to deliver vile, fallen souls: great souls never come to their homes for any personal purpose.'

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, 2.8.39)

I do not come to anyone's house for their food or any other things. I have not come to ask you for money, neither do I go anywhere else to do that. Those who can hear Hari-katha will get benefit, and if somebody can hear Hari-katha and come to this line, then it will bring the greatest benefit in their life.

— : • : —

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Size: 27 Mb
Length: 56 min
Language: Bengali

READ OTHER PARTS:

1) Pure Hearts' Kirtan
2) Worship of Lord Siva
3) Proper Worship Comes from Proper Identification
4) Know Thyself
5) Pivoted Life
6) Short-Lived and Short-Sighted
7) Do Not Cheat Yourself
8) Devotional Service
9) Temple Is Not Made of Bricks
10) Spiritual Foundation
11) Stray Souls
12) Embrace Sheltered Life