Lying and Bribing

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
Sri Nrisingha Palli, morning class
16 March 2019, translated from Bengali, part 1

[Following the morning kirtans:]

You must always realise these kirtans in your heart. I see that some of you cannot sing them, it means you are not practising—many do not know these kirtans. You can buy a small kirtan guide and chant these kirtans at home; you will see, you will like it. How beautiful this is—"Nijera posana kabhu na bhaviba (িজের পোষণ কভু না ভাবিব রহিব ভাবের ভরে): I will never think about myself."

"Janani-jathare, chhilama yakhana, visama bhandana-pase (জননী-জঠরে ছিলাম যখন, বিষম বন্ধন-পাশে): when I was in my mother's womb, choking by the bondage, surrounded by stool and urine, one day the Lord allowed me to see Him." How much we suffer in the wombs of our mothers—we suffer a hellish agony there. We are shaken all the time, we always cry, our legs are upwards, head downwards. Now we all want to stay in a big room, when we sit we must spread and stretch our legs, we have so much freedom, but when we were in the womb, we suffered so much being confined in that tiny space—how terrible this is. Seeing our plight, the Lord revealed Himself to us, He allowed us to see Him. The Lord appeared in front of us and asked, "What do you want? Why have you called Me?" We cry, "Prabhu, I cannot take this any more! Please rescue me from this place!" The Lord then asked, "I have given you eyes to have the darshan of My Deity form, I have give you legs so you can circumambulate My holy abode, I have given you hands so you can serve Me. Will you do this?"

The Lord has given us all senses so that we can serve Him, but we have forgotten everything. We sang in the morning during the temple parikrama, "Bhajibo boliya ese samsara-bhitare bhuliya rohile tumi avidyara bhare (ভজিব বলিয়া এসে সংসার-ভিতরে ভুলিয়া রহিলে তুমি অবিদ্যার ভরে): you came into this world saying, 'O Lord, I will serve You', but, having forgotten this promise, you have remained in ignorance." We have made a promise, but we have not been able to keep our promise. We have promised to the Lord, "I will serve You, I will see Your form with these eyes, I will serve You with these hands, I will do parikrama of Your holy dham with these legs, I will chant Your glories, speak about You with this mouth," but, "Dinera madhye abala-tabala kata pachala parite para, tara madhye ki eka-bara govinda bolate nara! (দিনের মধ্যে আবল-তাবল কত পচাল পাড়িতে পার, তার মধ্যে কি একবার গোবিন্দ বলতে নার)—How many idle talks we have during the day, how much we talk during the day! We talk all sorts of nonsense and cannot even one time take the Name of Govinda!" How much we talk! We only talk about money, food and clothes, about the material life! Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu told Srila Raghunath Das Goswami,

গ্রাম্যকথা না শুনিবে, গ্রাম্যবার্ত্তা না কহিবে ।
ভাল না খাইবে আর ভাল না পরিবে ॥
অমানী মানদ হঞা কৃষ্ণনাম সদা ল'বে ।
ব্রজে রাধাকৃষ্ণ সেবা মানসে করিবে ॥

gramya-katha na sunibe, gramya-varta na kahibe
bhala na khaibe ara bhala na paribe
amani manada hana krsna-nama sada la'be
vraje radha-krsna seva manase karibe

"Do not listen to the mundane talks, do not listen to the mundane news. Do not eat fancy food, do not wear fancy clothes. Do not expect honour to yourself, but offer all respect to others. Always chant the Holy Name of Krsna, and in your mind serve Radha-Krsna."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Antya-lila, 6.236-237)

You can read this in Sri Sri Prema-vivarta or Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita.

We have fallen into this material world and we spend this life only thinking about this body, about our material life, and before we know it, "Vardhakye ekhana upaya-vihina ta'te dina akinchana (বার্দ্ধক্যে এখন উপায় বিহীন তা'তে দীন অকিঞ্চন): now aged, devoid of any means of deliverance, I am poor and worthless." "Vrddha-kala aola, saba sukha bhagala, pida-vase ha-inu katara (বৃদ্ধকাল আওল, সব সুখ ভাগল, পীড়াবশে হইনু কাতর): now old age has come and all happiness has fled—distressed by diseases, I have become miserable." Afflicted by so many diseases, we always become sick—somebody's eyes pain, somebody's nose pains, somebody's stomach pains, somebody's liver pains, somebody gets operated on, etc. So many diseases come and create a problem for the body! With all these diseases, we become old and in our old age we give up all happiness, we are not able to do anything any more.

It is our earnest, heartfelt prayer to you all—do not forget all this, serve the Lord, worship the Lord. Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur writes, "Nijera posana, kabhu na bhaviba, rahiba bhavera bhare" (নিজের পোষণ কভু না ভাবিব রহিব ভাবের ভরে): I will never think about my own maintenance; I will always remain within the shelter of loving attachment for You." "I will stay with You as a dog. You tie me nearby as Your dog." A dog takes care of his master, and we too will become the gatekeepers of the Lord—we will come to Gurudev, to the Lord and, guarding his gate, make sure no adversity comes through. We will not make the Lord our order-carrier. I have written about this in Guidance 3, you can read about it there—instead of serving the Lord we make the Lord our order-carrier. We go to serve the Lord or Gurudev, but instead of serving them we make them our servants. How? We always think, "Gurudev, give me this, give me this"—we only give problem, this problem, that problem, etc. We make our Guru and the Lord our servants.

I see that when people worship Deities (Durga, Kali, Ganesh, Laksmi, even Krishna), they offer obeisance to the Deity and ask for something in exchange for their worship. I also see—I notice everything!—that when the arati lamp (the pancha-pradip) comes from the altar, those who have some pain in their chest they touch the fire and touch their chest, those who have pain in their heart or other place, they touch the fire and then touch the place that pains. For example, if somebody is blind, cannot see well, they always touch the fire and then touch their eyes. People always pray to the Lord, "I want this! I want that!" Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur says that when we give something to the Lord and ask for something in return, we make the Lord a ghuskhor (ঘুষখোর), a bribe-taker. We give some money to the Lord, we give some money, some rice to Durga, Kali, Laksmi, Ganesh, and pray, "O Lord, help my son get a job!", "O Lord, give a good husband to my daughter!" You turn your deity into a bribe-taker. Is it true or not? For example, if somebody wants to get a government job, they can give ten lakh and get some primary master's job, and those who take the bribe are called a ghuskhor (ঘুষখোর, a bribe-taker). In the same way, we turn demigods into such bribe-takers when we say, "O Lord, help me get a job!" We do not understand anything! We want something from the Lord, we expect the Lord to serve us, but we do not want to serve the Lord. We make Him our servant—"Give me this," "Give me that." Our duty is serve the Lord, to serve our Guru, to serve the Lord's devotees. The Guru or the Lord will accept that service or not, this is his matter, but our duty is to serve Him. Always remember this. He may or may not accept our service but our duty is to serve Him. Never forget that our duty is to serve Him. Always think about this.

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