(7/12) Maya's Domain

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
Bakultala, noon class, 7 April 2019, part 7
Translated from Bengali

Everybody can understand that getting birth is painful. You can see how much hellish suffering children endure in their mothers' wombs. Squeezed in a tiny space, the child is living there upside down (its head is down and its legs are up). At some point, the child cannot take it anymore, so it starts crying to the Lord, 'O Lord! Please let me see You just once! I cannot take it any longer here!' If the soul is fortunate, the Lord appears to it and says,

'Why have you called Me?'

'Dear Lord, I am suffering so much, please let me out!'

'I will, but there is one thing...'

'What is it?'

'I will give you eyes – will you look at My Deities with these eyes? I will give you legs – will you do dham-parikrama with these legs? Or, if you cannot come so far, will you do Tulasi parikrama with these legs? I will give you hands – will you use these hands to serve Me? I will give you ears – will you use them to hear about Me?'

We say 'yes' to all of this, but:

ভজিব বলিয়া এসে সংসার-ভিতরে ।
ভুলিয়া রহিলে তুমি অবিদ্যার ভরে ॥

bhajiba baliya ese samsara-bhitare
bhuliya rahile tumi avidyara bhare

'Forgetting that you came to this world saying, "I will serve You," you remained engulfed in ignorance.'

(Sri Gitavali, Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur)

We forgot all about it! Why? Because of our ignorance – ignorance means Maya. What is Maya like? You may wonder, 'What is Maya like? What is Maya?' I will give you an example to show you what Maya is like. It is said in the scriptures:

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)

This is what is said in Srimad Bhagavad-gita, and I will give you an example so that you can understand it. If you put a piece of iron into fire, the iron will become red. After that, if this iron touches anybody's body, clothes or some plastic, the iron will burn. Why does it start to burn everything? Because it gets power from fire. So, getting power from fire, iron can burn. Maya is also like that. Getting power from the Lord, Maya removes souls from the service of the Lord and turns them into her servants and maidservants. That is why we live in this world thinking, 'My little son', 'My daughter', 'My wife', 'My husband', 'My friend', 'My body', and so on. And when all this comes to an end, this is all you will have left in your life. Maya turns you into your servant and removes you from the service to the Lord.

If some fortunate soul surrenders to Lord Krishna, who is Maya Devi's Master, then Maya Devi sees, 'This conditioned soul has surrendered to my Master's holy feet' and flees from that soul, and then the soul can practise Krishna consciousness. You can see some people here who are practising Krishna consciousness now. They surrendered to Gurudev, and Maya left them, so they always think about Krishna. There are some such devotees among you also. They always think about the Lord. And as for the rest – those who have not surrendered to the Lord – they must first surrender to the Lord. Surrender has four aspects, or limbs:

দৈন্য, আত্মনিবেদন, গোপ্তৃত্বে বরণ ।
'অবশ্য রক্ষিবে কৃষ্ণ'—বিশ্বাস পালন ॥
ভক্তি-অনুকূল মাত্র কার্য্যের স্বীকার ।
ভক্তি-প্রতিকূল ভব—বর্জ্জনাঙ্গীকার ॥
ষড়ঙ্গ শরণাগতি হইবে যাঁহার ।
তাঁহার প্রার্থনা শুনে শ্রীনন্দকুমার ॥

dainya, atma-nivedana, goptrtve varana
'avasya raksibe krsna'—visvasa palana
bhakti-anukula matra karyera svikara
bhakti-pratikula bhava—varjanangikara
sad-anga saranagati ha-ibe yahara
tahara prarthana sune sri-nanda-kumara

'(1) Humility, (2) self-submission, (3) accepting that the Lord is your maintainer, (4) keeping faith that “Krishna will certainly protect”, (5) engaging only in what is favourable to devotion, (6) rejecting what is unfavourable to devotion. Lord Krishna hears the prayers of those who surrender in these six ways.'

(Saranagati, Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur)

When you surrender in all these ways, then Krishna will hear your prayer, and Maya will not be able to bar you. But if you sometimes again start thinking about Maya, she will again catch you. For example, if you have diabetes and your health is weak (if you do not control your blood sugar), all kinds of diseases can attack you – people get a heart disease, a stroke, some eye or kidney disease. In the same way, Maya also attacks those who are weak. When we slack and lose our spiritual strength, the Lord removes us. Remember this.

Now that everything is quiet, we can chant some kirtan. [His Divine Grace starts chanting kirtan.]

— : • : —

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Length: 97 min
Language: Bengali

READ OTHER PARTS:

1) Check Yourself
2) Spiritual Purity
3) Your Chance
4) Happy Existence
5) Look for Service, Not Excuses
6) Short Time, Short Life
7) Maya's Domain
8) Genuine Connection
9) Thoughtful Existence
10) Mature Vision
11) Places to Be Avoided
12) Do Not Be Afraid to Give