(7) Jagadananda, Sanatan and Kavi Karnapur

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
Sri Puri Dham, 3 July 2019, part 7
Translated from Bengali

There is another pastime related to Srila Jagadananda Pandit and Srila Sanatan Goswami.

When the Ratha-yatra festival had finished and the chariots had already come back to the temple, Srila Sanatan Goswami came to Srila Jagadananda Pandit and said,

'Prabhu, you all are so fortunate. You are staying here with the Lord, in this holy place. But we are so unfortunate – we stay in Vrindavan and Govardhan, so far away! We cannot stay with the Lord all the time. We only come once a year, and now the festival is over, so it is time for me to leave...'

'Yes, right!' Srila Jagadananda Pandit replied. 'It is time to leave, so why are you still here? Go! You have your service over there, so go and do it. What are you doing here?'

Then, Srila Sanatan Goswami came to Mahaprabhu and said,

'Prabhu, the festival is over, and it is time for me to leave and go back to Vrindavan... Jagadananda Pandit also says that I should leave soon...'

'What?!' Mahaprabhu exclaimed. 'Bring Jaga here!'

Some devotees went to Jagadananda Pandit's house and brought him to Mahaprabhu.

'Hey, Jaga! You were born only yesterday, who are you to say such things to Sanatan? Sanatan is like a guru to Me – he is a very learned man, even I learn from him. How dare you tell him what to do??'

Mahaprabhu scolded him like this. Hearing this, Srila Jagadananda Pandit stood with his head lowered, and Srila Sanatan Goswami also stood there embarrassed. Suddenly, Srila Sanatan Goswami began to cry.

'Prabhu,' he told Mahaprabhu, 'You are giving sweets to Jagadananda and bitter things to me. You scolding him like this is real mercy – You are giving him sweet things, but as for me, You are giving me only bitter things, You are not giving sweet things to me.'

This is what Srila Sanatan Goswami said, but if we scold anybody, they get angry. I have recently scolded a devotee in Nrisingha Palli because he had cooked less and it caused problems – do you know what he did after that? The next few days, he cooked four times more than necessary, and so much had to be buried in a hole. The kitchen is near the outbuilding bathrooms, so when people went to the bathrooms, they could get all the rotten stench. Not only that – he also showed off in front of others, 'See? Maharaj scolded me, and I have done so much damage to him! He scolded me, so I have fixed him!' What is this?? This is no damage to me! What is to me? How foolish he is! That is why service left him and he has become mad... People see only the external world – they have no idea of the internal world.

So, I was tell you about Srila Sanatan Goswami. He said to Mahaprabhu, 'You are giving sweet things to him and bitter things to me.' [He understood that chastisement is sweeter than any praise.]

Another time, Sri Sivananda Sen was taking many devotees from Kulingram, bringing also jute rope for the chariot festival. From Mahaprabhu's times to this day, they have been bringing the jute ropes for the chariots from there – they make the huge ropes tying smaller ropes together and use them to pull the chariots. These ropes come from a village in the vicinity of Kulingram. Haridas Thakur visited that place. I have visited it many times, too, when I went for potato collection (it is near Jaugram). Srila Prabhupad opened there a temple of Chaitanya Math (Sri Haridas Gaudiya Math). Mahaprabhu Himself said, 'There is no one as fortunate as devotees from Kulingram. Even parrots in this village chant the Holy Name of the Lord!' This is also the place of Kavi Karnapur who took initiation from Mahaprabhu. Mahaprabhu gave him the name Puri Das in memory of His own guru, Sri Iswar Puri. One time, Mahaprabhu told him, 'Puri Das, say, "Hare Krishna"!' He did not speak. Mahaprabhu turned to the devotees and asked them, 'What is this? Why is he not saying it? When I went to Jharikhand, even tigers and deer chanted the Holy Name, but this boy will not?!' Then, they told Mahaprabhu, 'Prabhu, he has become Your disciple.' 'How so?' 'You told him to chant Hare Krishna, so he has taken the mantra from You and he cannot repeat it in front of You now because disciples never utters the mantra in front of their guru.' 'Oh, is that so? We must test him! O Puri Das, recite a sloka from Bhagavatam!' Then, Puri Das (a five-year-old boy!) recited a sloka from Srimad Bhagavatam! After that, everybody understood that he must have definitely become a disciple of Mahaprabhu.

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