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His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
Sri Ekachakra Dham, morning class
Sri Varaha Dvadasi, 6 February 2020, part 3
Translated from Bengali

When I first came to the Math, I remember I had been at the temple for one year at that time, and there were others who had been at the temple for twenty years. We would all sit together to take prasad. I would come, distribute prasadam for everyone, and then sit to take prasad myself. Actually, I remember I would read Chaitanya-charitamrita at the class, then come to distribute prasadam, and then I would sit and the storekeeper would give me prasad. One day, when I sat down, the storekeeper (Yadu Gopal Prabhu was in charge of the store room at that time) gave milk to everyone, but when he came to me, he put curd on my plate. Everybody asked, "What is going on? He is a new boy, how come he is getting curd?! He has not been at the temple for even a year, how come there is curd on his plate?" The storekeeper said, "No use telling this to me. This is an order from the 'head office'." This is how Gurudev looked after me from the beginning—he noticed everything. He had heard that I did not drink milk, so he arranged for curd to be given to me. I did not particularly like curd—I actually do not eat it on ekadasi or other days. You know, Mahaprabhu said, "Give me laphra (a very simple dish of mixed vegetables), and give milk and cakes to all the devotees." I do not have attachment to food—I did not have it even before too. When I went to the field in the morning, I would take some fried chilli with some rice and go. Even if I did not get anything, I never complained about it, "Oh I have not got prasad."

Yesterday, I was sitting in a mill and got a phone call from a devotee from here, Ekachakra. He is foolish—he said, "Maharaj, we have not got prasad! They are cooking less, and we are taking prasad very late!" How foolish this is—they are so attached to food. If you do not get prasad at your own home, what do you do? You cook and then you can take something. Do you have to call Gurudev and tell him about it?! I have to tolerate these things... You are in your own home here, but do you think this is your own home? You call me saying you have not got prasad, but we were at the mill that time we had not taken prasad ourselves. Because I was with foreign devotees, and I know they get hungry, I went to the market and got them some sweets (I do not eat rasagullas myself, but I got some for them). I knew that if we were to drive back to the temple, it would take a long time, and then we would not have been able to visit all mills. We had a goal to collect a certain amount of rice (one ton), and I thought that by hook or by crook we had to make it to this goal. So, we too did not get prasadam that day, but who will we complain to? They blame Sripad Niriha Maharaj that he had told them to cook less, and I told him, "Why are you making Vaishnav aparadh? If your house is on fire, will you let it burn? If you criticise somebody behind their back, this is a Vaishnav aparadh."

I had told them before that they could cook more in the afternoon, but not so much in the evening because if you cook too much in the evening, then you will have to feed cold rice to cows, etc. and even if you want to, it is not possible to eat much of old cold rice. People always say about me that I waste so much food, and I always scold devotees at the time of Gaura Purnima: is there any lack? Why cook less? After that people say, "Oh, Acharya Maharaj is wasting so much, every day he throws so much rice away!" Does that harm me in any way? What loss is that for me? I think it is your house that becomes poor, not mine. Can anyone make the Lord poor? The Lord is the master of the entire universe—can anyone or anything make Him poor? Therefore, do not gossip behind others' backs about what others are doing or not doing. This is not Krishna consciousness. Do not criticise or blame anyone. Gurudev always said: always talk about the good qualities of others. If somebody has ten bad qualities, they must also have one-two good qualities, so you must accept their good qualities and overlook the rest. It is necessary to understand this, but they do not understand it. These things happened before too, even in Mahaprabhu's time.

When Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu was praising Srila Sanatan Goswami, somebody else's face became sour. Mahaprabhu did it on purpose—he wanted to see how others would react when another person was being praised in front of them. So, Mahaprabhu praised Srila Sanatan Goswami and watched others' faces—He saw devotees thought, "Oh, we are staying together with Mahaprabhu in Puri, but Mahaprabhu does not praise us! Sanatan Goswami is from Vrindavan, how come his name comes up?" This is what others said or thought, but Srila Sanatan Goswami Prabhu and Srila Rupa Goswami Prabhu did such a great service—others did not think about that... Moreover, one time, Srila Jagadananda Pandit told Srila Sanatan Goswami Prabhu, "Go back to Vrindavan! Go back to Vrindavan! You have been here for so long, why are you still in Puri?" He had come from Vrindavan after a very long time to stay with Mahaprabhu—did Mahaprabhu tell him to leave? He did not, but Jagadananda Pandit told him, "Your work is done here—Ratha Yatra is over, the chariots have already returned to the temple, so why are you still here?" When Mahaprabhu got to hear about this, He chastised Jagadananda Pandit very much, "Who are you to say this? You were born yesterday, and Sanatan is My guru! He teaches even Me, but you are telling him to go away!"

There are people in the world who did not get devotion so easily. For example, Pradyumna Misra was sent to see Ramananda Ray, and he did not like it when he saw Ramananda Ray training girls to dance. It is not so easy to understand devotion. It took Pradyumna Misra time to understand everything gradually. It is not easy to understand how much devotion who has. That is why, Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu always taught others, and it is necessary to discuss what Mahaprabhu taught us. We must always try to understand it and follow it.

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