Chitraketu's Example

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
Late afternoon class, Sri Nrisingha Palli
4 March 2020, part 5, translated from Bengali

I will tell you now about Chitraketu and finish after that.

Chitraketu was a great king. He married many queens one after another. Why did he need so many wives? Because he had a strong desire to have a son. However, although he had many queens, he did not get a son, and it was a big problem—who will take care of the kingdom after him?

This happens in our country too—sometimes no son comes, so somebody ends up with three-five daughters, and all the family starts scolding the wife saying, "It is your fault that there is no son in our house!" What is her fault? Sometimes they even kill the woman for that, or the woman hangs herself because she cannot give birth to a son. Such things happen in this country—how foolish we are, how many stupid things we do...

So, Chitraketu wanted to have a son very much. One day, a sage named Anghira Rishi came to his kingdom. When Anghira Rishi met with the king, he asked him, "Chitraketu, are you doing well? Is everything all right in your kingdom?" Chitraketu replied, "Prabhu, everything is all right, my kingdom, my subjects are all right, but I am very worried because I do not have a son. If I do not get a son, who will look after the kingdom in the future?" Anghira Rishi thought to himself, "He has material desires—he wants a son so much. As long as he does not get a son, no matter what I tell him, it will not enter his ears. He only keeps thinking, 'I want a son,' 'I want a son'..."

We are also like this—no matter how much it is explained to us, no matter what is told to us, we only always keep thinking about our material desires. Spiritual things do not enter our ears—even if we hear it, it still does not enter our ears because of that.

So, Anghira Rishi told Chitraketu, "Yes, you will get a son, but when you get a son, you will get both happiness and sadness." Chitraketu became very happy—he did not think about the sage's words about sadness, he only kept thinking, "I will get a son! I will be so happy! What sadness can there be? I am rich, I have so much wealth, how can sadness come?" He did not understand it.

Many of you understand what it means when you get a son—many people think that they had lived happily before they got a son. When you get a son and he starts taking drugs, smoking, associating with bad people, when the son becomes bad, then you too will think, "Life was so good before I got this son!" And then a daughter-in-law comes to your house—when you grow old, you will be harassed by her too...

Anyhow, one day Chitraketu finally got a son. He was very happy and affectionate to the wife who had given him this son—everybody started looking after her, everybody hovered over her, etc. Seeing this, all the other wives thought, "Our husband does not even look at us! He is only busy with her all the time. He does not even notice us anymore!" Then everybody realised the cause—the king behaved like that because that wife had given him a son. So, they started thinking how they can get rid of the boy. In the end, they chose the youngest wife and told her to wait when the boy's nurse went away and then she had to go and give some poisoned milk to the boy. What is said is done. When the nurse who looked after the child went away, that young wife came to the boy and poisoned him. When the nurse came back, she was shocked, "What is this? Has the child died?!" Then, the mother of the child also came, "What has happened to my child?" She began to weep, and seeing her cry, all the other wives pretended to cry too, and they cried even more bitterly than the mother.

Anghira Rishi possessed the power to see everything from far, so he saw what had happened. He came to Chitraketu again and said, "So, king? How are you now?" Chitraketu said sadly, "Prabhu, you have told me that I would get a son. I was so happy, I had everything, but now my son has gone all of a sudden. Now I am suffering even more! Before, I did not have a son—I did not have him and it was all right, I only worried about the kingdom, but now that I have got him and lost him, it gives me even more pain!" Then, Narad Muni came there. Through his divine power, Narad Muni made the boy speak. The boy said, "I am here. Where am I? How did I come here?" The boy's mother said, "You are my son!" The boy looked at her and said, "When, in which birth were you my mother? I do not remember you." Then the king said, "I am your father! Can you not remember me?" The boy again said, "In which birth were you my father?" When the boy spoke all these things, then that Hari-katha entered the king's head. Narad Goswami instructed the king through the boy explaining that everything in this world is false, that I am not this body, I am the soul, he spoke about the power of the Holy Name, etc. Having heard all the Hari-katha, Chitraketu became a great sadhu, a great devotee.

Chitraketu took a puspa-ratha (a chariot made of flowers) and started travelling all over India preaching about the Holy Name. One day, as he was travelling, he came to Sivji Maharaj. At that time, Sivji Maharaj was sitting naked on an asan with Parvati Devi sitting on his lap. Seeing the scene, Chitraketu thought, "Sivji Maharaj can control everything, he can control even Kamadev (Cupid), so he has no fault, but there are other rishis here, they can think wrong, people will speak bad about Sivji Maharaj. If I tell it to him, I know he will not mind it." So, Chitraketu said to Sivji Maharaj, "Prabhu, it is not right that you sit like this with Parvati on your lap. Parvati should better move and sit by your side." Chitraketu knew Sivji Maharaj would not mind him saying it, and Sivji Maharaj did not mind it—he knew Chitraketu was a great devotee. However, there is one person who could not tolerate it, and this person was Parvati. Parvati got angry, "Where have you come from to give advice to my husband? I curse you to go to hell!" Chitraketu was not angry, he did not think anything of it, he only said, "I must go to hell? Oh, OK, then I will go to hell. What of that?"

Whatever situation a sadhu finds himself in, whether he is in liberated position, whether he lives in a jungle or anywhere else—sadhus always chant the Holy Name wherever they are. That is why Chitraketu thought, "Hell or heaven, it is all the same." He left peacefully, but Parvati Devi was surprised—she asked Sivji Maharaj, "Who is this man? He did not even feel anything! I told him he would go to hell, and he will have to go there, but he did not even think anything about it! There is so much suffering in hell!" Then Sivji Maharaj explained, "You did not recognise him—he is a great devotee Chitraketu. Sadhus are never affected by anything—even if they are struggling, suffering, even if they are in pain, they do not think anything about it."

So, always remember this and always be alert. Whatever your situation is—whether you live in a forest, in a jungle or anywhere else—always chant the Holy Name, and you will get supreme benefit.

Nitai Gaura premanande Hari bol.

— : • : —

{ 2001  |   2002  |   2003  |   2005  |   2009  |   2010  |   2011  |   2012 }
{ 2013  |   2014  |   2015  |   2016  |   2017  |   2018  |   2019  |   2020  |   2021 }

• Listen online (Bengali):

• Download (4 Mb)