(5/5) Still Waters Run Deep

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
Nrisingha Palli, 27 November 2020, part 5
Translated from Bengali

You heard this line in one of the kirtans we sing:

কাম-ক্রোধ আদি ছয় বাটপাড়ে দেয় ভয়
অবসান হৈল আসি বেলা

kama-krodha-adi chaya batapare deya bhaya
avasana haila asi bela

'I am attacked by the six highway robbers (lust, anger, etc.), and my life is coming to its end.'

(Gitavali, Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur)

We are attacked by six robbers who take everything from us. When lust attacks, you feel greed, hankering, you behave bad; when anger attacks you become angry, and so on.

In my life, I have tried to raise so many people, I have tried to make good men out of them... Not so long ago, one boy came here. I tried so hard with him. He is a brahman's son, but he has so much anger in his heart. He had never been married and used to stay in one of the houses at the temple. He was a good boy at first. You know that many foreign devotees come to our temple, so, one time, he met a girl and without my permission went to Russia. He followed the Western line. After some time, he returned to India. He called me and apologised, but after a while he got married. I offered him, 'I can give you some money to maintain your family. Come to stay in Ekachakra.' I went for preaching in Tarakeshwar, and when I came back, he called me and said, 'My wife has left me! I will come to stay at the temple!' I told him, 'If she has left, it is well and good. Come.' But then his wife called me, 'Where is he? Can you tell me? Where is *** Maharaj?' I asked her, 'He is in Siliguri. Why are you asking about him?' She replied, 'I think he went to him.' I said, 'Maybe. I have not heard anything about it.' In the end, I heard that the man left the temple and was working on his own land. He came to the temple out of anger, without any service mood. It is all right if you get angry and leave your home to stay at the temple, but if you have no service mood, why do you think the Lord will take care of you? The owner of everything is the Lord, and if you do not work for the Lord, why will the Lord take care of you? I know what he has been doing, I know everything, but I ignored it. But when you keep making offences, these offences grow, and you end up ousting yourself.

This is what happened in the case of Ramachandra Puri also. He was offensive to devotees, then to his guru and then, finally, to Mahaprabhu. The Lord ousted him from Puri. Ramachandra Puri committed a very big offence.

His guru, Madhavendra Puri, is not an ordinary man. He was a very great Vaishnav, and he lived without begging – if somebody gave him something, he would take it, and if nothing came, he would fast. But Gopinath stole kheer for him, and the Deity of Gopal manifested through him! Ishwar Puri was a disciple of this Madhavendra Puri, and Mahaprabhu Himself took initiation from Ishwar Puri. Everybody knows Ishwar Puri, but nobody knows Ramachandra Puri, who was also a disciple of Madhavendra Puri. If you do something good, everybody will know about you, but if you do something bad, then nobody will even want to pronounce your name.

What kind of offence did he make? He told his gurudev, 'You are Brahma, you are above this material world. Why then are you crying so much?' (Foolish people say, 'Guru brahma guru vishnu guru devo mahesvara. Guru is Brahma [creator], Guru is Vishnu [maintainer], Guru is Siva [annihilator].') Madhavendra Puri became angry, 'Get out, you sinner! I am suffering so much from the agony of separation from Krishna, longing for His darshan, and you come and ask me why I am crying!' Madhavendra Puri ousted him. This is how Ramachandra Puri committed an offence to his guru. Before that, he also made vaishnav-aparadh by always finding faults in Vaishnavs (he always examined who is doing what and looked for faults in everyone). So much so that one day, he came to Sarvabhauma Bhattacharya's house to see what Sathi's mother (Sarvabhauma Bhattacharya's wife) was feeding Mahaprabhu. When we go for preaching, devotees take me as their gurudev, so they cook ten–twelve preparations. Somebody can see it and think that I eat so much, but do you think I can eat so much? I just take a pinch from the preparations or touch the preparation with my finger to just try it. But when Ramachandra Puri saw the many preparations served by Sathi's mother, he thought, 'Oh my! A sannyasi eats so much! He is so greedy!' [A devotee laughs] Do not laugh. That was his offence. At that time, he observed it secretly, from some place afar, but one time he actually came to Gambhira, to Mahaprabhu's room. He saw some ants in the room and said, 'Oh, new sannyasi! I see You like to eat a lot of sweets, do you not?' Ants always come on their own, you do not have to have sweets in the room. Anyhow, Mahaprabhu replied, 'Yes, what can I do? My tongue is so greedy that I eat a lot of sweets. I cannot control My tongue.' Mahaprabhu did not eat sweets, but He replied to him like that. What else was He to say? After that, Mahaprabhu thought, 'I have heard that this man has been criticising Me behind My back, but today he has come and said it in front of Me!' Another day, Ramachandra Puri again saw Mahaprabhu taking prasad at Sarvabhauma Bhattacharya's house. This time, he said, 'Oh, You are eating so much!' Mahaprabhu said, 'Yes, you are right. I am a sannyasi, and I should not be eating so much. From now on, I will not accept anybody's invitations. And if anybody wants Me to come, they must make only one–two preparations, not more than that.' When all the Puri Vaishnavs heard it, they were very sad. They went to Lord Jagannath and prayed, 'O Lord Jagannath, please remove this Ramachandra from Puri! We cannot stick him – he is causing too much pain!' Lord Jagannath heard devotees' prayers. After that, Ramachandra Puri was nowhere to be found ever again. Nobody knows what happened to him. He was ousted from Sri Puri Dham.

But everybody knows Ishwar Puri. His birthplace is in Halisahar, at the place called Chaitanya-doba. When Mahaprabhu took all the devotees to that place, He said, 'Look! This is My Gurudev's birthplace.' Showing example to all the devotees, Mahaprabhu took some soil (some dust) from that place and put it on His head. All the devotees followed His example, and as everyone was taking and taking soil from that place, there appeared a pond. That pond is called Chaitanya-doba. Now people go fishing at that pond... I have visited that place.

Jay Srila Guru Maharaj ki jay.

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Language: Bengali

READ OTHER PARTS:

1) Kirtan – Highest Practice
2) Three Pillars of Spiritual Life
3) Outer and Inner Surrender
4) Drowning in Maya
5) Still Waters Run Deep