(5/5) Searching for Maya or the Lord?

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
Preaching programme in Sirajpur,
30 November 2020, part 5
Translated from Bengali

Having conceived of Srimad Bhagavatam, Vyasadev wondered, 'Who will listen to what I want to say and who will preach it?' Then, the Lord sent him some inspiration, and he remembered his only son, Sukadev. 'Yes, Sukadev can do it!' On the one hand, you can say that Sukadev was Vyasadev's son, and on the other hand, you can also say that he was his disciple.

When Vyasadev thought of teaching Sukadev, Sukadev had not been born yet. Sukadev spent twelve years in the womb of his mother, and he had received so much mercy from the Lord that he was able to hear everything from the womb and could even speak from there. There is another thing that you will be surprised to hear. It is true, but it is hard to believe it.

Vyasadev came to his wife and said to Sukadev, 'Sukadev, come out of your mother's womb!'

'No, I will not come out,' Sukadev replied.

'Why not?'

'Because if I come out, Maya will attack me and I will forget everything.'

Then, all the sages came to Vyasadev and requested him, 'You have a lot of power, why do you not stop Maya's work for five minutes?'

Sukadev said then, 'Yes, if you stop Maya's work, I will come out of my mother's womb.'

So, Vyasadev stopped Maya's work, and Sukadev came out. When he appeared, he did not lie like usual children do – he ran away! He was twelve years old at that time. Naked, he dashed to the forest. Vyasadev ran after him, 'Wait, listen to me! Listen!' Sukadev did not even have eyes – not seeing anything around him, he just went wherever the Lord was taking him. He could only see the Lord, nothing else (he did not hear or see who was calling him). In this way, he ran all the way to the Himalayas.

In the Himalayas, there were some young girls bathing in the river. It is cold in the mountains and rains often. As it was Satya-yuga, the people did not live in such a dirty environment as people live now; in Satya-yuga, people were very simple and did not have to always wear clothes. So, some girls were bathing in the river naked, and when they saw Sukadev coming towards the river, they did not cover themselves. They knew that Sukadev did not have eyes – he could not see anybody, and the girls also did not bother, their minds were occupied by other things. But when Vyasadev came running behind Sukadev, they quickly put on their clothes to cover themselves.

I will not go into much detail. At that time, Pariksit Maharaj was the king. One day, he was cursed by a brahman. The brahman said, 'Your lifetime will be only seven days.' So, as Pariksit Maharaj had only seven days left to live, many sages and great personalities came to him to advise him. Somebody said, 'You must give your kingdom to this person,' another person said, 'You must give this to that person,' and so on. They started giving many different kinds of advice to Pariksit Maharaj, but as he heard them, Pariksit Maharaj did not feel at peace in his heart.

There were many great sages from famous sampradayas gathered at that assembly of King Pariksit, including Vyasadev and his father Parasara Rishi. Suddenly, Sukadev Goswami appeared there. He was sixteen years old at that time (four years had passed after his birth), and he came in front of everybody stark naked. Although many great personalities were present at that assembly, he did not see anybody, so he did not offer his obeisance or greeting to anybody, not even to his own father or grandfather. But when he stood at that assembly, everybody offered their obeisance to him! All the sages told Pariksit Maharaj, 'Maharaj, you are very fortunate. Sukadev has come to your assembly today! Whatever siddhanta he will give, we all agree with it and follow it.'

Pariksit Maharaj offered an asan to Sukadev Goswami, and Sukadev Goswami sat down on it. He saw Pariksit Maharaj in front of him and asked him, 'Speak. What is your question?' Pariksit Maharaj replied, 'What is good for me? What is my goal in life?' Then, Sukadev Goswami said, 'You are a good searcher. You are looking for the right thing. Not everyone in this world is looking for what you want to find. Everyone is running everywhere, looking for kanak, kamini, pratistha; nobody is looking for good things.' And Sukadev Goswami started explaining it. In this way, the entire scripture of Srimad Bhagavatam appeared (an edition of all volumes that came out recently weighs forty kilograms!). At that time, there was no book or recording made, but a sage called Suta Goswami was present at that assembly of Pariksit Maharaj, and he had a special gift of memory (he could remember everything he had heard just once). When Suta Goswami came to Naimisaranya, he repeated in front of 60,000 sages what Sukadev Goswami had told Pariksit Maharaj. After that meeting, Bhagavatam was recorded.

Therefore, we must search for the right thing. If we want to know something good, we must come to the person who knows it. If you want to know something about the Lord, you must find a person who knows the Lord's address. Where are we to go to find the Lord? Where are we to go to meet the Lord? Where are we to go to know the Lord? This is what we must understand.

This is what I want to tell you all. You come to the programmes, you listen to Hari-katha, but none of you come to this line... Being controlled by some trifle greed, you cannot leave your material life and come to this line. Eating (ahara), sleeping (nidra), fearing (bhaya) and breeding (maithunam cha) – even animals do these things. Fearing for your life, you build houses. You do not want to sleep on the street, so you find a room for yourself to feel safer: insects, snakes, frogs cannot reach you, you will not feel so hot or so cold. And breeding means procreating and increasing your family. Who does not do these things? Even animals do all this. A lion is considered the king of the jungle, but even a lion, no matter how proud it may be, is afraid of somebody (if you fire a gun near it, it will become scared and run away). Then what is the difference between us and animals? The problem is that we do not do that which makes us different from all other species. We do not practise Krishna consciousness – we do not serve the Lord. We do not even try to search for the Lord's address. If you want to find it, you must give up some things in this world.

You have a family in this world, but you must not be attached to it. You are only a guard. This is the truth. I live in a house, but I am not the owner of the house. The Lord is the owner, the master of the house, and I am only a guard. This must be our attitude. But we think, 'My son', 'My house', 'I will protect everything!' Who are you? How long will you be around? You can stay there for five minutes, five hours, five months, fifty years or even a hundred years at most, but not more than that. You have to leave one day, then why are you so proud? 'Ahankare matta haina, Nitai-pada pasariya, asatyere satya kori mani (অহঙ্কারে মত্ত হৈঞা নিতাই-পদ পাসরিয়া অসত্যেরে সত্য করি' মানি): maddened with pride, forgetting Nitai's feet, I accept untruth as truth' (Srila Narottam Das Thakur). Because we are puffed up with ego, pride, we take untruth for truth and think, 'This is my house', 'This is my room', 'This is my son', 'This is my family', 'This is my wife', 'This is all mine.' We are drowning in all this, but

মায়ারে করিয়া জয় ছাড়ান না যায় ।
সাধুর-গুরুর কৃপা বিনা না দেখি উপায় ॥

mayare kariya jaya chhadana na yaya
sadhur-gurur krpa bina na dekhi upaya

'You cannot conquer illusory environment and become released from it. I see no other way to get relief except by the mercy of saints and Guru.'

(Prarthana, Srila Narottam Das Thakur)

If you want to over come this illusory environment, you must come to the guru and sadhus and listen to this katha. If we keep listening to Hari-katha, we can come to the Lord.

Jay Srila Guru Maharaj ki jay.

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Length: 31 min
Language: Bengali

READ OTHER PARTS:

1) Traversing Unconscious Lives
2) Detach Yourself from Maya
3) Escape Parasitic Existence
4) Path of Aural Reception
5) Searching for Maya or the Lord?