(2/14) Proper Recipient for Proper Taste

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
Uluberia, 12 January 2021, part 2
Translated from Bengali

তদ্­বিদ্ধি প্রণিপাতেন পরিপ্রশ্নেন সেবয়া ।
উপদেক্ষ্যন্তি তে জ্ঞানং জ্ঞানিনস্তত্ত্বদর্শিনঃ ॥

tad viddhi pranipatena, pariprasnena sevaya
upadeksyanti te jnanam, jnaninas tattva-darsinah

‘You will be able to attain knowledge by satisfying the divine master with submission, relevant inquiry and sincere service. The enlightened souls who are learned in scriptural knowledge and endowed with direct realisation of the Supreme Absolute Truth will impart divine knowledge to you.’

(Srimad Bhagavad-gita, 4.34)

So, pranipat is surrender (six types), and pariprasna means honest enquiry. Honest enquiry is not asking ‘How are you?’, ‘Where do you live?’ Honest enquiry means five questions: (1) ‘Who am I (ke ami, কে আমি)?’ (2) ‘Why am I suffering (kene amaya jare tapa-traya, কেনে আমায় জারে তাপত্রয়)?’ (3) ‘How can I get benefit (kise hita haya, কিসে হিত হয়)?’ (4) ‘What is the ultimate goal of life (sadhya vastu ki, সাধ্য বস্তু কী)?’ (5) ‘How can I attain this goal (sadhya vastu ki karle paowa yaya, সাধ্য বস্তু কী করলে পাওয়া যায়)?’ First, it is necessary to know who you are. Those who forget who they are – who do not know their actual identity – think that they are these bodies. If you think you are this body, it means that you have not got the knowledge of the self. Identifying yourself with the body is ignorance. You say, ‘My name is so-and-so,’ but this is only a name, this is not who you are. Your real identity is that you are a soul and an eternal servant of Krishna (‘jiva nitya Krsna-das’).

‘কৃষ্ণ-নিত্যদাস’—জীব তাহা ভুলি’ গেল ।
এই দোষে মায়া তার গলায় বান্ধিল ॥

‘krsna-nitya-dasa’—jiva taha bhuli’ gela
ei dose maya tara galaya bandhila

‘Jiva souls forgot that they are eternal servants of Krishna. Because of this mistake, illusion threw its ropes around their necks.’

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, 2.22.24)

Illusion attacks us as soon as we forget that we are eternal servants of Krishna. We are always servants of the Lord. We are not servants for one–two hours only – it is not like we will chant and give class for one or two hours, we will remember that we are the Lord’s servants, or menial workers, and the rest of the time we live with ‘I, I, I’ (engrossed in ourselves).

দীক্ষাকালে ভক্ত করে আত্মসমর্পণ ।
সেইকালে কৃষ্ণ তারে করে আত্মসম ॥

diksa-kale bhakta kare atma-samarpana
sei-kale krsna tare kare atma-sama

‘Devotees submit their entire being when they take initiation. At this time, Krishna accepts them as His very own.’

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, 3.4.192)

You surrender yourselves when you take initiation, but after that you forget everything. Taking initiation means being admitted to a school – your education does not end there. Do you think that students get school certificates just by being admitted to a school? They do not. They must first study for ten years, then they take exams, and then only they get a certificate (if they pass the exams). Exams show how much you have been studying (or not studying) during those ten years – they show whether you have been studying 45%, 35%, 60%, 80% or 90%. Therefore, once you are admitted to a school, it is necessary to study. What does studying mean in spiritual life? It is explained by Srila Sanatan Goswami.

There is sambandha (relationship), abhidheya (the means to the end), and prayojana (the goal). The Deity of sambandha is Madan-Mohan, the Deity of abhidheya is Govinda, and the Deity of prayojana is Gopinath. ‘Ei tina thakura gaudiyake kariyachena atmasat (এই তিন ঠাকুর গৌড়ীয়াকে করিয়াছেন আত্মসাৎ). These three Deities have captured the hearts of Gaudiya Vaishnavs’ (Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, 1.1.19). You can see that these three Deities (Madan-Mohan, Govinda and Gopinath) are installed in most places. Abhidheya, the means to the end, is sravan and kirtan. If you do not listen first (sravan), you will not be able to understand anything (kirtan). It is necessary to listen well, with your heart and soul. I have told you that if you have holes in a glass, you cannot keep water in it – all water will fall through the holes. In the same way, if your heart is full of other things, full of dirty things, where will you keep the Lord?

I have begun telling you the story about a sadhu who lived and practised Krishna consciousness on his own. Curious to know what kind of knowledge that sadhu had, some naughty man came to that sadhu to test him.

He did not come to him with a surrendered mood, but the main thing is that it is necessary to be surrendered. Surrender is the first rule in devotion. First and foremost, you must surrender, submit yourselves at the lotus feet of the Lord and gurudev. If you think, ‘I know a lot,’ then it is the end of talk because you will not be able to know anything like this: both all your attempts to learn anything and all others’ attempts to teach you anything will be in vain.

So, when the man came to the sadhu, the sadhu gave him a chair to sit on and put some old table next to him (the sadhu was a poor man, so he had only simple things). On the table, the sadhu put a glass of sherbet (sweet or flavoured water). He had a habit that when anyone came to him, he would give the guest some water or sherbet. Then, sitting on the chair and swinging his leg in the air, the man said, ‘Listen, sadhu, I have come to you for knowledge. Can you give me some?’ The sadhu thought, ‘What knowledge does he want to get from me? He thinks that he already knows everything more than me. Even if I try to teach him, what will he understand?’ He decided to teach the man a lesson. He brought some water and poured it into the glass of sherbet standing on the table. The glass was already full, so when he came and poured water into it, the water mixed with sherbet and started to spill over. The man was wearing nice pants and a shirt, and as the water flowed down the table, he got all wet.

‘You are a fool! You have spoilt my new clothes!’ he cried.

‘Yes, I did it on purpose,’ the sadhu explained.

‘What does that suppose to mean?’ the man asked, puzzled.

‘You are full of knowledge up to your head – where will I put knowledge into you? You have seen just now that I poured water and everything got spilled. Likewise, if I give you any knowledge, everything will spill over, nothing will stay in your head.’

If somebody thinks, ‘I know everything, I have understood everything’, this is a dead end.

We chant the Hare Krishna maha-mantra every day, so whenever you hear Hare Krishna chanted somewhere, you go there to listen to it. You think, ‘What is the problem? It is the same Holy Name, it is the same kirtan as we chant!’ It is actually not so. The difference is in the glory, the taste, the beauty of the Name. Somebody chants one lakh (100,000) Holy Names, somebody chants two, three, four lakhs – they all chant the same Holy Name, but is there any taste? Where does that taste take them? First, taste must come. If you eat a piece of sugar and do not feel its sweetness, then you can understand that you are ill. You can often see that sometimes people do not feel like eating anything – they try to eat but they cannot; it means that the person has some disease. So, if you chant the Holy Name and do not feel the taste, then you can understand that there is some disease in you: kama, krodha, lobha, moha, mada, matsarya (lust, anger, greed, illusion, madness, envy), rupa, rasa, gandha, sabda, sparsa (desire for enjoyment through eyes, tongue, nose, ears, skin), kanak, kamini, pratistha (desire for money, women, fame), avidya, asmita, raga, dvesa, abhinivesa (ignorance, false identification, misdirected love, aversion to anything that goes against your enjoyment, being unable to give up unfavourable habits). Those who are full of these diseases will not feel any taste for chanting the Holy Name – they will not like chanting the Holy Name.

Always remember this.

— : • : —

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

CLICK TO LISTEN TO THE LECTURE

Size: 49 Mb
Length: 101 min
Language: Bengali

READ OTHER PARTS:

1) What Is Surrender?
2) Proper Recipient for Proper Taste
3) Highest Stance
4) Cry and Pray
5) Seeking Respite
6) Greatest Choice
7) Nityananda Prabhu's Mercy
8) Mahaprabhu's Mercy
9) His Things, For His Service
10) Faith Is Not Idle
11) Devotion or Display?
12) Example to Follow
13) Shelter of Sri Guru's Mercy
14) Service or Offence?