Eternal Values

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
Basirhat, 13 January 2021, part 9
Translated from Bengali

If a father does not truly bring you to this path of Krishna consciousness, he is not a father to you. If your friends do not truly bring you to this path of Krishna consciousness, they are not your friends. Your greatest friends are those who can give you attachment to the lotus feet of Sri Krishna—your kin, your own are those who bring you to the Lord, who take you out of this world of Maya and engage you in the service to the holy lotus feet of the Lord. You should come to this kind of personalities and serve them. O Vaishnav Thakur! You are the nearest person to me, you are my greatest friend!

We are sons of nectar. All of us are children of one father—we are sons and daughters of the Lord! We are relatives to each others. You think that I am in Nabadwip and you are here in Basirhat, somebody is in Mexico, somebody is in Colombia, somebody is in Venezuela, somebody is in London, somebody is Muslim, somebody is a brahman, somebody is a ksatriya, etc. But all these distinctions are created by us.

Somebody can wear a brahman thread and say, "I am a brahman!" which means they wear the thread today and they are a brahman and if they take it off they are not a brahman any more—is that so? You must first become a brahman. One does not become a brahman just by saying so or by wearing a brahman thread.

Therefore, surrender to a bona fide guru and practise Krishna consciousness in your own life. Mahaprabhu is so merciful! He is not an ordinary soul. Choosing Sachi Mata and Jagannath Misra as His parents, He appears in this Kali-yuga. He has given this world the transcendental magnanimous love for Supreme Lord Sri Krishna! He tolerated so much in this world, but He did not take up any weapon. Have you read Mahaprabhu's teaching? It is so beautiful. What teaching did He give to this world? People worship Kali, Durga, but they turn God into a bribe-taker. We make the Lord our servant. People say, "O Mother Durga, please give me strength, please give me money, etc." and in return for that they give Mother Durga some money—she becomes their servant and people expect her to serve them. Devotees do not behave like that, they never say such things to the Lord. When brahmans do their puja during Durga Puja, you can hear them say in loudspeakers, "Dhanam dehi, vidyam dehi, rupam dehi, varyam dehi, kavitam dehi, sundarim dehi (give me wealth, give me knowledge, make me beautiful, give me a good wife, make me a poet, give me a beautiful girlfriend), etc." "Give me this, give me that"—they make Gods their servants and in lieu of that they give their gods some bribe (some banana, some money, some flower, etc.). You come to worship a demigod but instead of worshipping them you turn them into bribe-takers and your servants. But Mahaprabhu said,

ন ধনং ন জনং ন সুন্দরীং কবিতাং বা জগদীশ কাময়ে ।
মম জন্মনি জন্মনীশ্বরে ভবতাদ্ভক্তিরহৈতুকী ত্বয়ি ॥

na dhanam na janam na sundarim kavitam va jagadisa kamaye
mama janmani janmanisvare bhavatad bhaktir ahaituki tvayi

"I do not want wealth, I do not want followers, I do not want beautiful women, I do not want to be a poet. I only want causeless devotion to Your lotus feet. Give me that kind of devotion to Your lotus feet so that I could do Your service life after life."

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, Antya-lila, 20.29)

প্রভু তব পাদযুগে মোর নিবেদন ।
নাহি মাগি দেহসুখ বিদ্যা ধন জন ॥
নাহি মাগি স্বর্গ আর মোক্ষ নাহি মাগি ।
না করি প্রার্থনা কোন বিভূতির লাগি ॥

prabhu tava pada-yuge mora nivedana
nahi magi deha-sukha, vidya, dhana, jana
nahi magi svarga ara moksa nahi magi
na kari prarthana kona vibhutira lagi

"O Lord, I am appealing at Your holy lotus feet—I do not pray for bodily pleasure, learning, wealth, or followers. I do not pray for heaven, I do not pray for liberation, and I do not pray for any supernatural powers."

(Sri Siksastakam, 4, Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur)

Devotees do not want heaven. Heaven is temporary. You get to heaven due to pious activities, but when the result of those pious activities finishes, you have to come back again to this world. If you do pious activities, you will go to heaven, and if you make a lot of sins, you will go to hell, but even if you go to heaven, once your pious credit finishes, you have to go back to this world. That is why devotees do not want heaven. Even if you stay there for hundreds of thousands of years, you will still have to come back. Devotees do not want liberation. What do they want? "My Lord, please allow me to have devotion and attachment to Your holy lotus feet birth after birth. Whatever birth I may take, even if I am born as a dog, please allow me to be born as a dog in the house of Your devotee—taking prasad, Your devotee will throw the plate away, and I will take the remnants from that plate. Devotees do not want to become Brahmas. When Hiranyakasipu asked Lord Brahma for immortality, Brahma said that it was not in his power—he said, "Even thought I am a disciple of Krishna and I was created by Krishna, I too have to die one day. I too will have to leave this body and go to some other place." Kali, Durga, Ganesh live for some days, and then somebody else becomes Kali, Ganesh, Laksmi, or Saraswati...

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