(13/13) Determination and Surrender

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
Bankura Temple Anniversary Festival,
26 January 2021, part 13
Translated from Bengali

[Noticing a young boy in the audience, His Divine Grace remarks] It is necessary to practise Krishna consciousness from this young age. Everyone must eat vegetarian food and fast on ekadasi. You must try to practise. Try to explain to your parents also. You are chanting the Holy Name, do your parents say anything to you? Do they not prohibit you to chant? Parents usually get scared that their child will become a sannyasi and go away. My parents were also angry. Do you know what my father did? When I was little, I would wake up in the morning, take a bath, and then I would put on my father’s dhoti and go to a small temple we had near our house to read Srimad Bhagavad-gita for one hour. My father was not at home at that time, so he did not see me. Actually, he did not live at home most of the time – he worked in another place and would return home from time to time. One day, he came home and noticed that somebody had been using his dhoti. He asked my mother about the dhoti, and she said that I was reading Gita every day. Then, my father said, ‘Disaster!’ and wanted to tear the book. My mother hid the book because she understood it is an offence to tear Gita. My parents obstructed me in many ways. Later, I ran away from home without telling anyone, and they did not know for thirteen years that I had come to the temple. They only learnt about it after I took sannyas. They even did my sraddha at home, thinking that I was dead. Well and good. If I felt sorry for them, I would not have been able to come to this line.

আসক্তিরহিত, সম্বন্ধসহিত,
বিষয়সমূহ সকলি মাধব ॥

asakti-rahita, sambandha-sahita,
visaya-samuha sakali madhava

‘When you are free from material attachment and establish relationship with the Lord, then you will see that everything around you is Lord Madhav Himself.’

(‘Vaishnav ke?’ Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakur)

Those who criticised me and mocked me (‘Oh, look at him, he has become a sadhu!’) suffered very much in their lives. Somebody became a school master, somebody became a college professor, somebody became a doctor, but they do not look after their parents. Their parents lived with one of the sons, and the daughter-in-law abused them; they went to another son’s house – the same story; then, to the third son’s house – again suffering. All my aunts died suffering, but my mother died peacefully. The Lord says, ‘If you think about Me, I will think about you.’ Lord Krishna says in Gita, ‘I do not know anyone apart from My devotees, and My devotees also do not know anyone apart from Me.’

ষড়ঙ্গ শরণাগতি হইবে যাঁহার ।
তাঁহার প্রার্থনা শুনে শ্রীনন্দকুমার ॥

sad-anga saranagati haibe yanhara
tanhara prarthana sune sri-nanda-kumara

‘Lord Krishna hears the prayers of those who surrender in six ways.’

(Saranagati, Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur)

You must have full surrender. Unless you become fully surrendered, the Lord will not hear your prayer. People pray to the Lord because they have some desires, but we do not think, ‘What makes the Lord happy?’ We think, ‘I like paneer, so I should cook paneer,’ but the truth is that we must cook for the Lord, for the devotees – not for our own mouths. We sing in one of the kirtans:

সর্ব্বস্ব তোমার, চরণে সঁপিয়া,
পড়েছি তোমার ঘরে ।
তুমি ত’ ঠাকুর, তোমার কুকুর,
বলিয়া জানহ মোরে ॥

sarvasva tomara, charane sampiya,
padechhi tomara ghare
tumi ta’ thakura, tomara kukura,
baliya janaha more

‘Submitting everything at Your feet, I have come to Your home. You are my Master, so please consider me Your dog.’

বাঁধিয়া নিকটে, আমারে পালিবে,
রহিব তোমার দ্বারে ।
প্রতীপ-জনেরে, আসিতে না দিব,
রাখিব গড়ের পারে ॥

tava nija-jana, prasada seviya,
uchchhista rakhibe yaha
amara bhojana, parama-anande,
prati-dina habe taha

‘Whatever remnants Your devotees leave behind after honouring Your prasad, I will eat that very happily every day.’

(Saranagati, Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur)

These are very beautiful words. We must eat the remnants of Vaishnavs’ food every day with great joy. We must not eat for our own happiness.

আত্মেন্দ্রিয়প্রীতি-বাঞ্ছা—তারে বলি ‘কাম’ ।
কষ্ণেন্দ্রিয়প্রীতি-ইচ্ছা ধরে ‘প্রেম’ নাম ॥

atmendriya-priti-vancha—tare bali ‘kama’
krsnendriya-priti-ichchha dhare ‘prema’ nama

‘The desire to gratify one’s own senses is kama (lust), but the desire to please the senses of Lord Krishna is prema (divine love).’

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, 1.4.165)

If you do something for the pleasure of your own senses, it is kama (lust, material desire for enjoyment). We must do everything for Krishna’s happiness. We must spend every single moment for Krishna’s satisfaction and happiness. We will study, labour, go to work or run a business for the Lord. We must do everything for the Lord. When somebody calls me, I always tell them to do some service, I never tell anyone to do anything for my own self. I never worry about myself – I never even think that I need a toothbrush, some phone airtime, socks or anything else. Some devotees give me some money, but I never think, ‘Oh, I will buy a toothbrush or a pair of shoes with that money.’ I never think about all these things.

[Noticing the chants coming from a nearby mosque, His Divine Grace remarks] It is said in the Quran that you can kill a jiva soul only if you can give life to a jiva soul. Can anyone give life to another soul? So, you cannot kill any jiva souls. Muslims and Hindus sacrifice goats and observe what is called ‘asura nidhan’ (slaying of demons). The true meaning of this ritual is to kill the demon within you – if you kill a goat, does that make you a better person? Vedas say that you must sacrifice all demoniac propensities within your heart – you cannot sacrifice a goat instead to please your own senses. Gurudev also told a funny story. There was a man who used to make a goat sacrifice every year at his house. One year, he did not make this sacrifice, and when Gurudev heard about it, he said, ‘Oh, I know why. The owner of the house where they held that sacrifice does not have any teeth now!’ No scripture, no Veda says that we can kill other jiva souls. We say we follow Vedas, but at the same time, we do what is prohibited by the Vedas.

[It is time to offer the noon bhoga] All right, I am finishing here. Let us chant some kirtan now.

— : • : —

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Length: 108 min
Language: English

READ OTHER PARTS:

1) Remembering Guru-Varga
2) Sacrifice For Preaching
3) Loving Interactions
4) A Hole In Surrender
5) Have a Heart For the Temple
6) Power of Service
7) Origin of Bhagavatam (1)
8) Origin of Bhagavatam (2)
9) Origin of Bhagavatam (3)
10) Lacking or Slacking?
11) Feeling Hungry?
12) Main Target
13) Determination and Surrender