(6/10) Perverted Tastes and Habits

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
Sri Ekachakra Dham, evening class, 26 February 2021
Translated from Bengali, part 6

You are living here, in this holy abode (Sri Ekachakra Dham). It is a very beautiful place. Even I have not got this kind of great fortune, but you have – you are here, in the holy abode of Nitai. This is Ekachakra Dham, where all the dust is Nitai’s footdust. You must never desire to leave this holy footdust and go anywhere else. We also do not want to leave, but we have no other way – we have to go to different temples, we have to go for preaching. I do not stay in one place…

Gauri Das Pandit tried to keep Mahaprabhu and Nityananda Prabhu at his home. He said, ‘I will not let You go! You must stay here!’ Because Gauri Das Pandit was Their devotee, Nityananda Prabhu and Mahaprabhu became Deities and stayed at his house. Gauri Das Pandit’s temple and those Deities are still there; it is a very beautiful place in Kalna.

If our fortune becomes bad and we make vaishnav-aparadha, service will go away from us. When that happens, we must not blame anyone for this – we must always look for faults in ourselves. We will not look for holes in others. Gurudev said, ‘I am not a drain inspector.’ What is there in the drain? You go to the bathroom, pass stool, and it goes away into a drain. So, if you dig in a drain, you will only get bad smell. If you always go about saying bad things, the faults you speak about will come to you. That is why Gurudev said that we must never look for faults in anyone.

Somebody may have some faults, but there is also something good in them. Suppose you have seen somebody steal prasad – they did what they did, it is their offence, but if you go about telling others about it, then you will be making an even bigger offence. You can talk to the person who stole prasad and try to explain to them that it is wrong to do that, ‘Brother, it is not right to do this. Do not steal the Lord’s things.’ You can try to explain it and correct them politely.

Listen to what I am saying. If you do not learn to be like that, you will never be able to practise Krishna consciousness. You only look for faults in others, you look for others’ holes, but Vaishnavs are adosa-darasi – they never see others’ faults. We must look for our own faults, ‘What faults do I have?’ ‘Gurudev has kicked me out, Gurudev is bad’ – no! We will only see that we are guilty, that we have faults; we will not see fault in anyone else.

What did Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur say?

বৈষ্ণব-চরিত্র, সর্ব্বদা পবিত্র,
যেই নিন্দে হিংসা করি’ ।
ভকতিবিনোদ না সম্ভাষে তাঁ’রে,
থাকে সদা মৌন ধরি’ ॥

vaisnava-charitra, sarvada pavitra,
yei ninde himsa kari’
bhaktivinoda, na sambhase tan’re,
thake sada mauna dhari’

‘Vaishnavs’ character is always pure. Bhaktivinod keeps quiet and does not associate with those who are envious of Vaishnavs and who criticise Vaishnavs.’

(Sri Kalyan-kalpataru, Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur)

If anyone criticised Vaishnavs in front of Srila Bhaktivinod Thakur, he would always keep quiet. He would become grave and said nothing – he did not like to hear such things.

Even in Srila Prabhupad Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakur’s time, there were some brahmacharis who would fight and complain to Prabhupad, ‘He did this!’, ‘He did that!’ – they blamed each other and never saw their own faults. Such people have ego and they are offenders of Vaishnavs, that is why they can never see their own faults. They only roam around looking for faults in others, criticising others and gossiping about others.

I know that you do not like to hear all this, but I am telling it to you straight, as it is.

If you eat rice, your stomaches will be full – if you eat chanachur [a common Indian junk-food snack], it may be very tasty, but will chanachur fill your stomaches? So, criticising others, talking bad about others may taste delicious to you, but it brings no spiritual benefit. This is the example that Srila Prabhupad gave. You can eat chanachur, bhujia and other tasty things, they taste very good – do they not? – but they will not fill your stomaches.

So, never search faults in others. You must always say, ‘I am the offender. I never want to look for faults in others.’

Those who make offences against Vaishnavs can never get any good result – they cannot even chant the Holy Name, no matter how much they count the beads. We are told to chant the Holy Name giving up the ten offences, and the first offence is sadhu-ninda – criticising devotees. Always remember this. I always tell you this. Mahaprabhu also told:

গ্রাম্যকথা না শুনিবে, গ্রাম্যবার্ত্তা না কহিবে ।
ভাল না খাইবে আর ভাল না পরিবে ॥
অমানী মানদ হঞা কৃষ্ণনাম সদা ল'বে ।
ব্রজে রাধাকৃষ্ণ সেবা মানসে করিবে ॥

gramya-katha na sunibe, gramya-varta na kahibe
bhala na khaibe ara bhala na paribe
amani manada hana krsna-nama sada la’be
vraje radha-krsna seva manase karibe

‘Do not listen to village talks, do not speak about village news. Do not eat fancy food, do not wear fancy clothes. Do not expect honour from others, give all respect to others. Always chant the Holy Name of Krishna and serve Radha-Krishna in your mind.’

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, 3.6.236–237)

Gramya-katha and gramya-varta means prajalpa (idle, useless talks) – gossiping about others, criticising others. For as long as you do this, you will neither ever attain any spiritual benefit nor ever chant the Holy Name; you will be making offences, and gradually everything will be finished for you. You will be left with nothing. Therefore,

গ্রাম্যকথা না শুনিবে, গ্রাম্যবার্ত্তা না কহিবে ।
ভাল না খাইবে আর ভাল না পরিবে ॥
অমানী মানদ হঞা কৃষ্ণনাম সদা ল'বে ।
ব্রজে রাধাকৃষ্ণ সেবা মানসে করিবে ॥

gramya-katha na sunibe, gramya-varta na kahibe
bhala na khaibe ara bhala na paribe
amani manada hana krsna-nama sada la’be
vraje radha-krsna seva manase karibe

‘Do not listen to village talks, do not speak about village news. Do not eat fancy food, do not wear fancy clothes. Do not expect honour from others, give all respect to others. Always chant the Holy Name of Krishna and serve Radha-Krishna in your mind.’

(Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita, 3.6.236–237)

Never speak and never listen to all these so-called pleasant-sounding talks (what somebody’s daughter or daughter-in-law did, what this person did, what that person did, and so on). If you enjoy such talks, you are only cheating yourselves. You may like to hear such things, but it will damage your spiritual lives.

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Length: 80 min
Language: Bengali

READ OTHER PARTS:

1) Main Festivals
2) Serve with Faith
3) Service Duty (1)
4) Service Duty (2)
5) Heed My Word
6) Perverted Tastes and Habits
7) Snowball of Offences
8) Path to Indigestion
9) Memorable Pastimes
10) Kali Yuga Brahmans