Radhanath Swami explains Gratitude to Belgaum Devotees
My great thankfulness to all of you for coming today. Specially I am thankful to Maharaj ji for his great affection for all of us. Let us all welcome him by chanting loud “Hari Bol”. It is one of the most beautiful experiences to come and be with the devotees in Belgaum. Your simplicity and enthusiasm to chant and dance, to serve the Vaishnavas, to make wonderful Prasad has captured the hearts of most fortunate people who come to a new association. All Mumbai devotees agree with this too. Whenever devotees come from Mumbai, Radha Gopinath temple and visit Belgaum, whenever they come back they say, “Why can’t we be devotees like Belgaum”. And When Belgaum devotees come to Mumbai and go back, they think, “Why can’t we become devotees like Radha Gopinath temple’s”. This is the way Vaishnavas are. It cannot be understood with material mind. Devotees are always trying to put themselves in a secondary position to others. Devotees are very enthusiastic to give praise to other spiritualistic people as they are very much afraid to accept any such praise for themselves. So it is my service to praise you. Last night’s programme was Hari Bol Hari Bol Hari Hari Bol.
I am trying to follow his instructions.
Radhanath Swami narrates “Entire Universe in Mouth!!”
When Krishna was at Brahmanda Ghat in Gokula mahavana, Balaram and other Gopas told Yashoda mai that today Krishna has eaten the dirt. He was very little child and Yashoda mai was very much hurt. If you eat it, you may become sick, you may die. Why you eat it, and Gopala said, “I don’t eat it. Balaram and cowherd boys are making lies against me because I defeated them in the play today. If you want to see look into my mouth.” Yashoda Mai looked into his mouth, and she saw the entire creation within his mouth. She saw all the demigods, she saw all the mountains even the Himalayas, all the oceans and saw herself in the mouth. And When Yashoda Mai saw like this, she became very respectful to Gopala and she offered prayers to him, “Dear Bhagawan, please forgive me. I was thinking I am your mother. But you are the mother and father of everything. Sometimes when you’d steal the butter, I’d punish you by stick, and sometimes I’d chastise you but now I know that you are the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Please forgive me and accept me as your servant” But Krishna found more pleasure when she’d chastise her than when she was worshipping him as a devotee, so he closed his mouth and he was so beautiful with his smiling face that that beauty completely defeated all of the respectful feelings that she had upon seeing him as God. And she was thinking “If I do not feed him milk from my body, he’d be hungry.” And she began to feed him milk. This form of Krishna, the Supreme Godhead facilitates the most intimate loving exchanges. But also we understand that Madhurya is higher than Aishwarya. Love of God in intimacy is higher than love of God in reverence. But this cannot be artificially imitated. First we have to worship God, that you are my master, I am your servant and by serving him and serving his devotees and performing our sadhana that is strictly throughout life, gradually these higher realisations of intimate madhurya lila with Krishna awaken by Krishna’s Grace. But also we find within the story how within his mouth was the entire creation. That is the difference between us and Bhagawan. If we eat too many chapattis, we become sick, we get indigestion. Krishna can eat the entire creation and still be happy. Because Krishna is Vibhu, he is unlimited, and we are Anu, we are limited. jiver swarup hoy krishna nitya das
We are the eternal servants of Krishna.
Radhanath Swami clarifies “God is always God”
Some people say that actually we all are God but somehow we have forgotten. When you become liberated you realize that you are God. But God does not realize that he is God. God is always God. God never forgets. So, if got to the control of forgetfulness then forgetfulness would be greater than God. When Krishna was just a little infant in the laps of Yashoda mai, the great daemon Putana came. And even though she was so powerful, she had poison on her breast that could kill millions of men; Krishna drank her poison, then drank the milk, then drank out her life. Krishna never had to do Dhyaan, or Japa or sadhana to realize that he was a God. God is always God and the living entity is always his sewak.
Radhanath Swami sheds light on “How are we serving Krishna”
As the conditioned state, in forgetfulness, we are serving God indirectly. We are serving his Maya Shakti, and in the liberated state, we serve his Daivi Shakti . We serve him through love, and that loving exchange is the Supreme perfection of all our desires, and that is Bhakti. Bhakti is the eternal nature of every living soul, to surrender to Krishna with unalloyed devotion.
bhurini bhuri-karmani srotavyani vibhagasah
atah sadho ‘tra yat saram samuddhrtya manisaya
bruhi bhadraya bhutanam yenatma suprasidati
Bhagavatam explains the Supreme occupation of all the Humanities is awakening loving devotion towards Krishna, Such service should be without interruption and without any motivation except the Pleasure of the lord. And that is what our great acharyas have taught. In the songs of Tukaram, he sings only about the unalloyed devotion to the lord. It is the conclusion of all Knowledge.
bahūnāḿ janmanām ante jñānavān māḿ prapadyate
vāsudevaḥ sarvam iti sa mahātmā su-durlabhaḥ
After all studies of religion, yoga and dhyan are perfected, we surrender to Vasudev, knowing him to be the cause of all causes and one who has surrender to Krishna, he is Mahatma.
mahātmānas tu māṁ pārtha daivīṁ prakṛtim āśritāḥ.
bhajanty ananya-manaso jñātvā bhūtādim avyayam
Krishna defines Mahatma in Gita, One who is always under his protection and one who is always engaged in his loving service.
Radhanath Swami tells what should be Our Eternal Aspiration
Lord Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu came to teach this, nothing new. His life revealed the truths of Srimad Bhagavatam. He had a simple message, Worship Krishna, always remember Krishna, chant his holy names and serve his devotee, that’s all. And he was always serving the devotees. Sometimes when his devotees were going to Ganga, he would take the water for them. He’s fold their clothes for them, and he’s say This’s the greatest fortune Krishna is giving me, the opportunity to serve the Vaishnavas. So this is our eternal aspiration. We don’t want to serve so that ultimately we become God. We want to serve so that we become purified for the love and satisfaction of the Lord.
This is the land of Madhavacharya. He is the avatar of Vayu, so we have to understand the power and strength of Vayu. Krishna likes to bow down to his devotees. We just describe like this.
Any questions?
Question to Radhanath Swami – We hear different things about the London temple. Would you like to tell us something about it?
Ans- What have you heard? (Ans- That Temple has been closed.) You see in Kaliyuga, there will always be opposition. Our Guru Maharaj, Srila Prabhupada said, “If there is no opposition to your preaching it means you are not preaching properly because the world is full of materialists. And if you are teaching spirituality to materialists, some opposition would be there.” After all, Bhagavad Gita was spoken on Battle field. Bhagavad Gita was not meant to create peace, it was meant to create war. Krishna was not telling Arjuna, Be Peaceful. He was trying to incite him to fight war. So when people Om Shanti Shanti Shanti, we say,
sarva-dharmān parityajya mām ekaḿ śaraṇaḿ vraja ahaḿ
Radhanath Swami explains What is real peace?
But we have to understand what the real peace is. The peace of this world is not the real peace at all. Two nations consign treaties that we shall not fight, then they will go home and fight with their husbands and wives and children, and they’ll be crying in the streets. And they’ll always be thinking, What have I lost, what do I need, there’d always be battle in their senses and mind and eventually they will break the treaty and the nations will begin to fight. That is peace in the world. The real peace means To be free with ego, to be in complete harmony with the will of the god.
bhoktāraḿ yajña-tapasāḿ sarva-loka-maheśvaram
suhṛdaḿ sarva-bhūtānāḿ jñātvā māḿ śāntim ṛcchati
To understand that Krishna is the proprietor of everything, that everything is meant to be realised in his service, and he is the best friend of all living beings, one who knows this is really in peace. In order to come to this conclusion, we have to actually fight a war with our own mind and ego and amongst material tendencies. And maya will fight us, not only within but outside us. But when they come, it is actually an opportunity to purify our hearts. Krishna wants to see whether we are sincere or not. Like when little children go to school and they listen to their lessons and the teacher says, “Next Friday we’ll have exam” and all the children are in anxiety, nobody likes exam. In fact, everyone hates exam. But they are necessary, because they force you to become serious about studying the subject. So when there is opposition to our devotion, it forces us to become serious about the subjective pattern.
So in London, there are people who are Christian who do not like Hindus, and also some of their children have become Hare Krishnas. So they do not like this. And also when devotees chant kirtans, sometimes it makes many sounds. They don’t like these sound, they like rock’n’roll music, but Hari Kirtan they do not like and also the temple is very very popular. And at Janamashtmi, thousands and thousands of people come and to their churches, only few people come, so they do not like it. So they have launched very serious complaints. They say that this Hare Krishna temple is causing disturbance in our lives. So they approach so many governing leaders, we’ll work for you if you make them stop their worship. So they actually made a law where no public can worship in Hare Krishna Temple. But 20,000 Hindus and British Hare Krishna people marched on the banks of river Thames. And then the government was realising that this is very difficult situation. And so many big big people from India, America, Australia were writing letters that why are you opposing our faith. So the government did not know what to do because they want everyone’s votes. They are not concerned with justice. They are concerned with votes, because votes mean power for them. So there was very powerful oppositions to this. It has been a final hearing of the Supreme Court and they said they’ll decide it in the month of March. Hari Bol!
But this temple was very dear to Srila Prabhupada. You know how we got his temple? Srila Prabhupada’s Gurudev Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur opened 64 temples in India. But Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu wanted Bhagavat Dham to be spread throughout the world and that time offcourse, India was under British rule. And the British brainwashed Indians to think that London is the capital of the whole world. According to Srimad Bhagavatam, Naina Saraniya is the centre of universe. But according to the British, London is the centre of the whole universe. And the Indian people believed British people instead of Srimad Bhaagavatam. In fact, Srila Prabhupada, at one time in his young age, was working in a pharmacy. He had his own pharmaceutical company in Allahabad, and the Prime Minister Mr. Nehru used to come into that pharmaceutical store to get his medicine from our Gurudev. And Prabhupada told us that he had medicine made in India and medicine made in Great Britain. And the medicine made in Britain was 10 times the cost of the medicine made in India. And usually, it was the exact same medicine with the exact same chemical. But Mr. Nehru would always ask for the medicine made in London. And he was told, that it’s exactly the same medicine, why do you wan tt ospend 10 times more for this. And he would say, if it is made in London it is First Class and if it is made in India, it is Third Class. This was the leaders in India. This is how much the minds had changed. Anyways, Bhakti Siddhant Sarwati send some Sanyasi s to London to start a branch of Gaudiya-Math. And they started their centre and a few old widow ladies start coming. So Bhati Siddhant Saraswati called these sanyasis back and said you did not do very good job. But our Guru Maharaj, he started the first temple in New York, in San Francisco, then Montreal and from Montreal he sent 6 of his disciples to London and said “My Guru Maharaj wanted a centre there. Please start a nice centre in London.” When they went they had nothing. One of the ladies, She is my God-Sister, she had an infant child and because they had no place to stay she would make the child sleep in the basement of the house and their bed room was a cardboard box. There was a big box for Television or something, and She and her daughter would sleep in the box. Very simple life. But they had Guru Nistha (Faith).
Radhanath Swami explains about Faith in Guru
mukam karoti vacalam pangum langhayate girim
yat-kripa tam aham vande sri gurum dina tarinam
If you have faith in Guru, then even if you are layman, you can cross the Himalayan Mountains. Even if you are dumb then you can speak beautiful beautiful poetries. And even if you are blind man, you can see the sun and the stars in the sky.
These 6 people were not great Vedantists. They were simple Bhaktas. But they had Guru-Nistha , Sharnaagati. They were willing to serve under any circumstances. So they struggles like this, they were all in separate places.
Inspiring Beetles: A new hare Krishna temple in London
Srila Prabhupada was writing letters to them every week. And he told them, If you can convince a leader of society that people can help you convince everyone. So they decided that amongst the young generation of the whole western world, which means, United States, Canada all of the Europe, Australia is also like western world, all these places, who is the most influential people. It was a musical band, named the Beetles. Whatever they say was like Shastra to the Young generation people. Whatever they say, everyone would believe. “Yes! Yes! The Beetles have said”. Sri Beetles uvacha!! Like that. So the Beetles were from London, so these devotees rather got to meet them , gave them Prasad, chanted the mantra, and one of them became devotee, the lead guitar player and another one had a big big mansion beautiful house, millionaire. He said, Invite your Guru Maharaj and he can stay at my house, so they invited Prabhupada. Then the Beetles, they owned a recording company and they invited 6 devotees to make a record, they would pay for the whole record, no compromise, just singing Sanskrit and Bengali bhajans and they would distribute it to the whole world. So they made the record called the Radha-Krishna temple, and they chanted Brahma samhita, Govindam-adi-purusham tam-ahem bhajami, Bajahu re mana sri nanda-nandan, sri ishopnishada, gaur-arti and Hare Krishna Mahamantra. And this Hare Krishna Mahamantra they made a record, and this was the number 1 selling record in Europe. And everyone was chanting Hare Krishna, and then this person was very helpful because the devotees didn’t have a proper temple. So Prabhupada asked, Can you get us a nice temple. So one of my God-Brothers, Dhananjaya, he was out searching for a nice place and he found beautiful beautiful big big house in the country with wonderful lawns and lakes and everything. And this man, George Harrison, the beetle, he bought the whole state and gift it to Prabhupada. The 6 devotees, they actually did not have anything, sleeping in cardboard boxes, and without any material endeavour, just by preaching Hari Naam, now they have a beautiful beautiful mansion with parks and lawns and parking lawns and everything. Prabhupada came and he installed the deities of Radha Gokulananda. That is the name od the deities, Radha Gokulananda. So there is some connection between Belgaum and London. Our temple is also Radha Gokulananda. And Prabhupada told the devotees, Now we have this beautiful place, do not use it for your sense gratification. You are not allowed to be comfortable here. This is Krishna’s place and meant for preaching Krishna’s name. Soon, hundreds and hundreds of devotees came and practically all the Hindu community of London accepted that this was their place of worship. On big festivals, tens and thousands would come for Kirtan, and drama and pravachan of Sri Radha Gokulananda. Srila Prabhupada gave a lot of time and energy in preaching at that place. Srila Prabhupada was very happy, and said the desire of my Guru Maharaj is now fulfilled, that Krishna has conquered London. The British conquered India, but now India is conquering British. In March, Krishna will reveal what he wants.
Radhanath Swami explains of the “Ultimate Supreme Court”
Ultimately there is only one supreme court, that is Krishna. In this world each country has a supreme court, but it is not supreme at all because everyone of the supreme court justices someday will have to stand before Yamaraj and then they’ll realise that they are not the Supreme Court. Yamaraj is the Supreme Court of this Universe. But we read in Srimad Bhagavatam when Yamdutas came to take Ajamil away, the Vishnudutas said you are not allowed to take him away, and Yamdutas didn’t have the power to challenge the Vishnudutas. They were very confused because they were thinking that Yamaraj is the Supreme court justice of this universe, no one is greater than him. How is it that anyone has the power to disobey him? So they came to Yamaraj, in great distress nad said Who are these beautiful people who have the power to stop us when we are killing people, and Yamaraj said that I am not the supreme, Vishnu is supreme, I am his humble servant, not only me but even Brahmna and Shiva and Narada are all humble servants. Krishna is the Supreme Court Justice. But directly he doesn’t get involved in all these things, As Vishnu he does these justice, but Vishnu is an expansion of Govinda. Govinda simply plays. In the spiritual world of Goloka, he is Rasaraj, Rasabihari. He just have loving exchanges. Just like when the supreme court justice of our land, when he goes home, he doesn’t wear his robes and doesn’t say to his wife and children that you are sentenced for 20 years. In the court everyone stands, Your honor may i have permission to speak.
Question to Radhanath Swami– In today’s world, one cannot live without money, but money is an obstacle for our sadhana, so what should we do towards this?
Ans:- You have to be serious about our duty. Your first priority is tha real aim of life. The real aim of life is not to accumulate money. It is to accumulate Bhakti. The real aim of life is to purify our heart and become a pure servant of Krishna and to be detached to anything that is not pleasing to Krishna. But while living in this world, somehow we have to survive and in the process of survival we have to use whatever we have for Krishna. Just like this is your house, very nice house and whenever devotees come, you say, “Please come into my house” and you give them nice Prasad and today over 100 people are there enjoying in the house performing Kirtan, Hari Katha, Prasad. This is the proper purpose of house and if our money is being used for this type of sewa, then it is very good. But at the same time, if we do not do proper sadhana, and we do not have proper satsang, then our money just becomes a burden. Srimad Bhagavatam explains that if you are drowning in an ocean and if you are wearing a big big crown or turban, that will only make you sink faster in the ocean, howsoever valuable it is. So in making wealth, we do not have proper balance to do sadhana and do satsangs, then all the wealth we create will result in faster drowning into the ocean of ignorance. But if we have proper sadhana and proper satsang and we are living a devotional life, then whatever money we earn, we’ll naturally use for good purposes and it’ll actually uplift us. So you should not be greedy. The greedy mentality is every moment is money, time is money. If I put 9 hours, I make so much. If I put 12 hours, I’ll make more. So why should I do my sadhana. Every moment I do japa, I could make money. Every moment I’m reading Shastra, I could be making money. This is the mentality of an animal. Bhagavatam says men who are like dog, camel and asses, they glorify others who are like dog, camel and asses. So we should not be like ass, foaming at the mouth, carrying big burdens, just to get kick on the face, just to get grass. How many chapattis can you eat? Mr. Birla cannot any more chapatis
Than the sweeper of the street, but if you have real peace in Bhakti, then your life is successful, so we should not be greedy. We should lead a very simple life and keep ample time . An ornament in your Bhakti.
We’d like to have temple everywhere, especially where you want us to have temple. In English, it is said “Men proposes, God disposes”. We are very open to the idea. Let us see how Krishna wants us to serve.
We are very happy with Nanda Maharaj for nicely serving all of you, by inviting you all to his nice house, enjoy chanting, dancing and feasting. It is a very nice example when we use what we have to propagate the Holy Name and serve the Lord’s devotees. Hari Bol!
Any Question? If there is no question than I’ll go to Mumbai. As long as there are questions, I’ll serve you. As long as there is no service, there is no need for my existence.
Radhanath Swami asks “Follow Srila Prabhupada’s Instruction”
It’s my humble request to all of you to follow Srila Prabhupada’s last instruction. He told us that we can show our love for him by how we cooperate with one another. So these two principles are most important, to remain very pure, by strictly living according to the highest principles of morality, by regularly chanting the name of lord, by having nice satsang, this will keep us very pure. This will keep us protected from maya, it’ll keep us always at the lotus feet of Krishna. And by cooperating with one another and to assist one another in the mission of the lord is the greatest sacrifice because there are people all over the world who are suffering terribly because of the ignorance. People not only in Belgaum, but throughout the world, who are suffering and wasting this valuable human life, and the world is in chaos because of it, but by the grace of lord Sri Krishna and our Guru Maharaj, we have the medicine that could give them relief and each and every one of us is responsible to help in this way. But our fighting is over those details that do not really mean anything. I’ve been listening to so many problems about different conflicts and they are all meaningless, all little details of the ego in the mind, either you do it this way or that way, if you just do it then the mission will go on. But when we are having conflict, then the mission is stopped and all of these souls starving for the medicine of the holy name remain starving over who is better. So we should not be concerned over these fights. We should keep our minds focussed on the mission in life and the desperate need of the world, and in this way we can cooperate very nicely to work together to make a wonderful offering to Krishna and a wonderful offering to Humanity by broadcasting the message of the great acharyas, to chant the Holy names of Krishna.
Thank you very much. That is my request.
