Tag Archives: fault finding

How to worship Nityanananda Prabhu ?

by

Hare Krishna.

25th April, 2015. Gurgaon.

Last Saturday was a very special day as HG Madhavananda Prabhuji, along with his kindhearted wife KrishnaKunda Mataji, purified our home. Prabhuji stayed only for day but he enlightened all of us with his deep insights into Krishna consciousness.

Madhavanda Prabhuji 1

During the discussions at home Prabhuji asked do I know why do we offer chappan bhoga (56 dishes) to Krishna ? I replied in negative. After a while Prabhuji searched and came back to share the mystery of offering chappan bhoga to Lord.

When Krishna lifted Govardhan mountain for seven days he couldn’t eat anything . After seven days when the whole lila was over, Brajawasis were very happy and they offered Lord Krishna food for what he had missed throughout those seven days. Mother Yashoda used to feed Krishna eight times a day. Hence the number became  7 x 8 = 56

So they made fifty-six different things for Lord Krishna and offered Him as a token of their love and gratitude. Thus began the tradition of offering “Chhappan Bhog” to Supreme Lord on festive occasions.

All glories to Govardhan Lila!

Although Prabhuji was very tired, his next day was a hectic same day return trip to Vrindavan, yet he agreed to our request to visit the  deity installation ceremony at the home of Shyamvihari prabhuji.

We entered the packed home of Shyamvihari Prabhuji, everyone was dancing  to the kirtan by HG Sriniket prabhuji. We took darshan of very beautiful Nitai Gaura Sundar.

Nita Gaura Sundar

Madhavananda Prabhuji spoke very briefly, less than 30 minutes, but Prabhuji mesmerised everyone with his deep thought process and made everyone think too. I am sharing some nectar.

Madhavanda Prabhuji 3

Prabhuji first sang a beautiful bhajan by an anonymous vaishanava called Krishna Das. I request readers to kindly read it carefully and absorb the English translation of each para carefully as the whole session was based on it and these lines will get quoted again.

adoña daraçi mora prabhu nityänanda

nä bhajinu hena prabhura caraëärabinda

I pray that Lord Nityananda will not look at my sins, I did not worship the Lord’s lotus feet.

häya re nä jäni mu-i kemana asura

pä”ä nä bhajinu hena dayära öhäkura

Alas! I did not know. What a demon I was. I did not worship Lord Nitai, the Lord of mercy.

häya re abhägära präëa ki sukhe ächaha

nitä-i baliyä kena mariyä nä yäha

O my unfortunate heart! Will you ever become happy? Why do you not call out, “Nitai!”, and die.

nitä-ira karuëä çuni päñäëa miläya

häya re daruëa hiyä nä darabe täya

When they hear of Lord Nitai’s mercy, even the stones melt. O my cruel heart, you do not melt when you hear His glories.

nitä-i caitanya aparädha nähi mane

yäre täre nija prema-bhakti kare däne

To persons who do not offend Lord Chaitanya, Lord Nitai gives the gift of spiritual love and devotion.

tära näma la-ite nä gale mora hiyä

kåñëa-däsa kahe mu-i baòa abhägiyä

Alas! The Lord’s holy name does not rest on my throat or in my heart. Krishna Das says: I am very unfortunate.

After the above prayer, Madhavanand Prabhuji started the session by first quoting the below verse

vande sri-krishna-caitanya-nityanandau sahoditau

gaudodaye pushpavantau citrau san-dau tamo-nudau ( cc Adi lila 1.2)

 Translation

I offer my respectul obeisances unto Sri Krishna Caitanya and Lord Nityananda, who are like the sun and moon. They have arisen simultaneously on the horizon of Gauda to dissipate the darkness of ignorance and thus wonderfully bestow benediction upon all.

Prabhuji explained that Gaur Nitai have arisen simultaneously and it is difficult to say who among Them is the Sun and who is the moon. Sun and moon are very auspicious and hence whatever auspicious qualities are there in Sun and moon are there in Gaura Nitai. Prabhuji mentioned  that sun drives away all darkness but Gaura Nitai drives away darkness even from those parts which are sheltered from the sun. If we are sitting in a closed room, with all doors and windows locked, then no sunshine can enter that room but if someone gets mercy of Gaura Nityananada then even the dark cave of our heart become illuminated!

The Sun also purifies everything,  even the most contaminated things like urine and stool too get purified under the sun. Similarly we also hide the most contaminated things in our heart which are comparable to urine and stool. The sun can not purify things in our heart because sun can not see them but the mercy of Gaura Nityananada can purify all the contamination in our heart! Similarly moon helps things grow and in the same way Gaura Nitai help our bhakti creeper, `bhakti lata beeja’, to grow and it is very very cooling, it helps extinguish the fire of this materialistic life.

Prabhuji said, as we are installing Gaur Nitai deities, we must understand what does it mean by worshiping Gaura Nitai ? They didn’t come into this world to be worshiped as Deities. We have to follow Their mood.  Prabhuji sang the famous line

uttama adhama kichhu na kaila bichara,…

Lord Nityananda  never discriminates whether one is uttama or adhama, most elevated or most degraded. Gaur Nitai do not see any designations, who is an Indian, who is an western, who is a brahmin, who is a mallecha. They give Their mercy to every one. And this is really Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu’s mercy, this is really Mahaprabhu’s movement and this is what we want! Our purpose is not to just make their deity and worship them, our purpose is that we want Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu and Sri Nityananda Prabhu to appear in our hearts! So are we getting that ?? Gaura Nitai gave everyone Krishna Prema ! Prabhuji then asked the devotees to raise their hands who among them has received Krishna Prema ! When no one raised their hand then Prabhuji pushed devotees to think why are we not receiving it ? Madhavananda Prabhuji quoted from the same bhajan to say that Nityananda Prabhu is my Lord. Why ? Because He is adosha-darshi, He doesn’t see any faults and that is exactly what I want because I am full of faults.

Prabhuji then added that our mind should be always focused on Krishna internally, while still remaining in our particular ashram externally, and quoted the below verse

antare niṣṭhā kara, bāhye loka-vyavahāra
acirāt kṛṣṇa tomāya karibe uddhāra (cc madhya 16.239)

Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu continued, “Within your heart you should keep yourself very faithful, but externally you may behave like an ordinary man. Thus Kṛṣṇa will soon be very pleased and deliver you from the clutches of māyā.

Prabhuji said that by following how Mahaprabhu is suggesting, by living our lives as per our whatever be our position in the society, while internally remaining oblivious to them, then we can really chant the name of Nityananda and Gaura!

Prabhuji then asked `So what is the symptom that we have received the mercy of Nityananda Prabhu ?’

nitä-ira karuëä çuni päñäëa miläya..häya re daruëa hiyä nä darabe täya..

That when a stone hears about how merciful  Nityananda Prabhu’s is, the stone melts. But

My heart, harder than a stone, it won’t melt ! I am so unfortunate. Why won’t it melt ?  What am I doing wrong ?

nitä-i caitanya aparädha nähi mane

One might say that I am doing some offenses, but you say that, Nitai and Gaura, They do not consider any offence, rather

yäre täre nija prema-bhakti kare däne

They give nija prema bhakti, They give Krishna Prema. So what I am doing wrong ?

Madhavananda Prabhuji then asked how do we worship Surya Deva ? By showing a burning Ghee wick. Similarly how we worship Ganga Devi, by offering her Ganga water.

So how should we worship adosha-darshi Nityananda ?

Prabhuji then stated strongly that this is what the author of this bhajan is  saying that I am not worshiping Nityananda Prabhu, because worshiping Nitai means that I do not find fault in others!!

Prabhuji quoted Srila Prabhupada who wrote in his purport to cc Adi8.62 `It is a qualification of a Vaishnava that he is adoṣa-darśī: he never sees others’ faults‘.

Prabhuji said that on this day we should think why Gaura Nitai have not entered our hearts yet ? Why is that this ecstasy of love of God is not touching me ? Because I am not really worshiping Them! I am doing something external. I am waving some incense, I am ringing the bell, I am offering some prayers. Prabhuji said this is fine, that is all very pious, but that is not why Gaura Nitai came. They came, like the sun and the moon, to dissipate the darkness of ignorance of this world. First of all we have to open our heart to Them. And we do that by giving up the propensity to criticise or fault find in other people.

Prabhuji said that if we are busy with finding faults in others then we are not worshiping Nityananda. Rather we are working for Chitragupta (assistant of Yamaraja, who keeps the account of everyone’s mistakes and sinful activities). To work in the court of Nityananda Prabhu means we must give up fault-finding and the propensity for bearing grudges.

Prabhuji said that in our lives we all have a choice, a decision to be made — which court do we want to work for? Do we want to assist Citragupta by being a pāpagaṇanām, a counter of everyone’s faults in the court of Yamaraja? Or do we want to give up finding others shortcomings and work in the court of Lord Nityananda?

The choice is ours.

Prabhuji spoke something very interesting on the Kripa Shakti of the Lord, which I will write later.

All glories to HG Madhavananda Prabhuji.

All glories to Sri Guru and Gauranga.

All glories to Srila Prabhupada.

Fault finding is good !!

by

Hare Krishna.

9th July, 2014, Gurgaon.

Quotes-by-Srila-Prabhupada-on-Suffering

Last week, as usual I got up in the morning and walked towards the kitchen to drink some water. Just after five steps, and in a micro second, my legs were up in the air as I slipped badly and then fell flat on my left elbow. It took me some time to realise that the living room floor had water on it. As I nursed my bruised elbow I realised that whole living room floor had a thin layer of water on it. Because of the shine of the floor I could not see water on it. Hearing the sound of my fall Priti, my wife, too rushed into the living room. I told her half jokingly that I did not know that she had created a `Maya palace’ for me and I have slipped like Duryodhana would have slipped when he visited the new palace of Pandavas in Hastinapur. We had a good laugh and we got our act together to clean the floor together.

After the whole floor was cleaned I looked back and tried to analyse why did this happen. My mental speculation was that this is Lord’s home and something like this should not have happened. My first thought was that Priti’s niece and her family were here and they might have brought their shoes inside the house and that’s why this thing happened, it was quite a thin argument. Second thought that occurred to me was I did not do `temple marjnam’ at home, as is being done at every Jagannath temple across the country this time of the year, so may be this is Lord’s way to get His this house cleaned ! When I shared my thoughts with Priti she rightly brushed aside my arguments saying that I am trying to find supernatural reasons where non exist. Somehow my train of thought changed as I realised that I am trying to look for all the reasons which others, including Lord Himself, might have created this situation while conveniently ignoring my own self. Then I started looking at my own actions scrutinisingly in last few days and I realised I have done a lot of mistakes in last 3-4 days itself, offenses against Vaishanavas, my own family members and even against Tulsai Maharani!! They all gave me a mild shock. These mistakes, of course, had nothing to do with water on the floor as after some delibration we found the technical reason, one of the balcony drain choked during the last night’s rain and there was some leakage from one of tiles under the glass door. Few months back there was a similar problem in our other balcony which we got repaired but never bothered to test the other balcony too, so it was our fault.

I offered my apologies to the Lord for not keeping Their home in good condition as due to my carelessness their home got flooded with water. I also offered apologies for all the mistakes I had just remembered during my quick introspection and promised that I will try my best not to repeat them. I then begged Srila Prabhupada to kindly bless me with intelligence so that I do not make repeat my mistakes as my own material intelligence is very limited.

I felt very happy from inside as I appreciated how much Lord guides us internally to see something positive in each negative situation, this is not at all my normal mode of thinking, rather opposite is true. Just a few months back my normal reactions would have been to first sulk at my bruised elbow, then I would have curtly told my wife to clean the floor herself as I have to chant my rounds first and lastly I would have cursed my civil contractor for the shoddy job done he did and more.

My realisation was that whenever something not so good happens to me then without being superstitious I must use that incident to do some bit of introspection and see where all I `slipped’ in my devotional service in last few days/weeks/months. Whatever mistakes I will be able to remember would give me a chance to correct them, not to repeat them and a pretext to reciprocate with guru and Lord.

I discovered that fault-finding is good … but only if I do it for my own self (and I must do it periodically).

All glories to Srila Prabhupada.
Al glories to Sri Guru and Sri Gauranga.