HG Rukmini Devi Dasi
svasty astu visvasya khalah prasidatam
dhyayantu bhutani sivam mitho dhiya
manas ca bhadram bhajatad adhoksaje
avesyatam na matir apy ahaituki
May there be good fortune throughout the universe, and may all envious persons be pacified. May all living entities become calm by practicing bhakti–yoga, for by accepting devotional service they will think of each other’s welfare. Therefore let us all engage in the service of the supreme transcendence, Lord Śri Krishna, and always remain absorbed in thought of Him.
(Srimad-Bhagavatam 5.18.9)
Many thanks to all of you, I want first of all to thank all the devotees of Mayapur for the wonderful projects that are going on, the wonderful Chakra that has just been installed [on the temple under construction], for all the courses and educational programs that take place here in Mayapur, the wonderful Mayapur Academy… For me it’s really exciting to be here.
I was in Mayapur in 1972 and 1974. We were in the Bhajan Kutir of Srila Prabhupada, there were only rice fields, there was nothing, and Srila Prabhupada cried because the devotees did not even have milk to drink. Just try to imagine his compassion … and for me being here now is really something incredible, due to everything you’ve done, I’m very grateful to all of you.
There are many elevated devotees present at this time in the temple and I will try to say a few words in glorification of the Shrimad-Bhagavatam. I ask for your blessings, may I can, with my little beak, try to collect some drops of this ocean and offer them to Srila Prabhupada. Thank you very much.
In the meetings of the ISKCON Leadership Sanga they are discussing the qualities that a leader must have and I have thought about talking about the first one, namely that a leader to maintain his purity must have culture and values. I have noticed that this verse by Prahlad Maharaj is very appropriate. We all need models like Prahlad Maharaj and Srila Prabhupada. Prahlad Maharaj is one of the great voices of the Shrimad-Bhagavatam, he is not one of the many figures of the Bhagavatam, he is a great acarya. In Montreal, when I met Srila Prabhupada for the first time, he was reading the story of Prahlad Maharaj and even Lord Caitanya was very fond of listening about Prahlad Maharaj.
So Prahlad Maharaj is praying that all envious people can become peaceful by practicing bhakti yoga.
This confidential wisdom is also described in the Bhagavad-gita:
This confidential knowledge should not be revealed to those who are envious of Me.
[Bhagavad-gita 18.67]
and also in the First Canto where it is explained that the Shrimad-Bhagavatam disapproves of misleading religions. But Prahlad Maharaj does an intervention, an intercession. With his prayer he intercedes for us and shows us how to go beyond the concept of friends and enemies, who is worthy and who is not worthy, just like the members of the Panca Tattva who gave everyone Krishna consciousness without considering who was worthy and who was not worthy.
Without mercy, without the intercession of people like Srila Prabhupada and Prahlad Maharaj, we could not have access to bhakti.
So the Vaisnava is there to satisfy everyone’s desires and to wish the good of all the inhabitants of the universe. It’s so beautiful! The Vaisnava does not pray only for himself, but for the welfare of the whole universe. He prays that envious people can be pacified. This is such an exemplary ideal to practice. The bhakti yogi thinks about the happiness of others.
It is said that the Six Gosvamis of Vrindavana were loved by all, were loved by the honest people and the ruffians. They saw beyond the external differences and encouraged everyone. This was not a judgemental love. A true leader, like Srila Prabhupada, like Prahlad Maharaj and how the Goswami sencourage everyone.
I recently heard a story about a disciple of Srila Prabhupada who has a dog. A brahmacari kindly asked him: “You are a disciple of Srila Prabhupada, how come you have a dog?” And he emphatically replied:
Because in my life I need at least one person, one person who loves me without judging me, at least one person who loves me as I am.
.. how sad it is that as a movement our judgment of others is so heavy that a disciple of Srila Prabhupada should have a dog in order to have some affection because, it seems, he can not find it in the Vaishnava community. He can not find someone who loves him without judging him.
At a lower level of achievement there is competition, rivalry, judging, but a leader with a broad vision like Srila Prabhupada proposed to build a society without competition and with God at the center.
As it is said in the explanation:
If the movement for Krishna consciousness expands, … the mentality of the envious will change.
The fact of loving without judging begins with ourselves. Prahlad Maharaj is our guru, Srila Prabhupada is our guru who prays for the well-being of every living being.
In the Chaitanya Charitamrita Lord Chaitanya tells Vasudeva Datta, to his beloved Vasudeva Datta: “You are the incarnation of Prahlad Maharaj.” In fact, he went to Chaitanya Mahaprabhu and told him:
May I suffer eternally and take upon me the sins of all living beings! Please, put an end to their conditioned life and give them Your mercy.
This is the compassion and attitude of a leader and, due to his prayer, Lord Chaitanya said to the devotees:
I am his, I belong to Vasudeva Datta, he can do all he wants of Me, I am his.
This is the character of a true devotee, a true leader, a leader must be radiant, everyone, both honest people and dishonest people, are struck by the bright character of a Vaisnava.
Srila Prabhupada had the same attitude as Prahlad Maharaj and Vasudeva Datta. When, alone, he was in the Boston Harbour, he interceded and prayed for us:
People are covered by passion and so much ignorance, how will I make them understand Krishna consciousness?
He begged Krishna as a beggar, he begged Krishna to give us his mercy, and that we, those envious people, could be able to have access, to understand [spiritual matters].
Srila Prabhupada had three volumes of the Shrimad-Bhagavatam, but there was no public and therefore he begged to find people who could hear his message. Thus, through his intercession and his mercy, we have been saved by an incalculable number of births and deaths; it is he who has given us access to the wonderful path of bhakti yoga.
I will tell you another story that still relates to Boston and shows how a devotee’s character should be bright and inspiring. During a harinam, a person approached the devotee who led the singing and began to punch him in the stomach. The police arrived and arrested him, and during the trial, that person told the judge that he had been attacked by those strange people, the devotees, and to save his life he had to react and defend himself. The judge then looked at the accuser, then looked at the devotee and saw his attitude and kindness, then he raised his head to the sky, opened his arms and said:
But how is it possible that this gentle, kind person has hurt you?
The character of a devotee must be bright. We must not be seen as these people who are immediately ready to fight, always ready to criticize and always ready to judge the devotees and others too. This is a very high consciousness. The great devotee, pure devotee, the enlightened leader, sees the Lord and sees the essence, the substance, distinct from the shadow of things. He sees that everything that emanates from the Lord is composed of different forms of energy and everything can be transformed with the power of devotional service and listening about Krishna.
In 1972 in Vrindavana, Srila Prabhupada was giving lessons on the Nectar of Devotion at the Radha Damodara quarters, and in one of these lessons he explained with great emphasis that in Vrindavana there are many elevated persons, but they have no taste for Krishna katha, and therefore these people have not succeeded to transmit the taste for Krishna katha to anyone. It is not people’s fault, the responsibility lies with these preachers. And [Srila Prabhupada] said that if we do not find taste, then the “show” of preaching we do, is only an imitation and will have no effect. They are very powerful words.
Sometimes the leaders in ISKCON think in terms of “my project”, in terms of “my group”, “me and the others”, “my man”, “he is not mine”, and they think with prejudice, who “suits me” and who “is not fit to be accepted in my group”. But if we read the Chaitanya Charitamrita, we see that all the disciples of so many gurus were serving together and all dancing together in ecstasy. All sang, danced and worshiped Krishna together, without a sectarian attitude and without prejudices.
I want to tell you a very beautiful story of a simple devotee named Bhumi devi, and her daughter is now here with us in Mayapur, it’s Krishnanandini devi dasi.
Bhumi devi, who is now deceased, was a simple person and not very affluent also; she was a very devoted Christian. She lived in Cleveland, Ohio. One day she received the Bhagavad-Gita of Srila Prabhupada and because of her spiritual power she understood that this was the perfect truth. She decided therefore that she would become devotee. She returned home (she had many children), shaved their heads and gave everyone an improvised tilak and all of them tried to become devotees. But the temple president did not think the same way and had prejudices:
No, you can not stay in the temple, only who is initiated can have a shaved head and a tilak.
He did not let them stay in the temple. What to do? Bhumi devi had a lot of faith, she put all her children in her car and decided to leave, but she did not know where to go and began to pray intensely Krishna:
We do not know where to go, we just want to become your devotees.
They prayed and decided Dallas, Texas. After many adventures on the way they arrived in Dallas, but in the meantime the Cleveland temple president had called all the temples to inform the devotees that some troublemakers from Cleveland would have soon arrived. He thought in a sectarian and limited way. Therefore, when they arrived in Dallas, the temple president had already been informed about them, but Bhumi devi implored him:
We have traveled from Cleveland and we do not know where to go. We also have children and my daughter is waiting for a baby, please let us stay!
Then the temple president said:
All right, but you can stay only for tonight, because Srila Prabhupada will arrive tomorrow.
Srila Prabhupada was coming right the next day!
At that point, Bhumi Devi became very happy and understood that everything would be fine because Srila Prabhupada would have arrived the following day.
Their case was brought to Srila Prabhupada and Bhumi devi was out of the door waiting for some instruction. Srila Prabhupada told the devotees:
Whenever I see even a little spark of Krishna consciousness, I like to fan it.
and … the very next day they were all been initiated! Srila Prabhupada initiated them.
Years later, Krishnanandini met the president of the Cleveland temple again and he apologized:
Please forgive me, I should not have behaved like that.
But she answered:
Don’t worry, if you had not done so, we would have never met Srila Prabhupada.
