English
29th July 2019
When we chant, when you chant,I just said‘blessings’; but those are not just my blessings, but of all the acaryas in ourparamparabless us, bless you when they see youchanting or they give us blessings when we are chanting. Even demigods are pleased.They may be even showering flowers upon the chanters. Chanters become worshipable, honorable and they always shower their blessings from all corners.
So, keep chanting. That is the target, ‘kirtaniyasadahari’.Let us get attached to this chanting. That is calledsomeone have‘ruchi’ then there is ‘asakti’ and then there is ‘bhava’ then achieve the ‘Krsnaprema’ levels. There is attachment, attraction to chanting. By chanting and chanting, we get attached to chanting. Chanting is Lord. So, getting attached to the chanting is getting attached to the Lord. There is so much ‘asakti’, that attachment gives rise to ‘bhava’, emotions, thinking, feeling, willing, feelings for the Lord, thinking about the Lord, feeling about the Lord and will to serve the Lord, to see the Lord. This is part of the ‘bhava’. And when ‘bhava’ becomes more concentrated, condensed that becomes ‘prema’. We achieve ‘Krsnaprema’. So, keep chanting till we achieve ‘Krsnaprema’, love for the Lord or attitude to lovingly serve the Lord that is ‘prema’. This could all be achieved by chanting the holy name of the Lord.
Dhyayatovishayanpumsam, sangasteshupajayate,
sangatsanjayatekamah, kamatkrodhobhijayate (BG 2.62)
You know this is Lord talking and then ‘buddhinasha, buddhinashatpranashyati’, you are finished. So, that is another path. One could be gliding down, sliding down to the hellish condition. So that is also there as one contemplates on objects of senses, ‘dhyayatovishayanpumsamsangahteshupajayate’, one develops attachment to the sense objects and then that attachment leads to the ‘kama’, the lust.
Just few minutes earlier we talked about how ‘asakti’ leads to ‘bhava’ and ‘prema’, that’s when one contemplates, meditates upon Lord, Lord’s holy name, then one develops attachment to the Lord. And then that attachment results in ‘prema’ for the Lord. But if we are contemplating on maya, the objects of senses then also we will lead to ‘asakti’, attachment to maya, attach to the objects of senses and that attachment to maya, attachment to objects of senses will lead to ‘kama, sangasteshupajayatesangatsanjayatekamah’.
So, one kind of contemplation to the Krsna contemplation, contemplating on Krsna and then one develops attachment to Krsna and then there is ‘bhava’ and ‘prema’, love for the Lord. And if contemplation is on objects of senses then one develops attachment to those objects of senses and the outcome is ‘kama’, lust. So, we have to know how one develops ‘prema’ and how one may be ending up developing ‘kama’ or lust. We have to be knowledgeable and wise to choose or select the right object and that is Krsna. No Maya, only Krsna! ‘Asatsangatyaga’, whatever is false,maya, illusory is to be abandoned and we accept Krsna andKrsnarelated objects.
So, as we have already said, contemplation on maya, sense objects lead to attachment and lust develops. One becomes bewildered, loses his intelligence, power of discrimination he loses and ‘pranashyati’, he is destroyed, he is dead, he is gone, he is gone to the hell.
I was listening to katha this morning. RadhaGovind maharaja was giving Katha, this is recorded katha. I can’t give you all the details, but this kathaisin 11th canto of Bhagavatam, the Katha of 24 gurus.This is talk of Lord Dattatreya and He is talking to king Yadu. There He is talking how we could learn different lessons from so many things around us. There He is talking about different animals, how because of one of their senses is weak, and so theyget trapped, as a result they get killed, they lose their life just because they have no control on one of the particular senses in them, some of the animals, some of the creatures.
So he quoted GarudaPurana and there in that quotation in that verse, mantra, shloka mentions why different animals or creatures, and the mantra says, I don’t remember the whole mantra, but the main side I remember, the patinga, matanga, kuranga, bhringa and mina, these are the five animals and each one of them get into trouble and lose their life because one of their senses is not under control. So, you know there are five sense objects and five knowledge acquiring senses. Sabda, sparsha,rupa, rasa, gandha, these are the five sense objects and sense objects are all around us.
The world is filled with sense objects and we, human bodies, all the bodies are equipped with different senses and we get to know about those sense objects with the help of senses which are mounted in the body. The body is also kind of basically the bunch of senses. We have five senses objects and because there are five senses objects, there are also and only five knowledge acquiring senses.
So ‘shabda’, sound, one sense object, the kuranga, the deer, his weak point or his sense of hearing is not under his control and the hunters know this. So, when they go for hunting deer, they also go with some musical instrument or some sound they produce and then the deer is listening to that sound and gets absorbed in enjoying that sound and he even has no bodily concept. He just into that listening to the sound, ‘shabda’ and then hunter takes advantage of that situation and he shoots the deer. So, like that the deer because of his sense of hearing, he is weak or has no control and he loses his life.
‘Sparsh’, the sense of touch, so there is example of matang, matanga is elephant. So, he elephant is attracted by she elephant and he wants to enjoy, intercourse, sex and predominantly the sense of touch, one skin rubbing against the other or touching, so the sense of touch he wants to enjoy. Otherwise elephant is very difficult to capture. So those who wish for hunting or capturing elephant, they know the weakness of the elephant, so what they do is they dig big hole into the ground, big hole and then they cover that with some bamboo or some grass and then they put a replica of she elephant or may be sometime they may have a real she elephant around and then elephant gets attracted by she elephant and wants to rub his body or touch all that he does during the intercourse , then he comes running, rushing and on the way he ends up in that hole, on the top of the hole there is some grass and bamboo and he gets trapped. Because he is so much attracted to his sense of touch, he wants to touch the body of she elephant and enjoy that sense object of touch.
‘Shabda’, ‘sparsha’,’rupa’, the form or objects of senses or eyesight, so the example of patinga, moth is given in this Garuda Purana. So, the moth sees fire in front of him with his eyesight, he looks at fire and he gets attracted to the fire and he just runs and rushes towards the fire. The moth’s wings are very small, not well developed, but his body is bigger in size and heavier. So,as the moth gets attracted to that form of fire, his wings are burned and then his heavy body is consumed by the fire and he is finished as he has no control over his eyesight, ‘rupa’which kills him.
‘Shabda’, ‘sparsha’, ‘rupa’, ‘rasa’, rasa is taste and ‘mina’, the fish is the example. The tongue of the fish is not under the control of the fish. The uncontrolled tongue is the weakness of the fish. So those who go for fishing, you know how they do the fishing. They have fishing rod, and string and at the end there is metal hook and they put some dough, some sweet or something they attach to the hook. So, the fish gets attracted by the ‘rasa’, taste, that object that is attached to the hook of the fishing rod and he goes for it and as he tries to enjoy that ‘rasa’, the taste and he gets stuck to the hook and he is finished. The fisherman gets to know and he drags him out and catches him and gobbles him up, killed because his sense of touch is not under his control.
So 'shabda’,‘sparsha’,’rupa’,‘rasa’,‘gandha’, the smell and the example arebhringaor the bee, they are always attracted by the fragrance of the flowers and they are going from flower to flower. And they are attracted by the sense of smell and as they are enjoying the smell, they sit on the flower and sometimes the flower are big, like lotus flower and as they are trying to get some honey, madhu from the flowers, the fragrance or the honey, they try to enjoy that and sometimes some flowers get closed in evening time. And that bee gets trapped and finished or maybe there may be some other causes of their death, they were in the middle of enjoying the sense of smell and then they end their life.
So, this GarudaPurana reference or statement then makes the point that one sense is good enough to kill you. One uncontrolled sense as mentioned in five of these creatures or animals, matanga, patanga, kuranga, bhringa and mina. So why if human beings, all their senses are not under control; one is good enough to kill you, anybody, any human being, that is the case with these other animals, these five animals mentioned. So, what if all the senses of the human being are not under control? And then outcome is death. As, ‘buddhinashatpranashyati’, beginning with‘dhyatovishyanpumsam’, contemplating on objects of senses is thebeginning andthe end result is ‘buddhinashatpranashyati’, totally destroyed, you are finished. So, this is why ‘punarapijananampunarapimaranam’ is going on. Birth, death, birth death, this is caused because of not having the senses under control. These uncontrolled senses lead to repeated births and deaths. So, in order to stop birth and death, we have to control our senses. That control is possible only when we employ, engage our senses in the service of the master of our senses that is Sri Krsna.
As a conclusion, it’s another statement,
ātmendriya-prīti-vāñchā — tārebali ‘kāma’
kṛṣṇendriya-prīti-icchādhare ‘prema’ nāma (CC Ādi 4.165)
When our senses are employed, engaged in atmendriyapriti, to gratify the senses, gratify the mind, gratify the body, gratify our all senses, then the outcome is lust. On the contrary, same senses could be also engaged in krishnendriyapriti, Krsnaindriyapriti, for the pleasure of Sri Krsna we engage our senses and the outcome would be the prema, love of Godhead. So this is what going on in the world, most of the people are engaging their senses in the service of mayaand they are enjoying the sense objectsand developinglust and that leads to death and ‘manushyanamsahasreshu’, out of thousand someone, some Hare Krishna, as you are becoming Hare Krishna now and are engaging your senses in the service of the Lord and you develop ‘prema’, love of Godhead and you become free from birth and death,
tyaktvadehampunarjanmanaitimameti(BG 4.9)
So, you are back to Krishna. HariBol! So,we are welcomingthe whole world to join this Hare Krishna movement and remain engaged or employ their senses, their whole existence in the service of the Lord and the services includes chanting of the Holy names of the Lord and resulting in developing love for the Lord and being happy and going back to Lord eventually.
Hare Krishna!