English
2nd July 2019
We should take inspiration from our acarya's
I am in Pandharpur chanting for you and with you. Today is a big day, very very auspicious day. Today is a disappearance day of Gadadhara Pandit and today is also disappearance day of Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura. So I would like to say few words to remember these great personalities in our parampara. Gadadhara Pandit is the member of pancha tattva.
sri krishna caitanya prabhu nityananda sri advait
gadadhar srivasadi gaur bhaktavrinda
So that Sri Advait Gadadhara, Gadadhara Pandit. Today we are observing Gadadhara Pandit’s disappearance day, the member of the panchtattva, you could understand, you should understand the status of Gadadhara Pandit, one of the panchtattva.
panca-tattvatmakam krsnam bhakta-rupa-svarupakam
bhaktavataram bhaktakhyam namami bhakta-saktikam (CC Ādi 7.6)
He is listed as bhakta sakti. He appeared as a bhakta but he is a sakti, he is energy, very special energy, ahladini sakti, pleasure potency of Lord. Gadadhara Pandit is Radharani, partial Radharani. Radharani is within Caitanya Mahaprabhu.
sri krishna caitanya radha krishna nahe anya,
Radha and Krishna are together in Caitanya. However Radharani also appeared in another form in a partial way and that is Gadadhara Pandit. There are many temples of Gaura Nityananda, Gauranga Mahaprabhu and Nityananda Prabhu but there are also several temples of Gaura Gadadhara, Gauranga Mahaprabhu and Gadadhara Pandit, deity of Gaura Gadadhara.
At Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura’s residence, in samadhi there is Gaura Gadadhara deity. Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura worshipped Gaura and Gadadhara.
There are lots of restrictions in Lord’s eternal lila in Golok and Vrindavan for Radha and Krishna to associate. They cannot be together in public. They have to keep distance from each other and like that. But Radharani always loves and likes, She prefers to be with Krishna. Why to be away from Krishna? She wants to be next to Krishna. So that desire of Radharani is fulfilled as Radharani appeared as Gadadhara Pandit. And Gadadhara Pandit was able to associate with Sri Krishna Caitanya Mahaprabhu who is Krishna. Sri Krishna Caitanya Mahaprabhu is Krishna, Gadadhara Pandit is partially Radharani and they are always together. They are next to each other and associating with each other.
So what they couldn’t do in Goloka or Vrindavan, they were able to do that association with each other in Navadvipa as well as in Jagannath Puri later on. Even during childhood days Caitanya Mahaprabhu and Gadadhara Pandit were always together and they were studying together also. Like they were in Mayapur the other members of the pancha tattva, they had appeared in other parts of Bengal, east Bengal or here there. Gadadhara Pandit was one who appeared in Mayapur So,as a result Nimai and Gadadhar, they were always together, they were friends. Gadadhar Pandit took initiation from Puṇḍarīka Vidyānidhi. Puṇḍarīka Vidyānidhi in Caitanya Mahaprabhu’s lila is King Vrishabhanu of Barsana. He appeared in Navadvipa Mayapur as Puṇḍarīka Vidyānidhi and Gadadhar Pandit took initiation from Puṇḍarīka Vidyānidhi.
Later on when Sri Krishna Caitanya Mahaprabhu travelled to Jagannath Puri, Gadadhar Pandit also joined Him in Jagannath Puri and he was worshipping Tota Gopinath deity and Sri Krishna Caitanya Mahaprabhu used to visit Gadadhar Pandit in Tota Gopinath temple and listened to Bhagavatam katha recited by Gadadhar Pandit. As if Sri Krishna Caitanya Mahaprabhu or Krishna is listening from Radharani.
So Radharani here in the form of Gadadhar Pandit is reciting Bhagavatam and with great ecstasy Gadadhar Pandit recites different pastimes of the Lord. His body trembling and tears gliding down his chest. And those tears would fall on the Grantha Bhagavatam, it would become all wet and they try another recitation, again it would become wet and Bhagavatam was getting spoiled by the tears of Gadadhar Pandit. Sri Krishna Caitanya Mahaprabhu would relish the recitation of Gadadhar Pandit at Tota Gopinath temple very much.
So like Sri Krishna Caitanya Mahaprabhu and Gadadhar Pandit who is Radharani they were associating with each other at Tota Gopinath temple in Jagannath Puri and eventually Sri Krishna Caitanya Mahaprabhu entered the deity of Tota Gopinath and wind up His pastimes. Gadadhar Pandit also left this world on this day from Tota Gopinath temple.
Gadadhar Pandit tirobhav tithi mahotsav ki jai!
Then there is also the disappearance day of Bhaktivinoda Thakura. He was also initially in Jagannath Puri as district magistrate in British rule. He fixed up all the administration of Jagannath Puri temple, so that the worship and services of Jagannath Baladev Subhadra would go on properly.
He prayed for son, who would be empowered to propagate, spread Krishna consciousness all over the world. So Jagannath heard the prayer of Bhaktivinoda Thakura and he was gifted with a son Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur, who was born in Jagannath Puri. Later on Bhaktivinoda Thakura moved to Navadvipa Mayapur and all he did service of Mayapur Navadvipa dhama by discovering different pastimes of Gauranga including the birthplace Sri Krishna Caitanya Mahaprabhu. He wrote so many,100 books he wrote including the ‘Navadvipa dhama mahatmya’ the guide book of performance of Navadvipa mandal parikrama and instructed his son Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur to establish Navadvipa mandal Parikrama. That is why Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura is also known as seventh Goswami.
Six Goswamis of Vrindavan were famous and Navadvipa had one goswami, Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura became known as seventh goswami. Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura was a great personality. We are indebted for what he has done for us. We pray at his feet on this occasion for blessing us further, empowering us further. That empower could come to us through Srila Prabhupada so that we could continue the mission of Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura. This Hare Krishna Movement is Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura’mission, Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati’s mission.
Amongst the one hundred books that he wrote, his ‘Harinama Chintamani’ is very essential scripture for us to study and practice. In this book Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura has presented dialogue between Gauranga, Sri Krishna Caitanya Mahaprabhu and Namacarya Srila Haridas Thakur and they are both talking about the ten offences against the holy name in great detail, explaining and making us understand each offense and how to avoid those offenses. So this is a contribution, this Harinama Chintamani is a gift for all of us chanters of holy name.
In conference we are chanting Hare Krishna and we try to provide some guidelines, we try to say something but a lot has been said in Harinama Chintamani.
I strongly recommend you to catch hold of Harinama Chintamani. It is available in English, Bangla and Hindi translation. You should get this scripture Harinama Chintamani and study how to improve your chanting and to chant attentively this book is great help.
Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura was a great chanter. He used to chant 64 minimum rounds of holy name every day, while he was in Jagannath Puri. He was householder, a district magistrate and father of ten children. And inspite of all these responsibilities he was still chanting 64 rounds and writing so many books. So you are householders, so Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura is a living example, he is hero of all of you, all of us, following his footsteps, specially chanting Hare Krishna, the way Bhaktivinoda Thakura chanted Hare Krishna. We cannot imitate Bhaktivinoda Thakura, at least chant your minimum 16 rounds daily and do that attentively and offenselessly. How to avoid offenses you could learn from Bhaktivinoda Thakura book Harinama Chintamani. I wish you all success in your endeavor of chanting. Hare Krishna !
Gauranga!
Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura ki jai!!
Gadadhar Pandit ki jai!!
Gaur Premanande Haribol!!!