Second period of Devotional Practice (2nd Yama Sadhana)

Everything depends upon practice. If we do practice then we shall have progress.

Morning Worship:-sādhu saṅge anartha nivṛtti

The first period of devotional practice begins with Sraddha. After that, in the second period, procedure has been shown: Association of bonafide sadhus and taking shelter of a bonafide guru with a one-pointed devotion to Supreme Lord Sri Krishna, here if we want Krishna prema, and as per his direction to perform all devotional practice, mainly Nama Sankirtan, and where it has been stated that ‘only Nama Sankirtan’, then all ulterior desires will be removed.

nāma grahaner kālākāla-vicāra nāhi
nāma sarvaśakti samanvitā

There is no consideration of proper or improper time in regard to chanting the Lord’s holy names. Holy Name can be uttered anywhere and everywhere, auspicious or inauspicious time, under all circumstances. Thus it has been made so simple and easy. Holy Name is All-Powerful.

In the Second verse of Sri Sikshastaka Mahaprabhu is teaching:

nāmnām akāri bahudhā nija-sarva-śaktis
tatrārpitā niyamitaḥ smaraṇe na kālaḥ
etādṛśi tava kṛpā bhagavan mamāpi
durdaivam īdṛśam ihājani nānurāgaḥ
(2rd Verse of Sri Shikshastaka)

O Supreme Lord! Certainly Your Holy Name can bestow all kinds of eternal welfare to the conditioned souls. So You have manifested in this world with Your Principal Names, transcendental Names like Krishna, Govinda, Gopinath, etc. When we chant transcendental Names giving up offenses then we reach transcendental world. If we utter worldly sounds we will get entangled with the material world. When we chant Names with some material desires then we commit offense at the Lotus Feet of Nama Prabhu, then not the real Name, some sound similar to Nama will be uttered by us. Then we may get some material benefit. But when we take Lord’s Name for His sake then that Name will take us the Lotus Feet of the Lord and bestow us All-Existence, All-Knowledge and All-Bliss (Purna sat-cid-ananda). Lord has manifested in various Names. There are different levels of devotees and also they can have different tastes in serving Krishna with different delightful relations.

Krishna-keshav Brahmachari Prabhu is our siksha guru, he would explain giving an example. Suppose a bucket fell down into a well. Here there exist deep wells. So, how can one lift the bucket from the well? They throw a big bunch of hooks into the well with the help of a rope and rotate it therein and the bucket gets caught in one of the hooks and then it is lifted. So also, Lord appears in this world in ten avataras (dasha-avatar) mainly, and He takes infinite incarnations. Among them whomever you like, you catch hold off, you necessarily have to, and then He will lift and carry you out of this material world. So whichever Name of the Lord attracts you, the Name in which you have taste, catch hold of that Name very strongly. All of Lord’s names have special powers in them and take you to Lord’s various abode, but if you have taste for especially the transcendental Krishna Nama it will take you to Him, to His supreme abode Goloka Vrndavan. So He has appeared in His various Names and all the Names are All-powerful. According to your taste you take Harinam. But if you want to get the transcendental realm of Goloka Vrndavan then you have to accept Krishna, Govinda, Gopinath. All these names will take you to that highest transcendental blissful realm. By doing Harinama you will get everything. He has bestowed all powers in these Names. To remember and chant the Holy Names no restrictions have been imposed regarding time and place, rules and regulations. Any time, any place and under any circumstances one can chant the Holy Names. Oh Lord! You are so very merciful to the conditioned souls, out of great compassion You have made it easy and simple for the conditioned souls to remember and chant the Holy Names, but still due to great misfortune, Lord has shown so much mercy, how much more mercy can He bestow, we have no taste for chanting the Holy Names.

In Nagar Sankirtan, whoever takes part and chants the names and hears, and also other living beings like animals who hear all are benefited. Nagar Sankirtan is most auspicious and Mahaprabhu Himself introduced Nagar Sankirtan and sent Nityananda Prabhu and Haridas Thakur to propagate. So when we chant the Holy Names of the Lord, not only we ourselves, but all other beings, humans, birds and animals, trees, all are benefited. The whole atmosphere becomes purified. In spite of making it so easily accessible, it is my great misfortune that I have no taste in chanting of Krishna Nama Sankirtan. I have taste for speaking about all material worldly things and complaining this is bad, that is bad, I am good and all are bad. Without speaking all rubbish, take Lord’s Name. What is the use of speaking all bad things, what will go with you? Such is the great misfortune. So Caitanya Mahaprabhu is expressing His extreme regret to see the sad plight of the conditioned souls of this world.

aneka-lokera vāñchā — aneka-prakāra
kṛpāte karila aneka-nāmera pracāra
khāite śuīte yathā tathā nāma laya,
deśa-kāla-niyama nāhi sarvasiddhi haya,
sarvaśakti nāme dila kariyā vibhāga,
āmāra durdaiva nāme nāhi anurāga
(Sri Chaitanya Charitamrita Antya 20.17-19)

ekānta bhaktera mātra kīrtan-smaraṇa,
anya parve ruchi nāhi haya pravartana

Indirectly he is saying, one who has great taste for various other devotional practices but no taste for kirtan, he is not ekanta bhakta (who has one-pointed devotion to Supreme Lord). All other limbs of devotion have to be practiced with kirtan, ‘yadyapi anya bhaktih kalau kartavya, tada kirtanakhya-bhakti-samyogenaiva’, and not without it. A pure devotee who has exclusive devotion to Lord has got liking only to perform devotion of chanting and remembering Sri Krishna (kirtan and smaran) and has no taste for any other form of devotion and he cannot be persuaded to do them forcibly. We repeat this often ‘Harer nama harer nama harer namaiva kevalam kalau nastyeva nastyeva nastyeva gatir anyatha’ but we do not practice it. ‘Harer nama harer nama harer nama’ three times said, certainly Harinama, only Harinam, and nothing else. Three times it is said ‘kalau nastyeva nastyeva nastyeva’ i.e. in Kaliyuga certainly there is no other way there is no other way, there is no other way, thrice. We tell others, but, about my own self I am saying I tell others but I do not practice it. How will the desired result come? So it is given so much emphasis.

bhāvera sahita haya śrīkṛṣṇa-sevana,
svārasikī-bhāva krame haya uddīpana,
ekānta bhakatera kriyā mudrā rāgodita,
tathāpi sei saba nāhi vidhi viparīta

Calling out Lord’s Name is the topmost devotion and those who love Him call Him taking His Name. So there is loving devotion (prema) in this and Lord’s attention is drawn by these calls. And all auspiciousness comes. ‘Gayite gayite nam ki dasa hoilo krsna-nitya-dasa mui hrdaye sphurilo’ i.e. by chanting of the Names realization that I am Krishna’s eternal servant (Krsna-nitya-dasa) will manifest in the heart. It does not come by itself, but by chanting Lord’s Names repeatedly and thinking who am I in relation to the Lord, that relation will manifest in the heart. Without chanting of the Names of the Lord such realization will not manifest. After chanting names of the Lord, if one gets engrossed in the worldly matters and if attention goes towards worldly matter and not to Krishna, he will get the feeling I am the enjoyer, I am the doer, and all his bhajan gets destroyed. Why should one destroy his bhajan? We have to bear our own loss. If any body is not doing bhajan, let him do so, what we will lose? A pure devotee serves Krishna with delightful relation of love and hence there cannot be any faults/deficiency in their service. Rightly you can serve all when you have got delightful relation. Without actual delightful relation with Guru Vaishnav Bhagavan, no service can be done rightly.

sarva tyāga karile o chārā sukaṭhina,
pratiṣṭhāśātyāge yatna payibe praviṇa

We can renounce everything but it is very difficult to give up the desire for name and fame. If this is not given up then one cannot develop love for the Lord, not even by chanting of the Names. We should not do chanting of the Names for getting name and fame. Anyway Vaishnav and Gurudev will bestow that on us. I will speak about myself. I did some dancing and singing (nrtya-kirtan) to show how great a devotee I am and someone told this to Gurudev, then Gurudev expressed great happiness. I thought, I did for gaining name and fame that I am a great devotee but why did Gurudev felt so happy? Our Prabhupad is also like that and said: ‘sei duti katha, bhulo na sarvatha kara uccaih svare harinama-rava’. may be sometime Namabhasa may occur and bring auspiciousness. It may happen, it happened in the case of Ajamila and will not happen for others, it is not so.

prabhate gabhīra rātre madhyāhne sandhyāye,
anartha chāriyā lao nāmera āśraya,

Giving up ulterior motives and desires, chant Krishna’s Name for His love only.

ei rūpe kīrtana smaraṇa jei kare,
kṛṣṇa-kṛpā haya śigrha, anāyāse tare

Krishna is actually within our heart and knows whether we are actually calling Him or by taking His Name calling some one else. This is not correct. It may seem externally that he has great love for Krishna, but within the heart he has other motives.

We have a math in Medinipur where the presiding deities are Sri Sri Radha-Govindaji. When we were there one lady devotee came there and started crying so much. We are living the math for such a long time and had never had such tears in our eyes. We all were surprised. We tried to console her, you will surely get Krishna’s mercy, why you should cry so much. Later we learnt after inquiring repeatedly that the elderly pujari at the math who is a babaji had a beard and when he was roaming his shaking beard reminded her of her dead goat to which she was very attached and who also had a beard like the babaji’s. Tears roll down in love for Krishna, but this is not Krishna prema. We also cry before Lord, but for what?

śraddhā kari’ sādhu sange kṛṣṇa-nāma laye,
anartha sakala jāye niṣṭhā upajaye

If one chants the Name of Krishna in the company of bona-fide sadhus with firm faith, then all ulterior desires will be removed and he will get permanent fixation of the mind to the object of worship. What is said here is not false.

prātaḥakāle nityalīlā karibe cintana,
cintite cintite bhāvera haibe sadhana

Thinking is the function of the mind, one can think of the world or of the Lord. Whatever your mind likes to think about Lord you think of that but following the directions of Guru and Vaishnavas.

Morning pastimes of Radha-Krishna

rādhāṁ snāta-vibhūṣitāṁ vrajapayāhūtāṁ sakhībhiḥ prage
tad-gehe vihitānna-pāka-racanāṁ kṛṣṇāvaśeṣanām
kṛṣṇaṁ buddham avāpta-ḍhenu-sadanaṁ nirvyūḍha-go-dohanaṁ
susnātaṁ kṛta-bhojanaṁ saha-caraistaṁ cātha tāṁ cāśrye
(Sri Govinda-lilamrta)

Radharani, after taking bath in the morning decorates Herself in beautiful clothes and ornaments, all for Krishna’s pleasure, and comes with Her Sakhis being called by Yashoda mayya. They are happy for the opportunity they got and become busy in service. The more one has love and attachment for the object of service, the more one serves and at the same time feel I have not done anything and one who has no love will say I have done so much service. Here they are all happily engaged in service and feel we have not done anything because they have great love and attachment to Sri Krishna. Because of that love, they feel happy when they get the opportunity for seva and get engrossed in seva all the time. They will not become unhappy by serving, but will become unhappy when they do not get seva. All that is prepared with love, Lord accepts. ‘patram pushpam phalam toyam yo me bhaktya prayacchati’ what is offered with love and devotion, the Lord accepts. And that which is offered without love, He does not accept. After Krishna accepts food, the remnants Radharani and Her sakhis honor with great pleasure and satisfaction. There everyday this pastime occurs. In Goloka it is not like in our material world that we feel hungry and have to eat something. There these pastimes occur due to Yogamaya’s influence. There they have transcendental bodies, not comprising of material elements and bones and muscles like ours. They have transcendental bodies and so even when engaged in lot of service they feel happy. They honor prasad and that is also transcendental, not like our rice, dal, laddoo, kachori, puri. I remember such Radharani. Radharani is Lord’s Complete Spiritual potency (purna-aradhika shakti), She has Her loving attention on all and by taking Her shelter one is sure to get Her mercy. She is very quickly, easily pleased. So we have such great opportunity. Now, in this Kaliyuga we got the opportunity to worship Sri Sri Radhakrishna. Mahamantra does not have any other meaning, it is Radhakrishna.

In the morning Krishna wakes up by the various attempts of His associates and then goes for milking of the cows according to His daily routine. And during milking of the cows along with His sakhas He gives pleasure to the cows and also to His sakhas. Sakhas have such great love for Krishna that they cannot leave Him for even a moment and so they take bath together. There is no difference between Krishna and His sakhas. If we speak anything against them or commit offence, then it will amount to offence at the Lotus Feet of Sri Krishna. They all are our worshipable. After bath they sit down together breakfast. Our worshipable Lord is our worshipable along with His associates. And Krishna is sleeping. It is only an excuse to give service to others that He is sleeping. Prabhupad mentioned this in his commentary on the first verse of Chatursloki Bhagavat, Supreme Lord who is Complete, Purna is all inclusive of His abode, His associates (dhama, parshad) who pervades at all times, during creation, after creation and in creation. Therefore, I take shelter of that Krishna whom Yashoda devi feeds.