Today is Dwadashi Tithi, the Holy appearance Tithi of Sri Varaha Deva. Tomorrow is the appearance day Sri Nityanand Prabhu and today is adhivas (a day before the Tithi). There are special devotional activities to be performed today. Preliminary preparations are to be performed on adhivas. We should prepare our heart before the advent of Sri Nityanand Prabhu.

In the fourth Canto of Srimad Bhagavatam, Mahadev says,

sattvaṁ viśuddhaṁ Vasudeva-śabditaṁ
yad īyate tatra pumān apāvṛtaḥ
sattve ca tasmin bhagavān vāsudevo
hy adhokṣajo me namasā vidhīyate
(Srimad Bhagavatam 4.3.23)

“I offer my obeisances to the Supreme Lord, Vasudeva who manifests only in the sanctified pure heart which is called Vasudeva.”

Krishna appears by accepting Devaki and Vasudeva as His parents. Who is Vasudeva? The Supreme Lord appears only in the sanctified heart and that sanctified heart is known as Vasudeva. We should sanctify our hearts today, so that Lord Varaha Devaa and Nityanand Prabhu appear there. We should prepare ourselves for their advent in advance. hy adhokṣajo me namasā vidhīyate—I offer my obeisance to the Adhokṣaj (who is beyond the comprehension of material senses). We cannot comprehend Him by our material senses, mind and intelligence. So, to sanctify our heart we should remember Him, take absolute shelter to His lotus feet and pray for His grace because it cannot be possible by any of our material endeavors. We should pray for the grace of Guru, Vaishnava and Bhagavan. We should worship Him and call Him by chanting His Name.

Mahaprabhu has shown an ideal in this regard. Along with devotees, He cleans the Gundicha temple prior to Lord Jagannathdev’s arrival, considering it to be non-different from Vrindavan. They took out grass, stones, sand etc. Gundicha temple represents our heart. There are so many unwanted things in our heart, desires for performing karmakanda—fruitive activities, desire to get salvation and mystic perfections. With the help of a broom, we should throw out everything from our heart and wash it with water. The desire for name and fame, money and woman should be completely washed off from our heart. Even a tinge of desire should not remain in the heart to make Lord Jagannath take His position there. So today is the day for cleansing our heart.

The pastimes of Nityanand Prabhu and Lord Varaha Deva are eternal. There are infinite Brahmandas and Their pastimes are going on continuously in each of them. Many people from the Western countries, being not able to comprehend such narrations, call them to be myth or fiction. If one does not have the faith on even the existence of the transcendental world, how can he enter in that realm?

In Dasavatara book, the word, ‘incarnation’ is used to indicate the advent of Supreme Lord. But in the dictionary, the meaning of word ‘incarnation’ is given as—a person who embodies in the flesh a deity, spirit, or quality. But for the Supreme Lord it is not true. The Supreme Lord appears as fish, tortoise or varaha that does not mean He has to enter into the body of fish, tortoise or varaha—a hog. He does not take a body made up of flesh and bones. He comes with transcendental body.

The Supreme Lord has infinite pastimes amongst which only a few are narrated in scriptures. For one who is limitless, everything belonging to Him is also limitless. If He can be bound in any limits then the word ‘infinite’ or ‘limitless’ loses its significance. He has infinite forms. There are infinite Vaikunthas also. By our limited intelligence we cannot comprehend the unlimited aspect of Supreme Lord. Infinite Brahmandas are coming from Him. When He saw that living entities coming from Him do not want to serve Him, He created infinite Brahmandas so that they may enter in them and try to fulfill their enjoying tendencies. In this world also, we see that parents have affection for their children and if they demand something from the parents which is not good for them then the parents do not give them. But on repeated requests, they are forced to fulfill the demands of their children. Like that Supreme Lord also does not want that the living beings come to this material world and suffer three-fold afflictions but He creates such places to fulfill their enjoying tendencies. One can enjoy things which are inferior to them, living beings cannot enjoy Supreme Lord or things belongs to Him. And because of that Supreme Lord created infinite Brahmandas and made the living entities enter in them in the form of 84 lakhs different species. They keep moving in the cycle of births and deaths in these 84 lakhs species and suffer three-fold afflictions. Out of compassion for them, the Supreme Lord gave discriminating power in the human form of birth so that they can decide on what is good and what is bad. In the human form, the living being can decide whether he wants to be entangled in this material world or wants to go back to Supreme Lord.

The Supreme Lord then may say, “If you want to be in the material world then you have to keep taking births in different species like birds, beasts etc.”

The living entity may say, “No, I want to come to You.”

“You utter this from the core of your heart, do not try to cheat Me.”

Gauranga Mahaprabhu, Supreme Lord Sri Krishna Who appeared by accepting the mood of Radharani, says,

na dhanaṁ na janaṁ na sundarīṁ
kavitāṁ vā jagadīśa kāmaye
mama janmani jamanīśvare
bhavatād bhaktir ahaitukī tvayi
(Chaitanya Charitamrita Antya 20.29)

“O almighty Lord, I have no desire to accumulate wealth, nor do I desire beautiful women, nor do I want any number of followers. I only want Your causeless devotional service birth after birth.”

We recite it daily during Kartik month. But we should utter this from the heart, not from the mouth. Say from the heart, “Oh Lord! I do not want money”. We are afraid of speaking so. But Supreme Lord is bhavagrahi—one who sees what is inside our heart. He is not bhashagrahi—one who sees what we speak externally. He does not listen what we say from mouth, He listens to what we want from within. So, we have to say from our heart, “I do not want wealth. Na janam—I don’t want wife, children etc. I do not want any scholarship. I do not want salvation or any kind of mystic perfections.”

“Then what do you want?”

“I only want causeless devotion unto You.”

“If you speak from within I will immediately bestow it upon you. Do not blame on Me, you do not want it from the heart, you want something else, you have some other desires in your heart. So, I have to give you what you want from within. I am impartial, I am neutral to all.”

Supreme Lord has showered His grace upon Dhruva, Prahlad and Ambarish Maharaj, will He not shower His grace on others? Supreme Lord is a Complete Entity, no one can bribe Him to get any favor from Him. One can bribe a judge or a magistrate to get the decision in his favor because they are incomplete, they have scarcity of some worldly things but Supreme Lord does not have any scarcity. He has everything within Him. Whatever you want to bribe Him with, He already has within Him. If you say that something is there which is not within Him then He will not remain Bhagavan anymore. He is Complete and Limitless Entity, nothing is outside Him. So, we should pray from the heart without blaming the Supreme Lord.

Tears rolling down from one’s eyes in front of the deity, does not indicate his love for the Supreme Lord. I witnessed one such incident in Shyamananda Gaudiya Math, Medinipur. I visited that Math along with Jajavar Maharaj, Giri Maharaj, Ashram Maharaj and Krishna Keshav Prabhu. There we saw one Mataji crying incessantly in front of Radha Govindji in Math. We thought, “This Mataji has such a great devotion unto the Supreme Lord.” I tried to pacify her telling, “Why do you cry so much? You should not worry, you have got special mercy of Supreme Lord.”

Upon repeatedly asking, she replied, “The temple Pujari (priest) has white beard which resembles the beard of a goat I had. Whenever he moves his beard, it reminds me of my goat which died a few days back. I feel strong separation from her and cannot stop my tears.”

Is it the crying for Supreme Lord? She remembered the goat and not the Supreme Lord. Our crying is also like that. If we cry for Supreme Lord from the core of our heart, we will get Him. What should we do to remove the ulterior desires from our heart?

sādhu-saṅge kṛṣṇa-nāma—ei mātra chāi
saṁsāra jinite āra kona vastu nāi

“The only thing required is the chanting of Krishna-Nam in the association of pure devotees. There is no other way to conquer material existence than this.”

It is said in the scripture, phalena phalakāraṇam anumīyate—by the fruit you can understand the cause behind any activity. If by performing service to the Supreme Lord, we do not get satisfaction of our heart then there is something wrong in our sadhan. Scriptures do not declare something which is false. There is lack of surrender in us. We lack the ‘tadiya’ mood—the feeling that I am of Krishna. Whatever we are doing, it is not being done for the satisfaction of Krishna.

Vedavyas Muni has written so many scriptures but he did not get peace in his mind. What will you write? Is it possible for any ordinary man to write like what he has written? He divided Vedas and wrote Vedant. He also wrote eighteen Puranas, Mahabharata, and in that, Gita. Can any ordinary person do so? But still he did not get peace in his mind. He enacted this pastimes to teach us. He remembered his Gurudev, Narad Goswami and he came there.

Narad Goswami asked him, “What did you do to get peace?”

“I wrote all these things, dharma-sastra, artha-sastra, kama-sastra”

“These all are for temporary, perishable things.”

“I have also written about emancipation, about salvation.”

“It is even more abominable. You have completely closed the path for them to reach Supreme Lord. You have deprived them of getting Krishna-prem for eternal time. You did not sing the glories of Supreme Lord.”

“I have spoken about Him in Mahabharata, in Gita”

“No, it will not work, you have to write for His satisfaction. You have to sing the glories of Krishna to please Him. In Gita, you have written it with some other motives.”

If you worship Him for some other motives, not for His satisfaction then He will not come. Absolute is for Himself and by Himself. (We do not use the word, ‘It God’, We say, ‘He God’.)

Today is the appearance day of Varaha Deva. He is one amongst the Lila-avataras of Supreme Lord. Sri Jayadev Goswami wrote Dasavatara-stotram describing the ten main Avataras of Supreme Lord Sri Krishna. Supreme Lord is one; there cannot be many.

Father loves his son and when the son becomes a well-known personality like a head of any department or a magistrate then the father feels proud to introduce him to others. Like that Jayadev Goswami, being the devotee of Krishna, has sung the glories of Krishna’s Lila-avataras in Dasavatara-stotram.

keśava dhṛta-mīna-śarīra jaya jagadīśa hare
keśava dhṛta-kūrma-śarīra jaya jagadīśa hare

Varaha Deva is the second Avatara but in Dasavatara-stotram, Jayadev Goswami has mentioned Him as the third Avatara.

Supreme Lord advents for His devotees. When Brahmaji was ordered to carry out the creation, he began to think about the details involved in the task. At that moment, a male named Svayambhuva Manu and a female named Shataroopa manifested from his body. In order to carry out the process of creation, Brahamaji made Svayambhuva Manu marry with Shataroopa. Seeing the earth submerged in the waters of annihilation and desiring to seek a dwelling place for the living beings, Manu approached his father, Lord Brahma, and prayed to him to rescue the earth. When Brahma saw the earth submerged in the water, he thought for a long time about how it could be rescued. He had earlier established the earth in its normal state after removing all the water, but could not understand why the earth had again sunk into the watery abyss.

Lord Brahma could not think of a solution even after much thought and effort. At last, he took shelter of the Supreme Lord, Vishnu. He prayed to Him, “I had been appointed to do the work of creation but the earth had become inundated in a deluge and had sunk into the depths of the ocean to Rasatala (the lowest of the seven underworlds). How was the act of creation to be accomplished? How was the earth to be rescued?”

When someone prays for the grace of the Supreme Lord without any deceitfulness for getting His service then He reciprocates to him. Brahma became deeply absorbed in meditation. That time penance was not so difficult but nowadays it is very difficult. The Supreme Lord knew the difficulty of Brahma so while Brahma was still deep in thought, He suddenly appeared as a small boar the size of a thumb from his nostril. Astonishingly, as Brahma looked on, the tiny boar expanded in the sky and within moments had assumed a form as large as a great elephant. The boar started revolving in the sky. Is He an ordinary boar? The Supreme Lord has transcendental powers, He can do anything.

Everyone became astonished to see this wonderful event. Brahma thought, “He must be a resident of the transcendental world traveling in disguise in the form of a boar. Is Sri Hari, concealing His original form and trying to agitate me?”

Everyone from Jana-loka, Tapa-loka, Mahar-loka, Satya-loka became astonished to see the boar. As Supreme Lord is all attractive, everyone was being attracted towards the boar. In this way, while Brahma was deliberating with his associates, Sri Hari roared tumultuously like the great mountain Giriraja. The omnipresent Sri Hari enlivened Brahma and the other highly elevated Brahmanas by His roaring. The sound of His roar was so sweet that it destroyed all the miseries of the hearer. Brahma and other sages who reside in Jana-loka, Tapa-loka and Satya-loka, chanted auspicious Mantras from the Vedas as offerings to Varaha Devaa. Upon hearing the prayers of Brahma and the other sages, Varaha Deva prepared to enter into the waters of annihilation for the benefit of the demigods. Lord Varaha rose into the sky while slashing His tail. The Lord quivered the hair on His shoulders and scattered the clouds in the sky with His hooves. Although His external appearance was fearful, He pleased the sages engaged in offering prayers to Him by lovingly glancing over them and entering into the water. His dive into the water and with His thunderbolt-like mountainous body, divided the ocean. The Lord of all sacrifices separated the water with His hooves, and saw the earth lying at the bottom of Rasatala in the same way as when He had carried her in His stomach during the time of annihilation. Appearing very splendid, Lord Varaha lifted the earth by carrying her on His tusks. We recite this pastime in Dasavatara-stotram written by Jayadeva Goswami. At that time, a very powerful demon named Hiranyaksha challenged the Lord. Hiranyaksha and Hiranyakasipu, though they both were twins, Hiranyaksha was considered elder than Hiranyakasipu. They were the sons of Kashyap Risi and Diti. Once Diti requested her husband Kashyap Risi for union but the time was not good for such deed as it was dusk but Diti forced him, so finally Kashyap Risi fulfilled her desire and two Asuras (Hiranyaksha and Hiranyakasipu) were born to them as a result of their union at the time of dusk. Later Diti repented for her act and asked for forgiveness from Kashyap Risi. He pacified her by saying, “Everything happens by the desire of Supreme Lord only”. He knew that Hiranyaksha and Hiranyakasipu are Jay and Vijay, the door keepers of the Lord and there is a cause behind their birth.

He did not inform Diti about their identity and the cause of their birth. He mentioned to her that both of them would become great demons and a great devotee of Supreme Lord would take birth as the son of Hiranyakasipu. Listening to her husband, Diti expressed her desire to him, “I want both of my sons to get killed by the Supreme Lord”.

Kashyap Risi replied, “It will happen so.”

The Supreme Lord is hatari gati dayaka—who bestows salvation upon enemies He kills. The Supreme Lord wants to relish the Vira-rasa by fighting with someone. But He cannot fight with any ordinary person. Only His associates are eligible to fight with Him so that He could relish the Vira-rasa. And therefore, He arranged everything.

Once, in the course of their travels around the three worlds, the four sages born from the mind of Brahma (Sanaka, Sanandan, Sanatan and Sanat-kumara) arrived unannounced at Vaikuntha, the residence of the Supreme Lord. Although the four Kumaras are in their advanced age, their appearance was like that of small children and they travel around naked. It so happened that the two gatekeepers of Vaikuntha, Jaya and Vijaya, saw the four Kumaras approaching. Thinking them to be ordinary children, they prevented the sages from entering Vaikuntha. Although the four Kumaras repeatedly tried to enter Vaikuntha, Jaya and Vijaya kept turning them away. Finally, becoming angry, the four Kumaras cursed the gatekeepers, exclaiming, “You rascals! You are prohibiting us from entering without exercising proper discrimination and out of pride only. Thus you are not qualified to reside at Vaikuntha. We therefore curse you to fall down from this place and to take birth as demons with material bodies.”

By the desire of Supreme Lord they were cursed by the Kumaras. Jaya and Vijaya started crying as they were going to fall down. Seeing their miserable plight, the four Kumaras took pity on them and promised them that, after three lifetimes as demons, they would be relieved from the effect of their curse.

In Sat-yuga they took birth as Hiranyaksha and Hiranyakashipu, in Treta-yuga as Ravan and Kumbhkarna and in Dwapar they were born as Shishupal and Dantvakra. They are not ordinary persons.

So here Kashyap Risi told Diti that Hiranyaksha and Hiranyakashipu would be killed by Supreme Lord. Hiranyaksha and Hiranyakashipu appeared in the sixth Manvanatar. But Syvambhu Manu is the first Manu (Adi-manu), during whose time Lord Varaha appeared, but that time Hiranyaksha was not even born. So there is a very important point to understand here. The Laghu-bhagavatamrita says: “Lord Varaha appears twice in one day of Lord Brahma. During the Svayambhuva-manvantara, He appeared from Brahma’s nostril and rescued the earth, and during the sixth Manvantara (Chakshusha-manvantara) He appeared to rescue the earth and killed Hiranyaksha.” According to the Laghu-Bbhagavatamrita, in the lineage of Uttanapada, the son of Pracheta was Daksha, the daughter of Daksha was Diti, and the son of Diti was Hiranyaksha.

At the time of the appearance of the original (Adi) Varaha Deva at the beginning of the Kalpa, Manu did not have any sons or daughters. How then could Hiranyaksha have taken birth during the Svayambhuva-manvantara? Therefore, it is seen that in the Bhagavatam, Maitreya Risi described the pastimes of Lord Varaha in both the Svayambhuva-manvantara and Chakshusha-manvantara.

Hiranyaksha and Hiranyakashipu both took birth from Diti and they both were so powerful demons that all the demigods were afraid of them. During the time of their birth, some inauspicious signs were seen, because of which the demigods came to know that Hiranyaksha and Hiranyakashipu had taken birth from Diti. They both were tremendously powerful. Hiranyaksha was so powerful that he never considered anyone equal to him.

When the Lord descended as the boar, in Varaha form, to rescue the falling earth by lifting it with His tusks, Hiranyaksha violently opposed Him. Considering Him to possess meager strength, he spoke many deriding words. The Lord, however, returned his taunts with equal vigor. Lord Varaha dodged the violent mace-blows of the angry demon Hiranyaksha, and thus a violent mace-fight began between the two. But in the form of a boar, the Lord did not have hands to carry the mace, so He held the mace with His front legs. Is He an ordinary boar? Hiranyaksha used many kinds of weapons but when He became unsuccessful, he expanded his mystic powers and created so many demons and demoness. They all were shouting, “Cut! Cut! Kill! Kill Him!” When he saw that he was unable to defeat the Supreme Lord, he started throwing stones at Him from far. Then Supreme Lord called for His Sudarshan Disc. Sudarshan Disc destroyed all his mystic powers. Then Hiranyaksha attacked on the Lord with his mace, and the mace from Varaha Deva’s hand fell down on ground. Witnessing this, all the demigod became frightened. The demon attacked the Lord with his mace which He felt like the touch of flowers to His body! Then Varaha Deva hit the ears of the demon so powerfully that his head started revolving and he fell on ground vomiting heavily and thus he left his body.

All the demigods started singing the glories of the fortune of Hiranyaksha, as he had got the touch of the lotus feet of Supreme Lord. He would get the highest auspiciousness. Who will be more fortunate than him? The glories of his fortune are narrated in Srimad Bhagavatam. Externally, one sees that Supreme Lord kicked him with His legs, but one who gets the touch of the lotus feet of the Supreme Lord’s lotus feet does not die, he attains salvation.

So today is appearance day of Lord Varaha. There was one devotee of Lord Varaha in Nabdwip, Koladwip. The Supreme Lord first showed him His Varaha form and then He appeared in front of him as Gauranga Mahaprabhu. Mahaprabhu told him that He would appear there and he would also take birth there. The deity of Varaha Deva is established in Devanand Gaudiya Math in Koladwip. ‘Kola’ means ‘Varaha’.

We may say that we are the devotees of Lord Krishna and will not worship any other form other than Him, but have you got the taste of devotion to Krishna? Have you got the realization of any of the form of the Supreme Lord? If you get the realization of any of His form then you will be completely attracted to that form. You will not able to leave Him and go anywhere else.

Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakur engaged Srila Prabhupad in the service of Kurmadev (the tortoise form of the Lord). When Srila Prabhupad started construction on Bhakti Bhavana at 181 Maniktola Street, while digging the foundations for the building, a deity of Kurmadeva was found. Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakur gave this deity to Srila Prabhupad and taught him how to worship Him. Ontologically they are the same but there is difference in the mellows. If someone gets the slightest taste of the transcendental mellow of any of the form of the Supreme Lord then he will be free from the clutches of the material bondage. And one cannot stop relishing that taste. The gopis relishes the Madhurya-rasa of Sri Krishna. During the Rasa-lila pastimes Krishna suddenly disappeared and the gopis started crying in His separation. Krishna came in front of them in His form of Narayan with four arms at paith-gram and the gopis thought, “What have we got to do with Narayan?”

We cannot say like them. For us getting darshan of Narayan form is also not that easy. The four Kumaras left Brahmananda (the bliss in Brahman realization) when they got the darshan of Narayan. If we get darshan of Narayan, then we would be stuck there. We will not have then the desire to go to Krishna. Gopis have relished the Madhurya-rasa of Krishna so they can do that. But when Radharani came there Krishna withdrew two of His four arms within His body being subdued by Her love which is more than the love of crores of gopis. He could maintain His Narayan form but not in front of Radharani.

Tomorrow is the appearance of Nityanand Prabhu who is non-different from Baladeva and who came along with Gauranga Mahaprabhu to distribute the highest Divine Love. The Supreme Lord Himself came as Gauranga Mahaprabhu and Balaram came as Nityanand Prabhu. He appeared in Ekachakra Dham. He went to Vrindavan and asked everyone, where is My younger brother? Everyone said that He is not here, then He came to Nabdwip and heard about the advent of Mahaprabhu. He thought, “I did so many efforts and My brother have forgotten Me? I will remain hidden now.”

He hid Himself in Nandan Acharya Bhavan. Mahaprabhu sent Haridas Thakur and Srivas Pandit but they could not find Nityanand Prabhu. Then Mahaprabhu Himself went there in search of Him and They both met there. Ecstatic feelings became manifested in both of Them. Nityanand Prabhu was crying in the separation of Mahaprabhu. One who is Baladev in Krishna-lila is now appeared as Nityanand in Mahaprabhu’s Lila. Gauranga Mahaprabhu is Nandnandan Krishna Himself. We will hear more about this subject tomorrow.