NITyaananda Gauraanga Hare Krishna NAAma BhaktI (NITAAI) Yoga

Dear Mihir, Swamiji and all Vaisnavas on this sacred sangha,

      Nityananda Gauranga Hare Krishna! Please accept my humble obeisances! Here I am sharing some realisations along with some nectar which great devotees have told me.

            We only have limited and conditioned vision and hence things don't seem right. We need some revelation from the Lord to tell us what is behind the scenes.  It is very mysterious the way in which the Lord and his devotees work.  They don't obey any logic whatsoever. Indeed if the Lord wants us to tell lies, we do, even though it is ethically incorrect. Bhaktisiddhanta Prabhupada states that morality or ethics are merely relative ways by which people come to accept ideas of right and wrong. However what the Lord wants us to do, that alone is right, the rest is wrong.

      You mention the Mahabharata. Yudhisthira's chariot always rode 5 fingers above the earth because of his dharmic nature. The pandavas had not stopped Draupadi's insult, so why did that chariot still stay above ground? Why did the Pandavas not fall to Vaisnava apradha but Bhishma did? One other thing is that when Lord Krishna wanted Yudhisthira to tell that Asvatthama was dead, he did not do it, but instead tried to say it was the elephant. At that point his chariot hit ground. Why is that? The answer is not because of the lie, it was because he had hesitated to act upon the Lord's order and tried to take shelter of mundane dharma at that point. He told a lie because he told something other than what Krishna wanted him to say. That was the real reason. It is very confidential and none of the mundane writers of the Mahabharata can understand such things.

        Why did Yudhisthira hesitate? One answer is that when Yudhisthira went to hell for a while, all the sinful suffering souls there were immediately delivered simply by that small amount of association with a pure devotee. So there was another reason behind that too. Another is to show us that surrending to the Lord's will is far superior to mundane morality.

         A great devotee like Bhishma is fully aware of right and wrong, being the authority on thousands of scriptures. Why did he not save Draupadi? As a matter of fact, why did he even stay with the Kauravas at all? There are many reasons. First of all Bhisma was actually playing his part in the Lord's pastimes as the Lord wanted. The pastime of Draupadi being rescued by Sri Krishna at the last minute is to show to the whole world how we must completely abandon our mundane ego and our sense of shame, honour and surrender to the Lord. The Lord in turn will never let his devotees be overpowered by demonaic forces. Thus the rascal Duhsana's attempt was utterly foiled. One very good reason for the whole Mahabharata war taking place is because of that one Vaisnava aparadha against Draupadi. The Kauravas were then doomed along with all their allies. Now the Lord had the best reason in the world to get rid of them. But he made them invite their own doom by letting them misuse their independence and he arranged for their annihilation by this type of circumstantial arrangement.  Similarly Hiranyakasipu was killed after he began to commit Vaisnava aparadha against Prahlada, but till then he was allowed to be let loose. Kamsa's fate was sealed after he committed numerous offenses against Vasudeva and Devaki and the residents of Vrindavana. That is one reason.

         Dhritarastra attained sayujya, but he failed to attain the Lord even though he was the first person to hear the Gita live as it occured. Why? Because of Vaisnava aparadha.

         Another thing is that Bhishma and all the others had been stopped by yogamaya and made to watch silently. But actually they were getting the highest bliss out of the Lord coming and saving them. Actually a pure devotee experiences highest bliss in playing whatever his role is in the Lord's pastimes. The thing in the spiritual world is that if you are meant to be the Lord's pin cushion, then you get the highest bliss when he pokes pins into you. In Vrindavana sometimes the devotees are victims of Lord Krishna's endless pranks. But that is the highest bliss. If the Lord didn't come to their home, they would be lost in an ocean of sorrow. And if someone was to be hit by stones and shoes, that would be the greatest pleasure for them. Everyone serves the Lord willingly and unconditionally and that's exactly what they want. Which person is so fortunate to get hit by a devotee's footwear, which is worshippable all over the universe?

          So Bhisma was not actually pained by getting pierced, struck down and lying on a bed of arrows so many that there were not even 2 fingers gap between them. His role in the pastimes was exactly that, to act like an enemy of the Pandavas. Although externally he manifested great suffering, internally he was actually experiencing the topmost bliss! That was his role in the pastimes and he gained the highest bliss from being massacared in battle. That is really the love of the devotees for the Lord. Anything that the Lord wishes becomes the highest bliss for his devotees. In hell, there are even worse punishments for the sinners than a bed of arrows. But the devotees are willing to desperately go there if the Lord wants them to go. Who can even fathom this type of love? No ordinary man can understand the real nature of the love between the Lord and his devotees?

           In truth, the Lord and his pure devotees experience bliss in all situations. In the spiritual world, everything is spiritual and everything is living. Think about the sweets that get chewed and crushed and eaten by the Lord. What about the cooking vessel which has to be heated up in a fire and the milk that got boiled for the Lord, and the butter pot that got broken into pieces so that Krishna could taste his beloved butter? What about the humble blade of grass that gets trampled by every moving entity walking in the dhama? How did they feel it? Answer : The highest bliss. That is the perfection of their existence. In the end actually only we are feeling sad because we are seeing with conditioned vision and material logic and we tend to judge everything based on those limitations. Our mundane logic is based on rules which keep it bound up and limited and one only sees how hopeless are the efforts of the rationalists, scholars, mystic yogis, impersonalists and speculators in trying to come up with imaginary ideas about the Lord.

           Lord Gauranga Krishna is a reservoir of all contradictory qualities. He is the only place where things are black and white simultaneously. Actually he was giving the highest bliss to both Arjuna and Bhishma and one can very well see how eager Bhisma wanted to get killed by the Lord. To enjoy that mood, he even gave away his weak point of not being able to attack women or anyone who had been born a woman. One more lesson in that pastime was that it is better to choose a bed of arrows over siding with non-devotees and Vaisnava aparadhis, so sinful were the Kauravas. Srila Visvanatha Cakravarti in his Sarartha Darshini commentary on the Bhagavad Gita says that the Lord had induced the mood of an enemy in Bhisma to enjoy this pastime. Otherwise Bhisma would never have been able to attack the Lord. This commentary gives many confidential revelations about the mellows of devotion while Prabhupada's Gita gives the siddhanta. As a matter of fact the acarya even says that Lord Krishna accepted the arrows of Bhisma like love bites in loving excahnges. Please try to study them side by side to get a complete picture of the very esoteric truths of bhakti in the Bhagavat Gita.

           Again the pastime of the Lord breaking his promise shows how loving devotion is far superior to mundane morality. Those ethics aren't going to save us in the end, only the Lord saves us. Actually he tells us one time how to behave by giving us the Vedas and then he tells us to behave another way at another time. Still even this small thing can never be understood by even those respectable people in the form of scholars or moralists because of lack of devotional qualifications.

       There are infinite layers of understanding in the Lord's pastimes. If this is the first layer than there is a second, a third and a hundred millionth layer and so on and very quickly we are overwhelmed on realising how utterly insignificant and ignorant and tiny we really are and how much we depend on the Lord and his devotees. We are only tiny souls who are so weak and who are like toys before maya's charms. We see ourselves with conditioned vision and wonder why the Lord has made us so imperfect. But yet there is a reason why we are what we are and when we realise it, that becomes ultimate perfection for us. Being that most unworthy, insignificant, utterly ignorant and worthless little particle of dust, a mere nobody and nothing in the midst of the infintely great personality of the Lord and his unfathomably, unimaginable great devotees is exactly what we want and that is exactly what gives us the greatest bliss and the greatest love as that is our real position -- being the lowest of the low.  That is ultimate perfection!

        I have written something which I think I understood to some extent from what the great devotees on this sangha have instructed me about. I am full of flaws and actually I should not be talking about such high things which I myself don't follow. I look for the first opportunity to trade devotion for some mundane pleasure and with all such disqualifications, I am actually incapable of having the same effect as what I received when a pure devotee told this same thing to me. My words are full of flaws and inconsistencies, but I pray that you overlook them for the fact that these are actually inspirations of the vani of those pure devotees who revealed these facts to me.

        If you are made happy by this, then I fall at all your feet and request you to show your mercy on this sinner so that he can continue to serve you as always.

Offering my dandavats and aspiring to be your eternal servant,
Srinath

Nityananda! Gauranga! Hare Krishna!

Nityananda Gauranga Hare Krishna!Dear Guruji, Srinath and devotees. Please accept my humble obeisances. All glories to Sri Guru and Sri Sri Nityananda Gauranga.I am not only happy Srinath with your realizations but I am overjoyed. I am so pleased to see your advancement in which the Lord reveals these unique insights to you. It is only the devotee of the Lord that can understand and pen down such insights. It also shows the divine potency of this Sangha and how blessed the devotees are who are gathered here at the feet of Guruji who takes us without delay directly to the lotus feet of Lord Nityananda Who bestows us with the supreme nectar of His association. Your very happy servant,Hadai Nityananda dasaNityananda Gauranga Hare Krishna!

Nityaananda ! Gauraanga ! Hare Krishna !

Thank you for such wonderful answers Srinath. I have certainly been helped by such wonderful answers but left with some more queries.

I understand that Bhishma was enjoying spiritual bliss, I also understand that devotees of the Lord are ready to undertake any suffering for the Lord even if it is to go to hell. However I am talking from the Lord's point of view. Though the devotees are ready to suffer for the Lord, the Lord never lets His devotees suffer. Still in this case Bhishma suffered so much just before his death. I understand that the Pandavs and Draupati also suffered a lot but that suffering was to bring them much closer to the Lord. When distress comes to bring us closer to the Lord then it is certainly good but here in this case of Bhishma and Abhimanyu the suffering was just before death. This causes a lot of pain to my heart.

ys,
Mihir.

Dear Mihir,

    Nityananda! Gauranga! Hare Krishna! Dandavat pranams!

    Mihir, you still see it only with your eyes which are at the relative level. The Lord's angle of vision is not like my conditioned vision. So although you do agree that they were enjoying bliss, still you think somewhere that there was still suffering. The Pandavas were actually suffering greatest when Krishna was going back to Dwaraka. Kuntidevi makes it clear that they were a lot happier in the middle of all the 'suffering.'

    Does a devotee really suffer in devotional service? Think for a minute... Actually it is we who are suffering because of the way we see it.

    Did you think that everything was finished with death and so since their suffering happened at the end they didn't get enough time to come closer to the Lord? Broaden your look some more....and see beyond the bodily platform.

    Think of our acaryas too. Jagannatha Dasa Babaji was paralysed at the end of his manifest pastimes. But was he suffering? Look at Srila Prabhupada. He had chronic diabetes which let to two heart attacks, a stroke, decrease in vision and ultimately towards the end of 1977 it had become so bad that he was bed-ridden with renal failure, all things which ordinary diabetics are especially vulnerable to. Was he suffering?

     Rupa Gosvami has advised us not to see these material limitations in the body of devotees as it is only an illusion of maya.

     However, I lack sufficient realisation or qualification to answer your question directly and I am sorry that I am not able to answer you further. I humbly request senior devotees to humbly enlighten us further on these mysterious topics, if we are qualified to know. I really don't know.

      Regarding Lord Balarama's behaviour, it is beyond our tiny understanding. As a matter of fact I wanted to ask the very same question myself. However I got this type of understanding. While someone can very well give us the answer, there are some things which are so high and confidential that simply getting hold of some data and digesting it in the memory isn't going to do. One actually has to be at a high level to properly receive the answers. I tried asking and all I found was that simply getting a worded answer and digesting the info is not the best solution and that's what the Lord and his devotees feel that way.

       Sometimes the answers are so far beyond words that only deep meditation and chanting and spiritual grace can we realise the truth. Sometimes I ask a question, someone answers immediately, at other times I am told to wait and let it come when it desires. However when it does come, it comes exactly when it has to come and along with it also comes the realisation why it comes only now and not earlier.

         Our curiosity is well encouraged as it is part of our nature to know more and more and only the Lord can satisfy that. But we really get the answers only when we really, really want to know. We have to pray sincerely and the understanding will come when we are qualified.

         Sometimes if people don't get their answer straightaway, they resort to speculating if this or if that and I used to do that a lot until I realised one fine day that I was being stupid. Sometimes our speculation can force us to become skeptic and commit offenses and that is how all the apasampradayas begin. I definitely have faith that you will be patient and humble and one day sooner or later you will get your answers.

       So leaving this thread to the mercy of Guruji and the senior devotees, I just say that its best to wait patiently and trust the Lord and the Vaisnavas even though we cannot understand their activities. From my experience I know that things work out best when we trust and leave it to the Lord and tag along. So please trust me and please forgive me for my huge ignorance when I tell you, "I don't know, but if you are serious, you will eventually get your answers and more."

Chosen to wait for the right time,
Srinath

Dear Mihir,

       Nityananda! Gauranga! Hare Krishna! Please accept my humble obeisances!

       Yes, please feel free to ask any doubts you may have so that these misconceptions may be cleared as soon as possible. Whenever I get a doubt, the sangha has been merciful to me by clearing it up. And by doing so I realise a little more about the infinitely wonderful nature of the Lord and it makes my attitude more favourable to devotion.

       Sometimes if these little demons of doubt aren't cleared, they can sometimes lead to major problems later on and I have seen many people leave the path thanks to insufficient guidance and improper attitude on their part. However, I see your qualifications and you humility to surrender to the guru and accept his instructions and therefore I am fully confident that you will stick to the devotional path and will become a saint in no time.

       The sangha exists only for this purpose and it is the opinion of our acaryas that if they can make just one person a pure devotee, then the whole mission is a success. So you see how rare it is for people to attain pure devotional service.

        By asking your doubts you have helped me to get a little insight into this and so I am very grateful to you for having brought me closer to the Lord. So we serve each other, you see?

        Oh, yes, Guruji was so merciful to have cleared that doubt about Lord Balarama. Actually Lord Balarama never accepted Duryodhana at all, he was just making a fool of Duryodhana, just like Lord Shiva supporting Ravana or Banasura. Actually Lord Nityananda Balarama never tolerates offenses to his master Lord Gauranga Krishna and those dear to him and the whole thing was only to bewilder the demons. That is a big thing I got while listening to Chaitanya Bhagavata.

        When Lord Gauranga's sannyasa danda was broken by Nitaai, the Lord left the devotees and went alone. Somewhere in that chapter it was mentioned that Lord Gauranga internally loves his devotees, but externally manifests anger or sometimes doesn't support them, but when he has made up his mind to finish off a person, he externally gives him special honour and glorifies him. So there we know the reason for Lord Balarama's behaviour. But that's all I was eligible to know.

         Do you know why Lord Balarama killed Romaharshana with just one blade of grass? Some people think it was just for not getting up and offering respects. But really Romaharshana was actually impersonalist at heart, a mayavadi. His knowledge of the Puranas was just bookish and at the time Lord Balarama appeared, he was actually lecturing on Srimad Bhagavatam. Just see! He was discussing all the Lord's pastimes, but yet he couldn't so much as recognise the Lord!

           Its the same with all the impersonalists too. Romaharshana was acting like a guru, and yet by being a mayavadi, his explanations of Srimad Bhagavatam was only a thunderbolt on Lord Krishna's body (see Chaitanya bhagavata, about Prakasananada). Srimad Bhagavatam is purely devotional and anyone who approaches it with the attitude of a mayavadi is simply a mischief maker and he simply beats the Lord left and right with a stick. As if that was not enough, the mayavadis also commit great Vaisnava aparadha because they potray all the Vaisnavas as impersonalists through their cloud of misconception. They may accept everything like love, devotion, prema, nama sankirtana, etc... but in the end they believe impersonal is the ultimate end. That way they commit Vaisnava aparadha too.

            Srimad Bhagavatam is Lord Krishna in book form. Plus Srimad Bhagavatam is also the devotee in the form of a book. Anyone who twists the purely devotional statements simply commits a big Vaisnava aparadha against Srimad Bhagavatam. The Srimad Bhagavatam is very dear to Lord Nityananda, who recities it eternally with his thousand mouths and who had originally narrated it as Ananta Sesha to the four Kumaras and Narada. He can never tolerate such hurting offenses to his beloved Gauranga Krishna and his devotees and the Bhagavatam.  Romaharshana was actually opening the door for impersonalists to enter to Srimad Bhagavatam by acting like a guru without having the qualification to do so. He actually posed a risk to the sampradaya itself and if you know how the 13 apasampradayas came about, you'll know why.

             So Lord Nityananda, he is the adi guru. When he arrives he must be given the vyasa-asana. Who was this upstart who claimed the position of guru for himself? To show the world how insignificant Romaharshana was the Lord only took a blade of grass and killed him then and there. By killing him, he saved him from going to hell for his offenses as anyone who is killed by the Lord is liberated. Its a message to everyone including the impersonalists, that they are so tiny and they talk all they want only as long as the Lord gives room for it. But if the Lord has decided enough, then the mighty mayavadi with all his yogic power, long life, erudtion etc etc can be trashed by a mere blade of grass. That's how small they really are.

             Many other things involved in a blade of grass. Sita showed Ravana a blade of grass and the azhwars have revealed more than 20 different reasons for that one activity, showing how many layers there are to just one simple act by the Lord. Srila Bhaktisiddhanta has written that if a guru thinks himself to be a guru, then he is only guru - the u == gur (which means 'cow'). He becomes as dull as a buffalo in qualification if he thinks himself to be greater than Lord Balarama, the adi guru. So the only food fit for a buffalo is grass, so Lord Nityananda said, "Eat grass!". That is one reason.

             Yet another reason is that since Romaharshana was at an elevated position he should be killed like a cheap piece of dirt. So when a king comes, he is offered a seat of honour and so the kusa grass is symbolic of a seat of honour and so it was equivalent to "killing with honour".  A seat of Kusa grass is used for all spiritual activities like yagnas, and penances, meditiation, etc..... And there are many more, but I can't recall them all.

              So from this we can just see how offensive the mayavadis who openly slander Srimad Bhagavatam are. Their explanations are so offensive that listening to them will ruin everything. "mayavada bhashya sune haya sarva nasa". We humbly appeal to the Lord that we never fall down into such a predicament where we become mayavadis and commit such offenses to Him and His dear devotees. Therefore I always pray that we are never subjected to these offenses even unknowingly and we always remain fixed on the path of pure devotion always.

Daaso'smi,
Srinath

Dear devotees,

       Nityananda Gauranga Hare Krishna! I have found some more information about this topic. Previously I had not found a complete answer to why the Pandavas had to suffer and I said that there was more to it than meets the eye

       Once Shri Krishna, son of Devaki, visited the Pandavas in that forest. All the Pandavas, including Draupadi, were very happy to see their Lord, and they forgot their painful forest life immediately. They felt enriched with a new life just by taking Krnsa's darshan. They paid their obeisances at their Lord's lotus feet Seeing the miserable living condition of the Pandavas, Lord Shri Krishna became very upset. and at the same time He became very angry towards Dhuryodhana. It appeared as if the Lord was going to destroy the whole universe, and so the Pandavas became fearful and all began to pray to the Lord in a humble mood. Listening to the humble prayers of Arjuna, the Lord composed Himself and said, "Oh Arjuna, being very pleased with all of you [ Pandavas], and being controlled by your devotion and friendship towards Me, I will now tell you about the wonderful history of Purusottama month....

        A fortunate person who follows My instructions and observes this Purusottama month properly, and in a faithful way worships Me will attain fame, opulence and a good son in this very life And after enjoying a happy life, he will return back to Goloka Dhama. By following My instructions, everyone should worship this sacred month. 1 have made it the best among all other months Oh husband of Rama devi (Vishnu), give up all kinds of mental speculation about (his extra month  Just take this Purusottama month with you to your Vaikuntha abode

After narrating this brief history of the Purusottama month. Lord Shri Krishna glanced very mercifully upon Yudhisthira and Draupadi, and then began speaking to Arjuna

"Oh lion among man, can you now understand the reason why you Pandavas are suffering? You did not acknowledge or honor the presence of Purusottama month, which has just recently finished. That month which is most dear to Vrndavana Chandra has passed, but you Pandavas were in the forest and did not worship Purusottama month.  So now you are suffering. You have been following the ritualistic principles given to you by Vyasadeva, but unless you worship Purusottama month you cannot perform pure devotional service to Me."

     More to come in the next post. Very interesting. Mihir, our questions are answered at the right time!

Daaso'smi,
Srinath