Nityananda Gauranga Hare Krishna! Spiritual Tidbits to excite the soul….

“…As a matter of fact the mercy age of Nitaai Gaura is the closest you can come to see pure bhakti in its original form at our fallen situation which is why it is never obtainable except once in creation…”

“…Actually there are really two issues involved : One is the mercy approach and the other is the philosophical approach. in the mercy approach devotees do not bother what background or faith people are following. All they care is that people chant the Holy names and they will get all the benefits. So to give mercy we have to see everyone as entitled for devotion to the Lord and so we must ensure friendly relationships with everyone as far as possible to avoid people committing offenses to each other. For this reason our acharyas have acted like paramahamsas and extracted whatever genuine portion of the teachings that are there in philosophies of the world. They have not taken religion/philosophy into consideration.

However when it gets more advanced, the philosophical approach is very significant because as people’s bhakti becomes more and more purer, any material corruption will eventually grow with it and start affecting one’s devotion and things that were ok or tolerable at first later do not appeal anymore and rather appearing very glaringly like dark spots. Now at that stage some philosophical clarification is necessary or else it will begin to create departures and deviations from the pure path. What more can I say, a stage will come where simply being in the material world will be a contaminant and at that time the devotee has to reject the whole material universe itself and head off to the spiritual world.

I know that it is necessary to sometimes speak truth however unpleasant it may sound. We have to be very judicious in our talk not to thrust down more than what people can gulp because then offenses may be committed to the pure devotees and siddhanta which can create obstructions to people’s devotion. Already we are seeing a lot of wrong practices are going on with most people not aware of these issues in depth and while it’s fine in the initial merciful stages, after a point it is not acceptable to keep that running because the wrong conclusions in the teachings of worldly dharmas will also become acceptable and the pure siddhanta will not be sought after which means people’s devotion can derail owing to lack of direction and this can cause other problems.

For example meat eating — we meet people who have had a history of meat eating as in some places no other food was formerly available like deserts or extremely cold and harsh climates. And when one first starts chanting Nityananda Gauranga, the Lord gives full mercy and doesn’t consider our limitations that we cannot follow so much, etc… but you can’t expect me or Shyam Sundar ji to do that and get away can you? So the Lord slowly raises the bar as things go purer and purer. If you fall from the first step you can land on your feet, but you jump from the stratosphere you’ll be killed on impact…”

“…I hope you will not take any offense at his statements and it should not affect your devotion in any way. Our devotion is in the hands of the Lord and when He wants a purer level of devotion He will also arrange for the circumstances so that we can appreciate it without the contamination of our material impressions. So we should always pray for that. Like a person who was from a hippie background if the impressions in this life do not allow him to advance beyond a point in one life, the Lord may put Him in a family of brahmanas or devotees in his next life so that this influence of his past is forgotten….”

“…before we take it to the level of Narayana naama, and say things like emphasizing Goloka and Krishna over Narayana, let us be careful to ensure our spiritual body is not intended to serve in Vaikuntha . That kind of a statement is true, but it is true only at a level where one has crossed Vaikuntha and as entered into Goloka along the path of spontaneous loving devotion. So while a Bhaktisiddhanta or a Prabhupada can say that, we have to be doubly careful. They’re right, but it won’t be good in our mouth…”

“…You know that is why we approach Chaitanya Charitamrita through Chaitanya Bhagavata. When one chants the name of Gaura, it is equivalent to devotion to all aspects of Godhead in all His features. The name of Gaura includes Narayana, Krishna, Radha, etc… so by chanting Nitaai-Gaura naama we are free from a lot of trouble….As a matter of fact we all have to be far more grateful to Swamiji for revealing the mantrarajas to us. I am ready to write my words on a stone and even sign a contract to say that we cannot attain Krishna without Nitaai Gaura. We are simply not qualified to approach them directly. Nitaai Gaura is the ONLY way out for us. As you have discussed siddhanta so much, you see very well why so many of us are automatically not fit for this path. Even if we discuss pure devotion, still we are not fit for talking about things beyond Vaikuntha so even if we say everything pure, practically speaking, we too fall in the same category of having plenty of problems in our qualifications….”

“…Not only that by chanting Gauranga naama, even the residents of Vaikuntha can increase their love and devotion to the point of equalling the residents of Vrindavana and it is said in Chaitanya Chandamrita that even the residents of Goloka obtained even greater bliss and love in Gaura lila than in Krishna lila. So apporaching the Lord through Nitaai Gaura is the perfect situation because it allows all devotees to relish the highest love whereas in other approaches there is always a fact that some devotees are higher and some devotees are lower and some aspects of bhakti are not accessible to some souls.

That is the magnamity of Gaura lila, and that is the reason why we find that Lord Gaura’s devotees come from all rasas and all abodes, including Vaikuntha, Vraja and Ayodhya. The sankirtana of Mahaprabhu is identical to the rasa dance — but in Krishna lila only the gopis participate whereas in Gaura lila it is thrown open even to fallen sinners like us by appearing in the form of audarya, but which gives us the love whose magnitude is possible only in madhurya. This is the statement of Prabhodhananda Sarasvati in Chaitanya Chandamrita….”

“…Yes it is good if we can appreciate whatever genuine truths exist where we can see. At the same time we should be equally unwilling to comprmise on siddhanta if we encounter anything that goes against the tenets of pure devotion as well.

So overall, these things are not actually necessary for our devotion because Nitaai is giving gold free in the market to save us from the troubles of gold mining. Let us not waste any more time. BRING THE WORLD DOWN WITH KIRTAN! …”

“…Anyway we forgot one thing, although we talk about a lot of things not right elsewhere, we haven’t stated how we are so fallen we aren’t fit for the highest siddhanta ourselves, what to speak of looking outside…”

“…So between the both of us I would choose to align with the Lord’s mercy feature first as that will give everyone in this world a chance to acquire qualification to understand the siddhanta.

And at our level of devotion we need to approach Krishna only through Nitaai-Gaura. It is just an extension of the same concept. Our link with Krishna (and all other aspects of Godhead) will always be through Nitaai Gaura and only through Nitaai Gaura and Gurudeva. Haribol!…”

Daaso’smi,
Srinath