Anartha Nivritti. Lecture 8

Om ajñāna te mirandasya, jñānām jānā shalākāya, shakṣur milikāṁ yena, tasmai shri bhūrave namah, śrī chaitānyā mano viṣṭhāṁ, sāpikāmya bhūtāle, sāyam rupā kādāmya, nanātisvā padāntika. Vandevam Shri Guru Shri Yudhapada Kamala Shri Guru Vaishnava Amstya Shri Rupa Sagrajata Saganara Gunatanditam Tamsajiva Sarvaitam savadrutam parijana sahitam krishna chaitanya devam Shri Vrādhā krishna padam Sādhanā valita śrī chāpā vitāmschya He Krishna Karuna Sindho Lina Vandho Jagatpate Gopesa Gopika Kanta Radha Kanta Namastate Taptakansana Gorangi Rāghe Vrindāvaneshwari Vrishabhānu-sutayeli Prāṇāmī-harī-priye Vāñca-kalpāta-rudyasca Krikā-sindū-mya-evacca Patitanām pāvānebhyo Vaiṣṇavebhyo-namo-namah Shri Krishna Chaitanya Pravuni Prananda Shri Arvaita Gadadara Shri Vasathivarava Navrinda Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare, Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare, Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna Hare Hare Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Hare Hare Svasyastu viśvasyakalah prasidatam dayantu bhutani shivam mitvodhya manaśca padram vajatatta dokśacca avyashyata mnomati radyahaitutri nimi. Aradya bhagavan prajeśyata nayasthakdham avrindavanam ramyaka chidupāsana brajavadu vargenaya kalpidam Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam pramānamamālāṁ prema-pumārtamahān Śrīcayitānyamahāprabhūrmātam edamāṁ tāp prādharo nāparaḥ Viśvāsya-nātta rūpa-sau bhakti-vārtmā pradarśanāṁ Bhakti-chākre-vārti-tātvāṁ Chakra Vata Khyadeva Vade Pridva Prenava Vakti Shasya Vitate Sanjivani Swakama Ramve Pāmatavartu Dāva Damani Vishvapa Vola Sini Dūrāñe maruṣa khinopi sarasi bābāyavu yāttavu śrīcai dānyakripāni rāṅkushamah madhurya kādambini Shri Chaitanya Kripani Ram Kusamaha Madhurya Kadam Vini Bhakti Purva Shritatam Tu Rasampasye Pyadatati tam nomi satatam rupa nama priyajanam hare So, Hare Krishna. Silvidesha Natsas Chakravati Takur classified all the anarchists which are there the unwanted programs which keep us attached to this body and to this material existence into four categories according to their origin. All of these anarchists have the same function. They bind us, keep us in the bondage of our body, and therefore facilitate continuing our material existence. Senseless, with repeated births and deaths and sufferings, but still we are attached to it. And out of the four kinds of anarchists, the most dangerous and the most persistent programs or anarchists, are anarchists which are created by an offense, a parade. Why the most dangerous, most persistent, deepest one? Because this tendency for offense is coming directly from the soul. Tendency to enjoy or tendency to avoid enjoyment is coming from the mind. but the offensive mentality is ultimately rooted in the soul. And therefore, whatever we do, impelled by these tendencies, creates very lasting effects on our consciousness. and we briefly mentioned this effect and the effect is twofold when we commit a parada the first effect of a parada is that the heart of those who are object of our parada becomes closed toward us they just want to keep as far away as possible from us and therefore Therefore we do not experience the effects of the Holy Name. We do not feel the taste in studying or hearing Srimad Bhagavatam. We do not really feel the reciprocation of the Holy Dhamma. We do not feel these exalted feelings which are supposed to come because Holy Down, one of the five powerful forms of devotional service, can immediately bring us one to the level of power. So we don't feel all these effects because of our offense, because all these powerful personalities, the holy name, scriptures, Vaishnavas, especially great Vaishnavas, and Holy Dham, they are not in a hurry to give us mercy. And the second effect, which we also mentioned at the end of the lecture, is that our consciousness becomes more gross. it loses its ability to discriminate or to sense the subtle presence of the spiritual energy pure consciousness can reflect spiritual energy and pure consciousness is very helpful for our spiritual progress it's still material consciousness but if it's pure we can through the media of this pure consciousness we can intuit the existence of God or presence of God and we can also feel the power of the holy name and so many other beautiful gifts the pure consciousness or pure heart can give to us but when our consciousness becomes gross gross and shrunken that's the effect as much as the fence makes the heart of the offended shrunken in a similar way the heart of the offender is also shrunken the consciousness of offender also becomes very narrow and very meager and because of this our consciousness becomes gross. We can only perceive something grossly material. Anything more subtle is not perceivable for such gross consciousness. And another effect upon our consciousness is that it activates dormant material samskaras for the time being we could have been very peacefully performed devotional service but all of a sudden so much disturbance is there in the mind and we have to deduct that this disturbance is due to committed offense which activated dormant samskaras and all of a sudden we feel something like lust or anger which we didn't feel for a long time so and we quoted this verse from Padma Purana which explains this manifestation of gross consciousness you only see the gross forms you see the form of the Lord and you say it's just a stone or metal and you look at the spiritual master guru and you only feel the ordinary human being with all his faults and mostly you see the faults and deficiencies and you look at Vaishnava and you judge Vaishnava according to their origin, according to their jati according to their caste or place of birth and of course you don't feel that there is an effect of Padatirtha or Charanamrita and the most important you develop the intelligence again this is all description of this certain type of gross intelligence which considers mantra or the holy name of Lord Vishnu which is capable of remove all the dirt from our heart as Shabda Samanya is an ordinary sound so and And of course, Vishnu, who is Sarveshvara, Taditara Samadira. No, he is equal to somebody else. There are so many gods out there. And this is the description of the mentality of people who live in hell, or in other words, who live in the material world. Because material world is hell. Dukhalaya Mashaasvatam. Who only can interact with the matter and cannot feel the presence of spirit. And Silla Jiva Goswami gives a beautiful description of it in Bhaktisandarva in more details. What happens with our consciousness when we commit offenses. There are five, he lists five very important effects on our consciousness of the offense. When we commit offense, the first effect is crookedness. Basically, the pretension, the tendency to pretend. I still do my devotional service. I still externally worship Vaishnavas. I externally worship Krishna. I externally pay respect to Guru. But internally, I become spiteful. I become negligent or even envious sometimes. So this crookedness that externally you continue with the same so-called service, but internally you feel haughtiness over Vaishnavas and spiritual master and so on and so forth. This is called crookedness. Another effect is facelessness. I will describe it a little later. so facelessness, absorption in objects that erode one's face in the Lord's slackness in devotion and pride arising from one's own devotional service. And then he writes, very important thing, if one is unable to give this up in spite of being engaged in bhakti, rooted in the association of great devotees, one should understand that all these are effects of offenses to the name in this life and symptoms of offenses committed in past lives as well. So, you know, there's certain kind of crookedness or hypocrisy, the atheistic tendencies, absorption in TV and mobile phones and social media, slackness and devotion and pride, they're natural to every human being. But when we start bhakti, and when this face appears in our heart, when shraddha comes to our heart, together with respect and so many other beautiful qualities, when bhakti sprouts, and we still cannot give up these things, these tendencies. Normally, in a normal circumstances, we should be able to give up all these tendencies and engage in bhakti. But if we cannot give it up, despite of our endeavors, despite of understanding that this is not good, it means that there is some offense somewhere hidden within our consciousness, and this offense produces these tendencies, reinforces or strengthens these tendencies. So that's a very important point to consider. so and he says this could be offense in this life or it could be offense from the previous life but it's there and the offense therefore becomes the cause of our faulty execution of devotional service when we continue with devotional service but devotional service doesn't bring the expected results because there is an obstacle there is some power within us which deprives the process of devotional service, their natural power so that's what Shiva Gasswami explains and we will go in little more details, but basically what we can see in this description is that as much sadhana bhakti brings us to the condition of love, helps us to develop love towards God, offenses result in indifference and ultimately aversion to bhakti. So that's the opposite because offenses are diametrically opposed to love. The result of the offenses is also diametrically opposed to bhakti. And we can easily find five corresponding qualities which are supposed to be present in our heart when we practice bhakti. present and flourish in our heart. When we start practicing sadhana bhakti natural tendency will become that we become very straightforward, honest. There is nothing to hide. I am a good person. I am doing what I am supposed to do and this straightforwardness is a very natural tendency of a sadhaka. if there is no offense. And then when we continue with sadhana bhakti, definitely our faith will become stronger. There's no doubt about it because we will gain some spiritual experience and the spiritual experience will make our sraddha stronger. Then gradually, gradually the taste that inspires us us to be completely absorbed in devotional service will also become more and more pronounced. And then, of course, sadhana bhakti increases enthusiasm to perform devotional service and ultimately sadhana bhakti makes one humble. Because no matter how great we are doing in sadhana bhakti, we understand that I'm just an insignificant worm which is trying to serve my glorious Lord, but who am I? So we can see that the five natural results of sadhana bhakti, gifts of sadhana bhakti upon our consciousness are coming when we perform sadhana bhakti properly. But if we don't do this, then these five opposite effects also will come. Quotilion basically means that we become more hypocritical. And it's not without a reason that usually people speak, normal people who are not practicing devotees, they usually speak about religious people as being hypocrites religiosity religions are famous of producing hypocrites why? because of this reason because we become devotees in this line or that line but because we are careless and we commit offenses then this tendency to hypocrisy, to crookedness, cotillium, becomes stronger within our heart. And then, amazingly enough, the facelessness also comes. We can, if we are honest and if we analyze our heart, we can see that sometimes, It seems like in the beginning I was so faithful and now I'm kind of losing my faith. Does Krishna exist or not? Not a fact. So, ashradha basically means that even if you encounter something which is miraculous, you still will explain it out by your rational consciousness that this is, ah, no, it is just ah, coincidence. Every time basically the miracles are happening in our life, practically every day. But the rational mind which is contaminated by aparada will try to explain it out by some coincidence or whatever is there. or it's just my imagination or something like this. So that's again result of aparata. And then bhagavatnishta chyavakas too antarabhinivyesha. We become very much absorbed in things which chyavakas, something which destroys our Bhagavan Nishta. So like the other day, Rada Pramod Prabhu asked, is it sinful to watch TV? It's not sinful, but it definitely destroys our Nishta in Bhagavan. It distracts our consciousness. It's not sinful, but we become absorbed in it. And this is what I've seen also. People come to Krishna consciousness, starts practicing it, and before they had some addictions, and they kind of give it up, sometimes easily give it up. But then after some time, the addictions return. They start playing games in computer or whatever is there. Or some other addictions start taking drugs again. So again, Silla Jivigaswami says that's the result of offense. As I mentioned before, the offense activates dormant material samskaras. And therefore, this desire to get absorbed in something material and to feel illusory happiness from this absorption becomes very strong and impetuous. and then as a result of it the force the force influence upon our consciousness is that bhakti shaitiliam our practice of bhakti becomes very slackened instead of chanting good rounds in the morning we do it during the day while driving a car or while watching TV or while browsing internet. You know, there's all kinds of very exotic varieties of japa. Facebook japa, TV japa, driving japa. So people start practicing this. And this bhakti-shayat healing, because bhakti doesn't bring you satisfaction, requires satisfaction. And the most amazing result is the fifth result, Sva Bhakti Adi Krita Manitvam. You become very proud of your advancement in devotional service. I'm so advanced, it's just unbelievable. It's just too much advanced. So you become very, very proud. I achieved this and I achieved that and I opened this namahata or this bhaktivriksha and this leader and that leader and at the same time you are empty in heart you don't have really taste for bhakti but because you need to compensate and you are in a society of devotees you need to have some reasons to be proud and then you start boasting of your devotional achievements. So, this is what is unfortunately happening and we should definitely give it up, but if it still persists, if it still all these tendencies are still there in our consciousness, then we should understand that there is some offense it's very interesting that Srila Jiva Goswami says that these tendencies should not be there or can be easily given up if we practice the devotional service in the association of great devotees it's a very important condition when we practice without association with great devotees then this quote unquote natural tendencies can still be there but in the association of great devotees it's practically impossible to maintain such tendencies. You just come close to a great devotee and all your crookedness disappears. You don't feel like pretending because you just you naturally feel humble. You naturally feel that you know there is no need to pretend I am what I am and you know how can I pretend in front of such a great devotee. When we are associating with, let's say, normal devotees, then it may not be so easy to give this up. But Srila Jiva Goswami says, normally it should be easily given up if we are associating with great devotees. but if we cannot do this even though we are in this sangha this mahat with great devotees then something is seriously wrong with us so that should be very important consideration how offenses twist our consciousness modify our consciousness and our perception of reality. So, this electricity is definitely in the stage of Anishtita Bhajana. It didn't reach the stage of Anishtita yet. There is another very important description of these effects given by Vishwanachakravatthitakur in his commentary to the 21st verse of the 29th chapter of the third canto of Simad Bhagavatam. The Kapila Dev says, So, I, the soul of all beings, am always situated in all beings, he who disrespects me in all beings performs false worship of my deity form. So in other words, if we forget that Krishna is situated in the heart of every living entity and become disrespectful, don't pay proper respect according to the position of these living entities, remembering that the Supreme Lord is there in every living entity, then our attempts to worship the Supreme Lord in form of archer becomes pretentious, hypocritical. We can only worship the Supreme Lord even in his form of archer properly if this consciousness or remembrance of the presence of the Supreme Lord in the heart of every living entity is firmly established. And Vishwanath Chakravartakur writes a beautiful commentary. He says, however, in such bhakti, offense creates restriction. This is exactly what I said. When we commit offense, that offense influences our bhakti and it restricts our bhakti or constricts our bhakti. Our bhakti becomes powerless, not as powerful as it is described. Offenses generally, it's very interesting here how Vishwanathya Kravartya Kuru explains why do we have to worship and respect every living entity. He says, offense generally stems from disrespect to the great devotees. though such devotees are difficult to see many exist in order to avoid offenses to them one should pay respects to all living entities thinking that the Lord is present in all of them in other words just in case somebody could be a great devotee we should pay respect to everyone sometimes we look at somebody and he looks dirty and you know, he's just a beggar. And you look down at him. Don't do it. He may be a great devotee. Jada Bharata. Nobody could recognize Jada Bharata. He was a great Mahabhagavata. And so everyone derided him. So he says this habit of being respectful is, you know the greater the devotee whom we offend the more pernicious the effects of defense and therefore we have to be very careful sometimes a new bhakti and we look at him and you bhakti but you don't know how many hundreds of lifetimes he practiced bhakti he's so enthusiastic and he has come, he's not really new you know, you think he is new and in reality in the eyes of God you are new and he is not new he is old so he is senior so Vishwan Chakravati Takur says without doing so even worshipping the deity forms of the Lord will not give any result since he is the supreme lord, Kapila then speaks in six verses somewhat angrily out of affection so with angry affection Kapila there just pointing out at him and he says I'm I don't approve this kind of worship of myself to benefit his devotee who does not respect all beings. In this verses a very important point. Disrespect, disregard, hatred and criticism are forbidden. Basically, Kapiladev in these four verses he speaks about four extents or four grades of offense. It can be Avagya, it can be Upeksha, it can be Dvesha or it can be Ninda. These are the four grades of offense according to the gravity of the offense. Avagya basically means, Avagya means disrespect. Avagya means disrespect. Avagya means like this haughtiness or when we look down at somebody or we kind of, you know, he's Avagya. Avagya means we're looking down basically at somebody because Avagya means down. Avagya means we think he's insignificant. So, and he says, basically we can deduce from these verses that there are four effects of these four grades of offense. If we are just disrespectful or, yes, it's view the vikalpa. So, again, if I'm disrespectful to other devotees, then the result is pretension or crookedness, hypocrisy. So, and our offensive nature becomes more strong. Even if we slightly neglect, not neglect, slightly look down at other devotees. The second grade of offense is upeksha. Upeksha basically means we don't want to see that this devotee is there. We are offending him by not noticing his existence. Have you been in a situation when somebody whom you know passes by you and doesn't even look at you. Doesn't say Haribola or whatever. Do you feel offended? Yeah, you feel greatly offended. So, Paksha, you know, you feel completely minimized in your dignity because somebody passed you as if you don't exist. Therefore, it's so important to say Hare Krishna, body ball or at least just you know, bye-bye or something like this. Whatever, whatever to say something. Because if you don't do, if you don't notice and sometimes it may not happen intentionally, consciously but we have to understand that this is an offense. What to speak if we are doing if we're just passing by and we don't care about other people. So he said, this is a picture. So if this second grade of offense is there, then as a result, God becomes indifferent to us. It's totally reciprocal. We don't notice the existence of one devotee, and God says, okay, I don't notice your existence. I pass by you, no problem, without saying haribo. So that's small grave offense. And, you know, we basically feel we're chanting the holy name, we're worshiping the Lord, but we don't feel any reciprocation from the Lord. We don't feel any reciprocation from our devotional service. And we should understand that's the result of our neglectful attitude toward other devotees, especially great devotees. So the third grade or the third extent of offense, the third grade of gravity of offense is dvesha, active hatred. The hatred of malice is the basis of offense. it's there but when it becomes visible when we are not so offensive or critical then we don't really manifest dvesha actively but when dvesha becomes very visible then the result of it is that we become internally very much disturbed we feel anxiety, we lose peace, and we feel fear. This is basically also a result of an offense. We committed an offense, and because the offense is grave, Krishna is disturbed. And because Krishna is disturbed because of our offense, we also become disturbed. it's his reciprocation with our improper actions you know we created disturbance to others by our active hatred and as a result we become we lose peace completely so this anxiety, fear all these symptoms you know when we are practicing devotional service we're naturally peaceful, I'm doing everything right, there is nothing to fear. Yes, death is there, but that is very natural. It's just death means that Krishna is calling us to meet with him. He is awaiting for us in some kunjas of Vrindavan. But the grave offense is experienced as a complete agitation, anxiety. And then ninda, ninda basically means we start criticizing the Lord. We start criticizing devotees, we start distributing their faults everywhere. Like Siddhar Swami, the quote is there later, he says that what is ninda? Ninde is dosha kirtanam. You start glorifying their deficiencies and their vices and their faults. And you cannot stop because it's a 24-hour kirtan. It's akanda dosha kirtan. All the time. You cannot just stop. You're just talking and talking and talking. So the result of it is very active displeasure of the Lord. The Lord is totally displeased and totally withdraws His mercy upon us. So that's what we can conclude from this explanation of Vishwanath Chakravartita Kuru, Four Grades of Offenses. Okay, so now we're coming to the next section of Madhuri Kadambini, of the third chapter of Madhuri Kadambini. And basically, what we read so far, in the very beginning of the third chapter of Madhuri Kadambini, while describing the anarchists created by our offenses he immediately mentioned that several apparatus are not counted among offenses because they're easily nullified or neutralized but then immediately he said but it doesn't mean that we can or entitled to commit several apparatus. Please never do this wrong conclusion because this is a grave offense against the holy name and against all bhakti basically. That's the offense against bhakti. But then immediately the impression which we get after reading this is that, oh my goodness. I should not commit several apparatus. it basically means impossible. Because there are so many different tiny details of how we should perform bhakti. Sheila Gopal Bhattagaswami, Osanathagaswami, it's still contested. They wrote this Hari Bhakti Vilas. There are 20 vilasas in Hari Bhakti Vilas and every vilasa runs from 300 to 400, sometimes more verses. So it's at least 6,000 verses and each verse is a rule and regulation. And not to commit Seva Aparada, you have to know all 6,000 rules and follow them. Judaic tradition famous for having 606 something rules six something rules. And it's supposed to be enormously vast and nobody actually follows these 600 plus rules. But welcome to Hare Krishna movement. Six thousand different rules and niyamas. And they're heavy. Like today I looked at Ramnavami, Ramnavami is coming. So the first verse about Ramnavami, A foolish person who does not observe full fast on Ramnavami will fall down into the hell known as Kumbhipaka. Hare Krishna. This is just one verse. Banaswami already translated Hari Bhakti Vilas. So you can purchase it from today on. Srila Prabhupada, when he was speaking with his first hippie disciples, at one point he said, there are so many rules. If you knew, you would run away from here immediately. If you knew about all of them. So then immediately this doubt comes into our mind. What does it mean not to commit servo aparato? Does it mean that now I have to follow the 6,000 rules? No. So good news is there. Vishwana Chakravarti Thakur says, please listen, it's a very important logic behind this. He says, no, no, no. don't be afraid of bhakti it's basically like he said that other people they're only faulty in creating anarthas by sinful activities but devotees they create all kinds of anarthas all four kinds of anarthas so sometimes this fear comes when we hear such descriptions so Vishwanacca Chakravartakura says, please don't worry. If you came to the right place, don't worry. So he quotes the verse from the 11th kent of Srimad Bhagavatam where Krishna himself speaks with Uddova. And he says, my dear Uddova, bhakti or Bhagavata Dharma has such a wonderful effect that once one begins practicing it practicing it free from material desire and can never be even slightly lost or destroyed. This is because it was established by me who am beyond the material nature. He says, I am transcendental Lord and I established this Bhagavad Dharma. And this Bhagavad Dharma, it cannot be lost. Even if you touch a little bit this devotional service, it always will be with you. so and then he says that simply by reciting this ten syllable mantra of Gopal mantra it will give you all perfections so there are many statements which speak that actually you don't have to perform all the details of devotional service it's not possible and you don't have to perform all details. There is a difference between actively committing several apparatus and some omission of certain rules. And that's exactly what Srila Vishwana Chakravartakur is trying to impress upon us. He says, if you don't perform certain angas of bhakti, It will never produce Nama aparada. Committing sin on the strength of the Holy Name refers to the intentional commission of sin, thinking that the power of devotional service will nullify bad effects. Sin is action condemned in Dharma Shastra to be nullified by Prayas Chita. So committing sins or consciously committing Seva aparada is Nama aparada. But if we neglect certain angles of bhakti, that's not a problem. Because bhakti is much more powerful than karma. In karma, you cannot neglect any tiny detail of karma. If you do sacrifice, fire sacrifice, you commit slight mistake in ingredients. the ingredient is not exactly pure or slight mistake in pronunciation of mantra the result will not be there at best at worst it can be opposite result you're performing big sacrifice in a good phase and as a result the result is disastrous you're finished because you performed it improperly bhakti is not like this bhakti is not that particular about this bhakti is much more generous process so you can avoid certain things and to prove this please listen very carefully Vishwanachakravata quotes two verses from 11 from the second chapter Yevai Bhagavata Prakta this path of Bhagavata Dharma or Bhakti is spoken by the Lord himself only the Lord himself can explain Bhakti Upaya Hyatmalabdaye Anjah Pumsah Avidu Shamb Vidhi Bhagavatam So he says that even ignorant living entities, human beings, can very easily know the Supreme Lord if they are going along this path. The process recommended by the Lord is Bhagavata Dharma devotional service. And the next verse, the most important verse, which is also often quoted by our Acharyas. Let's chant together. So he says, O my dear king, one who accepts this process of devotional service to the Supreme Personality of Godhead, this person will never blunder on his path in this world even while running with eyes closed he will never trip or fall he will never even in other words you can perform devotional service with your eyes closed and running at the same time so what does it mean it basically means there are two wrong interpretations of this verse. Some people say that, what are eyes? What eyes signify? What does it mean, closing the eyes? Knowledge. Knowledge. Eyes are knowledge. So, when one wrong interpretation, when it is said that you can close your two eyes, means you don't need any knowledge on the path of bhakti. Have you heard this philosophy? Yes, bhakti is gyan, we are bhaktas. We avoid gyan, gyan is very bad. This is all bhakti means bhakti. I am a vaktor, I am not jnani. I should not study scriptures, no, no, no. Otherwise I will become dry jnani and end up in some shankaramat or something like this. This is wrong. Because it is said here that you are not blind, you close your eyes. It basically means that you have eyes. But you close eyes. You know, you have the knowledge. The knowledge is there, but you close your eyes. And another one here, you close your eyes and you run. And running basically means if you run, you can smash everything on your way or whatever. And some people say that bhakti, no, there is no consideration of knowledge and there is no consideration of any apparatus, I can do whatever I like there is no real rules, it's all useless no, this is not what it means it's very important for us to understand because it gives us very clear conception or understanding how we should perform bhakti, yes we can run with two eyes closed and still reach the final destination. No doubt about it. But what does it mean? It basically means, two eyes closed means that we may consciously neglect certain angles of bhakti because they are not so important. And therefore, Silarupa Goswami explains there are five main angas which should not be, later, which should not be, which should never be neglected. But there are secondary angas. Like he mentions you should worship people tree and you should worship dat tree. You should do so many other things. So if you, in your desire to achieve the ultimate goal, concentrate completely on the main angles of bhakti, like chanting, like studying Srimad Bhagavatam, like worshiping the deity, and being in the holy dhamma and associating with sadhus, then that means that you close your two eyes. but closing two eyes means basically you're not seeing anything but you're seeing your goal and you're clearly seeing the direct means of achieving this goal Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare Hare Ram Ram so even if you don't fast completely on Ram Navani Of course, I spoiled this because now you know that you're supposed to fast. But in any case, if your goal is to achieve Krishna Bhakti by vigorous performance of main principles of bhakti, you may not pay so much attention to some secondary details. And what does it mean that you run? Closing eyes means you know Shastra and you knowingly don't pay so much attention to details, all these 6,000 rules or whatever, but you pay a lot of attention to the main principles of bhakti. What does it mean to run? Does it mean that running means that we can be very chaotic in our performance of bhakti. We're just running. No, running basically means that we have very clear goal. And you know, we just run towards this goal. And while running towards this goal, we may step over certain things, but because we are so eager, Running here means if you are real bhakti and you know how important it is to achieve the goal of bhakti, then you run. And you just run in this path. So, and you neglect certain angles. So closing eyes does not mean violating or not following the rules of Shastra because we have Shastriya Shrada. Closing eyes doesn't mean that we break the principles of Shastra. But certain things we can kind of not pay too much attention to. And that's why Srila Prabhupada never translated Hari Bhakti Vivas. never even considered translating Hari Bhakti because he knew that it would not be beneficial for us it would just distract some people have this tendency to follow all the minute details and while following all these minute details they forget about the main things so basically this verse says yes the Passover Bhakti is given by God himself it's an easy path it's a good path but you should be you should know you should discriminate between the principles and details so so that's more or less the next section of Madhuri Kadadmini so yeah this verse describes a person who has sincerely this verse from Shema Bhagavatam, taking shelter of the process of bhakti as outlined by the Lord himself. And 32 seva apparatus, beginning with entering the temple on palanquin or while wearing shoes, one should never be intentionally committed. Of course, you know, it's not often that we're entering the temple in palanquin. But in our case, we should not drive in the temple with our car. That's the modern version of this rule. So, and it basically means that under the pretext of following Raganuga, we should not neglect the rules which we know. We should know how to perform . We should put , we should do all these things. But at the same time, we also have to pay a lot of attention to the main principles. So, yeah, and then Vishwanaya Chakravati Thakur says that maybe Nama apparatus were unconsciously committed either long ago or recently. This is important, please listen. He says that among Nama apparatus, there are two kinds of Nama apparatus. And these two kinds of nauma apparatus, why do we have to know that there are two kinds of nauma apparatus? Because the effects of these nauma apparatus should be treated differently. One kind of nauma apparatus is unconscious nauma apparatus. We don't know what kind of apparatus I committed, but we know that the presence of apparatus from the effects. We can deduce the presence of Nama apparatus by the effects visible within our heart. And this is one kind. The second kind is that we know what kind of Nama apparatus we committed. so the method of neutralizing the effects of these two kinds of Nama Parada is different and we have to be very clear that there are different methodologies, we should not apply universal methodology, the universal methodology is described in Hari Bhakti Vilasa welcome to Hari Bhakti Vilasa again So that's 11th vilasa in two verses. Let's chant together. Nama Parada Yuktanam, Nama Nyeva Harantyagham, Avishranthaprayuktanit, Tanyekartha Karanicha. So these two very important verses from Hari Bhakti Vilas, which describes the way of neutralizing unconsciously committed or unintentionally committed Nama Apparada. It is very clearly says here, Pramadena. Pramadena, just by the slip of consciousness. by inattentiveness. Without being conscious, you commit aparato. It happens with anyone. So what to do in this case? If someone commits namaparato due to carelessness, pramadena, katanjana, somebody, then he should constantly chant the holy name, taking soul shelter of it. This is my shelter. This is my protection. I know I committed some offense. I don't know what kind of offense. So I'm changing the holy name to neutralize the effect of offense to purify myself. And then it is said, So the holy name destroys the offenses of persons committing Nama Parada. So the holy name himself can destroy . It takes away the impressions or the results of Nama Parada. How by which methodology . So constantly chanting the holy name will give us perfection. That's why we have programs like Nama Nishter. For one day, for two days, or three days, we come together, we chant as much as possible without mobile phones and any other distractions, trying to nudify our parades. And it works. It has an amazing effect. It refreshes your consciousness and rejuvenates your practice of bhakti. So that's recommended to neutralize apparatus which are committed unintentionally. But if you commit an offense knowingly, Vishwana Chakrava Taku says it's very dangerous. If someone knowingly commits offense, then the effects are grave. And accordingly, there are special procedures to nullify them. So for unknowing, unintentional apparatus, there is one universal procedure. But if you know what kind of offense you committed, then there are specific procedures to neutralize this specific offense. so and basically while stating this Silavishvanath Chakravarti part he goes to concrete offenses against the holy name Nama Paradas and the purpose of his description is not so much to describe the offense itself but to describe the method how to neutralize this specific offense. So that's the next section. And he starts with the first offense, Vaishnava Nindar. And we know. Let's chant together. So this exclamation, U, U, Sahate, U, how the holy name will be able to tolerate Sahate, such a offender who is criticizing Satam Vaishnavas. Here Satam means, Satam means Sadhu, somebody who is established in sad, in reality. but because it's talking about bhakti, satam here specifically means great bhakti. Because on every path, satams are different. On the path of yoga, satam are great yogis. On the path of karma, satams are great rishis who established these rules. On the path of jnana, satam are great meditators who meditate on impersonal Brahman. But here satam means bhakti. Satam ninda nam nah paramam aparadam vitanute. This is the most grievous offense. Paramam aparadam vitanute. It constitutes the most grievous offense. Why? yatak yatim yatam katham usahate tatvi garham. How the holy name can tolerate this because somebody is serving the holy name and you offend him. He is a very close and intimate servant of the Holy Name, and you offend him. As I said, ninda means dosha kirtanam, according to Siddharaswami. Ninda doesn't mean that you speak untruth. Sometimes people say that, I'm speaking truth. so it's not ninda it's not an offense I'm speaking truth well it may not be an offense if you speak truth but most probably it is an offense because you feel so much pleasure in speaking this truth you don't find so much pleasure in speaking other kind of truth because you want consciously to pull down somebody by speaking this truth because you have malice within your heart and because you want to spread this truth. You don't need to do it, but you still are completely obsessed by speaking this quote-unquote truth. So therefore Preet Singh Swami says Nindanam Dasa Kirtanam if you unnecessarily start advertising the faults of other people. This is ninda. You may have some good reason if you want to warn somebody against associating with such person or this and that and reluctantly you speak about somebody's faults. That's okay. That's fine. But if driven by malice, you start propagating their faults, then it's ninda. It's offense, and the result of this offense will be very, very serious. So, Vishwanachakra Vartita Kurs says, what is the specific way to nullify this offense? He says, if by chance this offense occurs, the person should repent. Oh, I am such a low-class person, I have committed an offense to a saintly person. A person who has been burned by fire seeks relief in fire. This is a very famous statement, Vishwanath Chakravartyatakur, sometimes quotes this line from Ayurveda. that if you are burned, that the remedy from the burn, if you don't want blisters to appear in your hand or wherever, then you have to put it in, not in fire, but in some, like in chili or something. Recently, one devotee, she told me that, you know, I heard this in your lecture, and I tried it, I burned my hand, and immediately I put it in a box of chili powder. And amazingly, there was no blister on it, nothing. So it works. So another example can be like when there is a forest fire and a big forest fire. So to put down the forest fire from the other side, From the other side, when there is this uncontrollable raging fire goes in one direction, then from other direction you can put some controlled fire, and this fire will basically burn everything, and then the fire will be extinguished because there is nothing to burn. So this is how they also fight with the forest fire, by putting counter fire against this fire. So here it is very clearly said that if you commit an apparate, then to counteract the effect of this apparate should be by the fire of remorse. Remorse, even in Hindi, it's called paschatap, right? Pascha Tav, Anu Tav. So remorse means this fire within the heart, fire of remorse, fire of repentance. You become very much aggrieved. And it should be sincere. Vishwanathya Kravartaku says, it's not that you pretend that I am... Sometimes people come and they try to beg forgiveness from somebody. And they're asking, oh please forgive me I'm such a rascal. And you look at them and you say, yes you're such a rascal. Even now you remain a rascal. Because you don't feel any remorse. It's completely false. It's not the genuine remorse. It's just a pretension of remorse. so therefore Vishwanachekravartakura says if you understand the grievous effect of Vaishnava Parada you should first really try to feel this how, why did I do this and only after sincerely feeling the remorse come to this and ask forgiveness so he says that according to this logic that fire nullifies the fire he should nullify the offense by lamenting resolving to come before the Vaisnava falling at his feet and satisfying him by offering his obeisances praises and respects so this is the proper way to neutralize Vaisnava If the Vaishnava is not satisfied, the person should render favorable service to him according to his desires for many days. This is the recommendation. If he is not still satisfied, he says, please, let me serve you in some way. and then he says sometimes the offense is so grievous that the Vaisnava's anger does not die so what to do in this case he says in this case in extreme remorse thinking himself most unfortunate and bound for millions of years in hell for this offense he should give up everything and take full center of continuous namasankirtana by divine power of Nama Kirtana, certainly in time that person will be delivered from his offense. So he says if all this doesn't work, then you can take shelter of the Holy Name and beg forgiveness from the Holy Name and then you will be relieved from it. But then he says, however he should not justify himself by arguing that Shastra says the holy name alone is sufficient to deliver an offender. So what is the need of humbling myself by offering repeated respects and service to the Vaishnava that he has offended? This type of mentality makes him guilty of further offense. So if you say, why should I humiliate myself by coming? You know, if anyway, you know, I can just chant the holy name and then it will be nullified. No, it will only aggravate your offense instead of nullifying it. So there is a proper way, proper procedure of doing it. If we offend somebody, we should beg forgiveness, should become straightforward and honest enough to do this. And then, very interesting and another, sometimes we may think you know that of course yes I offended him but he's not a devotee he's just a pretender you know he's just he's a neophyte you know he's not a mahabhagata so Vishwanath Chakravarti Takur says no should one be of the mentality to think that the offense of sadho ninda that discriminates between the types of Vaishnavas. Sadhu means sadhu. Sadhu Reva Himantarya. He should be considered sadhu, even if he is committing sins. So it does not refer only to one who is fully and perfectly qualified with all the qualities mentioned in scripture, such as mercifulness, never harming others, and forgiving to all living entities. Kripalo Akritadrohas Titikshuk Sarvadehinam so it says that scriptures Padma Purana please listen very carefully what Padma Purana has to say about this O Brahmana persons lacking proper behavior who are fallen deceitful full of false ego absorbed in bodily conception, drunkards, cruel, irreligious, lowborn, hard-hearted, attached to money, children and wife, and fallen in all respects, can also be liberated if they take shelter of the lotus feet of Govinda. Vishvanacikravita quotes this verse from Padna Purana, Sarvacara Vivaarjitah, satadhiya, vratya, jagatvančekah jagatvančekah, deceitful even person who has very bad character a cheater, devoid of all proper behavior and so on and so forth if he surrenders to the Lord he must be considered to sadhu sadhu reva samantavya so it's not an excuse to say I'm just I'm not an offender because I offend somebody who is an offender himself no, that's not an excuse and the last thing which we will study is this other yeah few more things about this two more so and then he says he considers different scenarios normally you should feel remorse, repentance, go back forgiveness. If he doesn't forgive you immediately, you should render service. If he still doesn't forgive, you should chant the holy name incessantly. But sometimes the sadhu is not being offended. You offend him and he is not offended. Does it mean that there is no apparat? Sadhu's there you know I cannot offend Sadhu because if he's offended he's not a Sadhu is it a good logic? what kind of Sadhu he is if he's offended Sadhu is supposed to be forgiving he says no, no, no it's not a good logic Sadhu may not be offended, but the dust on his lotus feet will be offended. And the dust from his lotus feet will come down to your head, and you will still suffer the consequences of this offense. Therefore, we should never misuse this sort of attitude. Yes, sadhu may be very forgiving, But it doesn't mean that we can offend him. It doesn't mean that we should not feel remorseful. We should feel genuinely remorseful if some offense takes place. So, and he quotes this verse from Sati's angry speech towards Daksha. And she came and she started criticizing Daksa, the offender of the great Mahabhagavata, Shiva. And she says, let's chant together. So she very beautifully says, The glory of that criticism which you committed is that the result which is gives. It basically means that the glory of the criticism is that the result will always come to you. That's the glory. It inevitably will come to you. You will not be able to avoid this result. That's how serious it is. So she says, it's not It's not surprising that materialists, people who are absorbed in asad, in a material nature, Mahatvininda Kunapatma Vadisu Those people who are claiming the gross body of the soul Kunapa, the bag of this body to be the Atma. Kunapatma Vadisu It's not surprising that they Mahatvininda constantly criticize great devotees. Sarvada Mahatvininda with envy and become deprived of their powers but they become deprived of their powers by the dust from the lotus feet of great devotees. It basically means that somehow or other the result will come to us. We will not be able to avoid the result. Therefore, we have to be very honest and not to commit offenses. and then the last thing this is very last part of this section of Madhuri Kadambini is that yes sometimes devotees are not offended but there are occasions described in Shastra when you offend a devotee and devotee gives blessings to you because the devotees especially great saints great sadhus, they are unconventional they are not following the normal conventions, the rules of ordinary people you come to him and you are full of fury and you offend him and he smiles at you and says Ashirvat Ayushman Bava whatever so they say yes he says it's there definitely it's there and the result of this blessings of a great devotee is that you become a devotee yourself and you will forget about all your offensive mentality it's actually there are many real stories in spiritual history of the world like there were thieves who were trying to steal some goods from Jagannath's Babaji they came in the middle of night and they started taking everything and when they were leaving he said oh you forget this, please take this and the next day they came and they fell at his feet because he gave them blessings they fell at his feet and started begging forgiveness and they became his sevakas. So I also have a similar story with one Russian Christian saying Serafim Sarovsky who was some rogues came to his secluded place he was in the forest and wanted to kill him. And he started praying for them. he started really you know he was kneeling down and praying for them and then they were caught and they were brought in front of the judge and he himself came in front of the judge and said please don't punish them don't punish them they are protected by me so and they became very saintly people at the end So that happens and Shila Vishwanath Chakravartakur, he gives three examples of this, how it happens. He says, he gave the example of Jadabharata, how this King Rahugana, King Rahugana severely offended him. He said, you are just a stupid fellow. You are pretending. Why are you faltering in your way? Why are you bumping me? And then Jada Bharata looked at him and said, you know, this guy needs some correction. So he started preaching to him. And King Rahugan was listening, listening, listening. then he jumped down from his palanquin and touched the feet of Jadabharata. And another story very interesting from Puranas about Uparicara Vasu, which is mentioned here. Uparicara Vasu was the king of Mahabharata fame, and he was a friend of Indra. he was such a saintly person and he was performing such severe austerities that Indra became very worried he came to him and he said what do you want he said I don't want anything please don't worry I'm not going to become Indra I want to be a sadhu and Indra became so pleased and he said I still want to give you my blessings do you want something and he said give me one flying saucer some airplane and that's why he became Uparicaru Vasu he was flying up there in the sky Uparicaru Vasu and then he committed some offense he was asked by the demigods and the demons sorry not by demigods and Brahmanas to be the referee to be the judge in their argument in their debate and he made the wrong judgment they asked him to give impartial judgment and he ruled in favor of demigods because Sindra was his friend so and therefore he was condemned and he actually ended up in hell in Patala Loka So he ended up in hell. But in Pataloloka, he still was a devotee. And he was so composed and happy. So he started doing bhajan. And all the demons who lived in Pataloloka became really worried. They started attacking him with all kinds of weapons. He couldn't care less. And all the weapons, he was so powerful saint, that all the weapons didn't touch him. So the demons went to Sukhracarya. Demons asked Sukhracarya, when a very strange fellow came to our planet, we never seen such a fellow. And he's so powerful, we're trying to harm him, and we couldn't harm him. And then Sukhracarya says, oh, he's a Mahabhagavata, so to overpower him, you should preach atheism you should actively and loudly preach atheism and that will destroy his bhakti and when his bhakti is destroyed you will destroy him so and they became very enlivened and they came in vicinity of this Upharecharu Vaso and they started actively preaching atheism, God is not there It's just all stories from Puranas. It's all useless mythology. And Puranas are written in 7th century AD. Max Müller says this. They started preaching this well-established atheistic conceptions about scriptures. And Uparicaru Vasa became so compassionate. He started crying. He said, look at these people. They're already demons and they're already living in hell. And they also have this stupid conception. So instead of cursing them, he gave them blessings. And they all became devotees and came to Sukhracarya and said, thank you very much. It was a good, it worked so that's that's the story but in any case please don't offend a great devotee hoping that he will give you a blessing it's not it's not the way to obtain the blessings of a great devotee please be careful with any devotee, please don't offend anyone and then your progress in bhakti will not be impeded by this aparata. So by saying this we can come to the next stage of our program today. We should we're supposed to give initiation to eight people who are patiently waiting for this moment and because we are supposed to speak about initiation and give instruction how we should chant the holy name so today's lecture was very appropriate because it was about how to chant the holy name without committing nauma parats and what we should do if in case we commit some nauma parats So it was very appropriate and please remember this lecture and then you will always be successful in your endeavors to please the Lord.