|
|
| Dipavali
Srimad-Bhagavatam 10.9.18-19 After Lord
Ramacandra slew the demon Ravana and liberated Sita, He returned to His
capital, Ayodhya, to assume the throne. And Ayodhya celebrated His
return by lighting lamps. To welcome Him, they placed lamps, or dipas, throughout the city. In the Hindu
calendar, Diwali also marks the New Year, and many Hindus perform Laksmi-puja
so that the year will be successful. They also take care to repay their
debts from the preceding year by Diwali time so that they don’t carry any debt
(or the consequences of late payments)
into the next year. In his purport to the first verses of the chapter of Srimad-Bhagavatam
“Mother Yasoda Binds Lord Krsna,” Srila
Prabhupada states that Srila Visvanatha Cakravarti Thakura, quoting from
the Vaisnava-tosani of Srila Sanatana
Gosvami, says that the incident of Krsna's breaking the pot of yogurt and being
bound by mother Yasoda took place on the day of Dipavali. So there are many
aspects to the occasion, but
because we have been reading from the Tenth Canto about damodara-lila
and because of another reason that I will explain as I speak, we shall continue
the discussion of the damodara-lila. Srimad-Bhagavatam, Canto 10, Chapter 9: TEXT 18 sva-matuh svinna-gatraya TRANSLATION Because of mother Yasoda’s hard labor, her whole body became
covered with perspiration, and the flowers and comb were falling from her hair.
When child Krsna saw His mother thus fatigued, He became merciful to her and
agreed to be bound. PURPORT When mother Yasoda and the other ladies finally saw that
Krsna, although decorated with many bangles and other jeweled ornaments, could
not be bound with all the ropes available in the house, they decided that Krsna
was so fortunate that He could not be bound by any material condition. Thus
they gave up the idea of binding Him. But in competition between Krsna and His
devotee, Krsna sometimes agrees to be defeated. Thus Krsna’s internal energy, yogamaya, was
brought to work, and Krsna agreed to be bound by mother Yasoda. TEXT 19 evam sandarsita hy
anga TRANSLATION O Maharaja Pariksit, this entire universe, with its great,
exalted demigods like Lord Siva, Lord Brahma and Lord Indra, is under the
control of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Yet the Supreme Lord has one
transcendental attribute: He comes under the control of His devotees. This was
now exhibited by Krsna in this pastime. PURPORT This pastime of Krsna’s is very difficult to understand, but
devotees can understand it. It is therefore said, darsayams tad-vidam loka
atmano bhakta-vasyatam (Bhag. 10.11.9): the Lord displays the transcendental attribute of
coming under the control of His devotees. As stated in the Brahma-samhita
(5.35): eko ’py asau racayitum jagad-anda-kotim By His one plenary portion as Paramatma, the Lord controls innumerable universes, with all their demigods; yet He agrees to be controlled by a devotee. In the Upanisads it is said that the Supreme Personality of Godhead can run with more speed than the mind, but here we see that although Krsna wanted to avoid being arrested by His mother, He was finally defeated, and mother Yasoda captured Him. Laksmi-sahasra-sata-sambhrama-sevyamanam: Krsna is served by hundreds and thousands of goddesses of fortune. Nonetheless, He steals butter like one who is poverty-stricken. Yamaraja, the controller of all living entities, fears the order of Krsna, yet Krsna is afraid of His mother’s stick. These contradictions cannot be understood by one who is not a devotee, but a devotee can understand how powerful is unalloyed devotional service to Krsna; it is so powerful that Krsna can be controlled by an unalloyed devotee. This bhrtya-vasyata does not mean that He is under the control of the servant; rather, He is under the control of the servant’s pure love. Because we are approaching Srila Prabhupada’s disappearance
day, I thought I would explain how these verses affected me in my life around
the time of Srila Prabhupada’s disappearance. Some of you may know that in 1977,
during the days before Govardhana-puja, Srila Prabhupada expressed his desire
to go to Govardhana Hill by bullock cart to participate in the festival, and that his disciples divided into
two groups of opinion. Basically,
one group felt, “Srila Prabhupada is our spiritual master and we should execute
his order without consideration,” and the other group felt that Srila
Prabhupada, who had practically
no flesh on his body because of his illness--he was hardly drinking some fruit
juice by that point--would be in
extreme pain on the bullock cart. They thought that he was making progress by following the Kaviraja’s directions
and should wait until he got stronger before he attempted to go on tirtha-yatra. They also felt that if he
attempted to travel in his emaciated condition on a bullock cart over the rough
roads of Vrndavana, not only would he feel pain along the way, but he could even give up his body. So, the day before Govardhana-puja, in the evening, Akincana Krsnadasa Babaji Maharaja
came to visit Srila Prabhupada. Bhakti Caru Swami was one of the disciples who
felt that Prabhupada should not undertake the journey, and he confided in Krsnadasa Babaji and requested him to
intervene and appeal to Prabhupada not to go. In the meantime, Tamal Krishna Goswami and Bhavananda Maharaja were upstairs. They were
distraught and were discussing with each other, and then they came down to
Prabhupada’s bedside, still very distressed. Basically, Tamal Krishna Goswami
requested Srila Prabhupada not to go, and Srila Prabhupada agreed: “All right.”
Srila Prabhupada turned towards Babaji Maharaja, “You request me not to go?”
and Babaji Maharaja responded, “Yes.” Then Bhavananda Maharaja said, “I was in
too much anxiety.” And Prabhupada replied, “No, I will not put you in anxiety. You have done so much for me;
you have suffered so much in Mayapur. I shall do what you want.” Then Srila
Prabhupada turned to Babaji Maharaja and said, “Just see how much affection
they have fore me.” The devotees were relieved--and jubilant. The next day was Govardhana-puja, and two days later Srila Prabhupada left us. Even then the feelings among the two groups of disciples about whether or not to have complied with Srila Prabhupada’s desire to ride on the bullock cart were very strong; the emotions were very strong. One group felt, “We should have just done what Prabhupada asked. We shouldn’t have speculated on the order of the spiritual master, on the words of the spiritual master. We should have just done as he said.” And the other group felt justified in what they had done, because after Srila Prabhupada had agreed not to go and had turned towards Babaji Maharaja and told him, “Just see how much affection they have for me,” Tamal Krishna Goswami had said, “The way you deal with us simply deepens our attachment for you every moment,” and Srila Prabhupada had responded, “That is my duty.” So they felt that Prabhupada had reciprocated with them, and that they had actually done what Srila Prabhupada had wanted. Personally,
I was a bit confused, because there were senior devotees on both sides of the
controversy. Although I wasn’t directly involved in the controversy, after
Srila Prabhupada left it was still in my mind. Maybe it was in the mind of everyone; it was definitely in mine.
I used to go and chant in Srila Prabhupada’s room, and even after he left I
would go into his room and chant japa. The second volume of the Tenth
Canto (in the first edition) had just come out before Srila Prabhupada left. (We were there when he received it and
paged through it. He was looking especially
at the pictures and showing so much love for Krsna—amazing.) So, I went behind his bed where
the books were. I was just chanting, looking at the pictures in the room,
looking around, and I noticed
the book. Without much thought, I opened it up to the section “Mother
Yasoda Binds Lord Krsna,” and I started to read. Then I came to the verse we
just read—that Krsna comes under the control of the love of His devotees even
though He is supremely independent—and somehow I got the idea that that is what
had happened: Srila Prabhupada had voluntarily
come under the love of the devotees. And just as one of the themes in
the damodara-lila is that spontaneous
affection is higher than love with awe and reverence, I felt that Srila
Prabhupada had been trying to draw that spontaneous love out of us. He had been
so adamant that he wanted to go to Govardhana. And before that,
for a while, he had been adamant
that he didn’t want to drink--which basically meant that he had intended to
give up his body. Then too the
devotees had thought, “We just have to surrender and let Krsna do what He
wants.” But then Srila Prabhupada had said, “Krsna has given me the choice.”
Srila Prabhupada had also said, “Discuss among yourselves and decide what you
want me to do.” In that situation,
all the senior devotees
met together outside of Srila Prabhupada’s room. They realized that if Krsna
had given Srila Prabhupada the choice, in the same way Srila Prabhupada was giving us the choice by telling us we
should discuss. We discussed and concluded--of course, I was one of the more
junior members--but we all discussed and concluded, “If Prabhupada
is giving us the choice, then
we want to ask him to stay.” So
we went back into the room and Kirtanananda Swami, on behalf of the group,
asked Prabhupada to stay. And Srila Prabhupada agreed. So Srila Prabhupada had already given us the hint that we could
exercise our free will and express our heart’s desire. And now, in the controversy about Srila
Prabhupada going by bullock cart to Govardhana for Govardhana-puja, the one group of devotees felt that
they doing just that. They were
not thinking in those terms; they were just feeling upset and anxious, and they
expressed themselves to Prabhupada and he reciprocated. Then, when Tamal Krishna Goswami had said, “The way you deal with us just deepens our
attachment for you all the time,” and Prabhupada had responded, “That is my
duty,” it was like he was bringing us to a higher level of spontaneous love for
him. And in one sense I felt
that this was the final lesson.
Everyone agrees that in Prabhupada’s last days and in his departure he taught
us the final lesson, and in one
sense the final lesson was how to
leave one’s body. But in another sense, I felt that the final lesson was how to
experience and express spontaneous love. Although we were always conscious that
Srila Prabhupada was our spiritual master, those devotees had appealed to him more on the basis of their
love and affection, and Srila Prabhupada had reciprocated. That is what I got
out of reading these verses in Prabhupada’s room after he left—that just as
Krsna is supremely independent but still allowed Himself to be bound by the
love of Mother Yasoda, so Srila Prabhupada allowed himself to be bound by the
love of his devotees. Srila Prabhupada ki jaya! Urvasi Dasi: Maharaja, you experienced in those final days
that Srila Prabhupada allowed himself to come under the control of his
disciples--that they were making
decisions for him and he would agree. Did you experience that at other times in
Prabhupada’s worldwide travels, like in opening temples and making decisions? Was it always pretty much that
Srila Prabhupada’s disciples just followed exactly what he said, or would they go against what Srila Prabhupada first said and then
Srila Prabhupada would agree? Giriraj Swami: Srila Prabhupada reciprocated with the
devotees all along. Of course,
there were cases when Prabhupada was very firm on what he wanted. I remember
that at one stage some of the devotees got disgusted with India and with the
lack of response from people in India.
Srila Prabhupada was staying at Bhogilal Patel’s house. When I walked by
Srila Prabhupada’s room, there were Tamal Krishna and Gargamuni, sort of arguing with him. I overheard Gargamuni saying, “Prabhupada,
we are just wasting our time here. We should go back to the West.” But Srila
Prabhupada was adamant. He had his mission. He had his mission to spread Krsna
consciousness in India, and he wasn’t going to be bowled over by Tamal Krishna Goswami or Gargamuni Swami or anyone else. But in other situations, Srila Prabhupada did respond to the
wishes of the devotees--sometimes even if they didn’t ask. Even if they didn’t
ask Prabhupada to reverse a decision,
for instance, he would just know what they wanted and act accordingly. One example was when Tejiyas Prabhu
in Delhi had arranged a program for Srila Prabhupada and Prabhupada didn’t
really want to go. Srila Prabhupada had been staying in Juhu and struggling
with the whole issue of the land and the permission to build there, and his health wasn’t that good
either. He really didn’t want
to go, and the devotees around him were encouraging him to stay, but in the end Srila Prabhupada
said he would go. And the reason he gave was that if he didn’t go Tejiyas would
feel discouraged. So it’s not even that Tejiyas had to say, “Prabhupada, please come. I have made so many
arrangements for you.” Srila Prabhupada knew that he had made many arrangements. Certainly Tejiyas didn’t say, “I will
be very disappointed if you don’t come.” But Srila Prabhupada knew that Tejiyas
would be discouraged if he didn’t come, and he did not want to discourage him.
So even though he wasn’t feeling well and
probably had other priorities, he went. So that was there,
and later, when the Caitanya-caritamrta
came out, I started to see more and more resemblance between the way Lord
Caitanya dealt with His devotees and the way Srila Prabhupada dealt with his. For example, when Caitanya
Mahaprabhu wanted to leave Puri, the devotees didn’t want to give Him
permission to go. There was often a sort of tug of war until Lord Caitanya came
to an agreement with the devotees. The devotees wanted Him to stay, but at the same time they knew He
wanted to go. They did not want to frustrate His desire to travel and preach or
to visit Vrndavana. So they reached a compromise. He would stay until Rama-vijaya-dasami (or whenever), and then they would permit Him to
go. Not that He needed their permission,
but out of love He allowed Himself to be . . . He submitted Himself to their
will. He didn’t just act independently as the Supreme Personality of Godhead.
He submitted Himself to their will.
Another example is Lord Caitanya’s loving exchanges with
Jagadananda Pandita. Jagadananda Pandita would offer Him opulent items, such as
oil for His body. He also offered Him a mattress, because Caitanya Mahaprabhu was sleeping on a thin mat on the
floor. Because Lord Caitanya was
setting the example of austerity in the renounced order of life, He didn’t
actually want to accept what Jagadananda Pandita was offering, but at the same time He was afraid
that if He didn’t, Jagadananda
Pandita would be upset. One verse in Caitanya-caritamrta
says, inha-sabara vasa prabhu haye ye ye
gune: “The Lord was controlled by the good qualities of all His devotees.”
In the purport, Srila Prabhupada explains, “The personal associates of Sri
Caitanya Mahaprabhu sometimes behaved contrary to regulative principles out of intense
love for the Lord, and because of their love Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu Himself
sometimes violated the regulative principles of a sannyasi. In the eyes of the
public, such violations are not good, but Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu was so
controlled by His devotees' love that He was obliged to break some of the
rules.” So, for the sake of His devotees, Lord Caitanya would sometimes
transgress the regulative principles—not in any gross way, but at the time the
Hindu society was very rigid, and there were so many rules and regulations for brahmanas
and for sannyasis,
so sometimes out of love for His devotees He would break the rules. He didn’t
want to disappoint His devotees. He wanted to reciprocate with their love for
Him. So when I started to read the later chapters of Caitanya-caritamrta
about how Lord Caitanya reciprocated with His devotees and would submit His
plans to His devotees for their approval, I understood that this was how Srila
Prabhupada had dealt with us. Urvasi Dasi: In the last days of Srila Prabhupada’s life, as you said, the final test—when the devotees were so supercharged
with emotions and love and attachment for Srila Prabhupada--the decision
hanging was “to be with Prabhupada, or not to be with Prabhupada.” Giriraj Swami: It was the extreme. Urvasi Dasi: The ultimate. Giriraj Swami: Yes,
the ultimate. And the same
thing happened when Kirtanananda Swami . . . You know, we had the meeting and we all came in the room and
Kirtanananda Swami said to Srila Prabhupada, “If Krsna gives you the choice,
then don’t go. We need you.” Then Prabhupada, I guess you could say, paused to
consider. Some time passed, and all the devotees were waiting, hung in
suspense, in complete anxiety. Then Srila Prabhupada sort of yawned and said,
“All right.” Still, we were not quite sure what would happen, because the
situation was so intense and we were in so much anxiety. Then Srila Prabhupada
said, “So bring me something to drink.” Because that had been the issue—Srila
Prabhupada had stopped drinking, and we knew that if he stopped drinking he was
just going to leave. He had
already told us that his father had
given up his body by stopping drinking, that it is one way a
person gives up his body when the time comes. So when Prabhupada said, “So
bring me something to drink,” all the devotees shouted, “Jaya Srila
Prabhupada!” And then Prabhupada said, “This is real affection.” So he was very
grave in the sense that he didn’t really openly disclose what was in his mind. Sometimes I think he was just under the control of Krsna or yogamaya,
and sometimes I think he was very conscious of everything he did. And as naïve as I was then, I
couldn’t distinguish between
what he did consciously and what he did by divine inspiration without consideration
of the effects. But certainly the result was that he brought us to the point of
almost going mad, and then he would give us relief. First he insisted, “I am
not going to drink. There are already so many problems with my body, and there
are going to be so many more as time goes on. So I am just going to stop
drinking and die peacefully.” And the mood of the devotees then—“Whatever he wants”—in retrospect wasn’t actually very
nice. Urvasi Dasi: You mean the mood was not very nice or the
consequence was not very nice? Giriraj Swami: The mood. In effect, we were saying, “If you
want to go, you can go,” which I don’t think was very nice. Of course, in the
mood of “He is the guru and we
are the disciples; the guru is independent and can do whatever he likes,” it’s all right. But I am saying
now, in retrospect, after Srila Prabhupada brought us
to a higher understanding . . . in
retrospect, when I think of our saying, “Oh, it’s okay; you
can go,” I don’t think that was very nice. It wasn’t in our hearts. At least I
don’t think it was in our heart of hearts. We just got into this mood that we
thought was Srila Prabhupada’s, that he was surrendered to Krsna and whatever
Krsna wanted he would accept. If Krsna wanted to take him, he would go. If
Krsna wanted to allow him to stay, he would stay. So we sort of adopted the
same mood of surrender—or resignation. And then when Srila Prabhupada said,
“Krsna has given me the choice. Krsna has given me full freedom,” it was like a
complete reversal of everything that he had said before and everything that we
had thought. That allowed us to open up our hearts and express our desires, and
then the mood changed for many of the devotees. Then they were in the mood of
“We want him to stay. We want him to get better.” So later, when he said he wanted to go to Govardhana on the
bullock cart, some of the devotees said, “No, you will suffer on the way. You may even give up your body on
the way. We want you to stay. We want you to get better, and then you can go to
Govardhana. Then you can go everywhere,
but first we want you to get better.” And that, I believe—I got the idea from these verses—was
higher. But again, Srila Prabhupada was grave. He didn’t say anything or do
anything to discourage any of the devotees. He just agreed to stay. But in his
personal reciprocation with all of the devotees, he tried to encourage all of
them. This reminds
me of another incident. Srila Prabhupada was staying in Mr. Sethi’s unfinished
house in the Juhu scheme. We
didn’t have a place for Srila Prabhupada on the land yet; we were still
struggling for ownership of the land. Anyway, we had a life member who was sort
of a devotee and a lawyer, and Srila Prabhupada was very anxious to get some
news from him. So around six-thirty in the morning, Srila Prabhupada sent Tamal
Krishna Goswami to phone him. We had no phone then, so he had to find
some neighbor’s place where he could use the phone. When he finally phoned the
lawyer’s house, the lawyer’s wife
answered. Tamal Krishna Goswami said, “Srila Prabhupada
wants some information, and I have to speak to Mr. Asnani.” Mrs. Asnani must have consulted
him, and then she came back and told Goswami Maharaja, “He is doing
his puja. Kindly phone
back later.” So Tamal Krishna Goswami was very upset. He came
back to Srila Prabhupada and reported with some sarcasm: “Here is the pure
devotee. He wants some information, and Mr. Asnani is busy with his puja.”
But Srila Prabhupada replied (referring to Mr. Asnani), “At his stage it’s
actually good that he is rigid like that.” So, this is another part of Prabhupada’s genius or wonder, that
he encouraged devotees on all levels. He gave the devotees who were ready the
chance to come to a higher level and open their hearts to him and express their
feelings for him and their desire to keep him, but he didn’t discourage the other devotees who were in the
mood that “Prabhupada wants to go. We have to execute his will. We can’t
speculate on his instructions. We just have
to serve his desires.” He didn’t discourage that. He never said, “This is real affection, and that is not.” He just said, as he said to Babaji Maharaja, “Just see how much
they love me.” So that was his
wonder, that he could encourage
devotees on all levels. Urvasi Dasi: And probably mixed into that other mood also
was deep love for Prabhupada, not wanting him to suffer any more than he was suffering in this
present body, if he had the choice to go.
Maybe they were thinking they just didn’t want him to suffer anymore. If he
could go, maybe he should go. Giriraj Swami: Well,
that is a valid concern. I know I felt that way about my father. I wanted him
to stay--but not if he had to suffer too much. If his staying meant he had to
suffer, then . . . Urvasi Dasi: My mother too, in her last days was suffering
so much. Her body wasn’t fit for the soul to stay. I am sure those last days
with Srila Prabhupada were just tumultuous, with all kinds of extreme emotions. Giriraj Swami: That is true. Urvasi Dasi: Thank you for
sharing this with us. It was wonderful. Giriraj Swami: It was there in
my heart, but you brought it out by your questions. Urvasi Dasi: [inaudible] Giriraj Swami: Yes, we were being pulled along by his mercy
and his potency, and we didn’t realize how much difference his personal
presence made or how much effect his departure would have. I remember that, according to the system, we waited for two weeks after Srila
Prabhupada departed and then held a festival of separation for him in
Vrndavana. Then we left for Calcutta to go to Mayapur with the flowers for the puspa-samadhi
there. We had to leave early in the morning to catch a flight from Delhi to
Calcutta, and we just couldn’t get out. There were a number of us, but we just
couldn’t get it together to bring all our bags and make them fit in the car.
Eventually, we finally did get out. We raced to the airport and made the
flight. But when we were struggling just
to pack our bags in the trunk and get on our way, one of the devotees
commented, “Actually, Srila Prabhupada was doing everything. We only thought we were
doing something. Actually, he
was doing everything. Now we can’t even pack our bags in the trunk to leave for
the airport.” Sarvatma Dasa: That’s what happened to the Kurus and to
Arjuna when Krsna left. Arjuna couldn’t even shoot an arrow anymore. He was
defeated for the first time. Giriraj Swami: Yes. Last year was actually the first year
that I really thought about Srila Prabhupada’s departure. I guess in some terms
one could say I was in denial. On Srila Prabhupada’s disappearance day I would
always talk about how Prabhupada is
still present—which he is, though not in the same way.
Obviously, if he were present as he was before, things would be a lot
different. So he is present,
but not in the same way. It’s a lot harder now. Still, he is present, and many
devotees realize his presence,
but they realize his presence in the context of their relationship with him. Urvasi Dasi: Prabhupada is still present, and he is
manifesting himself in our hearts, as
you say, in terms of our
relationship with him. But that potency, that presence, is only as strong as the realization of the relationship, and
that’s hard to maintain universally, as when he was here. Then we all knew he
was here, and we all followed his instructions, whereas now it’s a
manifestation of the individual’s realization. Giriraj Swami: Yes, and there can be groups of devotees who
have similar realizations or a similar
mood, but that’s sort of an
expansion of their individual realizations. When Srila Prabhupada was here we
also had individual realizations, but somehow whatever he decided was the end
of it; that was the conclusion.
Now debates and controversies can rage for years without any conclusion, and
that really saps our energy. But there are reversals in loving affairs. Jagadananda
Pandita wrote an entire book called Prema-vivarta, which means “the
bewilderment of love” or “reversals in love.” The word vivarta can mean accepting something to be the opposite of what it
appears to be. For example, Jagadananda Pandita sometimes appeared to be angry
with Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu, but his anger was actually a manifestation of his
great love for Mahaprabhu. So the devotees may have expressed their love for Srila
Prabhupada in different ways, but their inner mood was somehow to please Srila
Prabhupada in love. Different devotees had different realizations, but Srila Prabhupada took the
essence of their moods—or the best within them—and appreciated and encouraged
all of them. When Srila Prabhupada was personally present, his love for all of
the devotees was so apparent that even when there were differences of opinion
or disagreements, one group couldn’t really call the other group demons,
because Srila Prabhupada so obviously cared for them all. He didn’t reject any
of them, so how could one reject another?
But now we don’t have the palpable presence of Srila Prabhupada in his external
manifestation to remind us how much he loves and cares for all the devotees. So
we can get totally wrapped up in our own ideas and believe that people who
disagree with us are demons who should be smashed, and really create havoc. And there are also bodily differences—between Indians and
non-Indians, blacks and whites, men and women—to divide us. But again, when Srila Prabhupada was here we
could see he loved all the devotees. Bhakti Caru Swami often mentions how
impressed he was when he first met Srila Prabhupada by how much Srila
Prabhupada loved the Americans, the white people, the foreigners. When Srila
Prabhupada was here we could see that his love for the soul transcended the body,
and that helped us to transcend the body. Now there are so many groups based on
the body—the Indians and the foreigners, and whatnot. I just got a letter from
a black devotee saying that he feels there is racism in ISKCON and that the
only thing keeping him in Krsna consciousness is Srila Prabhupada. Otherwise he
probably would have become a Buddhist or Saivaite or something—so he wrote. Urvasi Dasi: I never experienced that in my Krsna
consciousness, all the time I have served. Giriraj Swami: Yes. Urvasi Dasi: Also,
I just want to say that when Srila Prabhupada was here, if someone was kind of getting a little too far out there—like
checking out—Srila Prabhupada would act to keep them on the path. I mean, he
allowed room; it was a wide path. But if somebody kind of went out there, he
would bring them back. But now
that isn’t there, and there is so much personal opinion about how far we can
stray from Krsna consciousness and what Srila Prabhupada wanted, what Srila
Prabhupada said. Giriraj Swami: It’s a challenge for us. Even though it is painful and difficult, however, Srila Prabhupada’s absence has created a challenge for us which, in principle, I cannot believe is beyond our capacity. Although it may be hard right now for us collectively to come to a consensus, I think that on an individual basis we can come to know what Srila Prabhupada wants, that those individual realizations can be shared by a number of devotees, and that eventually as a society we can come to know what Srila Prabhupada wants, and thus together we can progress under Srila Prabhupada’s eternal guidance. Hare Krsna! Srila Prabhupada ki jaya! Gaura-bhakta-vrnda ki jaya! |
