CONTENTS:
- Lord Caitanya’s danda;
- Srila Prabhupada's Appreciation;
- Guru Maharaja’s Instructions;
1. LORD CAITANYA’S DANDA
So, everyone is nicely situated? Haribol!
Yesterday we discussed about Caitanya Mahaprabhu after He took sanyas. At His mother’s request He decided to stay at Jaganatha Puri. Caitanya Mahaprabhu with four or five other people were travelling from Shantipur to Jaganatha Puri. When they came close to Jaganatha Puri there was a river called Bhargi river. Caitanya Mahaprabhu decided to go there to take bath. He gave His danda to one of His associates and Nityananda Prabhu took the danda from him and broke it and threw it away.
Before breaking it, He had a little discussion with the danda,” My dear danda, who do you think you are? The Supreme Personality of Godhead does not need a danda.” Now danda actually means punishment so this danda is symbolic of punishment. Because we have rejected Krishna and fallen within the material nature, we repent for that and accept voluntary punishment of not indulging in any type of sense gratification, that is the meaning of sanyas. Sanyasi means rejection of everything. Of course, ISKCON sanyas is different.
There are two types of sanyas:
• Ekadandi sanyas (their goal is to merge into Brahman, rejecting and renouncing everything); and
• Tridandi sanyas (engage everything in Krishna’s service).
Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura mentioned he is a sanyas of yukta vairagya, renunciation in relation to Krishna consciousness. Actually, sanyas has been forbidden in this age of Kali.
asvamedham gavalambham
sannyasam pala-paitrkam
devarena sutotpattim
kalau panca vivarjayet
Cc. Adi 17.164
"In this age of Kali, five acts are forbidden: the offering of a horse in sacrifice, the offering of a cow in sacrifice, the acceptance of the order of sannyasa, the offering of oblations of flesh to the forefathers, and a man's begetting children in his brother's wife."
These five things are rejected in the age of Kali. So sanyas has been forbidden so now the consideration is why is there sanyas in ISKCON? Is there something wrong? No. This is a different kind of sanyas. One sanyas is ekadandi sanyas, the goal is to merge into Brahman and the other is to become engaged in service of the Lord and offer everything in the service of the Lord.
We can see the response from Srila Prabhupada. Once devotees brought a Rolls Royce for Srila Prabhupada so some reporters were critical about this, why they are having such luxury cars? Prabhupada’s response was, “This is nothing, if they could they would have brought a golden car.” Yes, he is not accepting it for himself, he is accepting it for Krishna’s service.
Like things have changed so much, like in other ages going across the ocean was forbidden especially for sanyas. If they went across the ocean that was called kalapani, going across the black water. But now not only are we going across kalapani we are also going across kala akash. For the sake of spreading Krishna Consciousness we are prepared to do anything. That’s the problem, the classes, no matter how much I want to stick to the main point, I keep side tracking but I think these informations are relevant? Yes.
Nityananda had a conversation with Mr Danda, The Supreme Personality of Godhead who is the maintainer of the entire universe, why should He accept danda? A danda maybe appropriate for a living entity but not the Supreme Personality of Godhead. So, he broke it. Another understanding to this is by breaking the danda of Caitanya Mahaprabhu, Nityananda Prabhu proved that Caitanya Mahaprabhu did not take ekadanda sanyas he took tridanda sanyas. Ours is tridanda sanyas, three not one.
When Sri Caitanya Mahprabhu came out of river from taking bath he asked for His danda and Mukunda told Him Nityananda Prabhu broke it. Mahaprabhu was completely upset. He said, “What do you think my sanyas is a joke? I wanted to go to Vrindavan and You Nityananda misdirected me and now my only possession was this danda, I had nothing else. So, the only possession I had You broken and threw it away! I am not going to be with You.” Saying that Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu ran to Jaganatha Puri, its about 12 miles from there. He then came to Jaganatha Temple, seeing Lord Jaganatha, Caitanya Mahaprabhu became so ecstatic.
2. SRILA PRABHUPADA'S APPRECIATION
Once devotees brought a Rolls Royce for Srila Prabhupada so some reporters were critical about this, why they are having such luxury cars? Prabhupada’s response was, “This is nothing, if they could they would have brought a golden car.” Yes, he is not accepting it for himself, he is accepting it for Krishna’s service.
3. GURU MAHARAJA’S INSTRUCTIONS
At the time of initiation, when we offer bananas into the fire, it symbolises the offering of our self into the fire of sankirtana. Therefore it is our duty to try our very best to offer ourselves completely. If we can wholeheartedly engage in Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu’s sankirtana movement, it is guaranteed that we will go back to the spiritual sky and once there we can engage in Mahaprabhu's eternal sankirtana- lila.
(The content of this E-magazine is based a lecture given by His Holiness Bhakti Charu Swami on 11 December 2019 morning class at Jaganath Puri during the 2019 Divine Pilgrimage)
(Compiled and Edited by Hemavati Radhika Dasi)