Sharanagati

(from a lecture of Swami Tirtha, 12.08.2018, Ludasto)

(continues from the previous Friday)

This chapter of the Chaitanya Charitamrita is about a very special devotee. This is “The devotional service of Madhavendra Puri”.

“I offer my respectful obeisances unto Madhavendra Puri, who was given a pot of sweet rice stolen by Shri Gopinatha, celebrated thereafter as Kshira-chora. Being pleased by Madhavendra Puri’s love, Shri Gopala, the Deity at Govardhana, appeared to the public vision. All glories to Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu! All glories to Nityananda Prabhu! All glories to Advaita Prabhu! And all glories to all the devotees of Lord Caitanya!”[1]

So, this is the very condensed summary of this chapter. There are many names and many details, but in this one first verse everything is contained. Three main characters are here. One is Gopinath, one murti of Krishna. The other main character is Gopal, another murti of Krishna.  And the third character is Madhavendra Puri, a devotee. Because our loving God cannot exist without His devotees. So, we can say Gopal has purchased Madhavendra Puri. But we can also say that Madhavendra Puri purchased Krishna. Who is the buyer, who is the seller? And what is the merchandise? A big question. This we shall understand – what kind of transaction happens here?

“The Lord went to Jagannatha Puri and visited Lord Jagannatha’s temple. He also met with Sarvabhauma Bhattacharya. All these pastimes have been very elaborately explained by Vrindavana dasa Thakura in his book Caitanya-bhagavata. By nature all the activities of Shri Caitanya Mahaprabhu are very wonderful and sweet, and when they are described by Vrindavana dasa Thakura, they become like a shower of nectar. Therefore I very humbly submit that since these incidents have already been nicely described by Vrindavana dasa Thakura, I would be very proud to repeat the same thing, and this would not be very good. I do not have such powers. I am therefore presenting only a synopsis of those events already described elaborately by Vrindavana dasa Thakura in his Chaitanya-mangala [now known as Chaitanya-bhagavata]. Some of the incidents he did not describe elaborately but only summarized, and these I shall try to describe in this book. I thus offer my respectful obeisances unto the lotus feet of Vrindavana dasa Thakura. I hope that I will not offend his lotus feet by this action.”[2]

From this, although this is only a literary exposition, we can learn something – how to respect our superiors. Because this Vrindavan Das Thakur is a senior member of the Vaishnava tradition and Krishnadas Kaviraj Goswami, the author of this book, puts himself on a subordinate position automatically. And Kaviraj Goswami says, “Oh, my superior has covered everything, so I won’t repeat it. But what am I doing? I’m collecting the morsels of food fallen from his table. This is my position.” This is what we can learn from this exposition: if we want to follow, we have to respect.  If you don’t respect, you don’t follow. It’s very simple.

All the followers of Mahaprabhu were so charmed that they definitely wanted to record the story. Raghunath Das Goswami, one of the immediate disciples of Mahaprabhu, he had a very strict regime of the day. I think he was sleeping one or two hours per day, chanting a lot, hardly eating and things like this. But every day he spent one and a half hours in glorification of Mahaprabhu – this was his daily routine. Such a beautiful sadhana.

Now I have to insert some bitter drops. Our Gurudev was a very strict spiritual master.  And once he was chastising his devotees. He said, “I told you to do this and to do that in order to help the kirtan. And all day you are complaining. Is this your kirtan?”  And what is our kirtan? What is your kirtan? Do you have one and a half hours per day to glorify Mahaprabhu or your superiors? Or do you have one and a half hours of complaints: “This is not good, that is not good.” Especially others are not good. What kind of kirtan is this? It’s gramya-katha[3].

(to be continued)

[1] Chaitanya Charitamrita, Madhya, 4.1-2

[2] Chaitanya Charitamrita, Madhya, 4.3-9

[3] Village talks, gossips