Sharanagati

“Suta says: “Perceiving the extraordinary devotion in the minds of His devotees, the Lord, who likes His devotees so much, entered the sinless hearts of them.” Because Krishna is present in the stories of the “Bhagavatam” Though He disappeared when back to His own realm, but remained here as “Bhagavatam” incarnate. But this is not the only place where we should search for Shri Krishna, Reality the Beautiful. Because He is residing in the pure hearts of the pure devotees. So wherever Krishna perceives extraordinary devotion, He comes there, enters there – but only the sinless hearts of the devotees. Therefore the heart must be purified. Even if we have a little devotion, the hearts should be purified – because in this way devotion could grow and Krishna can enter more easily. There is only one invitation for Krishna and that is the pure heart, the pure intention.

Sometimes the heart is captured by different tendencies like bhoga, gyana, vairagya – desire for selfish enjoyment, or sense of knowledge, or the false renunciation. But all these elements make the heart very hard. And Krishna cannot enter a hard heart. It is said that He is just like a stealthy thief. When you leave your door just a little open, He enters. Puts the foot first and you cannot close the door. You try, you try, but you cannot. And sometimes – like father like son – the devotees also apply the same method. I heard of one Sankirtan-devotee, he was selling magazines, and whenever somebody opens the door, first he put inside the leg! So that nobody could close the door at him… I’m sure he had taken the example of Krishna.

But He resides in the pure heart, so we should try to purify our hearts as much as possible. And we all know that the best way of purifying the heart is chanting the mahamantra, the Holly Name. But not as an artificial or superficial routine… but as some real prayer. When you are drown in the ocean, then you cry out for help. Immediately you start to pray from your heart. Then this is not artificial. When you feel so secure on the shore, so safe – “a, ksh ksh…” But when you are really in trouble you can say: “Krish na!” Or you can cry out loud!

It is said that the denizens of Vaikuntha, as well as devotees like Uddhava, were present at the assembly with the object of listening to the story of “Bhagavatam”. They forgot all about their body, dwelling and even their own self.  This is the method of listening to a divine discourse. For the attention that we should pay to the divine topics one story is quoted. I think I had told you already this story, but it’s always good to remember. Once Rupa Gosvami was giving a lecture and the people were paying much attention to his words. And you know, at that time they were giving so much attention and they were living with the story so much, that almost they could feel what’s going on in the lecture. Rupa Gosvami was quoting the “Ramayana”, he was talking about the devotion of Hanuman. And you know, Hanuman is very famous for different services to Ram; Rupa Gosvami was mentioning the story when he was jumping over the ocean to Lanka. And when he said: “And then Hanuman was JUMPING through the ocean…” then one person from the audience was living in the story so much, that he was jumping immediately! Don’t jump, stay at your places! So he took the mood of Hanuman, he took the mood of the lecturer. And actually this is the way to ENTER into the mood – when we come together so much, so intensively, that even the words will generate movements, feelings from you.

So those, present at the assembly forgot about everything, even themselves.