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At the age of only nineteen, Radhanath Swami left his home in America seeking adventure and spiritual knowledge. After trekking across Europe for months, Radhanath Swami reached his long hoped for destination: India. After living there for many years as a sadhu or wandering monk, Radhanath Swami returned to America in order to share the sacred knowledge and wisdom he had learned from the many holy men and women he had met there. It was an extraordinary choice, given what Radhanath Swami had survived to get there: a journey filled with bizarre characters, mystical experiences, and dangerous adventures. The story is recounted in his recently published memoir The Journey Home - Autobiography of an American Swami. Reviewers have called Radhanath Swami's saga "at once an engaging yarn, a love story, and the evocation of a transcendent paradise in all its savagery, solitude, and splendor.
Radhanath Swami emerged from his years of travel wanting to explain for others the beauty and rewards of a life devoted to God, and therein lay a dilemma. Radhanath Swami's many followers and friends describe him as completely selfless and consequently unwilling to take credit for his work and restless when a spotlight is focused on him. By choosing A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami (1896-1977), a Bengali Vaishnava Saint, as his guru (after declining offers of initiation from several tyagis or renunciants in the Himalayas), Radhanath Swami cast his fate to the wind, cut his matted locks, and entered back into the society.
RadhanathMaharaj.net gives us a complete collection of the teaching of Radhanath Swami. Teachings consists of Transcriptions of lectures delivered by Radhanath Swami at various places. This website is to inspire the followers of Radhanath Swami to practice the philosophy of Vaishanavism.
Gradually step by step one should become situated in Trans by means of intelligence sustained by full conviction and thus the mind should be fixed on the self alone and should think of nothing else.
Purport by His Divine Grace A C Bhaktivedanta Swami Srila Prabhupad: By proper conviction and intelligence one should gradually see sense activities, this is called Pratyahara. The mind being controlled by conviction meditation and cessation from the senses should be situated in Trans or Samadhi at that time there is no longer any danger of becoming engaged in the material conception of life. In other words, although one is involved in the matter as long as the material body exists, one should not think about sense gratification. One should think of no pleasure aside from the pleasure of The Supreme self this state is easily attained by directly practicing Krsna Consciousness. Gradually step by step one should become situated in trans by means of intelligence sustained by full conviction and thus mind should be fixed on self alone and should think of nothing else.
Hare Krsna. Very pleased to be with all of you this evening and I would like to thank all of you for coming. Today’s auspicious event for we have come together to discuss the sacred eternal teachings of Bhagavad-Gita. We are reading this evening from the 6th Chapter, in this particular verse, text no: 25.
There is a beautiful story, you have all heard, the Pandavas were exiled to forest for twelve years, the last of those twelve next year after they had to remain incognito if Duryodhana for any of his associates discovered them during that last year they would have to return to the forest for an other twelve years. So during that time just before that last year began the Pandavas were living in a forest Dwaitavan and one Brahmin approached them and said that: “I am every day performing sacrifice and in order to perform this sacrifice there is a very precious type of wood called Arani wood that I used to ignite the fire. A very mysterious deer has come into my home and taken the Arani wood on his anklets and run away and now I cannot perform my prescribed duty according to Varnashram of performing Yagna”. You should know that Yagna is meant for only one purpose, to please the Supreme Personality of Godhead. These days in India, especially of those Brahmin class, they perform many yagnas, many Samskaras and they are thinking that by doing so they do not have to fear that they are committing offence by not performing the regulative traditions or they are thinking that something could come in my material life by doing so. But Krsna explains in Gita: ________0:06:51 sloka That all Yagnas is meant for only one purpose to please the Supreme Personality of Godhead and it is not so much the ritual in which it is performed but it is the consciousness in which it is performed which pleases Krsna. _______________0:07:18 What ever activity we do according to our prescribed duties, if it does not please Krsna it is waste of time. The goal of life and goal of everything we do should be to please God. If God is pleased everything is auspicious in our life, if God is displeased nothing could be auspicious in our life and sacrifices are meant for the pleasure of Krsna. The word Yagna means Vishnu, the Supreme Lord, Yagna Purusha is the personality who the Yagna is meant for that is Vishnu, Krsna. So whether we are doing pooja or doing yagna or doing seva or chanting mantras or reciting the scriptures the purpose of that is to please God, to satisfy the Lord and it is the attitude of service in which such activities are performed that are pleasing to Lord not simply to think in itself. The ritual is the medium by which we express our devotion to God. The ritual in itself is meaningless unless we perform it with the proper consciousness or the spirit of devotion. Today people perform so many rituals and they do not even know what is happening or why they are doing it. But that is not actually what rituals were created for. Everything within life is a ritual the way a mother takes care of a child, there are so many rituals wake staying up whole night when the child cries that is a ritual, changing the child’s diapers, I do not know in India sometimes they use diaper, sometimes they do not. I remember when I was in a bus from Haridwar to Gangothri some of these very nice ladies from Himalayas one was sitting right in front of me and she had baby. And the baby wanted to go to the bathroom, bus was moving, so she just took the baby and held him out to window, he had no bottom clothes on, I was wondering, why does not she put something on the bottom of this baby. But actually she was a very functional process, as soon as the baby, she is the mother, she knows when the baby is about to do what the baby does so she just held him out to the window, then he did everything and she brought him back in. The only problem was I was in the window behind. The baby was happy, the mother was happy, I became happy by chanting
Hare Krsna, Hare Krsna, Krsna Krsna, Hare Hare, Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare.
Reverses in life help us to turn to God with greater attention, so there are so many rituals, all these rituals especially religious rituals are meant for the satisfaction of the Lord. So this Brahmin came to Yudhistra and he said that: “This is my particular service to God to perform this ritual and you are Kshatriyas, and Kshatriyas are always meant to assist and help Brahmins” and that is a fact. These days, big politicians, administrators of the society they think themselves very intelligent and they sit together in their parliamentary empires and they make so many laws but previous to the most modern times in this age of Kali-yuga, all of the administrators and the Kings they would receive knowledge from the great Brahmins, the sages and the Vaishnavas who actually taught what is pleasing to God, because what is pleasing to God is what is best for humanity. Human society is like tree and every member of society is like leaf, or a branch or a twig or a flower on that tree or the trunk. Service to God is like watering the root of the tree, if the root is satisfied the whole tree will be nourished and happy. If the root of the tree is not satisfied anything you do for any other part of the tree will not be sufficient, it will wither and it will die. So therefore, real knowledge means to understand how to please Krsna and knowing that through this means we are doing the ultimate welfare and charitable work for all humanity.
So Yudhistra Maharaj who was such a King understood his first and foremost duty in life is to protect his citizens and the greatest way to protect the citizens was to get knowledge and to distribute knowledge which is given by those who understood the essence of the scriptures in devotion to God. The Kings were really humble servants so he said: “We will get this Arani wood back for you”. And Yudhistra, Bhima, Arjuna, Nakula and Sahadev went chasing after the deer but it was a very mystical deer, they would see the deer and they would chase after him to catch him, just to get the wood back somehow or other and just when they had come close to the deer, he would disappear and he would appear just in another place close by and they run after him and when they were just close to him he would again disappear and he was leading them deeper, deeper and deeper into the forest throughout the whole day and the Pandavas were becoming very depressed because they were conquerors, they had the power to conquer the whole world, but they could not catch this little deer it was an insult to them and after all day chasing after this deer and still not becoming successful they were terribly, terribly stricken with hunger and thirst and they decided to rest because their thirst was so terrible they could go on no longer, they rested under a Banyan tree and they were just lying there, Yudhistra Maharaj told his youngest brother Nakula that: “Please climb to the top of the tree and see if anywhere around there is a reservoir of water which we can drink”, then Nakula climbed to the top of the tree and from a branch he saw beautiful reservoir of fresh clear water, something very rare on these days. And he said: “I have seen, I have seen”. Yudhistra Maharaj asked him: “Please go and bring water back to all of us, we cannot even walk we can hardly stand, we have so much thirst, come as soon as possible”. So Nakula went, ran as fast as he could run and he got to the reservoir of water and as he approached that lake, his thirst intensified and increased for some mysterious reason and he was about and picked up his hands a cup full of water and just he was about to drink a voice in the sky resounded very deep and very loud and said: “I am the proprietor of this lake and no one can drink this water unless you first answer my questions, if you try to drink this water without answering my questions you will die”. So Nakula was thinking who is this non sense, so he just thought “why do I have to, I am a great Kshatriya I do I have to listen to this voice”, so he drank the water and immediately, he died. So long time passed since that Nakula did not return, so Yudhistra Maharaj told to Sahadev that: “Your brother, I do not know where he is, may be some difficulty, go, go to that pond of water and help him bring water to rest of us”. So Sahadev went and when he got to the lake he saw his brother lying there dead, it grieved his heart but his thirst became so intensified that he could think of nothing but quenching his thirst and same voice resounded: “I am the proprietor of this lake, you may not drink this water until you answer my questions or you will die like your brother”. So Sahadev picked up the water and drank it and died. Sahadev did not return for long time, Yudhistra sent Arjuna, the wielder of Gandiva bow and he also drank the water and died and then Yudhistra sent Bhima, powerful Bhima and he went and the same voice warned him but he drank the water and he died. So then Yudhistra himself went to the pond and he saw his four brothers – Bhima, Arjuna, Nakula and Sahadev lying there dead and when Yudhistra Maharaj saw this his heart was broken, he loved his brothers so dearly he wanted to weep but he was so much devastated by what he had seen. He could not even weep, he was so dried up due to thirst and lamentation that he could not even bring tears to his eyes, he just trembled in pain, heart broken, mind smashed to pieces, he was thinking “these brothers of mine they have sacrificed their lives for me on everyway and now they are gone, how could I live without them, they are my dearest friends, my most loved associates, they are such exalted devotees of Lord Krsna, how could I live without them, why is death come to them and not to me?” And then he began to think “I will have to be the one to tell Draupadi and mother Kunti that all of her children are dead and how have they died, who could have done this? Bhima has the strength of ten thousand elephants and Arjuna’s bows unconquerable and it appears that they have died without a fight. Who could have possibly the power to kill them?” And in this state he just stood there and looked at his dead brothers, heart broken, no words can explain the grief of Yudhistra at that moment. But then his thirst became so intensified that he could no longer withstand it and he came upon pond of water and picked it up with his hands and just as he was about to drink that very, very cool, refreshing pure water the voice resounded from the sky, “You see how your brothers are dead, you will also die along with them if you do not follow what I say. I am the proprietor of this lake and you are not permitted to drink this water until you answer my questions”. At that point Maharaj Yudhistra who was nobility personified he put the water back in the pond and with folded palm he offered all respects to this voice and he said: “If you are the proprietor of the lake, I have no right to touch this water without your permission. But who are you? Who are you that are so powerful that has killed my brothers, what kind of magnanimous inconceivable personality could this be? Please show yourself to me” and at that time a terrible frightening looking Yaksha appeared before Maharaj Yudhistra. Maharaj Yudhistra offered his respectful obeisance’s to this Yaksha. Knowing what is his power. Actually devotees understand that all opulence is coming from Krsna and our Guru Maharaj Srila Prabhupad explained: “wherever you see great learning, wherever you see great power, wherever you see great wealth you should understand that this person is somehow or other being gifted by the opulence’s of God. So we can offer respect. We offer respects to the Lord who has bestowed such excellences upon such a person and in this way we remember Krsna”. Yudhistra Maharaj said to the Yaksha: “Now please, what are your questions? I will try to answer them to the best of my ability”. Meanwhile on one side he was looking at his dead brothers and his heart was broken into pieces, his mind was in complete grief and on the other side there was this cool beautiful water and his mouth and throat were dryer than a desert with thirst. He is the embodiment of tolerance, patience, obedience and humility. He agreed to answer the questions. And many questions were asked and the series of questions and answers are very vital part of the Sri Dwaipayana Vyasadev’s Mahabharat.
One question he asked is very important. The Yaksha asked Yudhistra Maharaj: “What is faster than the wind?” And Yudhistra Maharaj said: “what is faster than the wind is the mind”. And then the Yaksha asked: “What is more innumerable than all blades of grass on the whole planet of the earth”. And Maharaj Yudhistra’s reply was: “The desires within the mind are more innumerable than all blades of grass on earth”. Here Lord Krsna is explaining how difficult it is to control the mind? For so many millions of births we have accumulated so many impressions and so many desires and now we come to this human form of life and generally all species of life they are simply trying to satisfy any desire that comes to their mind and difference between the civilized human society and uncivilized human society is Shreyas and Preyas. Preyas means whenever one of these blade of grass sprout to the visibility of our mind we immediately want to satisfy somehow or other and we act. Our senses are dictated by the mind and mind is being dictated by the senses. But Shreyas – civilized human life means whatever desire comes upon our mind with our intelligence, the intelligence that comes through Guru, Sadhu and Shastra. Real intelligence - means the word of God. It does not mean the information we get from going to IIT or Oxford University or Harvard University or Bombay University or any of these institutions. They can give us some information and we can store that information within our brains and we can use it for certain purposes in life, our occupation and so forth. But that is not intelligence, Intelligence comes from God and the word of God is our intelligence and when we are guided by the word of God we are intelligent and that means we must discriminate at every moment of life whether this is good for me or whether this is bad for me? Whether this is pleasing to God or whether this is displeasing? Whether this will liberate me or create bondage in my life? That discrimination is necessary and Krsna explains in Bhagavad-Gita: That the mind that is controlled by one’s intelligence is one’s best friend, but the mind that is not being controlled by discriminatory powers of our intelligence is our worst enemy, in fact our only enemy. The mind is very difficult to control but the word of God has the power to control our mind. Krsna is all powerful and he is non-different than his instructions and he is non-different than his name, therefore the perfection of self-realization to keep the mind always fixed in remembering the name, the form, the instructions of the Lord and to act accordingly. __________0:29:23 sloka. The same mind and sense are causing us so much bondage and Karmic reactions when engaged in hearing and chanting the glories of the Lord according to the instructions of the Lord will purify our hearts. Our mind and senses can be used to purify our lives and connect us to the highest truth to Krsna. And that is the essence of the yogic process to keep the mind always fixed in Krsna through our matured intelligence and to have such intelligence we must with the Lord and hear his words and associate with his devotees because what we associate with we become. If we associate with materialistic people our intelligence becomes materialistic and then our mind and senses conquer us whereas if we associate with devotees of Lord who are always reminding us of what the purpose of life is and our intelligence is always fixed in truth and is there to calculate, to screen to moderate the wanderings of the mind and to accept what is favorable for devotion to God and to reject what is unfavorable for devotion to God. That is intelligence.
The Yaksha asked Yudhistra Maharaj: “What is the most valuable procession one can achieve in this world?” And he said: “the greatest possession is Knowledge”. Knowledge is the information that we get to discriminate properly. Yaksha asked: “What is real knowledge?” And Yudhistra Maharaj replied: “Knowledge of the self as separate from matter and how to discriminate between the two that is real knowledge”. Srila Prabhupad our Gurumaharaj explains how Bhagavad-Gita teaches this basic principle of Knowledge, which even the greatest Universities, cannot understand. Srila Prabhupada many years ago he gave a lecture at MIT, have you heard of MIT? Massachusetts Insistent for technology after Harvard it is the most prestigious University in all of America probably one of the three most prestigious Universities in the entire planet earth and he gave a lecture there. Many professors, many graduate students they were attending and Prabhupad explained to them the science of the soul, the science of matter and spirit, the basic teachings of Gita and then he said: “This big, big university and all universities in America, in all the universities in the world where is the department that teaches the difference between the living body and a dead body? So many subjects you are giving but the most basic fundamental principle of knowledge you are completely ignorant. Who are you? What is Truth? What is a living body and what is a dead body and why is there a difference between the two?” Such a simple question, but all these graduate professors were completely ignorant; they had no idea, no clue. One time there was a little devotee four years old, child of a devotee, Prabhupad asked: “What is the difference between a living body and a dead body?” And the little five years old, she was a little girl, she said: “Prabhupad the difference between the living body and dead body is the soul is gone in the dead body and soul is in the living body”. Prabhupad said: “She is more highly educated than all these big Professors at MIT or Oxford or IIT or Harvard or any of these other Universities. She understands what truth is?” Then the Yaksha asked Yudhistra Maharaj: “Tell me something that only has value when it is given up?” And he said: “False pride”. When there is false pride whatever it is connected to it ruins it. When false pride is given up, everything else becomes valuable. Even knowledge, even if you so much understanding of Shastras, if you have false pride it nullifies everything else. When we see even great Yogis, great politicians, great entertainers, people of all various aspects of success in society, there downfall is generally always their false pride and in spiritual life especially false pride nullifies the good reactions that whatever we are striving to achieve. Actually, it is said that when you do something first the path of self-realization and you do something, you attain something wonderful as soon as you take credit for it, and it practically nullifies everything you have done, the spiritual results. But you give credit to God who deserves the credit because after all, he has the one who has empowered you with all ingredients and all the prepotencies to fulfill whatever we have done. If we humble ourselves in all of those credits uplift our souls and our consciousness.
Then the Yaksha asked Yudhistra Maharaj: “What is wickedness?” Who knows the answer? Yudhistra Maharaj replied means: “To criticize others to find faults in other living beings”. This is the sign of someone who is actually having a kind and pure heart. Srila Rupa Goswami explains: “what is the symptom, one of the basic symptoms of a mahatma. He/ She no longer have the tendency to find faults in others that is always seeking to see the good in others. Even if there is a little spark of good try to see it and fan it. But the nature of Dhuratma – one has a crippled mind, crippled by envy and illusion takes great pleasure in finding faults and criticizing others. Today’s society is full of gossip infact; everywhere in the world you go there are these gossip magazines. It is there, every scandal, can you imagine these journalists and reporters their whole mind, their whole occupation is just searching for scandals and then exaggerating it as much as they can get away with and printing it and publishing it to millions of people and the people are hungry to hear about these scandals. On the way when we are driving toward Worli from Chowpaty there is always this big hoarding that tells some magazine what the latest scandals are? Buy this magazine. Everyone is buying this magazine; I do not what this magazine is but keep us thirsty for scandals. And this is what people like to read about in the newspapers, people may say Oh! How terrible? But it was not there, they would not buy it. The newspapers are boring unless there are earth quakes and AIDS, Epidemics and bubonic plaques and especially Politicians getting arrested for corruption and big entertainers being arrested for immorality everyone loves to taste the nectar of hearing the false of others. But Mahatma has no more tendencies, why? because he has tasted the sweetness of hearing the glories of the Lord. It is said that crows like to go to the garbage dumps of all material topics and eat and drink all the sewage and garbage that is present there but devotees are like Hamsas or Paramahamsas they like to go those beautiful fresh lakes and drink the nectar in the centre of Lotus, similarly devotees are satisfied by coming to programmes like to night hearing the glories of the Lord, hearing the truth from Bhagavad Gita fills our heart with so satisfactions and when we chant the Holy names of the Lord our mind, our tongue, our ears our hearts our whole being and when we are dancing even our body is engrossed in the nectarine immortal nectar of Krsna and such a person it is below the dignity, it is shameful to be looking for false in others, no taste. Yudhistra Maharaj said: “This is the definition of wickedness to find false in other living beings”.
And then the Yaksha asked the Yudhistra Maharaj: “What is the most wonderful thing on all the earth?” And he replied: “The day after day we see all living entities enter through the door of death and whoever remains is thinking that I will not die, this is the most wonderful thing in all the earth”. Srila Prabhupad gives the example that when they slaughter goats, what they do is the goats are lined up and they are eating their grasses and they are just eating grass, eating grass and they are going and they push and they are eating grass and finally they come to the killing floor and they are slaughtered such a terrible, cruel act with so much comic consequences but the goats in line they see that just ahead of them everyone is getting slaughtered. But they are so much engrossed in eating their grass, they are thinking, it will not happen to me, let me just eat grass and enjoy and what happened to them is inevitable. In the similar way in human society we see everyone is coming around us is coming to death and in could at any moment. 0:43:20___________ sloka. It is not a question any more, in previous ages Satya yuga, Treta Yuga, to some extent Dwapara Yuga people lived a full life before they left their bodies but in Kali yuga at any moment we do not know what will happen? Here in Bombay just walking across the street, you might as well be ninety nine years old you do not know if you live another moment just crossing the street, even if you are a child. All these crazy drivers, from the western point of view very crazy drivers. In the West of course, how many people die in automobile accidents but it is different, most people on the West die of automobile accidents because they go so fast. They have these big wonderful super highways and you are going sixty, seventy, eighty miles an hour, some people go ninety, hundred miles an hour and then some truck driver falls asleep and Crash and die or you fall asleep and you crash and die. But in India where can you go sixty, seventy, eighty, ninety and hundred miles an hour, every two feet there is a buffalo or a goat some cow is crossing the road or old woman is going like this. What to speak of cars all? It’s like maize where there is no beginning or no end or everyone just struggling to get in front of each other and try to not hit him but come as close to hitting him as possible. From Western point of view, I am coming from America this is my observation, that the pride of an Indian driver is who can come closest to hitting someone without hitting them, he is the best driver. But it is very dangerous, at any moment somebody just cuts and crashes, what to speak? There are enemies pointing nuclear bombs at every city all they have to do is pressing buttons from crazy persons. There are so many diseases that can come hit anybody at anytime and there are so many unforeseen forces that create so much danger and yet we are thinking that I will live till tomorrow but none of us have any guarantee. So this was Yudhistra’s the wonderful power of illusion and Maya. 0:46:34________sloka. Therefore Prahalad Maharaj said: “Now is the time, when you are a little child of four or five years old, this is the time to become very serious about self-realization and spiritual life, do not wait, because you do not know how much time you have”. ___________-:47:04. One should not be a mother or father unless one is teaching the dependent how to become free from ever taking birth again in this world by cultivating devotion in the heart of the child. But today, Bharatvarsha the great land of India, parents in general have become so conditioned and degraded, now as a child 0:47:37(some text missing). Oh no do not do this, this very dangerous ____________0:55:33 this is danger at every step, the dangers are the Hare Krsna movement the Sadhus are trying to teach you about God, it is not bad, but it is not for now when you become old then you do this, now you can just few minutes a day you do some pooja, you do ritual but your academic education, your career, finding a good husband/ wife this is what you have to concentrate all your energy on now, you have to build up a future you should not spend too much time in your religion because after all if you are too religious who will marry you? No in our caste is so religious they will not want you, Ah! This is what people are saying. In the name of love this is the unfortunate situation in today’s society. We should know that the fulfillment of the aim of life in this human existence is to become Krsna Consciousness, to realize our eternal relationship with the supreme, to liberate ourselves from the bondage of illusion and we should be cultivating in our own life and should be encouraging our children in their lives to receive this greatest of all wealth. And it is done by learning how to control the mind. Then you hear our adults, you know how difficult it is to control your mind, how wonderful it would have been when you are a child, if your parents were to train you very systematically and wonderfully, how to moral, how to be pious and how to keep your mind fixed on God, by the time you are adult it becomes natural. Let us give our children this opportunity, to be God conscious and let us take it ourselves.
Krsna explains in this verse, gradually step by step one should become situated in trans by means of intelligence sustained by fore conviction and thus the mind should be fixed on the self alone and should think of nothing else. So Yudhistra Maharaj by answering these questions of Yaksha, the Yaksha became so happy, he said: “I am completely satisfied, there is no more learned and noble with good qualities than you Maharaj Yudhistra. And therefore I want to give you an award; I will bring back to life anyone of your four dead brothers”. And Yudhistra Maharaj thought about it for a moment and he said: “Bring back Nakula”. Yaksha was shocked: “Nakula? You are about to fight this great war of Kurukshetra and you need Bhima, he is the most powerful person on earth, he can bring victory for you, then Arjuna is such a dear friend of Krsna and he is the greatest fighter and greatest archer in all the world, compared to them Nakula is insignificant what will he do for you? How will he help you, please tell me why you want Nakula?” Yudhistra Maharaj explained that: “My father Pandu, he had two wives, Kunti and Madri. And from Kunti there are three brothers – Arjuna, Bhima and myself. And I am still living, so Kunti will be satisfied because she has at least she has one child living but out of my love and respect for Madri because I always consider Kunti and Madri both mothers, I love them and respect them equally, I do not want to deprive Madri or break her heart of having a living child, so for her sake, please allow Nakula to live”. When Yaksha heard, how completely selfless, respectful, humble and considerate Yudhistra Maharaj was, he was overwhelmed with joy, he said: “because you have answered questions in such a way, I will bring them all back to life”, then all four brothers – Bhima, Arjuna, Nakula and Sahadev, they all woke up as if they were in some deep sleep and Yudhistra Maharaj began to embraced them all and everything else. And began to drink water and Yaksha said: “Now you can drink water, now it is safe” and they drank lots of water. In fact they were satisfied they did not even have hunger and thirst anymore just by drinking the water of the mercy of this great personality, they were perfectly satisfied. Then Yudhistra asked to Yaksha: “Who are you? Please reveal your true self to me” and then he transformed into Yamaraj – Dharmaraj. He said: “My name is Dharma and I am your father”. Yudhistra Maharaj had not met his father, he bowed down, fell at his feet crying in ecstatic love that he was meeting, not only was he as father but Dharmaraj was one of the greatest Mahajans, one of the greatest of all devotees of the Lord. He worshipped his father with love and devotion and Dharmaraj gave him a benediction, he said: “I will grant you, because you have satisfied me so much any benediction or blessing you want, I will give you. It is coming soon that you fight this Great War against Kurus, what benediction you want?” Yudhistra Maharaj replied: “Please make me victorious, in the greatest of all wars the fight against the six enemies living in my heart, lust, anger, greed, pride, envy and illusion because unless I conquer this six enemies, I cannot serve the Supreme Lord Krsna with pure devotion. That is the only benediction I ask for”. And Dharmaraj replied: “You have already conquered your six enemies, you have already conquered Krsna with your devotion but I will promise you that Krsna will always protect you, keep your mind always fixed in faith and devotion in Krsna and you will be victorious and successful in every aspect of your life”.
So how to keep our minds always fixed on Krsna. How to gradually purify our hearts to progress at every moment for the liberated state of pure devotion, it is very simple but it takes a sincere heart to accept it. By hearing the glories of the Lord regularly and by always trying to keep our minds focused in the Lord through the chanting of his Holy name:
Hare Krsna, Hare Krsna, Krsna Krsna, Hare Hare, Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare.
This Hare Krsna Mahamantra is the all pure incarnation of Godhead in this age and all the results of all the processes of Yoga are fulfilled and realized to one who sincerely keeps his mind fixed on Krsna’s Holy names.
Thank you very much.
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Tags: Unedited lectures
Tags: Unedited lectures