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Mukham karoti vacalam pangum langayate girim
Yat kripa tam aham vande sri gurum dina tarinam
Paramananda Madhavam Sri Caitanya Isvaram
So Kolkata is the birthplace of our dear Founder Acarya, His Divine Grace, Srila Abhay Caranaravinda Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada. And here, Lord Jagannath has come to this maidan and this is Gundica for this festival. That means it is Vrndavana. We are all Vrajawasis! Haribol! Haribol! The Vrajawasis of Iskcon on stage are historical personalities. I have mentioned earlier about the six types of Nava vida bhakti – sravanam, kirtanam, smaranam, vandanam, pada sevanam, arcanam. There are three more left. The three are – dasyam, sakyam, atma nivedanam. When we hear Krsna katha, pastimes of Krsna, when we chant Hare Krsna japa, remember the Lord, His lilas and His qualities, then we offer obeisances to the Lord and offer prayer, different services we perform, pada sevanam. We call the form of the Lord, the vigraha, arca avatar. Jagannath, Baladeva and Subadra have come in the form of arca vigraha, the Lord has Himself come here, to give mercy to all. And this way by pulling the ropes of Jagannath’s ratha, by dancing in front of Jagannath, and walking along with the Ratha, we are doing service to Lord Jagannath. Haribol! If we think that we are the servants of the Lord, like when our devotees get initiated we call them ‘das’ – das brahmacari or das adhikari. Das brahmacari, grihasta or vanaprasta. This way everyone is a das. Das is the Lord’s servant. Hanuman is a very good example of being a servant of the Lord. He said, why Sita wears kum kum, sindoor on Her forehead? Sita wears it to give pleasure to Lord Ramacandra. Is that so, Hanuman thought, does Lord Rama become happy seeing Sita wearing sindoor? Hanuman applied sindoor all over his body! Haribol! Ha! If you see Hanuman in any temple, his body is all red. He has put sindoor. He wants to give pleasure to Lord Ramacandra. He is at the height of servant mood. And this way, he serves Lord Ramacandra. He once asked Lord Ramacandra, how should I serve You? Lord Rama said, that if I yawn you can snap your fingers in front of me! Then Hanuman keeps looking alertly at Lord Ramacandra, when He would yawn! Ha! This way Lord Ramacandra was not getting any peace! But for the sake of Hanuman’s pleasure, He yawned! Hanuman used to immediately snap his fingers. This way Hanuman wanted to be the das of the Lord and serve Him. We are all das, servant of the Lord and we will serve the Lord. We are part of the Lord, His minute parts. If the Lord is happy, we are very happy! Because we are all His parts. By serving the Lord, by making Him satisfied, we are satisfied. Ordinarily, we use our own body and we don’t really feel the pleasure and pain of another’s body – we can only imagine it. But when the Lord is satisfied, we are really happy. Because we are minute parts of the Lord. So one service is to think that I am the das, servant of the Lord and I will work for the pleasure of the Lord. And this way we offer prayer to the Lord and do service to the Lord. And in Vaikuntha, everyone has the mood of servant of the Lord. In Goloka Vrndavana, with Krsna there is sakya mood, Krsna is my mood. With this thought, they serve the Lord. Krsna is my best friend. This way, Arjuna was a very good friend of the Lord. And he was always wanting to serve Krsna as His eternal friend. He wanted Krsna’s association. The Vrajawasis were very friendly with Krsna, they used to go along with Krsna, eat with Krsna, wrestle with Krsna, play all sorts of games. Lord Nityananda did the Cida dahi festival in Panihati. Then He told Raghunath das that He would punish him. Your punishment is that you will offer all my associates a feast of cida dahi, mango, jackfruit. Capa kola. Everyone heard the name of Mahotsava, and came running to Panihati! MAHOTSAVA! PANIHATI MAHOTSAVA! And came running. There Sri Nityananda prabhu brought Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu by His meditation, from South India. Then many devotees were having cida dahi and Nityananda prabhu was considering all of them as friends. Then Raghava Pandit came and told Him that your afternoon lunch is ready – rice, dal, etc. Nityananda prabhu said what? What did He say? Raghava Pandit came and said to Nityananda prabhu, Your lunch is ready. Nityananda prabhu said, I am a cowherd boy, I like to eat in the forest. You also sit down here with Me and eat cida dahi. I will later have your lunch prasad. This way, Nityananda prabhu, considered all the people there as His Vrjawasi cowherd friends. Some people say that in their homes, they do not get support. But here Nityananda prabhu is supporting everyone. That is why we can serve the Lord in the mood of friendship. And if we do all the services together, that is called atma nivedanam. On Sunday, about 150 devotees took initiation. And here lots of rice prasad, khicri prasad are offered to Lord Jagannath. But the best offering to the Lord is atma nivedanam. The devotees pledged that they would every day, chant the holy name of the Lord, partake of His prasadam, preach His teachings and serve Him. Here devotees have come who will perform drama. This way various dramas and dances are being done as a service to the Lord. This way if the goal of our life is to serve the Lord, then we will not have to stay long in this prison house, we can go back to the Lord. Haribol! Haribol! Haribol! All of you chant Hare Krsna, do service to the Lord, do atma samarpan, offer Your self to the Lord and this way your life will be perfect. Here, there are many booths for service – children related, tribal care, various scriptures, bhakti vrksa opportunities, question and answer, various matters, there are various programs going on. And in the centre of all these activities is the temple of Jagannath, Baladeva and Subadra. You are all requested to serve Them. This Kolkata falls within the area of the sacred birthplace of Caitanyadev. Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu appeared in Navadvip, but 168 km around that place is Gaura Mandala Bhumi. This Kolkata falls in that area. In this place Caitanya Mahaprabhu has walked! Gaura mandala bhumi jeba jane chintamani, tara hoi braja bhumi vas. You are blessed that you are the residents of the land of Caitanyadev! Caitanya Mahaprabhu instructed everyone to chant the name of Krsna, serve Krsna and read the teachings of the scriptures on Krsna. I hope that you will all get the mercy of Caitanya Mahaprabhu. Nowadays there are a lot of airlines. They all want you to travel in their airlines. They announce, thank you, we know you could have chosen any other airline, but thanks for choosing to fly with us. There are two other airlines, one is fruits of Karma airline, whatever karma you do, good or bad deeds, based on that you get the reward. If you do pious activities, you get residence in swarga, the heavenly planets, get lots of money, good body, etc. And bad deeds, you get disease, suffering, court cases, residence in hell. This is in Karma airline. The other one is Caitanya Nityananda Mercy airline! If you get into that airline, if you chant the name of Krsna, we go back to the Lord! Who wants to take Karma airline and who wants to take Caitanya Nityananda Mercy airline? THOSE WHO WANT TO TAKE THE KARMA AIRLINE, PLEASE RAISE YOUR HANDS! Ha! AND CAITANYADEV’S MERCY AIRLINE? Haribol! Hare Krsna Hare Krsna Krsna Krsna Hare Hare, Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare. There are many more programs lined up today, so I will end my talk here.
Transcribed by Jayaraseshwari devi dasi
09 July 2019