Gurv-astaka 02 mahaprabhoh kirtana-nrtya-gita... cited

Expressions researched:
"mahaprabhoh kirtana-nrtya-gita" |"romanca -kampasru-taranga-bhajo" |"vaditra-madyan-manaso rasena"

Festival Lectures

Sri Sri Kaliya Krsna Deity Installation -- Lautoka, Fiji, May 2, 1976:

Guru's first business is to deliver the suffering humanity from the forest fire of this material existence. This material existence is compared with forest fire. You know there is fire in the forest. Big forest, nobody goes there to set fire. But automatically there is fire. Therefore this material existence has been compared with the forest fire. Here everyone wants to become happy, but there is fire. Even if we do not want, there is fire, miseries. Because this place, this material world, is place for suffering. It is confirmed by Kṛṣṇa Himself in the Bhagavad-gītā, duḥkhālayam aśāśvatam (BG 8.15). This place is for suffering. But under the spell of māyā, sufferings, we have taken as happiness or enjoying. This is called māyā. Actually there is no enjoyment here. Where is enjoyment? When we have to die, then where is the question of enjoyment? Does anyone want to die? No. Nobody wants to die. If there is some danger immediately, immediately we shall flee away. That is Nobody wants to die. Therefore, in the Bhagavad-gītā the four principles of unhappiness is described by the Supreme Lord, janma-mṛtyu-jarā-vyādhi-duḥkha-doṣānudarśanam (BG 13.9). Those who are intelligent, they will see four principles of major suffering. What is that? Janma-mṛtyu-jarā-vyādhi, to take birth, to die, and to suffer from disease, and to become old. So, so long you have got this material body, you have to suffer. Now, under the spell of māyā you can accept suffering as enjoyment, That is your business, But it is suffering.

So therefore, guru's business is to deliver the disciple from the suffering condition. Saṁsāra-dāvānala-līḍha-loka-trāṇāya kāruṇya-ghanāghanatvam **. So one who has got this mercy from the Supreme Lord, and he can deliver his guru. guru's out of many other businesses, one business is śrī-vigrahārādhana-nitya-nānā **. To establish temple for regularly worshiping the Deity of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Śrī-vigrahārādhana-nitya-nānā. And to worship the Deity very nicely, to decorate, to dress, to cleanse the temple, to offer nice foodstuff, distribute prasādam these are the activities of the temple. Unfortunately, people are in so much ignorance that they have forgotten everything. They're living like cats and dogs, animals. So this is a great opportunity that you are going to open a nice temple here. So not only open temple but you take part yourself How to decorate the Deity, how to cleanse the temple, how to offer nice prasādam, how to distribute prasādam, how to chant Hare Kṛṣṇa mahā-mantra.

mahāprabhoḥ kīrtana-nṛtya-gīta-

vāditra-madyan-manaso rasena

romāñca-kampāśru-taraṅga-bhājo

vande guroḥ śrī-caraṇāravindam **

So the opportunity has come by the endeavor of our Mr. Punja. He's to be known as Vāsudeva dāsa henceforward. His wife, Bhagavati, and his mother . So my request is, I of course I am traveling all over the world. It may not be possible for me to see you very frequently. But I expect to come again and again. But I entrust the matter to you all. I'll send help also as far as possible. Now you have to take care of your own business, this temple, and always remember that according to your capacity you can serve the Lord. It is not that one who is worshiping the Deity, decorating the Deity, offering arotik, he's in better position than the person who is cleansing the temple. Both of them equal. In the spiritual world there is no such distinction. Absolute. As here there is distinction between higher grade and lower grade service, in the spiritual world there is no such thing. Everything is spiritual service. So that you realize one after another.

General Lectures

Lecture on Gurvastakam at Upsala University -- Stockholm, September 9, 1973:

Everyone has blazing fire within the heart. That is the proof of material existence. Nobody is without anxieties. That blazing fire means anxieties, always. Everyone has got anxieties. Even the small bird, he has got anxiety. You give the small bird some grains to eat, he'll eat it. But he's not very peacefully eating. He'll see this way, that way, "If somebody's coming to kill me?" Yes. This is material existence. Everyone... Even President Nixon, he's also full of anxieties, what to speak of others. Even Gandhi, in our country, he was full of anxieties. All politicians, they're full of anxiety; although they hold very exalted post, still the material disease, anxiety, is there. So if you want to be anxiety-less, without any anxiety, then you must take shelter of the guru, or the spiritual master, and the test is that by the instruction of guru, by following the instruction of guru, you will be anxiety-less. This is the test.

saṁsāra-dāvānala-līḍha-loka-

trāṇāya kāruṇya-ghanāghanatvam

prāptasya kalyāṇa-guṇārṇavasya

vande guroḥ śrī-caraṇāravindam **

Don't make a cheap guru or a fashion guru, just like you keep sometimes a dog as a fashion. Similarly, if you want to keep a dog, or if you want to keep a guru as a fashion—"I have got a guru"—that will not help. You must accept a guru who can extinguish the blazing fire of anxiety within your heart. That is the first test of a guru.

And the second test is, mahāprabhoḥ kīrtana-nṛtya-gīta-vaditra-mādyan manaso rasena. The guru... Second system, symptom, is that guru is always engaged in chanting Mahāprabhu, glorifying Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu. That is his business. Mahāprabhoḥ kīrtana-nṛtya-gīta. He's dancing and chanting in the... By chanting the holy name of the Lord... Because this is the remedy for all calamities within this material world at the present moment. At the present moment, nobody can meditate. The so-called meditation is humbug. It is very difficult to meditate in this disturbing age of Kali. Therefore śāstra says, kṛte yad dhyāyato viṣṇum (SB 12.3.52). Meditation means dhyāna, dhyāyato. So Kṛte, in the Satya-yuga, when people used to live for 100,000's of years... The Vālmīki Muni, he got perfection by meditation after meditating for sixty thousands of years. So there is no guarantee whether we are going to live for sixty years or sixty hours. So meditation is not possible in this age. That was possible in the Satya-yuga. Then the next path is performing rituals as they are enjoined in the Vedic śāstra. Kṛte yad dhyāyato viṣṇuṁ tretāyāṁ yajato makhaiḥ. Yajato makhaiḥ. Makhaiḥ means performing big, big sacrifices. It requires huge lots of money.

Lecture on Gurvastakam at Upsala University -- Stockholm, September 9, 1973:

So first symptom is that he will give you such instruction that immediately you will feel relief from all anxieties. And the second symptom is that he's personally engaged also in chanting and dancing the holy name of the Lord. Mahāprabhoḥ kīrtana-nṛtya-gīta-vaditra-mādyan manaso rasena. And enjoy the transcendental bliss within the mind by chanting and dancing. Unless you become blissful, very happy, you cannot dance. It is not... Artificially, you cannot dance. These dances, they are not artificial. They feel some transcendental bliss; therefore they dance. It is not they are dancing dog. No. They dance from the spiritual platform. Vaditra-mādyan manaso rasena. Romāñca-kampāśru-taraṅga-bhājo. And there are sometimes transformation of the body with spiritual symptoms—sometimes crying, sometimes there is, I mean to..., swelling on the end of the hairs. There are so many symptoms. These are later. These are not to be imitated. But when one is spiritually advanced, these symptoms are visible. This is the second symptom of guru. And the third is:

śrī-vigrahārādhana-nitya-nānā-

śṛṅgāra-tan-mandira-mārjanādau

yuktasya bhaktāṁś ca niyuñjato 'pi

vande guroḥ śrī-caraṇāravindam **

The spiritual master's duty is to engage the disciples in Deity worship, śrī-vigraha. Śrī-vigraha. In our centers, all centers... We have got about..., more than one hundred centers all over the world. We have got the method of Deity worship. Here we have not yet established, but we worship the picture of Lord Caitanya and guru. But in other centers... In London, we have got two centers, two temples. In America we have got about forty centers. In this way, in each and every center, there is Deity worship. Śrī-vigrahārādhana-nitya-nānā: to worship the Deity, to dress the Deity very nicely; to cleanse the temple very nicely; to offer nice foodstuff to the Deity and accept the remnants of the foodstuff as our eating. In this way, there is method of Deity worship. The Deity worship is done by guru himself, and he engages the disciple also in that business. This is the third symptom. Śrī-vigrahārādhana-nitya-nānā-śṛṅgāra-tan-mandira-mār janādau, yuktasya bhaktāṁś ca niyuñjato 'pi. Not that he is not engaged. He is also engaged. His disciples are engaged. He's always showing, "Do like that. Do like that. Do like that." Or sometimes, if he cannot, the guru shows how to do it. That is the business of guru.