If systematic and principled direction is given to this daily prayer meetings following the footprints of Mahatmaji, then we can help all concerned in subduing their evil propensities which are the causes of disruption in the human society at large. When spiritual instincts, which are inherent qualities in every living being, are kindled by such daily prayer meetings, it is then only the people in general develop the qualities of the gods and the Trust Board of Mahatma Gandhi Fund should not miss this lesson of Mahatmaji's practical life. Such qualities being developed people in general will give up the habit of imitating others but they will live and act freely boldly and rightly like Mahatma Gandhi and that will bring real freedom of life individually or collectively.
Lessons (Letters)
Correspondence
1947 to 1965 Correspondence
(25) He may enhance his spiritual education taking lessons from Geeta, Bhagavata, Science of Devotion, Lord Caitanya etc. and prepare for the examination of Bhakti-Sastra, Bhaktisiddhanta, Bhaktivedanta etc.
What I want to do immediately are as follows:—
(1) To hold consecutive meetings at different Mohallus & houses of Delhi for impressing the ideas of the mission.
(2) To give training to at least 7 to 10 educated young men in the "parampara lessons of Bhagavad-gita" and then to "Brahma Sutra," Bhagavata & Caitanya Caritamrta
(3) To publish an English monthly paper to sell specially to the English knowing heads of the society and to get printed some relative literatures __.
I am glad to note that you have got the highest estimation for Gita. I am just trying to present the conclusion of Gita to the world as it is and without any imperfect compromise with speculative interpretations. We have to learn the lessons of Gita from the authorized disciplic succession as it is advised there in the book (4th Ch.). Unfortunately every one not in that line tries to explain Gita in his own way and this process is misguided the people. We have to counteract this disruptive tendency and put them at right.
1966 Correspondence
As such my Godbrother who is entrusted with this work has asked me to return to India for some days to expedite the work. I am trying to avoid the journey to India and again to come back specially for the reason that I am holding at the above address classes thrice in a week and training some American Youth in the matter of sankirtana and devotional service of the Lord (Bhakti) some of them are taking the lessons very sincerely and in future they may be very good Vaisnavas according to rigid rituals. One of the youths Mr. Paul Murray is even ready to go with me to India to learn the cult more specifically and I wish to take him with me when I go to India. Please therefore write to your Agent here to allow this more serious boy to come with me in India and see things directly how temple worship is done in the Visnu Temples. I shall keep him for some days in Vrindaban and he may be given lessons for future preaching in the western countries.
1968 Correspondence
Regarding diacritical markings, you may refer to the book First Lessons in Sanskrit Grammar and Reading by Judith Tyberg of the East-West Cultural Center published in 1964. Each letter should be transliterated in a careful manner so that one may be able to know the Devanagari character corresponding. Devanagari type characters will not be there in this new book we are preparing. Markings are as follows.
Regarding Kallman affairs: please try to get out of it, even at a loss. And for future, take lessons out of it. For us desiring to go back to Krishna, persons engaged in sense gratification business is more dangerous than poison. But rest assured Krishna will save you from this entanglement
Regarding the challenge in the International Times, I am sorry to read the letter of a rascal advertising himself as Swami Gitananda, but from his letter it appears that he is neither a Swami nor has ever read Bhagavad-gita. He is so rascal that he describes the River Yamuna as metaphysical in lower consciousness, although the River Yamuna is flowing so happily all over the Northern India. He is claiming yogi, but he does not know that the greatest yogi is the devotee of Lord Krishna. So we can reply him in so many ways to teach this rascal a good lesson, but the more we continue such correspondence, we give unnecessarily some publicity to a rascal. Mukunda has already protested such rascal and we have to go on with our own work positively. Fault-finding men will always be there, that is the history of the world, but one has to execute his prescribed duties.
1969 Correspondence
I am very much anxious to know how is your present condition of health. Please let me know if you are improving or if there is some disturbance still. We should always remember that our body is not for sense gratification; it is for Krishna's service only. And to render very good sound service to Krishna we should not neglect the upkeep of the body. We learn from an instance of Sanatana Goswami. He was sometimes very much sick on account of eczema, and he was therefore sometimes bleeding. But whenever Lord Caitanya met Sanatana Goswami, He used to embrace him in spite of Sanatana's request for Him not to touch him. Because of this. Sanatana Goswami later on decided to commit suicide so Lord Caitanya would not embrace him in his bloody condition. This plan was understood by Lord Caitanya, and He called Sanatana Goswami and said to him, "you have decided to end this body, but don't you know that this body belongs to Krishna? You have already dedicated your body to Krishna so how can you decide to end it?" So you must not neglect the upkeep of your body. This is the lesson we get from Lord Caitanya and Sanatana Goswami. Try to take care of your health in the best possible way.
Your writing in the second paragraph is so much encouraging for me and your appreciation of devotees like Upendra and Ananda is super excellent. Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu taught us this lesson—one who appreciates a sincere devotee is eligible to approach the Supreme Personality of Godhead. I am so glad to learn that you are prepared to come to L.A. but in the meantime I have come here to Hawaii. I am returning to San Francisco by the 31st of March, and if you kindly see me on or before the 6th of April, 1969, there in S.F., with Barbara if possible, it will be very good opportunity to talk in detail about your future service. Your suggestion to return to Germany and engage yourself in the translating and publishing work of the books and magazines in German language is very much welcome; because you are a sincere soul and trying to serve Krishna sincerely, He is giving you good intelligence from within.
Regarding your question about keeping daily income and expenditure records, I am enclosing a brief lesson in how to do this. I hope this will meet you in good health.
Regarding Birbhadra, when I go to New Vrindaban soon I shall see if the situation is all right for him to go there. For the present, he need not go out, and you should simply teach him history, geography and mathematics. His history lessons will take care of his reading and spelling instruction. So far as your question about how to think of Radha-Krishna, your present process of visualizing the Deities is nice. You have written for me to press the temples, namely London and San Francisco, to send their $750 for the printing of Back To Godhead, but this project should be referred to Brahmananda because he is in charge of dealing with Dai Nippon Company in this connection.
1970 Correspondence
I beg to acknowledge receipt of your letter dated January 21, 1970, and I am so glad to learn that you have regained control of your mind and the tricks of Maya have finished. So by Krishna's Grace you have been saved from Maya's attack.
This appears to have been a very close call for you and the lesson should be taken well that if we deviate from the strict following of the regulative principles Maya is always ready to inject doubts to shake our faith in Krishna. So I am glad that you have recovered and I was praying for Krishna to save you.
So you can see the great necessity of following the prescribed duties of chanting regularly and following strictly the instructions of the Spiritual Master and the regulative principles. In addition to this everyone should go on the streets with Sankirtana Party as much as possible and preach this Krishna Consciousness Movement to his best ability for the benefit of all people.
I want to start a center in India at the birth-site of Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu specially for accommodating non-Indian students for taking lessons in this great transcendental art. When Indian young men will see that foreign students from England, America, Canada, Australia, etc. are taking interest in the spiritual science left by the Acaryas headed by Lord Krishna, then naturally they will also take part. It will be a great expensive job, but still if one half the expense is borne by the Indians I shall manage to send the other half from America and Europe. As your good self has voluntarily offered some service on account of this Krishna Consciousness Movement, I shall be very much pleased if you kindly consider this proposal.
Mayapur is the birth-site of Lord Caitanya. It is a small village You cannot find it on the map, but near Calcutta you may find the place "Navadvipa," and Mayapur is part of this Navadvipa district. So far your planning to go to India, not only you, but I think several others, including Kirtanananda Maharaja and other advanced students, will go to India for preaching Krsna Consciousness. That will be a lesson to our so-called "secular" government. I came here with this purpose, so you have to fulfill my desire. I think it is coming to be true by the will of Lord Caitanya.
In the beginning I was seriously corresponding with Indian friends to get some good mrdanga players, but when I found it too difficult to get a man from India some of my students were given the rudimentary lessons in playing and simply by practice they are putting on Sankirtana Party everywhere. My Guru Maharaja used to say that in a foreign land where you cannot speak the language with the natives very nicely, what do you do when there is a fire in your house just to get their help? In such emergency one has to express himself somehow or other to his foreign friends and get their help to extinguish the fire. But if he wants to learn the language first and then talk with the foreign friends to get help, then everything in the meantime would be finished. Similarly if we have to learn and then paint, it will be a long-term affair. But immediately we want so many pictures for all of our books, so all the artists may always be engaged in painting works and that painting itself will gradually teach them how to make things nice.
1971 Correspondence
Yes, we are above all religious work. Krishna Consciousness is post-graduate to all these religions and any religion can take lesson from us. Therefore we are not on the mundane plane. Other religions are trying to understand God vaguely and we are on the platform where God is really understood and we are associating with Him directly also.
Regarding your teacher problem, I have advised Pradyumna to go there and teach students primary Sanskrit lessons at least to learn the alphabet, so that in the future when they go to India they may learn Sanskrit very easily. The students should be taught Sanskrit both in Devanagari and Bengali alphabets. Satyabhama in New Vrindaban has written a nice book for elementary lessons in English. I think this book may be printed immediately. If not the manuscript may be used to teach the students. The important matter is that the children are taken care of nicely. Bhavananda was talking with me that in New Vrindaban students were very much neglected. Therefore they were immediately transferred to New York. Every parent wants to see that their children are taken care of very nicely. That is the first duty. If they are not healthy then how they can prosecute their education? If they are undernourished it is not good for their future activities. They must have sufficient quantity of milk and then dhal, capatis, vegetables, and a little fruit will keep them always fit. There is no need of luxurious fatty foods but milk is essential. A big building is also very good for the children's health. They can move freely and run and jump.
It will be a good idea in the future if our devotees take lesson from this unfortunate incident and take precaution not to drive late at night for any reason—no gain can come from such driving at night which will ever compensate for much great losses. Please advise your GBC zonal secretary that in future great precaution must be taken.
1973 Correspondence
Our occupational duty is not arbitrary, that means once we have taken up some field of action, if we are advanced in our understanding, then we shall not change it for another. Rather our devotion is the important factor, so what does it matter what I am doing so long my work and energy are completely devoted to Krsna? Just like Krsna, He is the Supreme Personality of Godhead, He has no work, neither He has anything to do, still He comes here to teach us this lesson. He accepts not only His occupational duty as cowherd boy, royal prince, but also He accepts married life, He enters politics, He is philosopher, He is even chariot driver during a great battle, He does not give example of Himself avoiding His occupational duty. So if Krsna Himself is exhibiting by His own conduct what is the perfection of existence, then we should heed such example if we are intelligent. Even supposing there is wife at home, with children, that does not matter, that is no hindrance to our spiritual life. And once we have accepted these things, occupational duties, we should not lightly give them up. That is the point.
1974 Correspondence
The news that you are able to keep up the prasadam program which is now up to 1500 persons on Sunday is very welcome and I hope you can continue this without stoppage. The success of Bhavananda Maharaja's English lessons of the Varnasrama College has given me great pleasure and I am sure many devotees will come from this program. It is a first class idea.
1975 Correspondence
I am advising therefore my senior disciple, His Holiness, Kirtanananda Swami to attend the meeting and I hope he will be able to present the proper view of our Krishna Consciousness movement. Our movement is completely a spiritual movement, therefore sometimes it appears to be a little different from the materialistic cultural movement. In the Bhagavad-gita, the spiritual hint is there in the beginning of the lesson to Arjuna. Krishna wanted to pick up the spiritual soul from within the body: dehino 'smin yatha dehe kaumaram yauvanam jara (BG 2.13). So, the spirit soul is within the body. Unless we catch up the spirit soul within the body, there is no question of spiritual life or culture. Still, we are trying to push this movement in the western countries and many of them are taking it very seriously. I hope Sriman Kirtanananda Maharaja will be able to convince you further in the meeting and I hope you will give him some time to speak on the subject matter on my behalf.
1977 Correspondence
Now I am old man, I have become a little weakened, and I do not know how much longer I shall be able to push on this Krsna Consciousness movement in active preaching capacity. Therefore I have entrusted my right hand men, like GBC, sannyasis and men like yourself, to take up where I had left off and continue expanding and propagating KC all over the world as per the desire of Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu. In this way, you have got the opportunity of being favored by Krsna to become responsible leader of the human society, therefore I am simply surprised that you have again fallen under the spell of old bad habits. If you are actually intelligent and not simply pretending intelligence, then you will take this as a lesson and make repentance. If Krsna sees that you are sincerely repenting, He will excuse you. As austerity, you should forget these things and never again think about them in your mind. That will make you very strong.
| Page Title: | Lessons (Letters) |
| Compiler: | Visnu Murti, Labangalatika |
| Created: | 15 of Aug, 2010 |
| Totals by Section: | BG=0, SB=0, CC=0, OB=0, Lec=0, Con=0, Let=23 |
| No. of Quotes: | 23 |