Srimad-Bhagavatam 7.9.17
Бхакти Вигьяна Госвами · Дели · 2025
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Invocational prayers and opening
Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare Yuntak pra dishja mama vachima ma prasubtam sandji vaja kila shakti dara s vadamna
hanjam scha charana sravanat bagari prananda mo Bhagavathi Purusha Bam, Swasastu Vishwasya Kalah Prasidatam de Antupudani Shivam Mitoya, Manascha Badram Bajatata Doksha Javishatam
Namati Ratya to keep, Yamprava Jantamano Peta Mateta Krityam, Dwaipaya Novirahakatara Juhava, Putreti Tan Mayata Yotaravobinedus, Tamsarva Buddha, Hridayam Muni Mana tosmi Hare Krishna.
It's uh it's very difficult to speak something worthwhile after Srila Prabhupada. Srila Prabhupada very nicely explained that in this prayer Pralan Maharaj very clearly shows the useless, hopeless attempts,
pursuits to become happy in this world. He says in every birth which I take sometimes there is the yoga, the separation, sometimes there is some yoga, the meeting with priyana priya.
Sometimes in this life we meet something which is priya which is very dear to us, which is very pleasing to us. But then the yoga comes and we become unhappy.
Or sometimes we meet something which is displeasing and we are unhappy. In any case we're unhappy. That's the point.
Whatever happens, if something is pleasing happening to us, then after that we're separated with something which is pleasing and we become unhappy.
Or we meet with something displeasing and then we separate it with this and we become little happy about this, but then something displeasing again comes. Yasmat Priya Priya, Vy Yoga, Sam Yoga, Janma,
Sukalgnina, Sakala Yoni Shu Dhyamana. It says, Sakala Yoni Shu in every lifetime. Whatever I'm taking birth, in whatever form I'm taking birth, Sakala Yonisu Dhahyamana, I am just burning.
Dhahyamana is He says it's its past its present participle. I'm burning right now. The problem is that we don't understand that even right now we're not happy. If you ask somebody, how are you?
the stand and answer is very well, very good. What's so good? What's so good? There's nothing good in this life. But the standard answer is that, oh, I'm I'm okay, I'm well. You know.
There is a story that's one man he had a car accident and he's in a hospital, he is in the stretcher, you know, his head is here, legs are there, and you know, he's stretched, and his friend is coming uh to the ward and asking, How are you?
Maya and the reality of suffering
He said, Oh, I'm okay, I'm fine. I'm good.
So the problem is that, because of my Śrīla Prabhupāda explains, because of this āvaraṇātmikā māyā which covers our consciousness, we don't understand the tragic position in this material world.
Because everywhere, in every yoni, śokāgninā, we are just burning in this agni, in this fire of shock.
It's literally fire because according to the modern science the uh all these neurotransmitters of whatever uh like adrenaline uh which are produced in this material life uh the stressors which are there, they have the hot nature.
So this agni is there, śokāgninā, the agni of shock. Sometimes I have shock because I'm separated with something. Sometimes I have shock because I'm meeting with somebody whom I don't like to meet.
You always meet somebody whom you don't like to meet, or sometimes you're separated with something which you don't like to be separated with. In any case in any situation there will be some cause for sufferings.
Sufferings are there, it's totally unavoidable. Śokāgninā sakala-yoniṣu dahyamānāḥ. And therefore, even now I'm burning. Sometimes people say you will be burning in hell. You know, there's no mm reason to wait for hell.
You're already burning. And you know, of course now it's a cool weather, but very soon you will be burning in Delhi just in one month the weather will be burning. Śokāgninā, and you will be unhappy.
And of course, during the winter you're unhappy because you're meeting with too cold weather, and during the summer you will be meeting with too hot weather.
And in any case, śokāgninā, this shock, this dissatisfaction is there. And Prahlāda Mahārāja says, bhrāmyāmi, I'm wandering through this different yonis, through this different forms of life.
In any form of life, the only constant position which I have, the only something which is constantly happening with me is that I'm looking for happiness. In any position of life, I'm not meeting happiness.
Every person has the hope for happiness. Nobody has happiness, but the hope is there. And the hope keeps us alive. If there was no hope, we would be dead long ago. But in any position, we hope for the better.
Like recently there was New Year, and New Year means you know, we hope that the next year will be better than the previous year. The next year is never better than the previous year.
But the hope is there and the hope keeps us going. Yes. Happy New Year. What's so happy about the new year? Nothing happy about New Year. So many turmoils, the war is going on, the problems will come. It's inevitable.
It's the nature of this material world.
Flawed material solutions to suffering
And therefore, Prahlāda Mahārāja says, yaṁ naḥ. And then he says, yeah, no, no, no problem, because, uh, every time people are trying to find the solution for the problems. People are very ingenious.
They are really they're really good at finding solutions for the problems. But the problem is that the solution for problem is usually worse than the problem itself.
That's people are famous for finding solutions which are worse than the problems. Like one manager said, for any problem, for every problem there is a solution which is simple, clear, and totally wrong.
That's what they do. You know, for any problem there is very simple and clear solution, but it's usually wrong.
Because usually when people are trying to find solutions, they don't understand the consequences of this solution. And therefore, duḥkhaṣāṁ dadāti duḥkham.
Prahlāda Mahārāja is very clear many thousands of years back, hundreds of thousands of years back, he knows that practically every solution which we find is the cause of worse suffering than the problem itself.
So the advice to people: don't try to find the solution for the problem, just tolerate. That's what it is.
You know, usually we're trying to find the solutions, but the real solution is just to accept, to accept the reality that the sufferings will be there.
And you know we know so many solutions which people invented to solve the problems which proved to be worse than any problem which they were trying to solve.
Like in the beginning of the 20th century everyone was very excited because the motor cars appeared.
And in London, and there was I recently read an article, one journalist he was celebrating this motor cars are coming and now the and the horse carriages will be out of the way, because of the city because there is so much horse dung in the in the streets of London because of this you know horse carriages and now the motor cars will come.
Of course there is no horse dung, but there is the air is totally polluted and there is traffic jams and there are so many other problems. So it's probably better to be when the horse carriages were there.
It was much more peaceful than before. And there is a another peculiar solution and so many solutions are there which are worse than the problems themselves.
Like in China, there was this Mao Zedong, the leader of China, and there was a shortage of grain at that time. And why there is shortage of grain?
He had a brilliant idea that the shortage of grain, because there are too many birds, sparrows, they eat too much grain, and therefore we Chinese people don't have enough grains.
So he declared a campaign against sparrows.
And all these Chinese people they were running behind sparrows and they didn't let the sparrows to sit down and the sparrows were flying, flying, and ultimately they would fall dead. You know, it was so funny.
I saw this footage, video footage. You know, the whole village is running behind the sparrows because Mao Zedong said the sparrows are our main enemies of which separate us from happiness.
When we kill all the sparrows, then we will have enough grains. So they killed all the sparrows in China, but the problem is that there was too much Locust and Locust ate all the grains.
The locust actually ate much more grains than the poor sparrows. And because of this solution, there was a famine and 25 million people died.
25 million people died because one genius man on the top decided that the sparrows are the problem and we have to solve this problem.
Actually Mao Zedong was the problem, not the sparrows was the problem. He was the problem himself. But he thought he knows the solution, and usually it is like this. We think we know the solution.
tat kṛta-rohaṇāṁ tad-abhiṣaṅga-to 'py budhaḥ Prahlāda Mahārāja is very clear about this that, uh, the auṣadhaṁ for duḥkhaṁ, tadati dukkam, is much more troublesome uh than the initial problem why? He says why.
Misidentifying the self as the body
He gives a very important reason why. ataḥ syād ayam. Śrīla Prabhupāda, very nicely explains in this lecture, ataḥ syād ayam, he said ataḥ means asat. The problem is that I think Diya, that Aham is atat.
We know that according to Upaniṣads dictim tattvamasi, your death, your spirit. You're eternal. You're the soul.
But Prahlāda Mahārāja says why the solution is usually worse than the problem itself because people don't understand the real problem.
People usually try to solve not the problem which created the problem, not the root cause. They try to solve problem not at the root but, uh, in some other uh stages uh without understanding the root cause.
But the root cause is atadiyaham. People don't understand who they are. They don't understand the spiritual nature. Atad. Atad means I am not spirit. I'm this body.
Let's try to solve the problem from the initial premise which is wrong. I'm this body. Instead of solving the problem where it lies, and the problem lays uh in the understanding that I am this body. That's the problem.
Unless I solve this problem, I will never solve any other problem. But if I don't understand the problem, I try to solve the problems and the solution is always wrong.
Śrīla Prabhupāda used to say that people make the mistake in the very first uh action. Like if there is some mathematical problem and you're trying to solve and you do everything right.
But uh the in the very beginning you made a little mistake which you didn't notice. And then everything, even if everything after that is right, the result will be wrong.
Because there is a mistake in the very first state who I am. Therefore, the real solution is to understand this: I'm not this body.
That's exactly what, uh, Krishna explains in Bhagavad-gītā because Arjuna was in the same condition. He was trying to solve the problem. How to solve the problem? I should stop fighting. That's the solution of the problem.
I should become very peaceful, I should become non-violent, I should become Gandhi follower of whatever it is. He had so many different solutions for the problem he's facing. And Kṛṣṇa says, you're a fool.
That's the first thing which he says. You think you're very intelligent, but you're a fool because you don't understand the root cause of the problem. The root cause of the problem is you think you are the body.
Not that you have to kill Duryodhana, not that you have to fight for this, this is not the problem. The problem is that you don't understand the real problem. The problem is the first mistake. The wrong understanding, dhiyā.
Atad-dhiyā aham. I am not the body. I am something which is temporary, whereas I am eternal. And I have to make the eternal solution for my problem.
Unless I make the eternal solution, every other solution will prove to be wrong sooner or later. You know how you can solve the problem if the body is the problem?
Once a disciple came to Śrīla Prabhupāda and he said, Śrīla Prabhupāda, I have a problem. Śrīla Prabhupāda looked at him very sternly and said, you don't have a problem, you are the problem.
The very notion that I have the problem is wrong because we don't have the problem, we are the problem. Oh, wrong understanding of who I am is the problem. That's the problem.
And unless we understand this simple fact, we will never be able to solve the problems. Because the solutions will always bring us to more troublesome condition than what we are now.
You know, so many solutions are there in this material world but they're all wrong. And therefore every new year is worse than the previous year because in every new year there are new solutions.
And new solutions are tad-aty-uktam. They bring more problems to people. You know.
Connecting with the Lord through service
That's the way of progress, material progress, the solution is worse than the problem. And therefore he says, Bhūmā. He says, oh my dear Lord, you are all-powerful. Because you're Bhūmā, Bhūmā means unlimited.
Our problem is that we are limited. And because we are limited, our mind is limited. Our intelligence is limited and our solutions are also limited.
And therefore he says, Bhūmā, you are unlimited, you are all powerful, you are all intelligent, you are unlimited and my problem is that I'm limited. That's the point.
The solution of the problem which is created by my limited condition and my limited nature is to be in contact with unlimited. Only when my limited intelligence comes in contact with the unlimited intelligence of the Lord, all the problems can be solved.
And therefore he says, uh Bhūmā brahma, oh my dear Lord, I'm always wandering in this samsara without end, changing one body into another. And he says, what is the solution? Vadāme tavadāsya yoga.
Vadāme tavadāsya yoga, he says, tell me that I am your servant. It's a very interesting statement here because uh he says Vada me tavadasiya yoga, you tell me that I'm your servant
and by telling me this uh the yoga the connection will be established. The connection, the proper connection between myself and the Lord, the proper connection is very simple because you are unlimited and I am limited.
Because you are complete and I am incomplete. Because you're all powerful and I'm powerless. Because you are intelligent and I am not intelligent.
The only proper solution and the only proper relationship between us two, between these two entities, is the service to you.
Because if I serve to you, then and I will bec conneted to you through the service, and I'm part and you're the whole.
Srila Prabhupada explains that the living entity is the part and the proper condition of the part is to serve the whole. If you have a car and you have a spare part.
And the spare part, if the spare part is outside of the hole, and uh if the spare part all of a sudden thinks that I'm a very powerful spare part, and I can exist without this whole.
This will be beginning of all troubles. The spare part is only useful as long as it is in the hole. Like if the parts of our body are in place, they are okay.
If the parts of our body are outside of our body, they are completely useless. Like the hairs in our head are very nice. But if you take the same hairs and you cut these hairs and put it there. Are they nice or not?
They're they're they're they're ugly. You know the hairs on the head are very nice but the same hairs which are very nice in the head, if they are now soup, they are not so nice. Because they are not in a proper condition.
Because they are not the part of the whole.
So in the same way, when we are separated from the Lord, when we imagine ourselves to be separate from the Lord, when we don't understand what is the proper yoga between us and the Lord, that this yoga should be Dasya Yoga, should be the yoga of the service, that we should always serve the Lord, then we become separated and we become useless.
Not useless, we become ugly. But somebody who is not connected with the Lord, he becomes ugly because he is displaced, misplaced. He is not properly situated in his life, and therefore he says, Vadameh.
Power of hearing divine sound
This is the most beautiful point of the of this verse. This is this prayer is very beautiful. But this is perhaps the most amazing point of this verse. He says, Vada Meta Vadasya Yoga, you tell me.
Because when the Lord tells something, it becomes truth. When the Lord tells something, whatever the Lord tells, it's the truth by definition because He is the absolute truth.
And if He tells, you're my servant, we become servant. And Krishna says this. Krishna says this in Bhagavad-gītā. He tells us. The problem is that we don't hear what he says.
But as soon as we hear that Krishna says Mama Evamsha Jivaloke, Jivaloka Sanatana, Krishna says this very clearly. Mama Eva Amsa Jivalokya. Ji iswa my Amsa, and his Sanatana. He's eternally the part and parcel of myself.
Mama Vamsa Jiva Lokay Jiva Bhutta Sanatana. He is my eternal part and parcel. As soon as we hear this, it becomes the truth.
And therefore, Prahlāda Mahārāja says, you don't need to do anything else. You just tell me I'm your servant and I'll become your servant. All the obstacles will be removed. That's the power of the proper sound.
When the proper sound is being addressed to us and we hear, the proper sound can pierce through the coverings of Maya.
And therefore, the beginning of bhakti-yoga or dāsya-yoga, which Prahlāda Mahārāja is asking for, begging for the Lord, the beginning of it is hearing.
When we properly hear what Krishna has to say, what Krishna says, or what Prahlāda Mahārāja says or what great devotees says, then this becomes the truth established within our heart. That's becomes the fact.
That's becomes the reality. And we come in contact with this reality.
So the first thing which we have to be eager to hear, we have to ask, my dear, like uh in this prayer, Guru Puja prayer, uh the disciple asked his guru, uh uh let Let the words which are emanating from your lotus mouth, will become one with my heart.
It basically means let I hear what you have to say. Let I open my heart to what you ought to say and let I enter let the words which are coming from your mouth enter my heart and become one with my heart.
And that will be the solution. That is the only solution. There is no other solution.
There is only one solution, to let the sound which is coming from the mouth of the Lord or from the mouth of a pure devotee enter within our heart and become one with this heart. And everything else will be solved.
And that will be the proper solution. That will be the only proper solution for all our problems eternally.
Because by letting the words emanating from the lotus mouth of a pure devotee, we will be established in this eternal connection between us and the Lord, Dasya Yoga. Whatever whatever service it is there.
may it be vatsalya rasa, it may be sakhya rasa, it may be mādhurya. We all eager to get this ras but we don't understand that Ras means Das. Ras means the servant.
Ras only comes the amazing ecstatic feeling is only coming to our heart when we establish ourselves as the das.
And therefore Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu says, jīvera svarūpa haya kṛṣṇera nitya-dāsa. That's the svarūpa of every jīva. That's the Swarup of every jiva. I am eternal servant of Krishna.
And Prahlad Maharaj says, yes, I am eternal servant of you, my dear Lord Nṛsiṁhadeva. But please tell me about this.
Cultivating the seed of devotion
So that I could remember and I could become a real servant of yours. So that's the beautiful prayer and the beautiful explanation which Śrīla Prabhupāda gave.
And therefore he says at the end that Brahmāṇḍa bhramite kona bhāgyavān jīva, that after wandering Bhagyavan Jiva that after wandering throughout the universe, uh, the bhāgyavān jīva, uh, guru-kṛṣṇa-prasāde pāiyā bhakti-latā-bīja, by the mercy of Guru Krishna Prasade Pai Bhakti Lata Bij, by the mercy of Guru and Krishna, we get the seed of Bhaktilata.
In which form we get the seed of Bhaktilata in the form of these words.
We hear the words and somehow rather we are fortunate enough to really hear these words. And when we hear these words, we understand. This is how we get bhakti.
This is how we get the seed of bhakti, through hearing and uh letting the words to grow within our heart. Because it's not enough to hear. Uh hearing is the first stage, the next stage is manan, you have to think about it.
And by thinking about it, you will let the seed of bhakti to grow within your heart unless it reaches the lotus feet of the Lord and brings the fruit of Kṛṣṇa-premā. Thank you very much, Hare Kṛṣṇa.
The only solution is we have to hear and then that I actually want with the heart. But uh I like we are I have this I think like we are hearing
only but so is that that easy whether that immediately is just by hearing it becomes one or there are many uh things we have been carrying for many lifetime. Um so how immediately these are uh therefore
hearing is uh hearing is not an easy process. Sometimes we think that hearing is very easy. What's so difficult?
I'm sitting and it just automatically comes, and because it's so easy, I become very drowsy and ultimately sleepy. And because we heard it so many times, you know. Yeah, yeah, very nice.
Naṣṭa-prāyeṣv abhadreṣu nityam bhāgavata-sevayā Everything which is troublesome within the heart is dissipated, and because nothing is troubling me, I'm very happily sleeping in the lecture of Shrimad Bhagavatam.
That's no problem. That's why we say naṣṭa-prāyeṣv abhadreṣu nityam bhāgavata-sevayā bhagavaty uttama-śloke bhaktir bhavati naiṣṭhikī.
And therefore Śrīla Prabhupāda in uh if we take the first canto of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, especially the second chapter, he says uh there is a spiritual spiritual art of submissive hearing. It's a very amazing phrase
or expression of Śrīla Prabhupāda, he says that hearing is an art. An art means, you know, to do some art, you have to be skillful in this art. So, what's so artistic about hearing? What is so special?
What is what kind of skill is there? The implication here is that you really have to master this art, you have to get some expertise in hearing, because usually what we do when we hear, we let the
sound go through the covering of false ego and the false ego distorts the sound. We only hear selectively. We only hear something which we like to hear. We like to hear jokes, that's always fine.
And that's the best way to wake somebody up who is who is of course if he's deeply sleeping, even joke will not wake him up. But the point is that we hear selectively.
Only something which we like goes through the covering of false ego, the tamas-guna covering, and something which we don't like, we usually don't hear. And we don't even understand how it works, how our ego selects
something which we don't like, and uh discards it. You know, if something which is really troubling to us, it just doesn't go in, but something which is pleasing, it's nice.
And that's why because of this selective hearing, we don't understand, sometimes we don't understand the meaning, and oftentimes we don't understand the intention behind the meaning.
Even if we understand the meaning, it only touches the intellectual part of our mind. It doesn't go deeper. Why Śrīla Prabhupāda says that this is the spiritual art of submissive hearing?
He specifically says submissive hearing. It means that I submit myself to this hearing process or to the words which are coming from above. I accept them with... I accept them as the absolute truth.
I accept them totally irrevocably within my heart. And if we accept in this way in this if we hear in this submissive way, then the words go very deeply and they make lasting impression within our consciousness.
And then we remember and, then when we remember, it's very easy to think about it and to make impression even deeper. If we just hear, yes, yes, nice, nice, yes, very nice, nice lecture. What was it all about?
I don't remember, but it was nice lecture. Very nice. But why? Why doesn't it go deep? Why doesn't it go deep again? Because it was intercepted by our false ego.
When the false ego is non-existent in the process of hearing, when we are not really thinking about our self-interest, but if we think this is the most important thing which I have to hear now. And we let this idea to go deep with the emotion which is attached.
When Śrīla Prabhupāda speaks, he does not address only our mind or intelligence. He addresses deeper.
He wants to impress upon our soul, but to impress upon our soul he has to pierce even through the mind. The mind has to be pierced. Because the mind says, Oh, oh, I already know this. This is is this not a new information.
And therefore, you know what's what's so special about this? But if uh but Śrīla Prabhupāda, he e he has the power. And his power, which is attached to his words, it has the ability to go deeper if we let it go deeper.
And then the impression will be uh very low uh very strong and very deep, and the deep impression will change the course of our life. Because the impressions is something which uh which chokes the course of our life.
The some scars which is there. When when the words are coming deep and leave very deep impression within our heart, then uh then it's
very easy for us to remember this and to remember in the critical situations in our life and when we remember it in the critical situations of our life, then the solutions which we will make will be proper.
So the problem is that we're hearing and we're not hearing. We should try to hear in such a way that uh it goes very very deep and then it will be no problem.
And that's why it's so important to be personally present not just here from Zoom or from internet so many lectures in my iPod or whatever. Sometime I will listen to them. It's never the same.
When you listen recorded lecture, it's never the same.
You don't get the same impact, the same impression from the same words which you have if you're personally present, if you're attentive and if you're consciously trying to hear the message which is m being given.
Therefore, it's so important to be personally present, not to put just tape recorder in. I will I will hear it later, no problem. That's the solution. Solution is to hear, but in a proper frame of mind.
Therefore, uh Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī used to say that our pass is Śrauta Pantha, the path of hearing. But uh for this path to be effective, the path of bhakti yoga is the path of hearing, śrotra-panthā.
But srautapantha means that the speaker is powerful enough to produce the proper sound which is coming directly from the spiritual world, and the hearer is humble enough to receive this sound which is coming from the spiritual world.
If this doesn't happen, then it's ineffective.
Strategic use of modern technology
If it's only leaving impression. other huh? Yeah. But my question was let me explain that uh horse car and motor car. Horse car and motor car. So my question is that when uh when Then
why you people are using this type of things? So if you think an explanation? Yes, Śrīla Prabhupāda gave a beautiful explanation. He says if somebody uh is uh uh driving a car and he is overspeeding.
He's violating the rules.
Then police which is chasing behind this car, which is going with the speed two hundred kilometers per hour, which is against, then police has to take the speed even more than this, right? To stop him.
So that's Prabhupāda's explanation. We want to stop it, but for that we have to go with the same speed or even more speed. That's why we're using motor cars.
Yes, we want to stop but in order to stop we have to speed up even more. We are warning, but we have to use the same technology because if we don't use the same technology who will hear us? Nobody will hear us.
That's why we use Zoom and we criticize Zoom by using Zoom. And we criticize internet by using internet. We criticize cars by using cars. But ultimately yes, that's a solution. Okay. Thank you very much, Hare Kṛṣṇa.
Srila Prabhupada Geecha Shri Rada Parta Sarade Lali Tari Shakadei Gija